Quotes About Authenticity

We try to cast very real kids who have raw talent.

I'm drawn to raw material and raw emotions.

In writing fiction, I can be free. I can use my life. The raw material is my experiences.

My music, I feel, has always been experimental, but it had got to a point where I felt disconnected from it completely. I didn't want to be a Clark Kent/Superman: I couldn't really say, 'Well, B.o.B's the old me, and Bobby Ray's the new me.' I had to just make a point.

Ray Aghayan told me to be more flamboyant, but I have to be me.

Music is more Ray J. When you act, you're playing a different person. I like the music end, basically because it's me.

When I'm in the ring, I'm doing great. As Razor Ramon or the 'Bad Guy,' I don't have a care in the world. But when I come back through the curtain, reality is there waiting.

Who decides what is and what isn't punk? I want to write songs that people hear and feel, and I want to be successful and reach a big audience. I'm not trying to be the coolest guy in the world; I'm trying to write songs that mean something to people. As you get successful, sometimes you lose one set of fans and gain another.

You reach deep down and bring up what feels absolutely authentic to you as you move along with the book, but you don't know everything about it. You can't.

Nothing is more despicable than to reach fame by crawling, position by cringing.

It's a great responsibility playing a real-life character because the person has reached a certain position after undergoing a lot of things.

It's really comforting for me and Jeff, at least, that after 12 years we finally feel we've reached a place where we can be more honest, real and loving with each other. And we're finally in a band that we know is good, and deserves the credit it's getting.

I'd reached a point where there was a direct conflict between what I was trying to be and who I really was.

I've reached a point in life where it would be easy to let down my guard and write simple imagistic poems. But I don't want to write poems that aren't necessary. I want to write poems that matter, that have an interesting point of view.

When you write a song, you don't ask if it's good or not, or if it's gonna sell. When you write a song, you ask whether you've reached deep inside your heart and whether it's honest.

We kind of reached this point in life where we don't really want to put out anything just to put something out. We really don't want it to be like, 'Two years are up. You've had your break; now do another record and get it out there.'

I think the illest thing about Wiz Khalifa is how true to himself he's always been, and I miss that from artists. Nothing about what he does ever felt like he was reaching to be something that he wasn't.

That concerns me, that we're reaching out for perfection, when country music has always been about imperfection.

That's a song about reaching deep inside yourself where you can completely be who you are.

I think my soul is intact, but my methods of reaching people are completely different.

I learned about not just being with someone because I don't want to be alone: being willing to be alone, and then find something that feels right and just reaching for companionship for companionship's sake. Not letting drama lead my life.

For us, our stage is always what it is. It's not about reaching the broadest audience as it's about doing quality work.

I try to bring all that I am to my work and all that I experience. That includes how people react to the way I am - the prejudice and the celebrations.

My idea of a good fantasy is something that's absolutely grounded in reality. And there's a little element that doesn't belong there - and that's the fantasy element - that you have to react to and deal with in a completely real way.