Alicia Keys Removes 'Perfect' From Her Vocabulary

Alicia Keys felt under pressure to present a perfect image of herself early in her career, but Alicia now believes that being “perfectly imperfect is the magic”.

She shared: “I did feel like I automatically had to be perfect. I felt like somehow I had to be this image or this perfection that people expected of me.”

However, Keys admits that her outlook has changed over recent years.

Speaking during TIME magazine’s Voices of the Future Women’s Summit on Monday (08.03.21), Alicia explained: “I’ve actually decided to remove the word ‘perfect’ from my vocabulary ’cause I think it’s detrimental … And so being perfectly imperfect is the magic, and now I know that.”

Alicia previously admitted to suppressing some aspects of her personality as her profile increased.

She said: “I’m not as comfortable [with] the parts that are very vulnerable or even angry.

“Anger is not an emotion that I’m very in touch with, and I realised that that’s because my mother has always had a really big, strong personality. Because of that I’ve always kind of had to manage her emotions and be the peacekeeper. And so I got used to that.”

Alicia signed her first recording contract when she was just 15 years old. However, she’s always felt like an “outsider” in the music business.

She explained: “I have felt like an outsider.

“I think I learned along the way how to fit into multiple circumstances in different places, different spaces, different people. But I always felt like I was from another planet or another time, and I didn’t really belong here.”