Family Over Everything with Devale Ellis

00:00:09
Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to this episode of Keep It Positive. Sweetie. I'm Christophine Hazeley.

00:00:13
Speaker 2: And today I have with me my dear, dear friend, my brother from another mother, Deval Ellis.

00:00:21
Speaker 3: What's up?

00:00:25
Speaker 2: You know?

00:00:26
Speaker 1: We got you?

00:00:27
Speaker 2: Listen, they've been asking for you. No, can we get di val At Kadeen on the couch.

00:00:33
Speaker 1: Here, he's here, I'm here, we got him.

00:00:36
Speaker 3: We appreciate you. I love this. I'm excited you Remember when it was just a thought I thought and I was here. I like it. I like you.

00:00:44
Speaker 1: Oh my goodness, thank you so much.

00:00:47
Speaker 2: When I think of you, Deval, I think anything pop smoke, anything Brooklyn.

00:00:55
Speaker 1: So what's a Brooklyn song?

00:00:56
Speaker 3: Where? Brooklyn? Where Brooklyn? I got yup? You see what I'm saying.

00:01:03
Speaker 2: No, literally, that's what I think of because everywhere we go, it does not matter where we are.

00:01:08
Speaker 1: Devala is going to rep Brooklyn. We could be head in the Atlanta Hawks game. Working.

00:01:13
Speaker 3: What are you gonna bring that up?

00:01:14
Speaker 1: Working?

00:01:15
Speaker 3: An bring that?

00:01:16
Speaker 1: Like? Who stand up? I got fired in State Farm Arena.

00:01:20
Speaker 3: I can't do what are you doing? I can't do it?

00:01:22
Speaker 2: You're like, and I'll do it again.

00:01:24
Speaker 3: And that's why they don't ever bring me back up. There have these swag surfing.

00:01:28
Speaker 1: Yeah, everybody was like.

00:01:31
Speaker 3: And they was playing the nets too.

00:01:33
Speaker 1: It was crazy.

00:01:34
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was crazy.

00:01:36
Speaker 2: For those who don't know, let me tell you. Daval Ellis is a former NFL player turned actor. Currently, he is a serious regular and the number one cable television drama series Tyler Perry's Sisters, and the star of his very own number one rated spin off is The Team, Though which he has the pleasure of playing opposite.

00:01:54
Speaker 3: Truly talk about it, talking about it.

00:01:58
Speaker 1: And can't leave this out.

00:02:00
Speaker 2: You are also a New York Times bestseller for your book Yes We Over Me, that you co worked with your wife, Kadema Elis. Yes, amazing. I'm so happy you are here. You are one of my closest friends. I just love you. I look up to you, and I admire you so much when I think about the first time we met. The first time I actually saw you was on Instagram and social media. Oh w, that was my first introduction of you. But I never a word, Like everybody.

00:02:25
Speaker 1: Ain't seen you a word, but we got to.

00:02:31
Speaker 2: The first time I actually met you in person or saw you in person, was in the audition room.

00:02:35
Speaker 1: Yup, for Sisters.

00:02:38
Speaker 2: At the time, Fatima was a really small character that hadn't yet been introduced. Yeah, and I was a producer on the show, or still have a producer on the show. But I was sitting in the back of the room watching all the auditions with Tyler, and that's the first time I got to see you as an actor and.

00:02:52
Speaker 1: I was like, Wow, he has something special. Yeah, no, for real, for real. Then got to know each other through Sisters.

00:03:02
Speaker 2: I remember getting the call saying I'm gonna make you Zach's girlfriend or his love interest, and I was like what.

00:03:08
Speaker 3: Yeah. When I first read it, I was like, I was like, where's this going on. I didn't understand it.

00:03:12
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was like, y'all can't give me.

00:03:14
Speaker 2: You know what I'm saying, tall dark chocolate and that's your tight too, your type too.

00:03:21
Speaker 3: That is your type too. It is It's gonna.

00:03:25
Speaker 2: Just put that in the atmosphere, tall dark chocolate and.

00:03:29
Speaker 1: Some other things.

00:03:30
Speaker 2: Cause I learned I gotta be careful what I say because that's what God will bring me. And that's all you have is just tall, dark frolic.

00:03:36
Speaker 1: So I gotta be careful what I say. But I remember when we got the call.

00:03:41
Speaker 2: We started rehearsing together and at first it was just like straight rehearses. One day you were like, so tell me about yourself. We had never just had a conversation. It was like, hey, I'm Crystal, Like do you want to run it?

00:03:52
Speaker 3: So like meek and I was like, First's the funny thing is, I got the scripts and you know, there were a couple of guys who had a crush on you. Oh I remember they had a crush on you. I'm not going to blow them up, but I got the scripts and I'm reading the scripts and it says Zack and Fatima and Zaki and Fatima, and then finally it says Zak and Fatima started to have sex. So I immediately called those guys. I said, well, well, well guys, and they were pissed at me that letting y'all know. But then we were also scared because you're also a producer on the show. So I was like, this is our boss, so like there has to be a level of respect, you know, when dealing with this role. So when you called me, I was just I was nervous. I was like, she called me as a producer, as an actor, and he was so meek on the phone, and I was like, why is she so meat? Like, you're a producer, you worked with Tyler all of these years. I was nervous more than anything else.

00:04:47
Speaker 1: Wow, that's crazy.

00:04:49
Speaker 2: And I was nervous because that was my first time really acting, and then having the same partner like you, who's had experience and been on all these shows. I'm like, oh God, Okay, here we go. And I remember calling you to rehearse because it was during the pandemic. No, actually the pandemic hadn't happened yet. It's beginning of January. It was the beginning of Remember, we got the call we were gonna do it, and then in March, yep, we got we got the call marks so we weren't coming back because of COVID. So that was our initial interaction. And here we are five years later, five years later, but since twenty nineteen.

00:05:25
Speaker 3: Yees, since twenty nineteen, but that was actually twenty twenty, so four years later, four years later. But I do remember us running lines the first couple of times, and we were just like, yo. I kind of liked this chemistry of where the story's going because at the time you were paralegal and Zach just coming out of prison. It was just like they can have like a coming of age love story. Yeah, we were like, we're gonna get our own show.

00:05:48
Speaker 2: Literally said that it shows you the power of the time.

00:05:50
Speaker 1: Guys.

00:05:51
Speaker 2: We literally said this. And like two years later or even less than that.

00:05:56
Speaker 3: It was No, it was less than that. We sat on the bed ready to do a scene and Tyler walked in and walked in and said I like it.

