I have Black guys who tell me they put my books on their bed stands to read at night like something for guidance or information. That really pleases me a lot. I think my work has changed some things. It's changed me.
Immersing myself in Shakespeare's plays, reading them closely under the guidance of a brilliant, plain-spoken professor changed my life: It opened up the great questions; it put my petty problems into perspective. It got me out of bed in the mornings and kept me in the library late into the night.
My daughter has changed me. She has made me grow up quicker because I don't just have a kid, I have a baby girl. She has made me more patient. I am actually soft when I get around her. I don't think she changed me as a fighter, but she has changed me as a person. She has helped me mature.
My life has been extreme. Most people will not have the experience I've had. But the things that changed me, really changed me, they happen to everyone.
Some people are really proud of me, and some don't like it. I don't really know what to tell those people. It's like people that don't know me or people that aren't even my friends saying I've changed. I have two friends - exactly two friends. It's like, how can someone that's not even my friend say I've changed?
I feel like songwriting changed from something that I liked doing to something that, I feel, is a very important outlet for me to digest all the things around me. Once I put thoughts into a song, I can let it go, it doesn't bug me anymore you know what I mean? It's kind of a catharsis.
I don't think my voice has changed very much when it comes to things that I create. It's just my perspective, my point of view, and I guess that really hasn't changed very much. Luckily, it hasn't had to change in order for me to work.
I think fashion is really opened me up as a person. All eyes are on you when you do the shows and when you do the photo shoots. You have to know how to act around people. I used to be a shy kid in school. I didn't know how to interact with people and now I find it so easy. Fashion has really done something great for me and it's really changed me as a person. I've changed my style as well.
I think my weight-training proved to me more than anything that I can do anything in life if I really put my mind to it. I saw me bring myself from 137 pounds to 175 pounds over a seven-year period. That alone said to me that all you have to do is really stick with something, and you can accomplish anything you want. It's brought me great self-esteem because I know I did it. I changed me.
I think in my life I have so many things that changed so much with work and my career, and I don't really get to plan out a lot of my days. So when I have something that's familiar - just something that's there - I don't really like to switch it up.
Fame has not changed me as a person, but life on the whole has changed a lot. I belong to a middle class family and that hasn't changed.
Grunge was, to me, the last big movement. It had such an impact on pop culture. We haven't really seen anything like that since, and we may never again. Things have changed; the digital age has changed things.
Sometimes people say yo do you think rap changed you. No doubt it changed me. If I wasn't making records I'd still be hanging every night.
I don't think anything has changed about me but my priorities have changed. At one point I was living my life and I didn't see a direct correlation between who I was affecting with my actions. I'm not as reckless, I'm probably not as fun or funny. I've turned to my dad's sense of humor. I think that having a family has put a lot more focus on what I do.
Physically, it completely changed me. I found strength that I never thought I had. And mentally, I mean, it's taught me just patience and letting go, and it's really changed my whole psychological outlook, I think.
I really don't find revivals very interesting because I like new work a lot. I feel like if you're going to pay me, then let me do what I do and let me try to solve some problems. Let me try to make something fly. Why would I do something that everybody has already done the hard work on? But that's me. Tons of people do revivals really well.
I have learned that my assignment is to write books for people who do not like to read books. I really try to connect with people who are not given to spending a lot of time with an open book. Pay day to me is when somebody comes up to me and says, "I never read books but I read yours." I have a heart for that person.