In an interview on the 'Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard' podcast, the 'Girl on Fire' hitmaker reveals that she was able to stop forcing father-daughter connection after an eye-opening chat with a friend.

• Apr 7, 2020

AceShowbiz - Alicia Keys is "really grateful" for her friendship with her once-estranged father after finally letting go of the rage she previously felt about his absence from her early childhood.

The "Girl on Fire" hitmaker was raised by her mother, Teresa Augello, and for years, the singer resented her dad, flight attendant Craig Cook, for abandoning her family.

Keys has since rekindled her relationship with her father, but admits it only began to blossom once she recognised his limitations as a parent and stopped trying to force that connection, instead choosing to build a bond as friends.

"My relationship with my father has evolved and I'm really grateful for it and I'm glad we've been able to find a way to really be friends," she explains in a new interview on the "Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard" podcast.

"At some point I realised, 'OK, you don't have to be my daddy, we can let that go, but we can actually be friends. We can get to know each other and get to know who we are as a woman and as a man, and respect that.' "

However, the 39-year-old only came to the understanding after an eye-opening chat with a friend.

"She was like..., 'Why do you keep asking him to do things that you know he's not gonna do...? It's like you're setting him up to disappoint you...,' " Keys shares.

"It changed everything, and I was able to look at it from that perspective and I was like, 'Why am I doing that?' Like, I'm trying to punish him or something, and in a way, I was..."

"That changed so much for me and I was able to start a relationship with him in a new way based on knowing who he is as a person and accepting who he is as a person... When I started to do that, we started to be able to connect and I felt good..."

"It's so deep... It's all a journey, and it is hard - not to say any of this is easy, it's layered, and all that - but (we're) finally getting there."

Keys, who shares two sons with her producer husband Swizz Beatz, delves further into her relationship with her dad in her new memoir, "More Myself: A Journey", which was released last week, March 31.