The Breakfast Club - Keep It Positive, Sweetie: The Business of Betting on Yourself w/ Brian Jordan Jr.

Episode Date: December 14, 2025

The Black Effect Presents... Keep It Positive, Sweetie! In this episode of 'Keep It Positive, Sweetie,'host Crystal Renee Hayslett sits down with the multi-talented Brian Jordan Jr., known for his role on Tyler Perry's 'Sisters.' Brian shares his journey from his childhood in Louisiana, through his struggles and triumphs in the entertainment industry, to his recent ventures, including his passion project 'Riley the Musical.' He reflects on the impact of Hurricane Katrina, his educational path, and the importance of black representation in theater. Brian also opens up about the personal challenges he has faced, such as body image issues and the pressures of public life. With a focus on his growth, faith, and the people who have supported him along the way, YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@BreakfastClubPower1051FMSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Short on time, but big on true crime. On a recent episode of the podcast, Hunting for Answers, I highlighted the story of 19-year-old Lechay Dungey. But she never knocked on that door. She never made it inside. And that text message would be the last time anyone would ever hear from her. Listen to Hunting for Answers from the Black Effect Podcast Network on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.

What are the cycles fathers passed down that sons are left to heal? What if being a man wasn't about holding it all together, but learning how to let go? This is a space where men speak truth and find the power to heal and transform. I'm Mike De La Rocha. Welcome to Sacred Lessons. Listen to Sacred Lessons on the IHart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Dr. Lari Santos from the Happiness Lab here. It's the season of giving, and this year my podcast, The Happiness Lab,

is partnering with Give Directly, a nonprofit that provides people in extreme poverty with the cash they need as part of the PODS Fight Poverty campaign. Our goal this year is to raise $1 million, which will bring over 700 families out of extreme poverty. Your donation will put cash directly in the hands of these families in need, and they'll get to decide how to use it, whether that's school transportation, purchasing livestock or starting a business. Plus, if you're a first-time donor, your gift will be matched by giving multiplier, which means more money for those in need.

Visit givedirectly.org slash happiness lab to learn more and to donate. That's give directly.org slash happiness lab. Hi, I'm Radhidavlukaya and I am the host of a really good cry podcast. This week I am joined by Anna Runkle, also known as the crappy childhood fairy, a creator, teacher, and guide helping people heal from the lasting emotional wounds of unsafe or chaotic childhoods. But talking about trauma isn't always great for people. It's not always the best thing.

About a third of people who are traumatized as kids feel worse when they talk about it. Get very dysregulated. Listen to a really good cry on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Hi, I'm Dr. Priyanka Wally. And I'm Hurricane DeBolu. On our new podcast Health Stuff, we demystify your burning health questions. You'll hear us being completely honest about our own health.

My residency colon was like a cry for help, honestly. And you'll hear candid advice and personal stories from experts who want to make health care more human. I feel like they never felt like I truly belonged in medicine. We want to make health less confusing and maybe even a little fun. Find health stuff on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Calling all my sweeties to the forefront, I'm your host Chris Renee Hazett and this. This is the Keep It Posit Sweetie Show. Welcome to the Keep It Posit Sweetie Show, the place where we heal, grow, and learn together.

This week's guest is a multi-talented actor, singer, director, and storyteller. Brian Jordan, Jr., you know him from Tyler Perry's sisters, but today we are diving into the man behind the music, the message, and the movement. Kip's family, without further ado, please welcome my dear friend, my clothesmate. Brian Jordan, Jr. Oh, close me. Hi, friend. Hello. You're here.

Finally. Finally. Finally. Look at us. Look at us. Look at us. All grown up. We've come a long way since 2019.

Yeah. A long, long way. A long way. People have no idea. But we're going to get into it. Absolutely. But you are from Louisiana. Yes.

Baton Rouge by way of New Orleans. Absolutely. A lot of people know you from the hit show sisters. They know. know you as Marie's Webb, but I want to know Brian Jordan Jr. I know Brian, but I want the audience to know who you are. Take us back to Young Brian. We want to just build this whole conversation. I really want to know where you come from, who you are at your core, and how it shaped who you are today. Wow, Young Brian, he was something else. I've always been a kid that

had a big opinion and big dreams, whatever it was. I wanted to be so many different things. I wanted to be Michael Jackson for like the first six years. years in my life and then I wanted to be a football player and then not and then I wanted to be one again and then I realized that I wasn't going to be professional but I did play but I grew up in rural Louisiana moved to Baton Rouge after the hurricane and I stayed in Baton Rouge for college and I grew up in a big family yeah four brothers and sisters a single mother and low socioeconomic but I knew that I wanted to do more. I knew that I wanted to be more,

but I just couldn't quite figure out what there more was until I went to college. And then I found the theater. The theater. I found the theater. And I was able to understand just the dexterity of myself whenever I could play different characters.

And I met Debbie Allen, my freshman year of college, because she was doing residencies in Baton Rouge, and I auditioned. And she saw some stuff. in me because I couldn't dance or I really didn't have any training, but she saw something in me that she knew could be trained. Wow, that's important.

Yeah, absolutely. And so shout out to Debbie Allen. I mean, she's everybody's goat. I mean, she doesn't get the credit as she deserves, but I'm going to always give her credit. And she gave me so many opportunities to train, and she guided me in the right directions to go to drama school in New York. And the rest is history, but little Brian still kind of lives in me today. He was funny, and he loved to eat, he loved to cook, and he loved to throw it on, you know, clothes and all the things.

Yes. So, yeah. I love that. You talked about moving to Baton Rouge after the hurricane, and you're talking about Hurricane Katrina. Yes. That was something that the entire world saw happen, but we didn't live it. Yes. Can you take us back to that time, and was it like what we saw on the news or was it?

Because I recently watched a documentary on Netflix, and it was heartbreaking. to like really hear the testimonies of the victims of Hurricane Katrina. Can you talk about your experience? Absolutely. You know, I can't watch the documentaries. I think I watched one way back. It's been 20 years. Yeah.

