Alicia Keys Quotes

I'm very happy with my body.

My mom always said, 'Don't date a guy who thinks he's prettier than you.'

That though passageway came with a surprising revelation. When life forces you to face yourself, what awaits in the mirror is a gift: vulnerability. Your heart is pierced. You're broken open. You're hyper-aware of what you're feeling.

I feel more like I'm a person who has so much to offer in different capacities that it would be a danger for me not to give myself a chance to spread my wings in all different directions.

The artists who have inspired me the most in my life are the ones who have really had something to say and stand up for. That, to me, is part of being an artist-having the voice to express things that need to be verbalized and brought to light. Unfortunately, I don't think that's a priority for people, because the few artists who do have the nerve to take a stand for what they believe get shut down in a way.

I love my heritage!

Sometimes
Some lies
Can take a minute
To fully realize
His tears
Your eyes
Thirty seconds to apologize
You give it one more chance
Just like the time before
But he already know you'd give a hundred more
Until that night in bed
You wake up in a sweat
You're racing to the door
Can't take it anymore

Our mission goes beyond commerce, it goes beyond technology. Our intent is to preserve music's importance in our lives, music is the language of love, of laughter, of heartbreak, of mystery. It's the world's true, true, without question, universal language.

Through the shake of an earthquake I will never fall. That's how strong my love is.

I really like to live my life in a low-key fashion.

If you treat me fairly, I'll give you all my goods.

My mixed-race background made me a broad person, able to relate to different cultures. But any woman of colour, even a mixed colour, is seen as black in America. So that's how I regard myself.

I definitely wanted freedom, but I wasn't yet ready to step into it, embody it, breathe it, own it.

What acting does bring that music doesn't bring for me is the opportunity is the opportunity to be completely different in every way from whom you normally are, the person that you are when you wake up in the morning is who you are in your life. But to take that and have the opportunity to be the complete opposite of that, is the excitement of it.

Once people see this 'Unplugged,' I just want them to feel the spontaneity, to feel passionate ... I want you to see another side of me, that's free, and feel where my head is, where whatever happens, happens. I want you to feel inspired.

When I first started getting into the business, a young woman in a music game that was mostly men, I did feel inadequate.

We have the potential to help people out of poverty, out of disease, out of slavery and out of conflict. Too often, we turn the other way because we think there's nothing we can do.

I realize that I want something more. Success is great, but then you also wake up in your hotel room at four in the morning and you're like, wouldn't it be nice to have someone here with me.

I think it's the ego in us that screws us up.

I've stepped more into my business and really ... taken control for how I want that to be.

At the end of the day, so many things that we hold so much value with, it just doesn't even mean anything. I really try to stay focused on being really positive.

Sometimes I feel good, at times I feel used. Loving you darling, makes me so confused.

Be driven, be focused, but enjoy every moment, because it only happens once.

I was always amazed the way people would come in looking one way and transform completely to the point where I couldn't recognize their language, their accent, the way they looked, their hair, their face even changed becoming so inside of the character.

I've always been very private, maybe because I discovered my mother, who is a wonderful lady, is very emotional.

I've learned that while I'd be a fool not to stay open to the advice and experiences of the smart, amazing people in my life, I also need to listen to what I have to say.

There's too much darkness in the world. Everywhere you turn, someone is tryin' to tear someone down in some way; everywhere you go, there's a feeling of inadequacy, or a feeling that you're not good enough. I want to bring a certain light to the world.

I'm discovering my sexual side, and exploring relationships. You know, sensual stuff. And I'm discovering a lot of sides of myself, stuff I've buried. So the music is also therapeutic, to come to terms with things. And I feel now like my head is in the right space.

I grew up in the middle of everything. I walked the streets alone, I rode the trains alone, I came home at three in the morning alone; that was what I did.

Most times, your blessings are also your curses. And for me, I have this ability to express myself so clearly with pen and paper, but when it comes to expressing myself verbally, I put up a big wall.

Love me like you'll never see me again.

Fear is not a part of my vocabulary, actually, and I think that it's really made me a much smarter, braver for sure, person.

Only joy comes from song.

No one will take care of you if you don't take care of yourself.

The smaller you strip things down, the more you depend on the songs and yourself, as opposed to arrangements.

Music is funny. I shouldn't even ever talk about music, because you can have all the ideas in your head, and it never goes exactly the way that you think it's gonna go.

I love the written word so much, I know it's gonna flow naturally.

When I'm on stage, my interaction with the audience is something that really makes me come alive. It's a feeling like no other. The energy of the crowd fuels something new inside.

Every moment is beautiful; delicious even!

I wouldn't mind being in one place for two months or so. It really doesn't sound so bad!

I find myself to be truly primal and passionate. Everything I do comes from a primal place.

My mother is an actress, and she used to drag me from theater to theater and reading to reading.

I feel the presence of a higher power. I believe that what you give is what you get. It's universal law. I believe in the power of prayer and of words. I've learned that when you predict that negative things will happen, they do.

I loved grand pianos and small pianos, too.

I learned the cello , but I would still need a massive amount of practice. But I do play classical music, so I understand where that comes from.

I would hate to make music and people love me for something that isn't me.

If I didn't love it, I would not record it.

Living will always be a struggle looking for someone to love you.

But when I first fell in love with the piano, I knew it was me. I was dying to play.

I'm inspired by artists and musicians. There are so many wonderful and talented people in the world. I love discovering new music, new writers, or new art.

I personally feel that acting is not totally different from singing and being a musician.

I just wanted to be who I was, which was like so many other girls I knew. We grew up in the city, had a hard edge and obstacles to overcome, but we were still young and beautiful. I didn't want to be all dressed up, all made up - I wanted to be myself, which hadn't been done before.

