I would hope my legacy would be bringing smiles to faces. Happiness with my music.

I'm convinced that we Black women possess a special indestructible strength that allows us to not only get down, but to get up, to get through, and to get over.

People do see me as sweet and innocent. Not to say that I am not those things. But I have other sides to me.

Competition is great. And as long as it's friendly and not a malicious thing, then I think it's cool.

I don't believe in luck. ... It's persistence, hard work, and not forgetting your dream.

I can be happy with who I am, not what I should be, or what I might have been, or what someone tells me I must be.

Believe in yourself. Have faith in yourself because no one else is going to.

It has taken me most of my adult life to come to terms with who I am. To do that, I had to break free of attitudes that brought me down.

In complete darkness we are all the same, it is only our knowledge and wisdom that separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you.

The greatest achievement to any human being is to love God, yourself, and others.

Every body type is different - that's what makes you unique. What makes you special is you, and you are different from the next person.

Grammar perfect books are for Ivy Leaguers in Ivory Towers. My book is a sandcastle built on the beach of usefullness.

Success is not a doorway it's a staircase.

I slept with faith and found a corpse in my arms on awakening I drank and danced all night with doubt and found her a virgin in the morning.

I don't do a lot of political jokes. Too many are getting elected.

Stay keeping my cup full so I'm extra charged like a state tax.

You know nothing till you know all; which is the reason we never know any thing.

We are a blend of dust and divinity.

~I try to call my mother, Betty, with more regularity because I think, What if Hazel didn't call me for two weeks? I'm able to see her mothering now from a different vantage point.~

There are some friends you don't meet for twenty years and when you meet them again it's as if no twenty years has happened - you're lucky when that happens. I feel the same about books.

The biggest of all differences in this world is between the ones that had or have pleasure in love and those that haven't and hadn't any pleasure in love, but just watched with sick envy.