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I gave up a lot of things in exchange for my success.

I always felt, right from a youngster, that it was my destiny to be a success. It sounds a little bit egotistical, but I felt I had a calling to do something.

Someone once pulled me aside and said it was all right to succeed, and I realised that I knew what failure felt like, but I didn't know what success felt like. I've carried that with me ever since.

I'm used to adversity and working really well in difficult situations. It was hard for me to accept the success.

Success was one of my weakest points. I was so ill-prepared for it. I never appreciated within myself the gift of success. I never accepted it. People gave me so much momentum and love, and people really got my music, but I didn't accept it. That's probably one of my biggest regrets.

I had lost a clear sense of the vision and values instilled in me as a child and was no longer driven by any mission or passion. I made the difficult decision to pull back from the noise of my life and reinvent the way I was living and leading.

I realised those things my ego needed - fame and success - were going to make me terribly unhappy. So I wrenched myself away from that. I had to. I had to walk away from America and say goodbye to the biggest part of my career because I knew, otherwise, my demons would get the better of me.

It is easy when you are successful to think that you did it all by yourself and to forget that you didn't. You got here because a lot of things broke your way. You were lucky enough to be born into a family that could afford to take care of you well.

For me, the path of failure exceeded by far the joys of success. My plight was hopeless.