00:06:05
Speaker 1: I like this, and we looked at each other.

00:06:08
Speaker 3: It's about.

00:06:11
Speaker 1: We knew it at that moment.

00:06:12
Speaker 2: I remember it had not been officially announced, and we heard the crew whispering about the team was coming as a teama because they saw it on the production calendar.

00:06:19
Speaker 3: And we're like, we like talking about it.

00:06:22
Speaker 2: And then I got the call, Yo, you got your I was like.

00:06:26
Speaker 3: You are lying to me? That was oh my gosh. I was in bed. I was in bed with K. He called me, and K was just looking at me like she could tell that something was happening. Yeah, because I was on the phone. Then I sat up and I remember saying, you serious playing Yeah. She tooked up like yeah, she looked nervous I was, and I told her it was. It was an exciting time.

00:06:55
Speaker 1: It really was history. That's amazing.

00:06:59
Speaker 3: We did that.

00:07:00
Speaker 1: We did we know, we really did that.

00:07:01
Speaker 3: We manifested it. Yeah, we did it.

00:07:05
Speaker 2: Speaking of manifesting, I feel like a lot of your life has been manifested.

00:07:10
Speaker 1: Yeah, let's take it back.

00:07:12
Speaker 2: Let's go all the way back, because I want to give people the full scope of de val, going all the way back to being raised in Brooklyn, New York, having these dreams. Did you always dream of being an NFL star? Did you always dream of being an actor? How did that come about?

00:07:26
Speaker 3: I ever wanted to be in an NFL really, so, how did that?

00:07:29
Speaker 1: You were just that good one of my Yeah, you know, no.

00:07:35
Speaker 3: This is a true story. My parents didn't want her. My parents didn't want their kids in the streets in Brooklyn, so they used to send us down to Morristown, Tennessee, Tennessee every year for eight weeks, our grandparents. We went down there. They had an acre and a half of grass, they had trees, they had everything, and it was a space for us to have some time to be away from the city. All you have to do there is ride bikes, run, jump, climb trees. Exactly that led man, stay outside. If you come back inside, you inside all day that. You know how country parents are. So I remember going down to Morristown, Tennessee and just being super athletic because we had nothing else to do. Like, all we did was playing jump, run and race and run up the hill. And they lived in the mountains, so everything was uphill or downhill. So all that acceleration deceleration made me athletic. But here's the thing that kind of sparked my interest. We used to go to the Boys Club when we turned thirteen. Then they turned it from the Boys Club to the Boys and Girls Club of America. And when they did that, they added Creative Arts. And I remember being thirteen years old and I went back into the Creative Arts Center and they were in there singing and dancing and putting on plays, and I was like, I want to do that. Wow. But here's the crazy part. I'm a kid from Brooklyn and everybody who goes into the Creative Arts who's a male is looked at as soft, weak, gay, you know. And this is the nineties, Yeah, different times. It's a different time. No one is even speaking about that type of lifestyle. So it was like, what do I do. I'm gonna just play sports. I'm gonna just ignore that part of my life and play sports. So I did that, and I just told my parents I was going to find a way to go to college so that after I go to college, I could be an artist. Wow.

00:09:27
Speaker 1: That is amazing.

00:09:29
Speaker 2: So when you so when you started playing how old are you when you started playing football?

00:09:34
Speaker 3: Sixteen? I was a basketball player. I could dunk when I was in eighth grade. I'm not tall, I was only five seven, and but I was crazy explosive, like I said, being in Morristown. So my brother and my cousin and I we were all just super athletic. And I was like, you know, I'm gonna go to the NBA. But my goal to go to the NBA was only to make enough money so that I didn't have to be a starving artist.

00:09:56
Speaker 1: Wow.

00:09:57
Speaker 3: And then yeah, that's that's literally the whole thing was I'm gonna the NBA. So I looked at Alan Iverson. He was like my size, and you know, I designed my game around him. And then my basketball coach, you know, he was he was a tough guy, but he wasn't one of those guys that got kids in the college. And then the football coach came and said, yo, you five nine and you can dunk. This is when I was a sophomore school. I'm dunk. Why don't you just play football? I was like, man, anybody's playing no football one hundred and thirty pounds. I said this to me, said you want to go to school? Said yeah. He said you want to go to school for free? I said yeah. He said you played between the numbers and the sideline. I'll get you to school for free. So at sixteen years old, I picked up football. Wow, and the rest was history.

00:10:38
Speaker 1: The rest was history. That is crazy. So you go to school at Hofstra.

00:10:43
Speaker 2: Yeah, and then you were you drafted or did.

00:10:48
Speaker 3: You wasn't drafted? I was first of all, I was walking on at Hofstra. I was walking on. I was. I was small at the time when I was being recruited. And this is something for parents to understand. I was seventeen when I played my last down in football in high school. Because I was in school early, so I didn't turn eighteen until the end of the year. But that season I was seventeen. I was competing against eighteen nineteen year olds, so I was only at the time, five ten, one hundred and forty eight pounds. So all the schools came and they were just like you wish she was one hundred and forty fifteen. It cannot be one hundred and forty pounds to stop that. But I haven't been that way since high school. But I broke a bunch of records. I got twenty six passes for eight hundred and thirty one yards fifteen touchdowns. I thought I was gonna get a scholarship. Offer never came, so Hopshaw offered me a partial scholarship, which was just room and boarding books. At the time, it's ten thousand dollars. My parents had to pay fifteen thousand dollars for tuition. So I told my parents, I said, YO, just let me walk on. I'm gonna earn a scholarship. Once I get the scholarship, my plan was to make a practice squad in the NFL. I could make a undred thousand dollars in four months, and those four months, I was going to buy a brownstone in Brooklyn. Shout out to Brooklyn ran out. The top two floors lived downstairs. So I had a whole plan. Wow, if I had a whole plan from the time I was seventeen.

00:12:13
Speaker 2: Wow, So you've always been like this because you for me to know you now you're a strategic thinker.

00:12:20
Speaker 3: Well, remember you started talking about manifestation. God gave me all of these visions, my kids, you not. From the time I was young, a voice always said to me, where you are is not going to be where you spend the rest of your life. That voice told me that. Yeah, And the same voice always told me to question things and challenge things and not to do things the traditional way. So ever since I had that, I always felt like God had me. So when it came time to doing something outside the box, God got me.

00:12:51
Speaker 1: Wow.

00:12:52
Speaker 3: I love that.

00:12:54
Speaker 2: So you get through college and it's time for NFL drabs.

00:12:59
Speaker 3: So what happened? This is a funny, man. I killed college. I was on pace to be the only receiver to have a thousand yards two years in a row.

