When I was growing up, my mother would take me to plays and museums, and we'd talk about life. Those times helped shape who I became.
As the mother of a grown son with a traumatic brain injury, I couldn't be more excited about the prospect of finding out how to repair even a small part of the damage that changed his life.
I've always dreamed of becoming a mother. I thought I would get married and do it all the traditional way, but life kept going on, my career kept me busy - and I had not stopped to become a mommy.
My mother always told me not to handle a buffalo by its tail, but always catch it by its horns. And I have used that lesson in everything in my life, including the Railways.
All my life I've had a weight problem. As a child, I loved to eat. I would hide from my mother and drink whole cans of condensed milk in my room.
My mother really loved me. And one of the gifts that I have been given is that I have never thought for one second of my life that I was not greatly beloved.
When I was 11, I realised that I did not have to live the life my mother had: school, marriage, children, apartment, summer house.
When I found out I was pregnant, my mother said, 'Don't separate your life, the life that you're going to make with this child, from the things that you are and what you want to do.'
My mother always told me if you write about life, you will always be in the game. Just don't write songs... write life. I decided to take her up on that.
Not one day of my mother's adult life passed without some critical demand on her maternal role, without some urgent response from her.
'Be passionate about your work and your life' was instilled in me by my mother Dada, who was a potter. She also introduced me to the arts and encouraged me to embrace the new.
Like any working mother I find it hard to have a social life. But my kids are so well adjusted. There isn't a brat bone in their body so I haven't done anything that bad.
When it came to using elements of your personal life in your work, my mother was the master, or the mistress. There were three or four songs she wrote about my father - songs about failed love.
I like being a mother. For some people, it's so much work that it can be a burden. But it's not for me, maybe because I had my daughter, Valentina, later on in life, at 41.
I am not a hugely religious person, but I believe that there is a oneness with everything. And because there is this oneness, it is possible that my mother is the principal reason for my life.
In terms of people that I know, my grandmother and my mother are huge influences on my writing life because they are both massively supportive and always have been of my career.
My mother was religious; she was knowledgeable about mythology and scriptures; she could tell the metaphysical nuances and make the story come to life with their deeper significance. The current generation is missing out on this.
I was trying to manage school and training for the Olympics and ended up not doing well at either. That was a big lesson in my life. My mother expected both.
My father is a chemist, my mother was a homemaker. My parents instilled in us the feeling that learning was the most exciting thing that could happen to you, and it never ends.
Since I'm a mother and a wife, I have to have passion or the frustration would win out. But I love managing people. The product is second to managing the people. And marketing to consumers is so challenging because it is evolving constantly.
I love my heritage! I have my mother, who is an Irish-Italian, and my father who is African, so I have the taste buds of an Italian and the spice of an African.