And I was in the ninth grade whenever it happened. Wow. I often like to speak to the documentaries because I think that it was such a subcultural disaster that the rest of the world can digest it. as a thing that seemed so far away. I feel like it put New Orleans and Louisiana because it was, you know, the southern cities of Louisiana, Lafayette, Baton Rouge, and New Orleans were heavily impacted.

And then there was another hurricane that came right after it, then nobody talks about Gustav. And so we went a long time, I mean, beyond what you saw, like the filled Superdome and the people swimming to safety and being on the roofs, the larger issue was the lack of support that we had thereafter. and electricity was gone for, I think, that we went almost two months without lights. And obviously the water was messed up if it was on and there was food insecurity

and people were looking for housing and people had to start their lives over. They lost everything and starting in new schools. Just think about all the kids who had to start in new schools. And so it's something that was very difficult. But I think that that type of disaster, and this may sound morbid, but I always think about those type of disasters happening. I could, I could say that I've lived through about four hurricanes that weren't as bad, but we've lost electricity for a very extended period of time. It's been floods. You know, Louisiana's just that type of place. But when you go into like a COVID, that is a

disaster where you see the loss of lives and you're able to conflate that with something that you were able to experience as a child, I think that that's what helped me to kind of get through it because disaster wasn't a stranger to me, I know. And there's always a silver lining on the cloud, and I think that clouds are apropos to a hurricane because it was scary. I mean, as a kid and just there wasn't enough warning. I always say that there wasn't enough warning and you look up one day and it's one thing and then the next and it's disaster and you're like trying to get out and trying to find somewhere to go and trying to find food and water and shelter and light and just a lot of families who can't afford to just get up and evacuate, you know.

But thank God we made it. And I didn't lose any family members. Okay. And Katrina, thank God. But it was a difficult time, and it's difficult to watch. I mean, there are even times, and I know that you and I share this experience when we were housed in quarantine. I was going to ask you about that because that was, they were basically like FEMA trade lost. Absolutely.

They were exactly like them. I remember you making a statement about that. You were like, I couldn't sleep. Yeah. The smell of it. The smell of it. It smelled like a FEMA trailer. It smelled like that type of thing.

And just a reminder and those small reminders. I mean, even when it rains, I don't like to drive and it rains. And I think that that has something to do with that. And thank God for therapy to work through those things. Yes, absolutely. But, yeah, we just, Hurricane Katrina was huge. But, I mean, living in Baton Rouge, Gustav was actually more impactful in the aftermath. And there was a huge flood that happened in 2016, I think, and people lost everything.

It's just, you know, it's a constant struggle with the sea level being so low. Yes. And not to talk too much about it, but just the rebuilding. I always like to say this. The rebuilding has been so challenging for the city, for the state, still now. I mean, 20 years later, it's just not the same. And economically, it's not the same. And so, you know, shout out to Louisiana.

Yeah, shout out Louisiana. We went for Essence Festival this year. and there's so much culture and so much history there. And the food is amazing. The food. Yes, so good. Your journey took you from LSU to NYU and Tish and then to Debbie Allen's School of Dance.

How did that journey shape the artist that you are today? I think that when you live in Louisiana and you stay in Louisiana for undergrad or you stay there for college, when you move somewhere else, it's like living in another country. Louisiana is such a cultural there has such a cultural difference in the rest of the world

but also I think that I went to an all-black high school and when I left that all-black high school and went to college at a PWI and then to drama school at another PWI in a very white-based industry theater I learned so much about what my place was in the world

and what I had to offer the world and what people felt that I had to offer the world and all those type of things And so understanding that there was a world outside of just the segregated Louisiana that I had grown up in was interesting. But then, you know, there was even a thing with like language. You know, I'm from Louisiana and I had an accent. And it was trained out of me. And so people always talk about the way that I speak now.

They're just like, I can't tell that you're from Louisiana. And I'm like. But you can do it. Hit it one time. Just one time for you, baby. It's just that, be quiet, Christop. No. But, you know, just those things, it was an assimilation that I learned.

and just being a black man in a super white space coming from Louisiana where I went to a school that I was celebrated. I was at an all-black school, you know, and just to understand that the celebration was over when I went into manhood was so jarring. And it changed my mind just about how I wanted to live my life and the things that I wanted to do and the stories that I wanted to tell. Yes. And the people that I wanted to tell the stories to. And I think that I've been blessed to be able to have the avenues to tell those stories. That journey was interested in, you know, I spoke a little bit about Debbie Allen, but she's really the reason that I've clung to arts education.

And that has really helped me to, like, navigate my path. Because I didn't, coming from Louisiana, it was either you an athlete that did well, you work at the plant. And if you was a girl, you was becoming a nurse. And that's just what it was. It's industrial, and nobody's going to say, hi, I want to be a TV star. Right. You know, like, shut up, you know.

But that's what I said, and God saw fit, you know, for it to happen. But it's because I was able to navigate through LSU and then take whatever money and whatever thing I knew that Ms. Allen could help me know and go to New York and struggle with that. Yeah, New York in itself is a struggle. And then going to school and... Absolutely, absolutely. And being kicked out of school and having to go back and I went through all the things.

Yeah. Let's talk about that. Yeah, so. Because a lot of people think it's just a smooth journey. They don't understand the ebbs and flows. Oh, there's so much in this country when it comes to education. First off, the price is astronomical. Ridiculous.

And so when you decide that you're going to do something and then you can get scholarship money or a fellowship, which is what I had, you have to follow rules. And some of the rules where, like, you can't audition. But, of course, I was like, I'm going to, I want to audition for things. Oh, wow. So you couldn't audition while in school. They didn't want you to audition. or work on the things when you were in school. Wow.

And so I was doing a fellowship, and I lost it, and I lost the money, and I couldn't pay anymore. And so I had to not do, I mean, I couldn't pay for it, so I had to stop going. So I didn't get kicked out. Yeah. They just kicked out the money. Right. And so, yeah, I had to figure it out.