00:13:07
Speaker 1: Wow.

00:13:08
Speaker 3: I played with Marcus Colston, who was a freaking savage. Everybody knows that, but if we're being honest, I was a number one receiver on the team. He was the number two receiver. But if you look at Marcus Colston, he's sixty five, two hundred and thirty pounds and runs a four to four. If I'm taking a receiver, I'm taking market. I taking a little fast guy. But once again, my plan was to just make a practice squad. It was like, yo, I didn't get drafted. I wasn't even a high priority for agent. I wasn't. It was just I ran a fast time. They was like, you can come try out if you want to. Ran a four three and forty fourty in is vertical ten to five on the broad jump. Like I had all the measurables, just some small guy from a small school. So at this point five eleven, one hundred and seventy five pounds still tiny.

00:13:52
Speaker 1: Yeah.

00:13:52
Speaker 3: I told my wife Kay, I said, Yo, all I gotta do is make a practice squad. I get one hundred thousand dollars and then we can get our dream. And I ended up making the team wow, and made way more than one hundred thousand dollars now, and then it was like, all right, well, I can buy some property, I can start some businesses. So this way, when I get into my art, I'm not broke right. And then I got cut unexpectedly my third season, at the same time as the recession lost all my money.

00:14:22
Speaker 1: So okay, wow, So what in that moment? What is going through your head? Because I would have been like, Lord, why.

00:14:30
Speaker 3: I was mad? Yeah, I was mad, and I was mad. I hate saying this. I was mad at God. You know how they say, you know, Jesus was on the cross and he said, God, why have you forsake? Yes, that was me in my bathroom running the shower. K is in there because I had just proposed a k I just bought a house. I just I was planning my life. Remember I always had a plan. I was planning in my life. I was slated to be the number three receiver, punt returning, kick returner. And that summer comes around and all just went to shit. I got cut. I was losing fifteen thousand dollars a day in the stock market. I had bought two properties. Both properties value was going down because the housing market had burst, so I had no equity in the properties. I had to move back to Brooklyn and my grandparents all apartment with my fiance, and I sat in my I used to sit in the bathroom. I used to put the water on, close the door and I would cry. I would cry, I would and she'd be like, bab you okay, and I'd been there. I used to be like yeah, I'm like yeah, yeah, I'm good letting the water heat up because we lived in an old apartment. That water used to be hot. And I used to be in there freaking boling because I was like, what do you to do? I followed everything you told me to do. When all my friends and people in the NFL and they were buying chains and they were buying They're going to the strip club, buying fancy cars. I drove a Ford f one point fifty. My payment was one hundred and thirty five dollars a month. I put all my money in property in the stock market, and all that they got taken and I was like, I was like, I listened. Yeah, I was committed. You know. I was with my girlfriend at the time, was my wife. I was doing everything the right way and it all was taken from me. And I was just like like God, why the same fear, Like I was like that this is this is trash, if this is life, why did I do all of that? I said, I could have been promiscuous, I could have been the strip clubs. I could have bought chains and cars, and I still would have the same amount of money, and I would still have the same feeling because I felt like less of a man. I'm like, I asked this woman to marry me under the pretenses that I was going to take care of her, and now I'm asking her to move back to my grandparents' apartment in Brooklyn. Like I just felt like, Yeah, my ego was done. I was just kind of like, and I don't like to say I have suicidal thoughts because that's just the thing, but I did. It was times I was just like, man, why I ain't even living? Like I didn't want to get out of bed, Like it was bad.

00:16:57
Speaker 1: In that moment.

00:16:58
Speaker 2: What was the pivot that made you say, you know what, get up to val Like I need you gotta move on from this. Life has to go on and I need to pick myself up.

00:17:07
Speaker 3: It's it's gonna sound crazy, but when you're responsible for someone else, like you just can't. Yeah, I asked my wife to marry. What I'm gonna do now, like what I'm gonna do? And then growing up in a Baptist church, you always hear about trials and tribulations. Absolutely always hear about tests. And then it was like, there was one person who used to always call me. It was my aunt Debbie. Yes, I love you on Debbie. When you go through something like that, most of your family doesn't know how to approach you. People think that, you know, oh, when when you're on high, everybody wants to be around you. But then when you know, nobody wants to be discard you. I've learned that it's not that they just discard you, but if you're the light to so many people and now your light goes out, those people really don't know what to say or how to be of service. Yeah, you've been of service to so many people and now you need somebody. They really don't know. My aunt Debbie would call me like once a week poopoo ha poo boo. I'm like, what's up on, Debbie? She's like you all right? I'm like yeah. She used to ask me time you and your Bible? I should be like, yeah, lying lion, lie like straight lining, and she's like, pool Pool, you don't got a lie to me. And all she said was you just remember how you was raised. That's all she would say, You remember how you was raised. And that was kind of like, you know what you're right, because my father was laid off when I was seventeen years old, going into my senior year. My father was working for Chase Bank forever. My father always kept multiple jobs. He used to bounce work at Chase Bank. He could sell jewelry. My father everything to provide for his family. I remember my father came home when they said I got laid off. I was like, hello, like you the man in the house, did you mean you got laid off? He said, don't worry, abody be fine. I got some because my father always plans. And I said, if my father could go through that, and he had three kids, one going to college, you know, my sisters in private school. So all I have now is a fiance.

00:19:19
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:19:20
Speaker 3: And I thought about how I was raised, and I watched my grandfather get up every morning if it work. Then I watched my father push through. So I said, fuck it, I'm gonna just put my head down and just just create. And that's that's all I did, was create opportunities for myself and for my wife. Like we had to make money, and I just find ways to create.

00:19:40
Speaker 1: Wow, Oh my goodness.

00:19:43
Speaker 3: Sometimes always be hard for everybody. Those really be the hardest times because people don't know what it's like to be not just a man with you the light in your family. God, yeah, you know what I'm saying. Like everybody's like, you're devoted, how can I can you? And I'm always like yeah, because I've always felt like these blessings that have been given to me are not for me. I have a fiduciary responsibility to provide for everyone around me. Even when I create businesses. You know, it's like I create a business, I'm like, yo, which one of my friends can use extra fifteen K I'm like, yo, I put you on my business. Then you can talk that you make some extra like I've always been that way. So when you feel like you don't have that ability to be that for people, you don't feel like you belong anymore. And it's like I felt like less of a man, I felt like less of a brother, less of a son, And I'm like, I'm failing everybody. So when you push through that, I always put it away. I don't even think about it until I got to talk about it.

