Boris Kodjoe

Secular artists see themselves with performance; they are more self involved, presentational.

As part of my relationship with my wife and my daughter, and we share everything and talk about everything.

Everybody goes through obstacles and problems and issues and turn their backs on people that we are fond of and love just because we hurt; and everybody goes through that.

Gospel artists are messengers; they are vessels of a message.

I'm in the booth and first of all, I'm from Germany and I had never heard a gospel in my life.

I don't care if you are religious or not and I think the message is that at the end of the day, everybody has to mature and everybody has to heal and mend their own injuries, emotional injuries, on their own pace.

I had to study acting to basically educate myself.

I just didn't know who was going to be my partner. I knew that once I had grown to be a man that I was going to attract the person that I deserved to be with, or deserved to be with me.

I knew immediately that she was going to be in my life forever. I didn't know in what capacity, but I knew that I had found someone who was going to be close to me for a long time. We became great friends fast.

I know I can act and it doesn't matter where you come from.

I was looking to show people I could act. I was looking for something that would take me away from the whole hunk riding off into the sunset thing that people wanted me to play after Brown Sugar.

I went back and researched the history of gospel; where it came from, slavery times, communicating with each other without their master knowing what they are saying, and that gospel artists view themselves differently.

Let's say black, the whole black religious experience, here, is very impressive to me, because when I first arrived I realized that people carry their faith with so much pride.

Yet I wanted to have children, and I knew that was my purpose, but I wasn't going to settle.

Some of the best actors in the world are very exterior actors, Anthony Hopkins being one of them. He knows exactly how to turn his face to get a certain expression. He knows exactly what to do with eyes, and with his voice. It's very exterior.

Sometimes in the black culture, being raised as an independent woman is misconstrued as someone who doesn't need a man. I think that's wrong. I think we all need someone.

The Southern Baptist Church is a specific culture in itself. So, I had to study, talk to people, watch tape and go to performances to see how Gospel artists move compared to secular artists.

The whole time I was modeling, I had a place in Paris, and a place in New York, and I was really single.

There was a certain point in my life where I had to decide that I was going to take my future and Nicole's and not wallow in what happened to me because when you do that, you just keep repeating what's been happening and at some point you have to make a choice.

We have relationships and know the exact outcome with that person because we don't deal with ourselves and don't deal with our issues and end up being attracted to the same person or the person is attracted to our energy.

Yet, that's what studios do. If one thing works, they'll keep doing it till it runs its course and people aren't interested anymore.

You can be very independent, but admit to wanting somebody close to you and that's what me and my wife have. We don't need each other but we want to be with each other and I think it's important to educate the kids with that.

Don't ignore the past, but deal with it, on your own pace. Once you deal with it, you are free of it; and you are free to embrace your life and be a happy loving person because if you don't, the past will come back to haunt and keep coming back to haunt you.

I love the fact that we, as black people, carry our faith with us. We share it and embrace it and love it and talk about it because we talk about everything else and why not that and that was the first impression that I had that really touched me.

We're very open and outspoken about our faith and our beliefs. We also talk about our doubts, our moments of insecurities. We talk about it all day, how we're inspired by God. We recognize little miracles every day, and that's how we're raising our daughter.