Jay-Z famous quotes

You can pay for school, but you can't buy class
-- Jay-Z

#School #Class #Inspire

Males shouldnt be jealous. Thats a female trait.
-- Jay-Z

#Jealous #Males #Female

I got mouths to feed til they put flowers on me.
-- Jay-Z

#Flower #Mouths

Remind yourself. Nobody built like you, you design yourself.
-- Jay-Z

#Design #Entrepreneur #Like You

A wise man told me don't argue with fools. Cause people from a distance can't tell who is who.
-- Jay-Z

#Wise #Distance #Men

I'd rather die enormous than live dormant.
-- Jay-Z

#Dormant #Enormous

My thing is related to who I am as a person. The clothes are an extension of me. The music is an extension of me. All my businesses are part of the culture, so I have to stay true to whatever I'm feeling at the time, whatever direction I'm heading in. And hopefully, everyone follows.
-- Jay-Z

#Clothes #Who I Am #Feelings

I'm hungry for knowledge. The whole thing is to learn every day, to get brighter and brighter.
-- Jay-Z

#Hungry

Jealousy’s a weak emotion.
-- Jay-Z

#Hustle #Emotion #Weak

The genius thing that we did was, we didn't give up.
-- Jay-Z

#Giving Up #Not Giving Up #Giving

Nine to five is how ya survive, I ain't trying to survive I'm trying to live it to the limit and love it alive
-- Jay-Z

#Trying #And Love #Alive

Gotta keep it peace like a buddhist Nobody gonna Wesley snipe me It's less than likely, Move back, Let I breathe Jedi knight, The more space I get the better I write, (Oh) Never I write, but, if, ever I write, I need the space to say whatever I like.
-- Jay-Z

#Buddhist #Moving #Writing

I'm not afraid of dying I'm afraid of not trying
-- Jay-Z

#Success #Entrepreneur #Dying

Rosa Parks sat so Martin Luther King could walk. Martin Luther King walked so Obama could run. Obama's running so we all can fly.
-- Jay-Z

#Running #Kings #Parks

I will not lose, for even in defeat/There's a valuable lesson learned, so it evens up for me
-- Jay-Z

#Dope #Lesson Learned #Lessons

I believe excellence is being able to perform at a high level over and over.
-- Jay-Z

#Believe #Excellence #Levels

I believe you can speak things into existence.
-- Jay-Z

#Motivational #Believe #Speak

What people do in their own homes is their business, and you can choose to love whoever you love. That's their business. It's no different than discriminating against blacks. It's discrimination, plain and simple
-- Jay-Z

#Home #Gay #Simple

I couldn't even think about wanting to be something else; I wouldn't let myself visualize another life. But I wrote because I couldn't stop. It was a release, a mental exercise, a way of keeping sane.
-- Jay-Z

#Exercise #Thinking #Way

Only God can judge me so I'm gone, either love me or leave me alone.
-- Jay-Z

#Judging #Leave Me Alone #Gone

Ain't nothin' wrong with the aim, just gotta change the target.
-- Jay-Z

#Target #Aim

Everything evens up, you just wait, Even a garbage can gets a steak, You ain't even a garbage can, you have faith!
-- Jay-Z

#Waiting #Have Faith #Garbage

My brands are an extension of me. They're close to me. It's not like running GM, where there's no emotional attachment.
-- Jay-Z

#Running #Emotional #Attachment

Wherever I go, I bring the culture with me, so that they can understand that it's attainable. I didn't do it any other way than through hip-hop.
-- Jay-Z

#Hip Hop #Culture #Way

We change people through conversation, not through censorship.
-- Jay-Z

#People #Censorship #Conversation

Be fluid. Treat each project differently. Be water, man. The best style is no style. Because styles can be figured out. And when you have no style they can't figure you out.
-- Jay-Z

#Fashion #Men #Water

You can want success all you want, but to get it, you can’t falter. You can’t slip. You can’t sleep. One eye open, for real, and forever.
-- Jay-Z