And I spent some nights on the train in New York. Wow. Just trying to figure it out. And some of my family probably won't even know this, because I was determined. not to go home. I would spend, I mean, there's friends that I have in New York that I always have who we would get a dollar slice of pizza and cut it and have. I've slept on trains.

I've slept on sofas. I've done the things until I just couldn't do it anymore. And thank God that I had sense enough to move to Atlanta after all that, you know, because it helped me to get a foundation and get credits and just do the things. But New York was hard. New York made a man out of me. I always say that. Listen, if you can survive in New York,

You can literally make it anywhere. That's right here. That's the truth. You carry so much confidence, and you're not a monolith, and you boldly walk in every single space that God is created for you. In finding that, because you talked about how you weren't celebrated once you left your all-black school, and finding yourself and finding that confidence, what has been some of the biggest struggles that you faced navigating this industry?

I think that the first thing about confidence is, it hasn't always been there, even if I pretended that it was there. There was something that I was determined to achieve, and I didn't really know how I was going to achieve it, but I felt like if I at least pretended to believe in myself, that somebody would believe it. And so I would pretend a lot.

If I could be honest, I didn't really believe that I could have all this until maybe 2018, and then my life changed right after that. Whenever I decided, whenever I believed for real, because I think that we spend so much time trying to convince other people that we don't even do the work to make ourselves believe. And so belief to me, now that I understand what belief

is to me, it is understanding that whatever you desire, you deserve it. No matter what the odds are, no matter what has happened before you or what will happen after you, what you deserve is what you desire. And so then that came the aplum. And so the challenges

that I have with the aplum is people are just like, Brian, overconfident maybe. Maybe Brian is arrogant, maybe Brian, because I am someone who, and I've grown to be better about it. But in my youth, I found myself in spaces where I was the youngest person a lot. And I had a lot of opinions and I had a lot to say. And older people are just like, hey, you know, you don't know everything. And I thought I knew a lot, you know. And I've learned that I didn't know. But the challenges were continuing to be confident. in the face of opposition, in the face of failure, in the face of nose, which you know, you know the nose. And when you're black and trying to tell the stories that may not only speak to black people or trying to tell the black stories to the people who don't understand blackness or who don't want to understand blackness, that's challenging.

And it's still a challenge. I think that we'll leave here with it being a challenge because that's just what we've been born into. And it's a special challenge. It's one that is unique. and rich with tradition and overcoming. And so what makes us any different? Right. That's so true.

You talked about 2018 was the year you actually started believing in yourself. And in 2019, you were cast on the number one show, hit show, for nine seasons, Palopary Sisters, as Maurice Webb. I remember sitting in the back of the room the day that you did your audition. And I was like, that's Maurice. Wow. Yes, no, I knew it. I was like, that's him.

And I just saw it. I want you to take us back to that day when you got the audition and you knew you were coming to Tyler Perry Studios. From the moment you woke up, what was that day like? The moment I woke up, I actually was in New Orleans that day because I was filming a film called Christmas Bells, which was actually on BET Plus now. I think they were just filming and trying to sell it then.

And I was flown in because I had done a self-tape for sisters to audition for Calvin. and for, it was Calvin and for Aaron. And then Maris came to me after those two auditions. And they were like, well, Maris is recurring. And I was like, I want to do the men who are going to have a job. Like, I don't want to do, like, God bless Maris and whatever he got going on. I'm trying to be on a TV show.

Come on. You know? And so I actually got to Atlanta. And I was living in Atlanta at the time. And so I went and got in my car to drive to the audition. And the car wouldn't start. I don't know if you remember the car that I was driving whenever we did season one. I remember it was like a shoestering or something.

I would call it Corollin Martin. That was the name of my car. And Corollin Martin was a Toyota Corolla that was actually gifted to me by Brittany Inge. Shout out to Britney Inge. I got a call her name. It was gifted to me. Her and her mom said, how much money you got? Wow.

And I said nothing. And they gifted me a car. And that car, you know, she had lived her life. Corollin Martin. Corollin Martin is non-binary. And so Corollin Martin had a shoestring tied to the hood under the hole in the hood to the rest of the car

because the hood would just do whatever he wanted to do. And that day it didn't want to start. And so I had to get a jump before I came. It was the battery. Got a jump, and then I drove to Tyler Perry Studios. And I asked God, I said, hey, God, my guy, I need you to get me there and back. And I'm good.

and he got me there. And I thought I went in there with four, it was Maurice, Gary, Aaron, and Calvin. That's with the four characters. A lot of the guys were called back for a lot of characters. And I was sitting there learning. It was about 60 pages of stuff. Sitting there going through it and seeing all these,

you know, you go to a Tyler Perry audition, everybody was swole up and buffed and I'm just like, Hi, guys. It's me from the theater. And so I went into the audition and Mr. Perry was, in there. I didn't know that he would be there. And he's like, we have Maurice for him. I'm like, okay. And so he's like,

can you read this? He gave me a new side that I had never seen before. Can you read this? And I'm like, yeah. And I co-read it. Yeah. And that was it. And I did not think that I got the job. What? Do you know that when I don't tell this story often enough, but I left out of that room. It was a big theater, y'all. And it was full of people, but you can't really see him.

could just see heads in the shadows and there's this light on you and I remember leaving there and then right after I left Mr. Perry left you're like I said I didn't drove him out of here I thought that I'd ran him up out of there but I guess I learned that he had saw what he needed to see yes and and what a blessing that was because I did book Maurice which was the recurring character but after my audition it changed and it wasn't recurring anymore and I think that he went from seven episodes to 17 come on and the rest is his history. Here we are 200 episodes later, more than 200 episodes. It's wild. It is wild. And I'm old. You are still young. Thanks.

Everybody, when you go out the streets, Maurice, Maurice, but who is the man behind Maurice that people may not know? Because some people cannot differentiate the character who Brian George Jr. is to Maurice well. Ah, that's good. Yeah, Maurice is such an escape from who I am. Yeah. And I think that we have so many things in common, you know, obviously, like, humor is something that I, and then you know, you know, I love to be funny. I love to laugh. Yeah. But Brian is a person who has such a big heart for people.

