There are a lot of different facets to my personality that I don't use all the time in my house, or in everyday life, that I can experience and share when I'm on a stage.
I did not like formal meetings, because they took away my freedom. I just liked to spend time with my friends, where I could be myself and did not need to don a mask.
I was encouraged to be imaginative and read, and it was a great childhood for a budding writer because I had the time and the freedom to go into a world of my own.
I love failure. It's stuff that I'm thinking about all the time in my life, so it would make sense to me anyway to write about it.
I want to have time for myself, my family and my friends. It's important because in order to sing well, you must have inspiration, and inspiration comes from life, from living.
My father worked for the Foreign Office, so he was away a lot of the time. We were a very volatile family. There was a lot of love and a lot of conflict. The conflict kicked in mostly during my adolescence.
I do have a family, and obviously I spend as much time as I can with them. Though even when I'm with my family, my mind tends to drift toward baseball.
No one really wants to admit they are lonely, and it is never really addressed very much between friends and family. But I have felt lonely many times in my life.
My passion in life, besides my family, was always music. From the time I was a kid, I was obsessed. I'm like the ultimate fan.
What little family I got is in Mississippi. A whole lot of them died before I left, and my sister died a long time ago, before my mama did.
Growing up, I just wanted to be like everyone else. I didn't value or understand the beauty in being different at the time in my life.
My mother never put an emphasis on looks. She let us grow up on our own time line. She never forced any beauty regimen into my world.
I've spent about that amount of time trying to tell the public that there was purpose in... my business, my career and the roller coaster ride... how the people I associated with worked together.
And I'm not apolitical - I'm very specific in my politics. But a lot of the time it's nobody's business unless you're over at my house having dinner.
I was never considered cool throughout my teens: a very important time to be accepted by someone, especially your peers. Yes, I had all the screaming women, but the guys hated my guts.
When I was younger, I had a perm, and it was really big. My mom was a hairdresser, so even my dad had a perm! I looked like a poodle, but it was cool at the time.
Liverpool is a fundamental part of my life. They don't remember me that way, but time will change that. I could not have chosen a better place to go when I left Atletico.
I never have time to myself; it's the one thing about my life I would probably hope to change.
I want to take this opportunity to express, one more time, my deep sadness to those countrymen who feel, rightly, that they were victims of my government.
My father was a lorry driver, very rarely at home. The house was run by my mother, and because there were 10 or so kids, there was no time for individual attention. It was about survival. It was about where the next meal was coming from.
After my tour I had time to stay at home, be with my boyfriend and hang out with friends and that brought me down to earth and helped me write music from a more relaxed place.