#Real #Sleep #Eye

I'm far from being god, but I work god damn hard.
-- Jay-Z

#Work

Everybody look at you strange, say you changed Like you work that hard to stay the same.
-- Jay-Z

#Looks #Strange #Like You

It's always been most important for me to figure out "my space" rather than trying to check out what everyone else is up to, minute by minute. Technology is making it easier to connect to other people, but maybe harder to keep connected to yourself-- and that's essential for any artist, I think.
-- Jay-Z

#Technology #Thinking #Artist

Hip-hop gave a generation a common ground that didn't require either race to lose anything; everyone gained.
-- Jay-Z

#Race #Hip Hop #Hips

I keep my enemies close/ I give 'em enough rope/ They put themselves in the air/ I just kick away the chair.
-- Jay-Z

#Air #Giving #Enemy

If the beat is time, flow is what we do with that time, how we live through it. The beat is everywhere, but every life has to find its own flow.
-- Jay-Z

#Flow #Beats

Artists can have greater access to reality; they can see patterns and details and connections that other people, distracted by the blur of life, might miss. Just sharing that truth can be a very powerful thing.
-- Jay-Z

#Powerful #Creativity #Reality

I was forced to be an artist and a CEO from the beginning, so I was forced to be like a businessman because when I was trying to get a record deal, it was so hard to get a record deal on my own that it was either give up or create my own company.
-- Jay-Z

#Giving Up #Artist #Trying

Rap has been a path between cultures in the best tradition of popular music.
-- Jay-Z

#Rap #Culture #Path

I spring train in the winter, around early December...
-- Jay-Z

#Spring #Winter #Growth

Successful people have a bigger fear of failure than people who've never done anything because if you haven't been successful, then you don't know how it feels to lose it all.
-- Jay-Z

#Successful #People #Done

Life is for living, not living uptight, see ya somewhere up in the sky.
-- Jay-Z

#Sky #Uptight #Life Is

I'm not a businessman, I'm a business, man!
-- Jay-Z

#Business #Men #Entrepreneur

The average rap life is two or three albums. You're lucky to get to your second album in rap!
-- Jay-Z

#Life #Rap #Second Chance

Hip-hop is more about attaining wealth. People respect success. They respect big. They don't even have to like your music. If you're big enough, people are drawn to you.
-- Jay-Z

#People #Hip Hop #Hips

You know the type: loud as a motorbike but wouldn't bust a grape in a fruit fight.
-- Jay-Z

#Fighting #Fruit #Grapes

I thought I would be more inspired to have all these new feelings to talk about, but I really just want to hang out with my daughter.
-- Jay-Z

#Daughter #Fathers Day #Feelings

I'm hungry for knowledge. The whole thing is to learn every day, to get brighter and brighter. That's what this world is about. You look at someone like Gandhi, and he glowed. Martin Luther King glowed. Muhammad Ali glows. I think that's from being bright all the time, and trying to be brighter.
-- Jay-Z

#Kings #Thinking #Trying

Without the work, the magic won’t come.
-- Jay-Z

#Magic

We were kids without fathers, so we found our fathers on wax and on the streets and in history, and in a way, that was a gift. We got to pick and choose the ancestors who would inspire the world we were going to make for ourselves.
-- Jay-Z

#Father #Kids #Inspire

I ain't lookin' at you dudes -I'm lookin' past you.
-- Jay-Z

#Past

When you step outside of school and have to teach yourself about life, you develop a different relationship to information. I've never been a purely linear thinker. You can see it in my rhymes. My mind is always jumping around, restless, making connections, mixing and matching ideas, rather than marching in a straight line. That's why I'm always stressing focus. My thoughts chase each other from room to room in my head if I let them, so sometimes I have to slow myself down.
-- Jay-Z

#Stress #School #Ideas

The day Obama got elected, the gangsta became less relevant.
-- Jay-Z

#Gangsta #Rapper #Relevant

The most amazing feeling I feel Words can't describe what I'm feeling for real Maybe I paint the sky blue My greatest creation was you.
-- Jay-Z