People don't expect me to be as funny as I am.

I've stepped more into my womanhood, I'm a mother now, I'm having a beautiful relationship as a wife and as a friend.

And I love kick boxing. It's a lot of fun. It gives you a lot of confidence when you can kick somebody in the head.

All women are NATURALLY, bad ass!

Falling down ain't falling down, If you don't cry when you hit the floor, It's called the past cause I'm getting past, And I ain't nothing like I was before, You ought to see me now

You don't know what will happen from one minute to the next.

It's when we become afraid of everything and worried about everything that you are never going to reach your highest potential.

A lot of times I watch TV and I watch film and there's so many things I'd love to talk about that I feel don't get the opportunity to be shown. Sometimes things become very stereotypical and one-sided, and I feel like it's such a colorful world.

Hand me the world on a silver platter, and what good would it be?

Simplicity makes me happy.

I've always been strong-minded, but I wonder.

We are all one. We're not as separate as we oftentimes think.

Everything you want to be, you already are. You're simply on the path to discovering it.

I have big everything on the bottom, but I love my legs. You've got to love what's yours.

It's not until I hear songs that I've done, that I realize how much of an inspiration music from the '60s and '70s has been.

You are what you listen to

I feel like B sides are always better, no matter whose record it is.

I think that marriage is beautiful. And if it's a partnership with someone you love, then it really is beautiful. Yeah, I think that marriage does work.

He broke my heart, and now it's raining, just to rub it in ...

If I Ain't Got You"

Some people live for the fortune
Some people live just for the fame
Some people live for the power
Some people live just to play the game

Some people think that the physical things
Define what's within
And I've been there before
But that life's a bore
So full of the superficial

[Chorus:]
Some people want it all
But I don't want nothing at all
If it ain't you, baby
If I ain't got you, baby
Some people want diamond rings
Some just want everything
But everything means nothing
If I ain't got you

Some people search for a fountain
That promises "forever young"
Some people need three dozen roses
And that's the only way to prove you love them

Hand me the world on a silver platter
And what good would it be?
With no one to share
With no one who truly cares for me

[Chorus:]

If I ain't got you with me, baby
So nothing in this whole wide world don't mean a thing
If I ain't got you with me, baby

I do feel like I owe something, but not to the industry. When you say "industry," I think of a group of people who don't really care much about you and treat you as a commodity. So, in that regard, I don't feel like I owe anything. But the people who've always been supportive of me and have always seen me for my greatest potential-those are the people who I feel like I owe something to. I feel like I am their voice. I owe it them to represent them in a way that they can be proud of.

I really appreciate Frank Ocean's lyrical style, I appreciate the way that he can kind of draw you into this personal space, but it's still lyrical. It's almost poetic, in a way, but it's very personal at the same time.

Still when I'm a mess
I still put on a vest
With an 'S' on my chest
Oh yes, I'm a Superwoman

Something I've learned from people like U2, the Stones and Lenny Kravitz is that the grind of live shows is so necessary [to build your career].

I definitely want to act, but I also want to score movies, and I have this idea to fuse classical music with other styles that would give it a different perception.

I've always valued the input of the people I love. So in the past, whenever I'd make a decision - what to wear to an event, whether to pursue a job opportunity - I'd consult those closest to me, like my mother, husband, or manager.

I promised myself that I'd never actually admit to listening to 'New Kids on the Block.'

I have solid decent people around me, and I believe that is all it is, because you will get destroyed if you have people bringing you down.

To be able to help a 13-year-old kid from the Bronx follow her dreams just by letting her know she's not forgotten in this crazy world - that's why I got involved with Frum Tha Ground Up.

I think we deserve people who really, really love us.

Maturity and experience are part of my liberation.

There are so many things where I realize, like, simple circumstance, like the simple choice that I made one night to not do that and to do this, one night could have changed everything.

A lot of people, they've been saying to me, oh don't get married. It ruins everything. And I'm like, damn.

Sometimes I've gotten photographs back and people have literally shaven off pieces of me, and I tell them to put it back.

Gangsta rap was a ploy to convince black people to kill each other. Gangsta rap didnt exist.

Mozart would play a counterpart with his left hand while using his right to mock it. It was blue, dark, shadowy - and it made me feel something. That's when I realized music was inside me.

You're stronger, and you're better, and you're
ready for whatever.

My music comes from many, many, many places. My emotions, my feelings, my thoughts, and conversations I have with people I know who influence me.

Empower us women and we will change this whole entire world.

The desire to play has always been in me. I remember my first experience at about four or five of really dying to sing and dying to play that came from no one telling me to do so.

You've got to love what's yours.

I love Bono. I really respect what he has done for Africa and how he has used his fame to do good in the world. I hope I can do half as much in my life.

I don't have a ton of friends, but the friends I have are great ones. I don't have huge family, but the family I have is a great one.

I am able to hang with the hardest, the baddest, the worst, and I'm able to hang with the most proper and be at ease. I'm able to hang with any skin colour, any belief. I just fit in everywhere.

Cause I am a Superwoman,
Yes I am,
Yes she is,
Even when I'm a mess,
I still put on a vest,
With an S on my chest,
Oh yes,
I'm a Superwoman,
...
And all my sisters,
Coming together,
Say yes I will,
Yes I can

I lived with my mom in a really small apartment. My bedroom was like in the living room. That's why I still love to sleep on couches now.

How terrible would it have been if I had come out with some watered-down version of who I am? People fell in love with the real me, and I still feel blessed that that was how the journey began.

We adjust ourselves to fit, to adapt to others' ideas of who we should be. We shift ourselves not in sweeping pivots but in movements so tiny that they are hardly perceptible even in our view. Years can pass before we finally discover that after handing over our power, piece by small piece, we no longer even look like ourselves.