Gloria Estefan

Music is almost mystical to me. It really has an incredibly powerful force.

Sex and drugs were simply not discussed in our culture at that time.

I have a very open line of communication with both my children.

As an entertainer, my job is to help people have fun.

My job as an entertainer is to take you some place else. I love exploring different genres of music to please my fans.

I hold 'Mi Tierra,' my first Spanish-language album, very close to me because that was all done in my native tongue and won me my first Grammy.

The sad truth is that opportunity doesn't knock twice.

Music has been so healing in my life, so the fact that my music could be that for someone else is the best gift of my whole career. People have told me that they got married to my music, divorced to my music, and played my music while they were having their baby.

You've got to believe. Never be afraid to dream.

Whatever it is your heart desires please go for it its yours to have.

People tend to forget that celebrities are human beings. We live our lives. We try to do what we love, which is music. And to share it with everyone in our job usually is to entertain and to make people forget their troubles.

We seal our fate with the choices we make.

You want your fans to like what you do, because it's coming from your heart and soul. You write it, you produce this thing. It's like your baby.

There's no reason that just because you're a celebrity you can't write.

In the United States, if you believe in yourself and you're determined and persevere, you're going to succeed.

Once you know the Romance languages, singing in those languages is so sexy and sensual. I do have a global audience, so why not?

I don't want anything from Cuba. I want them to be free and enjoy the things I enjoy.

I wanted very badly to be a mum. I'm a very maternal person. But at the point that I met Emilio I was focusing on a career. I never would have thought that I would get married at 21 and much less be a mum by 23.

We seal our fate with the choices we take, but don't give a second thought to the chances we take.

I know that people think of me in terms of Latin music and that's wonderful, that's my heritage, that's who I am, but there's so much more to me and my music.

Whatever it is your heart desires, please go for it, it's yours to have.

I'm very comfortable in my own skin now. I started just being myself more and more. For women, this happens as you get older. I loved my 40s - I thought they were fantastic. And I'm loving my 50s. I'm going to love everything because you're either older or dead!

My mom was definitely very strict with me.

You can put things off until tomorrow but tomorrow may never come.

My mum had a very strong moral code, which I kind of came with. I never really had to be told what was right or wrong - I knew. I was very mature from early on and I was a very good girl, so she never had any trouble with me.

I have great genes. Thank you to my mom and dad for that one.

We protect aspirin bottles in this country better than we protect guns from accidents by children.

As an immigrant, I appreciate, far more than the average American, the liberties we have in this country. Silence is a big enemy of morality. I don't want our blunders in history to get repeated.

As an artist, you dream about accumulating enough successful music to someday do just one greatest-hits album, but to reach the point where you're releasing your second collection of hits is beyond belief.

My mom was a source of strength.She showed me by example that women, regardless of how difficult life may get, can do it all.

Everything that an artist does is a risk. Some people want you to stay the same. If you want to evolve, they want to keep you in a certain place.

There are so many difficult things we're living through in the world today, so many horrible events, but we cannot let them stop us. No matter what happens, I feel you must move forward with optimism and not get totally sideswiped.

A lot of the way I sing is playing off other musicians. It's what I love to do the most.

All I tell artists is, 'Do what you love. Never let anybody talk you into changing what your musical idea is just to try to get a hit, because you're chasing your tail that way. It's not going to happen, and if you're successful, you have to do it the rest of your life. Stay true to it and do it for the sake of the art.'

Motherhood is... difficult and... rewarding.

I've been offered a lot of things that celebrities do that I wouldn't do, like perfumes, lines of clothing and this, that and the other.

My mom was an amazing singer and music was a big part of my life, so I grew up listening to Nat King Cole, Johnny Mathis, Henry Mancini; I used to watch 'The Andy Williams Show' on TV. I was very musical, so I was watching stuff that most kids my age wouldn't be interested in.

I'm a writer and this is what I love to do.

My inspirations include the Beatles - love, love, love them - Elton John, Carole King, and Stevie Wonder.

I'd love to have a program like 'Dr. Laura.' I studied psychology at the University of Miami, and when I rode the bus home from school, perfect strangers would strike up conversations with me and end up telling me their life stories. I think they could sense that I was studying to help people. That, or I have a face like a priest.

The Internet has been a blessing and a curse. The curse we know: A lot of people appropriating your intellectual property without paying for it. But I think it's important to realize the blessing of the Internet, which is that everybody has a voice and you can break through, even without a record company.

Being Latin parents makes us extremely expressive with our affections.

I think that the only way to teach is by example, as children will more easily follow what they see you do than what you tell them to do.

Having felt people's love and support first hand through difficult moments in my life makes me feel it's our responsibility to help one another.

The reason I'm not more political is because I have music. And from a young age, I needed it. After prison, my father came to America, joined the Army, fought in Vietnam - and was exposed to Agent Orange. He died a slow, horrible death. Music was my escape.

When I was a teenager, I was fat. I was shy. I wore glasses. I had a big eyebrow and hair all over my body. They were years of torture.

Sometimes my mother had difficulty communicating with me about certain topics.

There are certain realities we must speak of with our children that were not present when I was a child.

I think we should all live the moment. But you also have to think ahead. You have to think, 'Am I going to be happy with this five, ten years from now? Is it going to let me evolve and grow, or am I going to grow to one day wish I had never done it?' Sometimes you just have to think a little bit ahead.

My mother had a beautiful, soothing voice that made me melt.

My mom was a source of strength. She showed me by example that women, regardless of how difficult life may get, can do it all.

Touring is hard. It's really hard on the singer, especially, because your body is your instrument and you have to be so good, it's like boot camp out there; I can't do anything - just sleep, sing and be very healthy.

My family was musical on both sides. My father's family had a famous flautist and a classical pianist. My mother won a contest to be Shirley Temple's double - she was the diva of the family. At 8, I learned how to play guitar. I used to play songs from the '20s, '30s and '40s in the kitchen for my grandmother.

She's an amazing dog and really inspired everything that's in this book.

I spent 15 years on the road between touring and recording and I never saw anything. I want to enjoy life.

You know, it's funny how songs continue to grow and evolve and become a new and deeper reflection of your life.

In this life, I'm always going to choose the positive.

The responsibility of carrying and bringing a new life into this world is one that cannot be taken lightly.

Fashion is nice, but it's for the fans. If it were up to me, I'd be in a sweat suit!

To know that everything we say and do to this new little human being may have a profound effect on him or her is a daunting obligation.

Toys are not a need people typically think of, but they've got all these kids who have absolutely nothing to do.

There are so many beautiful things that are a part of the world, and I've always looked at life that way; I've always tried to put on a smile and a brave front, not just for my kids but in my own life and all the difficulties that I've gone through.