Nicki Minaj

I’m my worst critic and I always want to give people something better than I gave them before.

If I had to describe (the past ten years) I would say ‘blessed’. Blessed and highly favoured, because the things that have happened to me have been once in a lifetime.

This is what happens when you release a great body of work after they spent millions to ruin you.

Definitely tougher to be vulnerable. As a woman in the industry, you try so hard to remain strong and to not let your guard down. And once you let the walls down and let people see that you were a regular person who has feelings, sometimes people take advantage of that. I think that applies for everyone. It’s always a little bit nerve-racking to just completely let your guard down because you just don’t know if people are going to appreciate it. And then if they don’t appreciate it, you can feel like you did it in vain.

I love being able to say, I’m not American, I’m Trini. I think it gives me so much more depth.

I like you baby, just not more than my work right now

I was sleeping on a couch in my brothers apartment, and one day this guy walked over and said ‘How would you like to be in a movie?’ And I said ‘Yeah!’ I was an extra in ‘Explosive Generation’.

If you have paparazzi, you know you’ve gotten somewhere.

A lot of actresses start out modeling because it’s a great way to sort of get your foot in the door. That’s all it is, though. They open the door, and you have to walk through it.

I’ll be a nun, raise my daughter, and make albums.

I’m keeping the pixie. I hope I inspire people… it’s really cool to have short hair.

I don’t have a sound bite for everything.

I gossiped when I was given a chance because I wasn’t popular so the few times someone would invite you into the group to have a conversation it was usually about someone else and you just joined in because it was great to be a part of something, and that I feel bad for.

If you were to really look at it, the boys are still getting more money for a lot of garbage, while the ladies are hustling and doing amazing work for less.

I come from the tradition of a big Irish family that loves to sing. I love to perform.

News is now one of the three things that we get from social media, the other two being our entire sense of self-worth and pictures of shaved alpacas.

To be on this set today, I feel very blessed for the second chance and for the opportunity, my record company believing in me and everybody here just showing me so much love and support.

I sleep with my baby blanket, Kiki, that my nana made for me.

You can’t even imagine how it felt to have a cassette that you could take with you with a microphone so you could put down an idea and not have to hum it a million times to remember what it was.

To me the biggest irony of this lifetime that I’m living is that for someone who thrives in the public eye in the creative ways that I do, I actually don’t enjoy being in the public eye.

I was advised by an American agent when I was about 19 to change my surname.