You do. And I just love to take care of people. It's my love language. I love to cook for people and do things for, I just love it. I love big events. I love sports. I love talking crap. I love spades.

I love, you know, to work out. In like the last year, I really falling in love with that, which we know Maris don't love that. And Brian is someone who is who stands on the shoulders of a lot of black women

who have shown me the importance of what a man can be to a woman in a friendship, in as a brother. And I think that Maris is kind of that too. Yeah. But I know that. And I'll never stop talking about just how black women have helped me to build my career.

And, I mean, obviously gave me life. But in the absence of like a father figure and just other people around me who could be father figures, even in my career, like black women have been, you know, a God in light. When I talk about Debbie Allen, I'll continue to say her name because she just saw it in me to slap me upside my head, you know, and curse me out enough so that I knew what, you know, I understood the values. So now I'm probably harder than she is because it's that old school training that got me to the point where I am. But Brian is a lover of God and a love of people and a love of the art. Yes, he is.

And a lover of fine things and beautiful clothes, fine people and fine food, you know, fine film, yeah. Fine. Fine. Very fine. I love that. What up, y'all? It's your boy, Kevin on stage. I want to tell you about my new podcast called Not My Best Moment, where I talk to artists, athletes, entertainers, creators, friends, people I admire who had massive success about their massive failures.

What did they mess up on? What is their heartbreak? And what did they learn from it? I got judged horribly. The judges were like, you're trash. I don't know how you got on the show. Boo, somebody had tomatoes. No, I'm kidding.

But if they had tomatoes, they would have thrown the tomatoes. Let's be honest. We've all had those moments we'd rabbit. forget. We bumped our head. We made a mistake. The deal failed through. We're embarrassed. We failed. But this podcast is about that and how we made it through. So when they sat me down, they were kind of like, we got into the small talk and they were just like, so what do you got? What? What ideas? And I was like, oh, no. What? Check out not my best moment with me, Kevin on stage on the Iheart radio app, Apple podcast, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcast.

Hey, it's me, Eric Andre, bombing with Eric Andre and Will Ferrell's big money players and the I-heart radio. We are back with fresh chaos. Our latest episode features Tony Hawk, Rico Nasty, Yamanika Saunders, and Derek Beckles. Here's a fraction of what happened. This is your worst injury in your career, correct? It's the most traumatic in terms of danger factor and life-threatening, yes. What were the injuries? Fractured skull, broken thumb.

fractured pelvis. Look at your phone. Yeah, I changed my signature. I can tell if I signed stuff before or after that. You got help insurance? I do. I'm not explicitly putting down what I'm doing on insurance form. Listen to bombing with Eric Andre on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast.

Bombing, bombing with Eric Andre. For 25 years, I've explored what it means to heal, not just for myself, but alongside others. I'm Mike De La Rocha, this is Sacred Lessons, a space for reflection, growth, and collective healing. What do you tell men that are hurting right now? Everything's going to be okay on the other side, you know, just push through it. And, you know, ironically, the root of the word spirit is breath. Wow.

Which is why one of the most revolutionary acts that we can do as peoples just breathe. Next to the wound is their gifts. You can't even find your gifts. you go through the wound. That's the hard thing you think. Well, I'm going to get my guess. I don't want to go through all that. You've got to go through the wounds you're laughing. Listening to other people's near-death experiences, and that's all they say.

In conclusion, love is the answer. Listen to Sacred Lessons as part of the My Coutura Podcast Network, available on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Hey, y'all. It's me, your man, M.G. Marcus Grant. And I'm Michael F. Lurio. And I'm Laquan Jones.

If you're looking to win your fantasy football, league, you need to tune in to the NFL fantasy football podcast. It's right there in the name. Every week, Florio, LQ, and I bring you the latest news from around the league. We break down every matchup, give you our analysis and advice so you know who to start, sit, drop, and trade to bring that championship trophy home. I just want to remind everyone how good Rishie Rice was last season and these three healthy games. He was the wide receiver two in fantasy. I think Rishie Rice just goes off this week. The Chiefs come on a flip pass to Rice. This side. Touched! Ramondri Stevens is my sleeper this week.

This is a match-out where I think I can slide in Stevenson into my flex position and he could deliver double-digit points this week. Drake takes the snap, hands it off. Ramonari running it right and running into the end zone. Touchdown! It's never too late to turn your fantasy season around. Subscribe to the NFL Fantasy Football Podcast on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Welcome to Decoding Women's Health. I'm Dr. Elizabeth Pointer, chair of Women's Health and Gunning. at the Adria Health Institute in New York City. On this show, I'll be talking to top researchers and top clinicians, asking them your burning questions and bringing that information about women's health and midlife directly to you. A hundred percent of women go through menopause. It can be such a struggle for our quality of life, but even if it's natural, why should we

suffer through it? The types of symptoms that people talk about is forgetting everything. I never used to forget things. They're concerned that, one, they have dementia, and the other one is, do I have ADHD? There is unprecedented promise with regard to cannabis and cannabinoids, to sleep better, to have less pain, to have better mood, and also to have better day-to-day life. Listen to Decoding Women's Health with Dr. Elizabeth Pointer on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you're listening now. After being thrust, because you've been in the industry for a long time, but now you are. well-known. What are some of the ways that you had to adjust? Because I know people, we think we're

ready, but then it's like, whoa, this is a lot. Yo, no one can never prepare you for that to be in the public eye. And thrust is the correct word because you know, I'm so glad we're having this conversation together. COVID happened at the beginning of our show's plight. I talk about that all the time. Yeah. And we were tucked away during seasons one and two. Yes. And, then we were thrown out into this open world without a mask and that thing went crazy and I dealt with security issues and and you know I mean people have come to my home coming into my home I've had to move and find you know safer places I have to move throughout the world in a different way than I would normally move you know and that is one part of it but also you know

body image has been the biggest I wanted to talk to you about that. The biggest, it's been the biggest challenge. It is the biggest challenge. I have to be honest. Because I made a joke earlier about walking into a room of men and look a certain type of way. In film, they're, film and TV, especially, you know, with sisters and in the land of, if I can be honest, black television, there is a conventional standard of beauty that I did not meet.

