■ MLK Jr. was my first influence and inspiration. When my junior English teacher at Rich Central, Ms. Argue, made me do a talent show, I hit the stage thinking about King: I want to speak the way he spoke, I want to command the crowd the way he did. He was the pinnacle.

■ When I did HBO’s Def Poetry Jam, I got so nervous that I messed up and had to start over. Using that moment, I was able to say, OK, I’m never going to allow myself to get to the point again where I’m fumbling. It’s like, Man, these are people. You perform for people all the time. This is family. You’re good. So ever since then, I get the excitement, the adrenaline, but not the “Oh my God!”

■ For a long time, I would meet people who’d say, “What you do?” “I’m a poet.” “Oh yeah, that’s cool. So what you do to make money?” I’m like, “I write poetry.” People just couldn’t fathom it. But stepping outside of myself, that should sound crazy as hell. It’s remarkable to be able to make a living doing poetry.

■ Continue to create. You can’t wait on people to ring you. I learned that early. After Def Poetry Jam, I was expecting my phone to ring off the hook, and it didn’t. After “Never Let Me Down” on College Dropout, it didn’t. At that time people still didn’t know what to do with spoken word. So I said, Let me show you.

■ Me and Kanye had a conversation that turned heated two or three years ago. He was mad about things [in Jeen-yuhs, the documentary about West that Ivy helped make]: the mental health part and a part where the director cut the camera off because he didn’t like what he was seeing. Kanye didn’t like that. And I won’t go into it, but an incident happened, and I told him he needed to apologize for it. And it just went left. He got upset, then was like, “Y’all need to recognize I’m the king!” I was like, “Bro, we’re kings, too.” Like, you’re not gonna tell me I’m less than.

■ I was the halftime performer at Madison Square Garden for MLK Day three years in a row. Just me and the microphone. It’s “Defense! Defense!” and all the noises of the game. Then I go out, and it’s complete silence. Everybody’s sitting, chilling, anticipating. Stepping into a moment like that, you got to know, OK, I’m about to kill it. That’s not arrogance. You got to have that confidence, because otherwise they’re going to be talking over you. It’s like walking into a jungle and taming the lions, but it’s 30,000 lions.

■ The second time I met Lionel Richie, we were in New York at Nobu. This is after I won my first Grammy, and one of the managers there took me and my wife over to talk to him. He’s like, “You’re in the family now. You know how before you could take years to work on your album? You can’t do that no more. Keep your foot on the gas.”

■ You get what you give. So I give love. It’s not perfect. You’re going to have challenges. You’re going to have jealousy. You’re going to have mistakes. But I’d rather lead with love than lead with hate, because I don’t want that energy coming back at me.