00:20:59
Speaker 2: And I think there's so and we have to do more of stop suppressing everything. You know, I feel like especially the black man, you guys have to be strong for everybody.

00:21:08
Speaker 3: And especially I wasn't a crowd and why you did this to me? Man? So no you could.

00:21:18
Speaker 2: But as the black man who is the light to everybody, you do hold a lot. And our society and our community has not until recently allowed the man to express or to cry or to feel anything. Because which like you when your dad came home, all right, man, has what you're gonna do? That's been the thing, you know, So you have to suck it up and keep going.

00:21:44
Speaker 3: That's that's really even now, like you are creative, there's no there's no salary that every month, I'm guaranteed on the first and the fifteenth, I'm gonna get this. Nope, I gotta wake up every morning and say, Yo, how much money am I going to make to be able survive for the next six months? Yes, next five years. You know. I have a wife, now, I have four kids. They're going to start going to college. We're looking at private school. I can't just sit back and wait, so sometimes it is like a lot of pressure. But I ain't gonna lie to you. Yo. Gods always had me. I've never not had what I needed. I may not have always had what I wanted when I wanted it, but I've always had what I needed. One story I always tell was when Kadeen, we didn't have insurance because the NFL, once you get cut, they drop you from insurance. So I have no insurance. Now I have a wife, now she's pregnant, I gotta find assurance. I'm like, okay, if I become sad, let me get in this commercial circuit. So now I'm hustling every other day going to commercials. Going to commercials. It was like, well, you got to make thirty four hundred dollars by October in order to qualify for next year's insurance. I book a Cheerios commercial. I get a check in the mail. It's for like thirty four seventy six. It was like almost perfect. K calls him and said, hey, my husband just got a check in the mail. And there's like, oh yeah, we see his name Ellis. He's qualified as he's sad, yelligsble. He joined sad, he get insurance. God has always done that for me, Always made away, always made away. There was times I lived, you know, through my credit card. I had my Square app, and I got kicked off the Square app because I used to cash advance myself money through my American Express. Sorry American Express, but I used to cash advance myself money to make it from month to month. And this is when I owned the gym and I was trying to keep the business going. But I also had employees, and there was times where it's like, shoot, it's a valley in training right now, but these people got to get paid. So I'm like, it's five thousand dollars, here's year thousand, here's your thousand. You know what I'm saying. I lived through that for like half a decade. Wow, wow, half a decade, just paycheck to paycheck. Just I never told Kay how bad it was, never told my parents. I just smiled and I used to be like are you doing it? And I being there like broken, like yep, I'm doing it. Yeah. But God always had me. God have me. So now with everything that's happening, I don't take it for granted. Yeah, yeah, I don't take it for granted. I still put a lot of money away. I've learned how to protect my peace but also protect my future. Yeah, so I give to people, but I don't give what I don't have. That's good, you know, I try to provide a way for myself to exist for years if everything is taken away, I got cut. So last year we went with the strike. Yeah, yeah, you know, I was able to continue my life as usual because you've been through that, and that's the message.

00:24:39
Speaker 2: That's the message message, because lot of times you're looking like, Lord, why have you forsaken me? But all he's doing is preparing you for something else so that the next time you're prepared for it. And do you know how seamless that strike was, Chris like? And that's I do not say that in a arrogant well I hear, I hear it was nothing but god like, I seriously that we made it through without missing a meal, without any lights going out anything, and life still went on. We still had an amazing life and that was nothing. That's how God, That's how my God works.

00:25:12
Speaker 3: I feel it is.

00:25:14
Speaker 1: I know it's a storm outside, but you're.

00:25:16
Speaker 3: Good Christ when people ask me, because spirituality always get questioned, right, you have a ton of people now who are like, there's access to everything, so we're no longer it's just crazy, we're no longer blind in the world. But I do realize it's the blind leading the blind. There's a ton of information. It's a lot of information and misinformation. But what I've realized is that you can't convince someone how to practice faith. All I can do is tell you why my faith is important. And there's moments like that, like there's no way. I've never never had a nine to five ever, ever, ever. The only nine to five I had was when I worked at Hagen Das when I was seventeen.

00:25:55
Speaker 1: Oh wow.

00:25:56
Speaker 3: Every time anything other than that, I've been a contractor, even in the NFL. You know, you're ultimately a private contract. They can cut at any point. I think it's the same way when I owned my gyms, I never worked hourly. I just God always found a way for me and put things in my path that I could utilize and create a tool. Like for example, I never thought i'd be a trainer. I hate school, went back to study exercise physiology and kinesiology because I needed to get my degree in certification to be able to make money to provide my family. God put that there. Never in a million years would I ever thought that I was going to do that. Right, But that's why I believe so much, Like no one can tell me no one can tell me he don't eat not real.

00:26:36
Speaker 2: No, Seriously, we talk about faith a lot, and I'm very open with you about my journey with God. And I brought you to church with me Sunday kkine and church is not something that you guys participated in often. No, So let's go back, because I know you were raising the church. What was that journey like and what made you be like I want to take a step back.

00:27:04
Speaker 3: Every elder in my family is a parishioner in the church, minister, music, choir director, boy scout leader. My father man a men's group called the Junior Layman. One of my aunt is a minister, like my grandfather's a deacon. Everybody's in the church. So I was in church every day Monday through Sunday. It was choir, rehearsal, Bible study, youth counsel, junior layman, boy scouts, Junior Layman again on a Saturday. Like, I was always in church. So while being there, I've always been inquisitive. God gave me messages, asked questions. I remember I was in Sunday school and I asked a question about the devil. We were learning about Lucifer being the angel of music. I said, so, if Lucifer is the angel of music and he went against God and became the devil, did God make a mistake because he didn't make him to be the angel of music? And I got I mean dad, and kicked out of Sunday School. And I was like, I'm asking a legitimate question because I don't understand. And then when no one could give me an answer or try to, they just because I was young. I was twelve when they just kind of pushed me aside as a problem child. That was the beginning of the end for me for church. And then my brother had a baby at seventeen. We had tattoos and braids. My father used to get scolded from the pool pit a lot, and I was like, yo, y'all just mad judgmental. I just felt like it was so much judgment. And I went to college and I started to study different religions because I always had a question for knowledge. I just wanted to know. So when I was studying Judaism and Catholicism and Christianity and what was the other one I heard about the three books the Old Testament, the Koran, and the Torah, and the one thing that stuck out to me was that those books tell the same historical story from different perspectives, So there has to be some truth in those books. But it also showed me that I can't tell other people how they're supposed to serve God.

