Actually, I've never thought myself as being a particularly hard worker. I've always worked, and I guess my mind is busy all the time. I've been in a lot of things just because of my own intellectual curiosity.
I played from the time I was seven years old. My father was my first baseman coach. I had opportunities that I never really pursued - with some Miami teams and a few larger colleges, and then I ended up bailing and began cooking.
The further you go, what, I'm gonna wait til I'm 80? Naw, I'm tellin' my story now. I was just moved. I was moved to tell my story. You know? People write books all the time.
My daughter is, of course, perfect. Everyone's child is, but mine really is perfect. But I could not have raised her without my parents. From the time she was seven months until now, I have been a single parent.
In my case, the long gaps between my books have got quite a lot to do with lack of confidence. A lot of the time when I'm not writing I start thinking I can't do it.
I don't project no image. I just act like myself. I write about how I feel, the emotional stage I'm in at the time. So I write from the heart. I never write from my mind. My brain, I mean.
I might be more fluent in Swedish than I am in Spanish. My wife speaks it to our kids, and they're fluent so I hear it all the time, so I've got that under my belt.
I was a child during the Lebanese civil war, and I remember Israeli bombardments. So growing up, my view of Israel was completely negative. I'm not coming from a neutral place, but with time, I've had to re-examine my thinking.
I'm always trying to do stuff I haven't done before or challenge myself so I'm not resting on my laurels all of the time because if I just found my little niche and never left it, I'd be pretty boring, I think.
Dancing for the length of time that I did, it centered me in such a way to be really in tune with my body, and I just feel like I'm physically able to do things because of my ballet background. Without ballet, I don't think I'd look graceful at all o...
[neither understands the other's language] Jamie: [in English] It's my favorite time of day, driving you. Aurelia: [in Portuguese] It's the saddest part of my day, leaving you.
Doug MacRay: Not the way I planned it, but for the first time in my life, I'm leaving this city. Maybe if I go, I can stop looking.
I've been offered jobs by companies that supported apartheid many times in the 25 years of my modeling career, but I have never taken one of them. I have to refuse that money, because I'm not going to work against my people. They've suffered enough.
I remember thinking that I'd way rather give my parents my money, and not have to like have them go to work anymore, you know what I mean. Because I'd way rather spend more time with them.
Then I realized that secrecy is actually to the detriment of my own peace of mind and self, and that I could still sustain my belief in privacy and be authentic and transparent at the same time. It was a pretty revelatory moment, and there's been a l...
My second job has been to try to use my power to create institutions of a modern state that could enter the European Union, and there was very little time. The door was closing, and I wanted to get Bosnia through before it shut.
As my other obligations are beginning to take an inordinate amount of time, I have asked to step down as WMG's board chairman, effective January 31, 2012. However, I will remain a director of the company and in that way, continue my association with ...
What most people know about me, they know through my music. This time, I've tried to open that door as wide as possible. These songs are a giant step closer to who I really am and what my music is all about. Hence the title.
I listen to very little music, particularly contemporary. If I listen to it, it's going to be my own music, some arrangement or something. I spend so much time listening that the way I relax is by watching things, a comedy; that's my way to wind down...
People see my current success but don't realize I've worked hard to get where I am. I used to clean garbage off the Philadelphia docks and put a lot of time into developing my music.
James Brown was my favorite, my absolute idol. Every time I played with him was like a music lesson, and I never thought I could be so funky! I mean, a white boy from Canada - a Jew - getting down with his funky bad self!