Tupac Shakur: Going

“I believe that everything that you do bad comes back to you. So everything that I do that's bad, I'm going to suffer from it. But in my mind, I believe what I'm doing is right. So I feel like I'm going to heaven”

“I don't understand how people can stand next to you one year, and next year, they cannot. They're going crazy, screaming. They can't take it that you're there. But last year I was in the same club, walking around, lonely. Couldn't get a date or a dance. I was too skinny, too something, and now, "He's just adorable. He's just, oh!”

“As wars come and go, my soldier stays eternal”

“How could Reagan live in a White
House, which has a lot of rooms, and there be homelessness? And he's talking about helping. I don't believe that there is anyone that is going hungry in America simply by reason of denial or lack of ability to feed them. It is by people not knowing where or how to get this help. Why can't he take people off the street and put them in his White House? Then he'll have people from the streets to help him with his ideas. Not helpless! Homeless! Not helpless They haven't been homeless forever. They've done things in society. The White House would be tainted because he doesn't want to get dirty.”

“And did you ever stop to think that im old enough to go to war but i aint old enough to drink.”

“The reason I sell 6 million records, the reason I could go to jail and come out without a scratch, the reason I can walk around, the reason I am who I am today is because I can look directly in to my face and find my soul, it's there, it's not sold, i didn't sell it, it's still within me, I still feel it, my heart is still connected to my body.”

“I've always been an actor, the reason I've been successful in the rap-game I think is that I treat my albums like movies, and I treat writing it like I'm a character writing a story, you know, for each album whatever I'm going through, whatever stages I'm going through, and I do it vividly with vivid pitcure, with action and description, and an beginning and with an end, and conflict, and you know, redemption, things like that. So I feel like I always been an actor and acting is my first love.”

“I made a metamorphose, I'm a new person today, because I used to strongly and honestly, honestly! I feel like I can represent my generation so much because I honestly did not care whether I lived or died. But now I can not die, with people thinking I'm a rapist or a criminal, I can not leave until this shit is straight, you know I'm not suicidal. I can't go until ya'll really know what time it is. And then after that, BOOM!, It's all over and we can see how this shit fall, but that's how it is, and the reason being is because if I can't live free, if I can't live with the same respect as the next man, I don't wanna be here, because god has cursed me to see what life should be like, If God wanted me to be this person and be happy here, he wouldn't let me feel so oppressed, he wouldn't let me feel so trampled on, you know what I'm saying, he wouldn't let me think the things I think. So I feel I'm doing Gods work, you know what I'm saying just because I don't have nothing to pass around for people to put money in a bucket don't mean I ain't doing God's work.”

“I gotta big mouth, I can't help it, I talk from my heart, I'm real you know what I'm sayin whatever comes comes. But my controverse problems, It's not my fault, I try to find my way in the world you know, I try to be somebody instead of just, make money off of everybody. You know what im saying, so I go down paths that haven't been traveled before and I usually mess up, but I learn, you know what I'm saying, I come back stronger, I'm not talking ignorant, you know what I'm saying. So obviously put thought into what I do. So I think my mouth, my controverse, I have not been out of the paper since I joined Digital Underground, I've been in all, you know what I'm saying, my name has not been not uttered, you know what I'm saying, and that's good for me because I don't wanna be forgotten. If I'm forgotten then that means I'm comfortable and that means I think everything is okay.”

“You have to work from one point to go to another. So I admire work ethic, I think it should be re-inforced through out our neigbourhoods, that everybody should work hard, practice makes perfect, you have to be diligent with what you want, you have to apply your self, you have to motivate your self. You have to do for-self by your self, and then you can do things for other people. But that's what I had to do, I had to do for-self.”

“You grew up, we grew up B. C. Before crack. That's just saying it all. You understand? You don't have parents… You have young kids, fourteen, coming home and their mama is smoking out, going to their best friend to get the product.”

“To dance with the naked [blow-up] doll, that was me! That's what I mean by I'm real, I'm truly hardcore, because I needed the money and I had to work. So if he told me that for me to get paid I had to go out there in bikini briefs and hop on top of this [blow-up] doll and that's how I gotta get paid, and I was homeless at the time, that's what I had to do. But What I did was not let him pimp me, you know what I'm saying. It wasn't like I just did that because that was my order. As soon as I got the check's to say what was on my mind, I said what was on my mind. And we have a platinum record now, you know what I'm saying.”

“On the whole, I don't have any friends. Friends come and go; I've lost my trust factor. I believe I have people who think they're my friend. And I believe that there are people probably in their heart who are friends toward me or are friends to me. But they're not my friends, because what I learned is that fear is stronger than love.”

“And you can't go, "There's a hair in my Jell-O. I'd like to send this back. Can I see the cook, please?" The cook is a big dude named Bubba Joe.”

“If your not cheering for me, for what I'm doing, don't cheer for me. Don't cheer cause you think I'm cute, you know what I'm saying, screw that. Cheer for me for what I'm doing, for what I stand for, and when I go to jail you should cheer louder.”

“It's a constant man-ego-check going on in the streets, in this world.”

“It's not going to stop until "we" stop it. And it's not just white man that's doing this to Brenda. It's not just white man that's keeping us trapped. It's "black."”

“But in my homeboys' high school, it's not like that. They don't have trips to go see this Broadway play, they don't read things we read. They didn't know when I was like: "Yo, Shakespeare's dope."”

“I know how it's gonna be when I die. It's going to be no noise, you ain't going to hear people screaming. I'mma fade out.”