00:29:10
Speaker 1: Yeah.

00:29:11
Speaker 3: God is omnipotent, right, He's the alphay a mayor the Almighty.

00:29:16
Speaker 1: Church.

00:29:16
Speaker 3: I was the omniperty, you know. Yeah, who am I to tell someone else that God didn't present himself to you that way?

00:29:23
Speaker 1: Right?

00:29:24
Speaker 3: So for me to tell the Jews or the Buddhists or the Catholics that you're wrong, My God is the right one to me just seems wrong. So I stayed away from creating a label on how I served, and I just seek knowledge. I see God wherever I am. So for me, it's like, if I'm in a church and it's a a Catholic church, let me hear the word. Yeah, you know what I'm saying. I've been to bar mitzvahs before, Yeah, So it's like, let me hear the word, whatever the word is. M let me not tune out what it is. So I stay away from church because I don't wanna limit myself. Yeah, but I'm not against going to church. Mm, you know what I'm saying.

00:29:56
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I I mean I I can say that a lot of people the reason why they aren't in church now to this day is because Christians are labeled judgmental.

00:30:04
Speaker 1: They feel judged. How you say, you're being judged from the pulpit.

00:30:07
Speaker 2: Yeah, A lot of people deal with it, and a lot of people deal with church hurt and things that happened in those walls that shouldn't happen, you know. And I think there's a lot of churches that are trying to change that imagery and want to really like make it a safe space that it's supposed to be.

00:30:26
Speaker 1: But I I understand that.

00:30:27
Speaker 2: I I had this conversation with my parents one day about I dated a Muslim before. And I tell everybody this all the time when people ask me, like, who was like the best guy you ever dated?

00:30:38
Speaker 1: And it was this guy who was a Muslim. He was the most loving.

00:30:41
Speaker 2: I'm talking about the way he just like look after me, the care for me, Like I felt that was like I really felt love. And my parents were like, you shouldn't be unequally yoked, and like they were really coming at me hard with the Bible and the scripture and I was like, well, he's such a good person, and they ended up meeting him. He came to my college graduation and they to this day love him, like absolutely love him. But what I learned as I was, I feel like, because I'm a Christian, I believe in Jesus. I believe he died for our sins, and that's what that's my belief. But I don't judge anybody for what they believe in, you know, because God said to love your neighbor as you love yourself. So I'm not here to judge you. I hope that you know what I'm saying. He did, He did say before he comes back, everyone is going to have the chance to proclaim that he.

00:31:29
Speaker 1: Is a savior.

00:31:30
Speaker 2: But I look at religion as a way to have some type of order in different cultures, and the main thing is to treat others as you would treat yourself. So I don't judge other people, but I know what I believe because you ask me, He's like, so what do you identify?

00:31:49
Speaker 3: And I was like, I'm a Christian.

00:31:50
Speaker 2: You know, I don't do the Baptist, Catholic, Methodist. I don't do that because I think by college. It was that's when more the non denomination it starts to rise. So that's where I am with it. But I don't judge anybody for what they choose to believe in, you know, I just I love everybody, and I just let my life shine and hope that Christ shines through that.

00:32:12
Speaker 3: Chris, I wish more of the world just exists in that type of space. Like if you think about the fact that we have holy wars, that is the biggest oxymoron I've.

00:32:24
Speaker 1: Ever heard in my life, a.

00:32:26
Speaker 3: Holy war, Like people should not be fighting people for beliefs. Now, there's a long history of why holy wars have started, you know, and that's very political. It's about land and stuff. But my biggest thing is it is not my job to tell you you're wrong for believing the way you believe. If what you believe keeps you in the sense of peace, allows you not to kill people, hurt people, steal from people, and just be a good person for humanity, then that's what you should live. Yeah, you know, and that's that was my biggest fear from church growing up. You know, my godmother's Catholic, and even in the Catholic Church, they believe that Jesus died on the cross. They don't believe in the resurrection, so they were just like, you believe in the resurrection, and I'm like yeah, And then I could feel the judgment and I'm like everywhere I go, like why I get judged. I remember one of my friends, Brandon, his father was Jewish, and he was just like, you're not Jewish, You're not of the chosen people, so you can't get access to the positive afterlife. And I'm like, all of y'all have some judgmental way of telling other people that they don't belong. I'm not subscribing to that. I'm not and I refuse to argue with people. I don't want to go back and forth. People argue religion all the time on social media, and I'm like, this is the dumbest thing that person believes in being a better person for whatever they believe, let them believe that. I don't argue with my parents. My parents will still go to church every Sunday, and they asked me why don't, and we have conversation. But I don't judge them, and I'm sure they don't judge me. They love me the way I am. They still will take my boys to church.

00:34:01
Speaker 2: Like, so, as you're bringing up your boys, like, what are you instilling them so they have their own walk? Because I know our parents was like, You're to be in church every year, every Sunday. It wasn't a choice if I wanted to get up on Sunday morning or Bible study on Wednesday nights.

00:34:15
Speaker 1: Or choir practice.

00:34:16
Speaker 2: You were going absolutely, So what do you do to instill that your boys have some type of relationship with God.

00:34:22
Speaker 3: That's still a conversation because my wife grew up Seven Day Adventists and I grew up Baptists. They study and practice on Saturday, the Sabbath, and we go to church on Sunday. Once again being judged. K's aunt. First time she met me, oh he goes to church on Sunday. That's the wrong day. I was like, oh gosh, here we go. Like here we go, here we But Jackson asked me the other day it was just like, Dad, we don't go to church. Her church people are mean. Wow. I said, no, bro, that's not the case. I said, church people have the same issues as other people. I said, Look, you get sick, you go to the hospital, right when you go to hospital, hospital people sick. What if I told you we're not going to the hospital to get you corrected because people are sick in the hospital, what would you think? He said, that don't make no sense. I said, exactly, why would you not go to church Because people in the church have issues. Everyone is going to get healed. So you're gonna run into people with issues in church the same way you got issues. And he said, oh, that makes sense. I said, we all got issues. We all need to heal. So I said, you when you want to go, when you're interested, you let me know and we'll look into it. So he was like all right, And I still ask him about it. We pray every night. We pray that the boys don't know they you know, that won't lay me down to sleep day. They all know that they understand who God is. So when they came to me and they said that I don't want to try Let's go find THEE. Yeah, but I'm not going to force it on them because I don't want them to feel like they have to believe something. I'm trying to raise kids with open minds.

00:35:49
Speaker 1: Yeah, I love that.