#Fathers Day #Real #Blue

Boxing is a glorious sport to watch and boxers are incredible, heroic athletes, but it's also, to be honest, a stupid game to play. Even the winners can end up with crippling brain damage. In a lot of ways, hustling is the same. But you learn something special from playing the most difficult games, the games where winning is close to impossible and losing is catastrophic: You learn how to compete as if your life depended on it. That's the lesson I brought with me to the so-called "legitimate" world.
-- Jay-Z

#Sports #Stupid #Athlete

I gave you prophecy on my first joint, and y'all lamed out Didn't really appreciate it, 'til the second one came out
-- Jay-Z

#Appreciate #Hip Hop #Joints

I smoked some weed, and that's how I finished 'Izzo.'
-- Jay-Z

#Weed

Can I hit it in the morning with out giving you have of my dough?
-- Jay-Z

#Morning #Giving #Hip Hop

Sometimes I trip on how happy we could be And so I put this on my life Nobody or nothing will ever come between us And I promise I'll give my life
-- Jay-Z

#Song #Giving #Promise

Cough up a lung where I'm from marcy son, aint nothin nice
-- Jay-Z

#Nice #Rap #Son

Stop screamin', you know the demon said it's best to die, And even if Jehovah witness, bet he'll never testify, D'Evils...
-- Jay-Z

#Rap #Evil #Jehovah

If skills sold, truth be told, I'd probably be Lyrically, Talib Kweli Truthfully, I wanna rhyme like Common Sense But I did 5 mill' - I ain't been rhyming like Common since.
-- Jay-Z

#Rap #Skills #Common Sense

Now success was like lust, she's good to the touch, She's good for the moment, but she's never enough
-- Jay-Z

#Hip Hop #Lust #Moments

I got this black chick, she don't know how to act Always talkin' out her neck, makin' her fingers snap She like, "Listen Jigga Man, I don't care if you rap You better - R-E-S-P-E-C-T me
-- Jay-Z

#Rap #Men #Hip Hop

Got some, dirt on my shoulder, could you brush it off for me?
-- Jay-Z

#Hip Hop #Dirt #Shoulders

I love you so, But why I love you, I'll never know.
-- Jay-Z

#I Love You #Love You #Why I Love You

In the end, you can't censor the truth, especially when it comes packaged in hot music.
-- Jay-Z

#Hot #Ends

Which is the other reason hip-hop is controversial: People don't bother trying to get it. The problem isn't in the rap or the rapper or the culture. The problem is that so many people don't even know how to listen to the music.
-- Jay-Z

#Rap #People #Hip Hop

Hip-hop is a perfect mix between poetry and boxing.
-- Jay-Z

#Boxing #Perfect #Hip Hop

It was a weird mix of emotions. One day, your best friend could be killed. The day before, you could be celebrating him getting a brand-new bike.
-- Jay-Z

#Friendship #One Day #Emotion

It was a very intense and stressful situation. There was playing in the Johnny-pump (an opened fire hydrant) and the ice-cream man coming around and all of these games that we'd play, and suddenly it would turn just violent and there would be shootings at 12 in the afternoon on any given day.
-- Jay-Z

#Men #Ice #Games

As kids we didn't complain about being poor; we talked about how rich we were going to be and made moves to get the lifestyle we aspired to by any means we could. And as soon as we had a little money, we were eager to show it.
-- Jay-Z

#Moving #Mean #Kids

One of the reasons inequality gets so deep in this country is that everyone wants to be rich. That's the American ideal. Poor people don't like talking about poverty because even though they might live in the projects surrounded by other poor people and have, like, ten dollars in the bank, they don't like to think of themselves as poor.
-- Jay-Z

#Country #Thinking #Talking

I would run into the corner store, the bodega, and just grab a paper bag or buy juice - anything just to get a paper bag. And I'd write the words on the paper bag and stuff these ideas in my pocket until I got back. Then I would transfer them into the notebook.
-- Jay-Z

#Notebook #Running #Writing

It's hilarious a lot of times. You have a conversation with someone, and he's like, 'You speak so well!' I'm like, 'What do you mean? Do you understand that's an insult?
-- Jay-Z

#Mean #Insult #Speak