A lot of people are singing about how screwed up the world is, and I don't think that everybody wants to hear about that all the time.
Basically, I started singing when I started talking. Music has just been my saving grace my whole life.
Butterflies are always following me, everywhere I go.
Forget the image, forget the ensemble, forget the rumours, forget the short skirts, the big hair, whatever! I owe this to the fans and I will never forget you so I want to accept this award on behalf of all of you.
I always felt like the rug could be pulled out from under me at anytime. And coming from a racially mixed background, I always felt like I didn't really fit in anywhere.
I don't think anyone knows as much about what's right for me as I do.
I hope to be around past the 90's. I don't want to just be categorized as one of this era. My goal is to have a career that stands.
I know I can be diva-ish sometimes, but I have to be in control. The nature of my life, the nature of what I do, is divadom, it really is.
I prayed very hard for this to happen and it happened. I don't even think about what I've achieved, I haven't focused on it and I wish I had, because I really want to enjoy it, and I don't know if I am enjoying it, because I am going through my life like a bulldozer. I still haven't marvelled at it.
I'm not one of those people that goes into details of my personal life on national TV to get attention. Some things are better left unsaid.
I'm really fortunate. I'm really happy, and I'm really really lucky to be where I am.
If critics have problems with my personal life, it's their problem. Anybody with half a brain would realize that it's the charts that count.
If you see me as just the princess then you misunderstand who I am and what I have been through.
In this world, I call the shots and I think I know best.
It's hard to be someone that people talk about and write about, you know? They don't know me.
My heart has never been broken, I've never broken anyone else's.
My mother is Irish, my father is black and Venezuelan, and me - I'm tan, I guess.
One day I promised God that if he would give me my voice back I would never smoke again. I got three octaves back after quitting.
There is a light at the end of the tunnel... hopefully its not a freight train!
Whatever you're going through in your life, don't ever give up.
You really have to look inside yourself and find your own inner strength, and say, "I'm proud of what I am and who I am, and I'm just going to be myself."