00:35:51
Speaker 2: So you you have four whole boys. They are all aspiring athletes. I feel like they all are walking in your shoes as a former as what is something that you instill in them? I know you're like really hard and got working out and training. They train like world class athletes.

00:36:08
Speaker 3: All the time at twelve seven six and two.

00:36:11
Speaker 2: Crazy yes, crazy, and they're all amazing.

00:36:16
Speaker 3: Thank you. Yeah, one is your god to.

00:36:19
Speaker 1: He is, that's a baby. He'd be righting there with him like, which I do too.

00:36:23
Speaker 3: He just he's like he reminds me of Cairo. He just sees everything he wants to emulate him.

00:36:27
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, So as a dad, like, what do you do to hey son, this is if this is what you want to do, I'm going to teach you how to properly go after that? And what do you do to try to protect them as well as they're navigating them.

00:36:38
Speaker 3: The biggest thing is the mental peace, because once you start playing sports, the first thing you focus on is other people. Who's better than me, who's cheering for me, who's hating on me? I gotta tell him, like, none of that matters. Yeah, you're kid, You're training to be better, so all you have to focus on is just getting better better every day. Yeah, And they just like that's it. I'm like, if you win, I don't care. If you lose, I don't care how bad you are when you start. I tend to show them me at different stages of my life, and I'm like, don't look at dad now and say, look, my father is successful. So if I'm not there tomorrow, I'm a failure. I show them when I got cut. We talk realistically, but Jackson will be like, you didn't score no touchdowns in the NFL. No, I didn't. That wasn't my version of success at that point in my life. You know, I'm having more of my successes now in a different part of my life because sports isn't everything. And that's the biggest thing. I tell them, like, you're doing this to challenge your will. The only thing we can control is ourselves. Sports, to me, is an ultimate way to test your discipline, challenge your will. That's the only reason why we're playing. You don't got to be a world class athlete. You playing for fun. You may be a CEO, you may be an artist, you know, be a pianist, you may be anything.

00:37:51
Speaker 2: So I want to go back to a challenging time in your life. We talked about your boys, and we talked about your responsibility to your wife. Yes, when you were playing for the Lions, you got injured. Yes, And you've been open about your addiction to painless and during that time, what was it that you were going through in the mental and was the pain pills something that you were using to suppress what you were going through that time?

00:38:15
Speaker 1: Excuse me, oh man.

00:38:18
Speaker 3: Funny thing is the pain man stuff started in college. Started in college. And to be honest, you don't realize when things start when you're going through life. It's not until you look back and you say, dang, it started then. But to be an undersized athlete playing bohemos sport, I was getting beat up all the time, and I was a free agent try out in college, I was a walk on, so I always had to prove. I always had to But that takes word telling your body. I had five knee surgeries, separated shoulder I played. I had to put a local interestdeur on this shoulder just to finish out my senior year. Big needle. So the medication was a numbing agent. And then once you're constantly numbing, your rate of the pain coming back. So you take pain pills ahead of time. So that the pain don't come. You know what I'm saying. It's not about being it's a proactive. Like if I don't take these four tilan on, I know I'm gonna start feeling it, So let me just take And this is how bad it was when I was in the league. I woke up, I took four thailand on just to get out of bed. I would get to practice, I'll take four time o before practice. I would take four tient at the end of practice, and I would take two Vikings to go to sleep.

00:39:26
Speaker 1: Jesus what every day?

00:39:29
Speaker 3: It's a viking in every day, two viking every day to go to sleep. Because in my mind it was like if I don't get sleep, my body won't heal. But I'm stressed out. I'm a rookie in the NFL. My body hurt. You can't sleep, you cannot I can't sleep, So I'm like, let me just take this so that I can't knock me out. Then you wake up and you do it all over again, and before you realize that, you're like, man, this is years of abusing pills to numb pain because you don't want to directly approach something. And that's what it was the number agent for me. Wasn't my pain. It was numbing the fact that I was stressed out and I wasn't happy playing in the NFL. I never want to be in the NFL.

00:40:07
Speaker 2: That is crazy because you don't have any young men like that's their dream and then for you to make it and be like, oh, they want to be here.

00:40:14
Speaker 3: I realized that when I was there, Wow, it don't matter how talented you are. I was faster than the fastest. I could jump high, I could catch the ball. It's a different type of love for the game that requires you to get up every day to continue to hone your skills. I did not want to do that. I wanted to act, I wanted to dance. I wanted to just be an entertainer. And as I was in the NFL, I just was not enjoying it. I was miserable, Like I was miserable. So the pain message like yo to guy, to go to sleep, get this fifteen thousand dollars for this week, go home and start your business. That's all it was for me. And that's no knock on the NFL, you know, but it was just a means to an end, and the pain pills was away for me to numb that pain so I can get through it, and then it's funny to be talking about spirituality. It was my receiver coach in college. I was back home. When you get back home. Now, I don't have access to the payments, right, So I'm at Kenneen's apartment and every night Cole sweats waiting up. She got to change the sheets. She's like, Devow, what is going on? And I'm like, oh, no, I don't know. So I don't have the payments. So I'm drinking alcohol now because that's the way that the pain I got money. I have nothing but time on my hands. Me and my friends would wake up at three in the afternoon. We as soon as we wake up, we would go get some tequila, orange juice, we take shots, we will go do whatever it is we was doing, and then we would party until four in the morning.

00:41:36
Speaker 1: Wow.

00:41:37
Speaker 3: Because me and Kay also weren't on good terms, so I was outside. I was outside just at this point, no, we were this was two thousand and six, we weren't married. This is our first year apart.

00:41:50
Speaker 1: Wow.

00:41:50
Speaker 3: And you know, distance causes riffs.

00:41:53
Speaker 1: In relationships, absolutely.

00:41:54
Speaker 3: So we were trying to figure out how to get back to where we were because for the last six months we were not living together. Then I moved back, dealing with all the stuff I was dealing with, I was a different person. She was like, yo, see me, you got PTSD. Then she said you're gonna have to get out. She was just like, not, like, you can't stay here sleeping all day, going out with your friends and coming in late and sleeping all day. So I was like, fine, I'll leave right. But then she's also taking care of me. She's like devoured. Every night, you're breaking out in cold sweat. And then one night she called my receiver coach and MYCIA coach, Jamie Elizondo, and he's a very spiritual guy, and this is crazy because based on his spirituality, he doesn't curse. But he cursed me out without cursing me out and was like, you have a responsibility to that woman.

00:42:40
Speaker 1: That's a powerful talking to.