And I didn't realize it. It just happened. Yeah. And then it happened even more because I was on TV every week. Yeah. And then it was in person. And it was people who thought that they were being complimentary about how I looked on TV and how different I looked in person or how, you know. And then I started to struggle with feeling like a leading man but not looking like one.

Wow. And it's still a struggle. And I know that I'm speaking for a lot of. people who may not be able to speak, you know, who may not be able to speak because weight fluctuates and I, it's never been a thing for me being a big guy and I just was a big guy. I just always had been a big guy and in finding my way to success and being compared to people every day, seeing public opinion every day about comparison and looking at yourself in every gallery shoot, every photo shoot, every picture,

looking at yourself on camera and what angles working. I just, I had to develop a system for myself because I knew that I wanted to change. But I think that initially, probably the first three years of sisters, my change was based in what other people looked like. It was, I was comparing myself to people all the time.

And people who I loved and admired, and it wasn't like I was, it was a negative thing. It was just like I'm standing around, the best friends that I have, my brother's Cheeto and DeVal. And they look great and they have like abs. And I'm literally over here just like fighting for my life. And it was tough.

It is tough. And so even now as I navigate and obviously I've lost some weight since then. You look amazing. Thank you so much. It's such a journey though, Chris. It's it is such a journey. And I think I'm finally finding my footing, which it requires a lot of discipline. Let's talk about that discipline because you're running now, working out.

You've always been in the gym. Yeah. Was it the food that was a... Absolutely. Yeah. A. A. A.

A. Hey, brother. We love to eat. I love to eat. And still today I do, but I think that I had to figure out what was more important. And I still love to eat. And I still do eat. But it's in a very different way.

That's so good. It's in a very different way. And I found ways to enjoy the things that I need and not the things that I desire. Yes. And I also found cardio that I like. Yeah. And which is running and, like, looking at people. And, you know, I live in a different city now and running.

It's like the culture of running is different. It is. Yeah. In New York. And so I run. I've gotten up to about six and a half miles a day. What? I'm so proud of you.

I just run blocks. And, you know, I run and walk. I run and walk. I ain't going to lie. But that's good. You know, a little back and forth. You're moving, baby. But I am, and I'm getting those calories down and it helps and it feels good.

And I lift. I lift heavy and people not to do a fitness thing because you know anytime somebody lose weight and they become Billy Blanks but I I lift heavy and it helps because you lose their weight and their skin start to do something different

and you know how I feel about skin yeah pull it up so I lift heavy and I run and I do I cycle too I switch it up because I get bored with things I'm a creator I get bored with things and I just really I fast

I intermittent fast And I go into the last minute Where I'm starving And then it makes the meal so good No matter what it is Oh my goodness Like oh man god This salad is so god

It tastes like a porterhouse It tastes like a fried pork chop Y'all have had a fried pork chop sandwich I haven't had a pork chop since college I know we think we better than But we can get up on the pork shop sandwich Listen A little white bread

Hey Listen A little white bread Come on now Tear up a fried pork chop Lovely. Those things are lovely. So silly. They are very lovely. I can't eat that anymore.

Yeah, but I'm proud of you. I'm so proud of you because as your friend, like I would see you working out and even it's the unspoken dialogue that we have where I know this is something that you struggle with internally and I can see you trying to work towards it. So I'm just so proud of you that you found a way to work out and do it in a way that you Even when you walked in today, like you just, your glow is different. And I can tell us internal, not just external now. Yeah, yeah. You got to figure out.

I was working out from the wrong place and trying to accomplish something based on somebody else. And you just have to find your own body and find the best body that you have because you're just, we're born with everything that we have that we need. We really are. And so I just had to find, because it was in here. It was up under here. It's there, baby. It's still a little more up in here. It's still a little more up in here.

here. But, you know, it's still, I want to just drive the point home because I don't want to say it was a struggle. It is a struggle. And I'm finding something new every day and working through something new. And when I'm saying find something new, sometimes it's finding something new that I feel I need to change, that I feel I need to work on. And now that I've lost a weight, now I need to do this. Now this looks different. Now this fits different. Now, you know, and it's a challenge, but I think that challenges are not something that will stop. No. I think that challenges make us stronger so that when new challenges come we're able to attack them with more armor absolutely we I think it comes with evolution every time we evolve it's something else

and it's so refreshing to hear a man speak on that because a lot of times you hear women talk about body dysmorphia and how we nitpick I just talked about it Saturday at the event about how we just were our own worst critics and we're picking at every little thing that people look at us and like oh my god you look amazing and then some people like is she pregnant you look fat you know but Although, but we look in a man, we're like, ah, if I could just fix this or tweak that. So just to speak to men who may feel the same way

to let them know they're not alone in this. And also, we can be kinder to each other, you know, because we're all dealing with something. I mean, even hearing somebody and kinder to each other, like, not being mean, but also just speaking to, every time I see you, I'm just like, Jesus. Now, I really mean that in a godly way.

I'm like, wow, Crystal's here. You so. Hey, ain't no use to lying. We're here, you know what I'm saying? But that kindness to each other is just humanity. We need it. We need it right now in the world. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

No, for sure. We are nine seasons in. This is unheard of for many shows. Absolutely. You know, five to six seasons is normally a shopping point. A huge, huge, huge. What are some lessons that you learn on sisters from either your castmates or from Tyler during this time? You know, I'll start with, I'll say both.

I'll start with Tyler because I don't think that Tyler Perry gets the credit that he deserves for more than what he gets. I think that people talk about the amount of capital that he's amassed and all those things. But nobody is talking about the master class and techniques that it requires. for someone to amass that on their own. Come on. And I've watched him take those things every single thing, because he doesn't have to do anything. He has done the things.

