"Before I was on medication, the mania was so bad that I couldn't concentrate, so although I'd feel very creative, I could never really finish a piece of work because my mind was moving so fast."
"I had so much anger and judgement towards myself for my work not being up to the standard that I expected it to be, so I wouldn't allow myself to complete anything."
"It's very important for me to do things like talk therapy. That's where you begin to see the walls that your illness has put up as a way to protect yourself... but of course, those walls also keep us from getting to the truth of things."
"Although I take the medication, which has made a huge impact on my life in a positive way, still, honestly, when I'm a bit sick is when I'm at my most creative."
"So it's a majorly important thing for young artists, as well as older artists like myself, to know that not only do we have the right to say no, but if we don't say no, we're gonna die."
"Fame doesn't matter; people approving of you doesn't matter. And if it does matter, you're in store for something very difficult and painful."
"'I'd Rather Go Blind' was a song I did on an album with Joe Bonamassa called 'Don't Explain,' and I've always been such a huge, huge Etta James fan."
"My personality is a personality where I get really, really nervous and doubtful about almost everything, which is always a work in progress to build up my confidence a little bit more."
"I'd been trying to do this since I was 15, sending out the demo tapes and doing all the things that everyone told me that I should be doing. But no deal - like, never."
"If you're going to go the way of 'American Idol,' then you better be able to do what you want musically, because just going for the fame will only keep you happy for so long."
"I cook stuff that I picked up from my husband's mother. I thought that would be a good way to his heart, you know. I love to cook Italian and French, also."
"I learned about forgiveness, and I've reached out to others to make amends."
"I don't really see myself as a success. I just don't look at it that way."
"What I look at, success is about really being grateful. You wake up in the morning, and you're thankful that you could breathe because it's a beautiful planet we live on, and I know there is a lot of struggle and pain, but there is more joy."
"When I'm going through something really difficult, I think it's what made me go to the piano for the first time when I was a child. I look at it as a place to pray."
"I'd be a liar if I said I didn't care what people think, but I would rather have less people who like or approve of me for who I really am than a bunch more people who like or approve me for what I'm not."
"I like swimming or go to the gym, but I am alone a lot, and that can get a little depressing."
"Meditation is really good. I do that a lot with my bass player Bob, and we do TM: transcendental meditation."
"The audiences are really great. I really love it over there. I love Europe, period. Oh my God, all the architecture and all the history and just to the way people think and live is so different."
"I love being an American, and it's a beautiful country, but we are a bunch of whack jobs. We have got so much to learn."
"I got into cello in the fourth grade, and I played that for years. I adored playing it. I got an opera coach when I was 12 because I really wanted to learn how to sing properly. The only proper way to sing, I thought at that age, was opera."
"Usually, I use writing as a way to figure out things about me, and I get scared pretty easily about everything. I deal with a lot of depression, so I usually use it as way to find some relief from that."
"I ran away at 15 to chase a guy that I met who would become my boyfriend, and he was living in L.A."
"So many people that I've wanted to work with have died. I was so crazy in love with Amy Winehouse. When she died, I felt like I lost my sister all over again. I couldn't stop crying for weeks and weeks! It was horrible! She was so wonderful and so talented."
"'Better Than Home,' the song, is about getting out of your hiding place and having the courage to live as loud as possible. It is about feeling the life that has been given and has been waiting for you all along."