00:42:44
Speaker 3: Not one curse word. And he said, you have a responsibility to that woman to be better, and you have a responsibility to yourself to be better for yourself, so get up. And I was just like I was just telling him everything I was going through, like it was just depression, like me and my girl on the same page. The Lions was looking to draft another receiver who they ended up drafting Calvin Johnson. I had had to deal with playing with Marcus and now I got to deal with playing with Calvin Johnson. I already dealing with Megatron, the receiver of all receivers. I was depressed.

00:43:16
Speaker 1: Wow.

00:43:17
Speaker 3: And he was just like, that's not a good enough reason for you to lay in that bed and do the things you do. And he once again like my aunt Debbie, you know how you.

00:43:27
Speaker 1: Was raised, how you were raised. Wow.

00:43:29
Speaker 3: And it was just like a And from that moment when my alcohol got in the gym stopped taking any pain. I don't even take turning on no more.

00:43:38
Speaker 2: Yeah you don't because I was like, you'll have a headache, just be like nope nope.

00:43:43
Speaker 3: I'm like, you don't want to take nothing, Nope nope. Yeah.

00:43:47
Speaker 2: That's discipline, though, and that's really saying, hey, I don't want to get back to that space because you already know how dependent you can be on that.

00:43:55
Speaker 3: Because you see, even when I talk about it, I try not like it's so like dark that I'd be like, I'm not gonna cry I'm not gonna cry. I don't ever want to be back there, especially have my kids see me like that. Yes, like four young men, they're gonna look at me like I looked at my father, and I used to blame my father. I was like, my father used to walk around and he was perfect all the time. He used to put up a facade, he put up a front. But now I see why, because that's the standard that I lived up to. I was like, my dad does not do these things, so I'm not doing it. So with my boys, I'm with them to have the same standard.

00:44:30
Speaker 1: So do you I want to talk to you about that.

00:44:31
Speaker 2: So when it comes to black men and you have four young black men that you're raising up and feeling like they can express themselves, feeling like they don't have to be perfect all the time, feeling that they don't have to walk in.

00:44:46
Speaker 1: This facade, and like I got it all together?

00:44:49
Speaker 2: What are you doing to make sure that they have a balance that of being a man, but also showing that it's okay to cry, It's okay to say, Hey, this is how I'm feeling right now.

00:44:57
Speaker 3: This is the first thing every day when I see mysel sons come here. Did I tell you I love you today? Did you tell me you love me today? Get daddy a kiss. I kissed my sons. I don't care what people think about it. I kiss my sons, I hold my sons. I hug my sons. And when I hug them, it's not like a church like you. No, it's come here. I hold you tight. You know I love you? Right? You love me? Yeah? Were you great in school today? Tell me some things that you didn't do great? They tell me that's what we're gonna do that, we're gonna work on it, and that's it, and also put them in spaces where they don't have to like we grew up so different, like in the South, Jim Crow South, because remember I was born in eighty four, like Jim Crow South.

00:45:41
Speaker 1: Is not that only twenty years?

00:45:44
Speaker 3: Right? So my grandparents raised me in an environment where you know, when you're around white people, you keep your head down, you be quiet. When we get dressed up, we're gonna put on slacks, we're gonna put on shoes. You yes, sir, you, yes, ma'am everybody, And it just always put me in a place where I'm like, are these people better than me? Is that why I have to act like this, you know what I'm saying. And if you think about it, that type of indoctrination teaches you. You know, they would say you gotta humble yourself. Why are black men always being told that we have to humble ourselves? As an athlete, I watch it right, Cam Newton does the Superman he need to be humble. Aaron Rodgers does the discount double check and he gets praised for it. I'm not doing that to my boys. We walk in every environment in our truest, blackest self. What do you want to wear, Jackson? I just want to wear my flip flops and a hoodie. We we wearing that. And when you walk in there, you look people in the eyes and you impress them with your intellect, not trying to assimilate to what version they think you have to be in order to be accepted. And they're just like okay, and k is on board too, because I'm just so tired and it's exhausting to try to exist in someone else's world. Now, this is my world world, you know what I'm saying, Like, Noble, my God created this world for me to exist the same way you exist. Exactly so why I got a humble myself and be all this and be quiet, noble. I'm speaking my piece. If you don't like it, I'll go where I am accepted. Yeah, and it's celebrated, not just tolerated. And that's what I'm teaching my boys.

00:47:20
Speaker 1: I love that.

00:47:21
Speaker 3: That is so good.

00:47:22
Speaker 2: Your beautiful wife, Kadeen. You guys have known each other since elementary school? Yes, been married since how many years?

00:47:30
Speaker 1: Now?

00:47:31
Speaker 3: Let me get it right now?

00:47:32
Speaker 1: Right?

00:47:32
Speaker 3: Get it? Twenty two years? Okay, we've been married thirteen years?

00:47:36
Speaker 1: Okay, thirteen years.

00:47:38
Speaker 2: Was there any moment in your relationship that was super hard that actually helped shape you as a man that you are today?

00:47:44
Speaker 3: Yes, the moment that I wasn't able to do all the things that I thought made me a man and to still have a woman be there in her feminine energy, yeah, and not have to like belittle me or say why you ain't doing this? That moment there showed me what true partnership was. You know, because imagine you're in the NFL. I'm making half a million dollars. Whatever you want, baby, we go ahead, we go ahead. You don't want to vak, you know what I'm saying, I'm feeling like a man. I'm feeling like I'm providing this lifestyle and then all of it get stripped away and you got to take that same woman from your culder sack, your forty five hundred square foot home in Canon, Michigan, and you got to go back to the hood. We lived on New York Avenue between Dean and Bergen. It was called Murderer's Role. Saint Mark's right there. Saint Mark's was rough. First year we didre was two murders in the summer time.

00:48:40
Speaker 1: Oh my goodness.

00:48:41
Speaker 3: And I'm there with my wife who grew up in the house in Kanarsi, and she's just there like, okay, so what we're doing riding? Yeah, just there. And I'm like, I don't even feel like a man right now and you're just here. That made me like so dead. Catered to my marriage, you know what I'm saying, Because you know, I watched the show and Tyler was talking about what women need and what men need, and so much of it was misconstrued. And I watched it and I got a completely different.

00:49:16
Speaker 1: Message from it when you watch the whole.

00:49:18
Speaker 3: When I watched the episode, when I got a completely different message He was not telling women to accept nothing, but what he was saying is understanding when someone meets you at your worth. Your worth may not be a dollar amount exactly. You know what I'm saying, That's what I took from you. But I also do understand when people respond to things, it's often a projection of what they're going through. Even without comments, right, someone may say something crazy in our comments in the past, I'll be like, is this supposed the problem? Why they ain't? But that was like, man, I wonder what that person has been through that that's what they received from that, you know, It's it's like dang, Like sometimes the look at the comments, I'm like, man, that person must really be hurting. And sometimes I really want to reach out, you know what I'm saying, like, what's going on? I hope that men in particular understand that you are not defined by your wallet.