For 30 years. And I watch him with my own eyes, stand in front of me and take on every single piece of production and post-production and pre-production into account. And he knows how to do everything himself. And I will say that's probably the best of, biggest lesson that I've gotten in all of this because as I move into my own projects, like with Riley that I've been developing for eight years, I knew that I could not go into Riley

the way that I wanted to until I can afford to own it outright. Yes. And I've watched TP literally be able to not only own it, but own it. Like he owns it and you can't tell him anything about it. You can't tell him anything about the audience, about the content. about the deals, about the financing, about the time, about anything because he understands it. He created it. He has created a method.

And so when we, I'm what people will call a well-studied actor. And so you hear about the Stanof-Slovsky methods and all of the things. The Shakespeare and I Amet Pentameter and the August Wilsonian method. But Tyler Perry has a method. There is a method that he. has developed when it comes to the development and the execution of television film and theater. Yeah.

I mean, come on. Hey, I don't know if there is a more famous playwright in the history of the world. Like, people know him for those plays. And people forget that too because he hasn't done plays in a long time. But that's how I found Tyler Perry. That's how I, I mean, it's the first play I ever saw, you know, on a VHS at my grandmother's house.

And people forget that night. I think that that is such an important landmark in time. And to be aligned with that and such a historical way like sisters is just so gratifying because I feel like I'm a little part of that history. And from my castmates, you know, my castmates have shown me so much about enterprise and finance and building wealth from whatever you have. Yes. Like you and like DeVal, you know, I learned so much from you guys.

And you guys have been so giving and open. with the advice and with the help because you this thing could go away fast it changes fast too I mean you can go from being on TV and then there's COVID and then there's no auditions and then there's no and then there's a strike right after COVID you know and so I feel like I was able to live through those things because I found family and my castmates and I found advice and knowledge and wisdom and people that I could listen to and trust that they had my best interest at heart and so Those are the two biggest things, like that business acumen and the way that he was able, Tyler was able to develop this conglomerate and then the family that I found in you,

in DeVal and Cheeto, in KJ and Ebony and everybody, you know, that helped me to move through the world with an understanding that I wouldn't have otherwise. That is so beautiful. There's a level of, we talked about discipline, but also a level of humility that comes on taking different characters and for me taking on Fatima I used to judge her all the time have there ever been moments where you're reading the script and you you catch yourself judging Maurice all the time all the time every time Maurice is crazy he is he can say some awful things to people he makes some crazy decisions and he's he's put himself in a lot of different

places that don't make sense yeah cyclical things and that's such the opposite of me like if I see a cycle I'm like I'm not doing that again right you know but there is a thing about playing characters that I enjoy and it is literally you can do whatever you want like and if you don't judge the character you can play this thing so outright that it helps somebody who may not make the same kind of decisions that you make right and maurice is someone who before I played him I did not know him. So it's easy to judge somebody else, you know? But then I'm like, you find after, I mean, after so much text and so many episodes,

you find that there's a method to everybody's madness. And there is a reason why we all make decisions. So I try my best not to judge him, but I'll be lying. I mean, I'm reading scripts. I'm like, come on now. Mo. Mo, please. Just doing anything, saying anything.

and I understand a lot of it is comedic but I also understand that there are so many people and I've been able to meet so many people who identify with Maurice and they are like him and I'm like, wow, thank God you didn't audition. Right, because you would... It took my job. But, you know, I just didn't know anybody like that

before and I was able to build him into an amalgamation of so many people that I knew but yeah, it's difficult to not judge characters in such a crazy world that, you know, is and and but the beauty of it is that it helps you to live the life of two people when we've done this for so long you're able to learn from even their mistakes in your own life and it's kind of a cheat code no for sure of sure now I want to talk to you about Riley you said you've been working on this for eight years when you said that it reminded me of Tyler's Jasmine Blues that was

the first script he wrote and he had sat on it for years really I didn't know that yes that was the very first, yes. What did you even know that? Yeah, it was his very first movie that he wrote. And it was, he brought it back up around 2015, put it back down. Wow, that's how. So was that similar for you when it came to Riley? Yeah, because, I mean, Riley was not something, Riley is not something that I've made any money from.

And so the biggest thing for me about Riley was I had to put it down when I had to work. You know, you have to focus on other things so that you can eat and live. So I started Riley in 2017 whenever I looked around and I was really, really in the Broadway world, in the theater world. And there were no roles where strong black men led unless they were playing strong black men who had lived before. And I was interested in telling the story about a black community that was proud and a black man at the center who wasn't trope who wasn't a drug dealer or a slave or a doo-op singer. I was very interested in telling the story of just a young black man. and who was going to school like I did, like many of us do. Yes.

And it started off as a play because I wasn't writing music, which is so crazy that I've written all these songs now, but I wasn't writing music. And I did a reading of it, and it was missing something. I was like, an HBCU experience is one that is music. Like, you have to have music. You have to. And I started looking for writers,

and I could not find one that I like. And you know, Crystal, my standards are. Very high. And I just, I mean, I think I went through, four and five musicians. I just could not find one that could stick. Who does that sound like? My clothes made.

It sounds just like me yet. And so then I said, you know what? I'm going to do it myself. Come on. I'm going to write it myself. And then I wrote a song and I would call my friend, I'd sing it. And they was like, that's good. And I was like, it's all right.

