I always wanted to be an artist, whatever that was, like other chicks want to be stewardesses. I read. I painted. I thought.

Choices always were a problem for you. What you need is someone strong to guide you. Deaf and blind and dumb and born to follow, what you need is someone strong to use you - like me.

All I can do is say I smell a rat. I don't know where it is or what kind of rat it is, but as an artist, I can express how. But I couldn't responsibly stand up and tell people which way to go, because then I'm just as guilty as the people who are telling everybody else what to do and where to go.

You can measure a man's character by the choices he makes under pressure.

I leave the genre labeling to other people. I really do. If I were to think too hard about it, that would stifle you creatively. If you think too hard about who other people want you to be as an artist, it stops you from being who you want to be as an artist.

There's so much about Dolly Parton that every female artist should look to, whether it's reading her quotes or reading her interviews or going to one of her live shows. She's been such an amazing example to every female songwriter out there.