00:50:07
Speaker 1: Yeah, yep, you know what I'm saying.

00:50:09
Speaker 3: You're not defined by what you can provide for a woman financially, but you are defined by the type of peace you can provide for your family.

00:50:18
Speaker 2: And I think a lot of times men put more on themselves than what the woman actually needs from them. In fact, yeah, this list, like I gotta got this, and she's like, no, this is I need this and you're not doing this.

00:50:27
Speaker 3: I'm gonna tell you right now. As much as I used to make jokes because it's what people need to understand too, a lot of our content was out of jest, and I used to make jokes with my wife wanted this big wedding, and da da da. I wanted a big wedding because I wanted to prove to everybody else the type of man I was to provide that type of wedding for my wife. And it takes maturity to get and be like, you know what, di val, that wasn't her, that was you the whole time you bullt her the big ring, you bull her the shoes. You wanted to get her these things, and then when you couldn't, you then blamed her. Yeah, because like you made me buy these things. She never never never made me do anything.

00:51:05
Speaker 1: Wow.

00:51:07
Speaker 3: And I hope young men take from that that there's more that you can provide a woman and just a paycheck, like, like, there's so much more. You and I talk about this all the time. They're going through your dating journey and me being married. We talk about what you know, because sometimes even now I'm going to turn forty, I'm like, see, man, I don't know what help me understand what k may be going through. And then You'll just be like, well, you have you ever thought about this? And I'm like, no, I never ever thought about it. And then I'm just like, I still have a lot to learn at forty, and I'm just open to it. I want to learn. I just want to I want to continue to just seek knowledge and get a better understandable life. Is I love that, you know.

00:51:53
Speaker 1: Where do you see yourself in five to ten years?

00:51:57
Speaker 3: Five to ten years, I see myself headlining my feature film with a production company. I see myself carving out time to spend six months guaranteed with my boys. Every year. I'm making a point to not ever get so involved in my career that I forget about them. And I realize that now, like this past weekend, had an audition to do nothing is more important than me to my boys. I told my agent, I say, y'all have to get that to you later. Jackson got a tournament, Kyra wants to get trained the Code of GOT speech therapy. Kaz wants to do art and I have to do those things. And you know what I learned, people will bend to what you need. You know what my agent said, I can get you three more days. You know what I'm saying. It's like yo, So I can live in this entertainment industry still be a family man. I could still take my wife on dates every weekend because I'm not filming in Bangladesh for a year and a half. Oh okay, I can do this. You know what I'm saying. I can do this, and that's what I want to do. I want to be not one of the biggest actors of all time. I want to be one of the greatest fathers. I want. I want my boys to be like my dad, rock with me. And most importantly, I want to be that husband that my wife can say he helped us down. That's what I want.

00:53:15
Speaker 1: I love it.

00:53:16
Speaker 3: Yes, how about you five years?

00:53:20
Speaker 2: Five years? Oh my goodness. In five years. I want to be a successful business woman. I have some things that I'm working on. I want to, of course, start my own movies. I want to be executi produce. I want to direct you Will. I want to turn this into a talk show.

00:53:38
Speaker 3: You Will. I come in here and see this, I'm like, God, this is already a talk show. This is Chris, you know how proud? Thank you so much? Like we talked so much about what we want to do and then we're just doing it.

00:53:51
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's what it's about. Execution.

00:53:54
Speaker 3: Do you want to find love?

00:53:56
Speaker 1: I do?

00:53:56
Speaker 3: You will?

00:53:57
Speaker 1: I do want to find love.

00:53:59
Speaker 2: I mean it's say by my heart, just like as soon as you say that one, because I.

00:54:03
Speaker 1: Know you, I do. I do.

00:54:06
Speaker 3: Can't you can't? You love people so much. I watch you with all of your friends. I mean that ship, that's how we got close. You look out for everybody. He was looking out for me. I'm getting just Chris, you know, I mean to be honest, like people need to know. When I came here and I was trying to figure out things and do things for Kate when she was pregnant. You were my go to. You're my go to. You the one that got me the get cardier she carried ten months. You need to get there. What are you doing?

00:54:40
Speaker 1: Man?

00:54:41
Speaker 3: You love people so much that God Remember I told you that God always got me. I can tell God's favorites. God gonna have you when you at least expect it. He's he's gonna have you when you and he gonna be tall, dark and handsome. It's like you want he probably gonna play ball when dunk on his ass, Zach attack. I see it for you, though, I see appreciate you're too great. You're too great a woman, not too you know that.

00:55:11
Speaker 1: I appreciate that.

00:55:12
Speaker 3: And then Kaz and the code is gonna be the ring barrass love you to death.

00:55:18
Speaker 1: That no when listen and Cairo.

00:55:21
Speaker 2: When I walked into K's dressing room at the live show, when I say the way, Caro ran to me.

00:55:27
Speaker 3: He was oh yeah. I was like, and they haven't seen you minute. You're working? Yeah, why you haven't found love yet? Yeah, you're focusing on what you focused on. Yeah, there's there's nothing wrong with that. Yeah, it's not like you, Like, I don't believe age is really a thing. I understand the biological clock for women, it's a real thing. But with modern technology and with you taking care of your body the way you do, you'll be fine. If that's what you choose to have children, you know you may not want.

00:55:58
Speaker 2: You If every day it's a dim feeling, when do you go home?

00:56:06
Speaker 1: Okay?

00:56:07
Speaker 3: I see I stay with a toddler for too long. You blame I ain't haveing, no freaking when these kids are emotional terrorists. They are Toddler's a no joke. Thank you.

00:56:18
Speaker 1: I appreciate that coming for you.

00:56:21
Speaker 3: Come on, man, come on, I thank you for this. You made me cry. You made me cry. I said I wasn't gonna cry. She made me cry.

00:56:38
Speaker 2: So God, thank you so much for this day. Thank you for letting the val make it here safely. They got to ask that you just guide this interview or not the interview. But it's a conversation between two friends. Let this conversation help others, inspire others, and bring them closer to You, Dear God, and everything that we do. Let him get where he's to go safely after this, and Jesus, then we pray, Amen.

00:56:58
Speaker 3: Oh God, Jesus.

00:57:00
Speaker 1: Eight