I'll write another one. And then I think that today, I think that for Riley, the musical, I've written 54 songs. What? And we've kept 32 in the musical And they're 19 on the album So yeah And so I sat on it

I sat on it and I will walk away and go back And the name has changed six times Right And the stories have changed Because it's been eight years And so you have to do If it's a trending story You can't talk about the trending story

From 2018 That's so true You have to keep moving the needle And so it's changed so many times But I'm so happy that I'm finally getting The chance to bring it to the world And it's been so successful Surprisingly

I'm so surprised that people like it like this. Why are you surprised? I don't know. You just sit in your room and with you crisscross your legs and you write songs and you know you're just sitting and you just never know. I think that we all have dreams. Absolutely. And who's to say that people will like them, you know? I think I'm a hard critic and so I just assume everybody else will be one too. And I'm just blessed and an honor to be able to share with the world. Yeah, I love that. Now, you did not attend an HBCU. So where did you get the insurrection from the people around me I will say number one but number two when I was in high school I talked about the black private school that I went to it was a southern university laboratory high school

right so it was on the campus of Southern University in A&M college oh wow and the professors would teach us we would be involved in all the activities and it was such an escape from what I had experienced in middle school because when I got there it was wealthy African American people who cared so much about the way that this school was presented, I said, the pride. You know, in an HBCU, everything is pulled and high. My name is Brian Jordan Jr., and I am a senior mass comm. You know, it's all of that. And I'd never seen it before, and there wasn't a plumb and a confidence about blackness,

about academia, and about the customs, traditions, and ideas of black colleges that was so impressive to me. And I know that the world doesn't know that. The world does, especially the modern world, they don't see it. And what I continue to see is the influences of HBCU life in other things, in other things that weren't black. Right. But nobody knows that these land grant and bell tower institutions were founded because sharecropping was deemed unconstitutional. And they gave money to people to start colleges for agricultural and mechanical studies so that they can continue to be farmers.

Yeah. And what has come from that is Kamala Harris. and Stacey Abrams and Debbie Allen and Jarajie Henson and wonderful people who have gone to these huge colleges. Oprah. Oprah. Octavia Spencer, Chadwick Bowes, I mean, we can go on and on. And they have really shown the vivid illustration of blackness.

You can give us something really, really small, and we'll turn it into a whole thing. And so I knew that if I got into this point and no one had told the story, It didn't matter if I went to an HBCU. Right. It mattered that I went to upper bound programs at HBCUs, that I went to football camps at HBCUs, that I went to national youth sports programs at HBCUs

that helped to rear me and foster my gifts as a child. And even the communities, I mean, if you live in Atlanta, you know what time it is when it's a house homecoming. Come on. Everybody knows. If you're from Tennessee, and even if you didn't, if you go to Middle Tennessee University, you know what Tennessee State is about. That's my parents went.

And you celebrate the homecomings there. It's so much fun. Every homecoming. And it's just about what the black colleges mean to black academia, but also the black communities. It raises us all. It does. And it pulls us all up. I love that.

You also directed and choreographed The Whiz at True Colors Theater. Yes. What did doing a classic like the Wiz, how did that help get you ready to do Riley? Absolutely. It was way more instrumentally than I even thought. I'm a strategic thinker. And so I knew that. directing the WIS would help to establish my name in a theatrical place that would help me to bring.

Because I've been planning this Riley, the rollout, the outfits, all the school stuff that y'all have seen. I've been planning this for like four years. I knew I just had to have a certain amount of money to do it. And when I directed The WIS, first off, shout out to Kenny Leon, who is the founder and creative True Colors Theater and has been a mentor of mine for a long time. Kenny, you know, and Jamil Jude, who's the artistic director there, gave me the opportunity to direct The Wiz, and what I

found in The Wiz is so many people hadn't seen theater before, or they hadn't seen theater since they saw a Madea play. And they came to the show because they loved Maurice, and we sold that show out. I think that I went and did press for the show, and within 72 hours,

we sold out 29 performances of that show. Wow. Quickly, oversold. We sold the whole thing out. That's amazing. And it was a lot of people who were saying, this is my first play. What? And I feel like,

and I call it the lemon pepper whiz because I was strategic about making Oz, like, you know, Emerald City feel like Atlanta. And so the 10 man was at Cascade and the lion was at the Marriott Marquis. And it was just a lot of things that I included. I mean, Q Parker was the 10 man. You know, I was strategic about what Atlanta needed to see in the Whiz. Right. Because we have to make theater these days,

whenever, you know, digital is so in front of our face and everything is so quick to get and you want people to come and see live things that you don't have video of. You have to make it something that people will want to see. And so that taught me that there is a huge market for black theater. Yes.

If you bring it to the people who it's for. Yeah. Which is another Tyler Perry lesson. I ain't going to keep doing the Tyler Perry lessons, but you serve the people the things that they, if you're creating it for the people, serve it to the people, you know? And so I learned,

then that there was, there's so many stories that need to be told. And then now we're living in a time where last year was the biggest season on Broadway in the history of Broadway. And the largest grossing show was led by a black man. Yeah. Othello, you know. And so shout out to Denzel Washington. Shout out to the people who are showing that black stories and black IP is important, is marketable, is potent. And so the WIS taught me that it taught me that there is room or black theater even in mainstream because they'll try to make you believe that it doesn't belong but yeah the whiz was great it was a great experience that's amazing how did you what up y'all it's your boy kev on stage i want to tell you about my new podcast called not my best moment where

i talk to artists athletes entertainers creators friends people i admire who had massive success about their massive failures what did they mess up on what is their heartbreak and what did they learned from him. I got judged horribly. The judges were like, you're trash. I don't know how you got on the show. Boo. Somebody had tomatoes. I'm kidding. But if they had tomatoes, they would have thrown the tomatoes.

Let's be honest. We've all had those moments we'd rather forget. We bumped our head. We made a mistake. The deal fell through. We're embarrassed. We failed. But this podcast is about that and how we made it through. So when they sat me down, they were kind of like, we got into

the small talk and they were just like, so what do you got? what ideas. And I was like, oh, no. What? Check out Not My Best Moment with me, Kevin on stage on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcast. Hey, it's me, Eric Andre, bombing with Eric Andre and Will Ferrell's big money players and the IHeart Radio. We are back with fresh chaos. Our latest episode features Tony Hawk, Rico Nasty, Yamanika Saunders, and Derek Beckles. Here's a fraction of what happened. This is your worst injury in your career, correct? It's the most traumatic in terms of danger factor and life-threatening, yes.

