No matter where you are, what point in your life you're at, it's not the end.
Not everything happens when you expect it; it is what it is. The people who ride with you, ride with you.
No one can decide what you should do, what course of action you should take to get where you wanna go, except for yourself.
I'm not a Barbie doll, I'm just a multidimensional human being who likes to make things.
If my life is a movie - in the movie, there's always the bad part. There's also the parts where you're down and out, and there are parts where everything's amazing.
I'm constantly trying to look at things from a different view and to put myself into some new perspectives to evolve myself, grow myself, and reinvent myself.
I never had a backup plan. I felt like if I had a backup plan, it was like saying to the universe that I didn't believe in myself.
I just believe in standing up for people and against discrimination. I consider myself an advocate for human rights.
I just know what I want for myself.
My sun and my moon signs are mostly Cancer - it's really strong. We're deeply intuitive and sentimental. I really like to take care of people, nurturing them. I'm very passionate about the things I do and like to see people I love grow.
We're all born into whatever citizenship, circumstances, or class we happen to be born into. Immigrants and so many people in the working class work so hard every day for nickels and pennies and scraps to just barely get by and then realize that this precious life has been completely drained out of us.
My favourite 'stage' of Shakira was the brunette punk rock one, but she'll always have a special place in my heart, whatever she's doing.
Juanes is one of the legendary, iconic Colombian artists. Growing up in Colombia, you can't really not have him on your radar. His songs are everywhere, and there's a statue of him. He's pretty big for Latin America, and for Colombia especially.
I'm a big Gorillaz fan.
Aliens are definitely real.
My father is my hero. No matter what, I'll always forgive him.
I don't like to see people using their power over others, trying to hurt people who are weak or poor or people with darker skin or anyone who doesn't have as much privilege. It makes me so angry. I want to fight for people. I want to be able to make some kind of difference in the world.
I just like stuff that's raw, itself, real and genuine. I think that's the way art should be. That's the kind of stuff that people can connect to more.
I think it's boring when everybody wears the same brands or the same styles, and it's like, 'Oh, this is the new trend.'
Diplo kept asking me who styled my 'What They Say' video. I was like, 'No, that's just my clothes!'
I never had any technical training. I never considered that, one day, I'm going to be Beyonce like a lot of girls aspire to be. It just kind of happened.
I'm naturally sort of a sad person, and that comes out in my music, but when I realized how many people were listening to it... I wanted to be a little more conscious about what I was putting out and what people were going to be taking from it.
I'm Colombian-American. My father wanted me to have American citizenship, but he wanted to raise me in Colombia.
The constant pressure to be the perfect, ideal female - there's no such thing.
Spanish is such an important language globally.
As female artists, we have to be constantly criticized for the way that we look, the way that we dress, on a whole other level that men don't have to face.
I think everybody needs to be more empathetic.
That's the best kind of music: the stuff that happens based off intuition.
It's really not easy to be an artist. It's not easy to put yourself out there and be honest. I'm making things that are really happening to me, and it's not easy to share that with the world.
It's really natural for me to write bilingually.
I'm constantly progressing. My style is changing every day.
I always felt you could age with style and grace, or you could age in denial and hold on to issues and never push through.
When you're an artist, you're working, literally, for the sole purpose of art, and when people discredit you, it's probably the most disrespectful thing you can do.
I wasn't into social media at all, but when I decided I was going to put out my own music, I said, 'Okay, I'm just going to post it.' And that's when it started its rounds on the Internet, and people started to take an interest in me.
I've always been very insecure and had a lot of self-doubt growing up. That was partially because of how I was raised.
On my off day, I really want to just lay in bed.
As an artist, you have to work hard for things that you can't really hold in your hand. I work not for money but for my career, to expand myself as an artist. Every video I make, it's not making me any money; it's just because I want to expand.
You're taught that it's not very likely for you to become successful... that odds are you're going to be a struggling artist for the rest of your life.
When I'm making a song, I try not to think about audience or genres. It's free-flowing. Natural.
Being able to incorporate my language into songs is really cool. It's really cool to see that people are susceptible to it. It helps with writing a lot to turn off one language and then go to another.
Some of my writing is very subconscious, and that's definitely what happened with 'Body Language' - I looped some basic bossa nova sounds and just started singing.
I'm just inspired by life and, growing up, I listened to all types of different sounds, genres, and areas of music.
I love a good old-school reggaeton song.
Every time I go out to do shows, it just becomes a little bit more real and a little bit more full, so I'm excited just to see it hit its next level.
Just because someone is your family member doesn't mean they're a good person.
I was kicked out of the house, and I was really difficult as a kid. I'm happy it happened because I was able to grow so much from it, you know? It's always hurtful to feel that you can't be on the same page with people that you love as much as your family. Sometimes they don't know how to deal with all the things that are coming at them.
When I start something, I have to finish it, and I'm a super perfectionist, too.
It was really important for me to understand that I needed to provide for myself, and I needed to become a provider for my own family, too.
I've done my own videos, I do my own styling, so I feel like I've just always been a visual artist... I was one of those kids who wanted to make my own clothes and take pictures of everything. Everything inspired me, and everything felt like art around me.