What were the injuries? Fracture skull, broken thumb, fractured pelvis. Look at your phone. Yeah, it changed my signature. I can tell if I signed stuff before or after that. You got help insurance? I do. I'm not explicitly putting down what I'm doing on insurance forms.

Listen to bombing with Eric Andre on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. For 25 years, I've explored what it means to heal, not just for myself, but alongside others. I'm Mike De La Rocha. This is Sacred Lessons, a space for reflection, growth, and collective healing. What do you tell men that are hurting right now? Everything's going to be okay on the other side, you know, just push through it. And, you know, ironically, the root of the word spirit is breath.

Wow. Which is why one of the most revolutionary acts that we can do as people just breathe. Next to the wound is their gifts. You can't even find your gifts unless you go through the wound. That's the hard thing. You think, well, I'm going to get my gifts. I don't want to go through all that. You've got to go through the wounds you're laughing.

Listening to other people's near-death experiences, and it's all they say. In conclusion, love is the answer. Listen to sacred lessons as part of the My Coutura podcast network, available on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts. or wherever you get your podcast. Hey, y'all, it's me, your man, M.G. Marcus Grant. And I'm Michael F. L'Orio. And I'm Laquan Jones.

If you're looking to win your fantasy football league, you need to tune in to the NFL fantasy football podcast. It's right there in the name. Every week, Florio, LQ, and I bring you the latest news from around the league. We break down every matchup, give you our analysis and advice so you know who to start, sit, drop, and trade to bring that championship trophy home. I just want to remind everyone how good Rishie Rice was last season. And these three healthy games, he was the wide receiver 2 in fantasy.

I think Rishie Rice just goes off this week. The Chiefs come on a flip pass to Rice. Their side, touchdown! Remandry Stevens is my sleeper this week. This is a match-out where I think I can slide in Stevenson into my flex position and he could deliver double-digit points this week. Drake takes the snap, hands it off. Remodry running it right and running into the end zone.

Touchdown! It's never too late to turn your fantasy season around. to the NFL fantasy football podcast on the IHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Iba Longoria. And I'm Maite Gomes Rejoin. And on our podcast, Hungry for History, we mix two of our favorite things, food and history.

Ancient Athenians used to scratch names onto oyster shells, and they called these Ostercon, to vote politicians into exile. So our word ostracize is related to the word oyster. No way. Bring back the Oster Khan. And because we've got a very My Casa is Su Casa kind of vibe on our show, friends always stop by.

Pretty much every entry into this side of the planet was through the Gulf of Mexico. No, the America. No, the America. The Gulf of Mexico, continue to be it forever and ever. It blows me away how progressive Mexico was in this moment. They had land reform, they had labor rights,

they had education rights. Mustard seeds were so valuable to the ancient Egyptians that they used to place them in their tombs for the afterlife. Listen to Hungry for History as part of the My Cultura Podcast Network, available on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Balance of the creative and the business side of bringing Raleigh to fruition because I know that's a lot, especially doing it independently. Well, the balance is you may want a lot more than what you can afford. And so you have to you have to make those decisions. And the business of being on sisters and learning from people around me, learning from people who had taken their finances and independently place their money and their own things,

you know, it helped me to understand the balance of things and what could be more profitable and what is long game and what you need to pull back on because me, I'm just like I do it big. I want all the things, I want all the artist. I want to, you know, I want 65 dancers in a 47 piece orchestra. And I'm like, hey, brother, pull it on back, you know. And so I learned a lot of lessons. I did a lot of scaling back on what I dreamed and putting people in the right places so that they can reach the right people and understanding how to merge social and digital with the live theater aspect.

And just finding the balance because, you know, if it was up to me, Honey. I mean, the social thing, I struggle. Crystal is the goat. I struggle with the social and the digital stuff, but this really pulled me out, and I was very intentional about doing that because I know that's the way to get to the people.

Absolutely. And I wasn't going to waste my money. Mm-hmm. Come on. Okay? Okay, on the things. And so I had to figure out what would be long-lasting, what would reach the people,

and what would get me on Keep It Positive, Sweetie. So it worked. You are so silly. I love that. It's so funny because I'm going on a live show tour for Keep It Posit, sweetie. And like you, I like all the things. I want the LED screen. PIRO.

PIRO. Everything. I want to come from the roof. That's exactly right. All the things. Why not? And they're like, okay, Crystal, if we do this, you're not going to make any money. That's right.

So do you want to leave home with money, or do you, I mean, leave the show going home with some money, or do you want to put it all in the show? Give me the money. A little bit of money. You know, let's put a little into it. We still have a... I mean, the gowns.

I can't wait, it's the gowns. Nice gowns. Yikes. Yikes, archive. Listen, pre-ve. Museum. Yeah. All the things.

The Met. That's it. Please. No, but I totally, I get it. I get it. You've called Raleigh a story that's both personal and cultural. In your own words, what does Riley represent to you?

I think that if I had to say it in a short amount of words, I think that Riley represents what it looks like when black people decide not to struggle anymore. My Lord. What it looks like when black people decide to not wait on the celebration of others. And what it looks like when black people decide that there is wealth

and real estate in our own selves. And that's what Riley is. I mean, Riley is a story about a black football player who went to a white high school, but he decides to honor his mother's life by going to the black college. And he is kind of a fish

out of water, but he gets there and he realizes that that's where he belongs and there is something that was just ancestral about it. And it's a celebration of the black college. It's not filled with scandal. filled with the things that are baity to people. It is filled with why people pile up on Southwest flights to come to Atlanta on the weekend

to go to a Spell House homecoming and just be piled up in traffic. It is the reason it gives you a level of importance that is not something that you can buy. We're born into that importance. We're born into that ancestral, like landmark soil that is just who we are. And I feel like there has not been an adequate adaptation or storytelling of that since, and this is no shade to anything that it's come after. But I feel like when we look at things that have inspired me with Riley is a different world. Oh my gosh. It's school days, those things that really had that close connection to the celebration of these colleges and institutions.

And so, yeah, that's what Riley is. It's a celebration of blackness and independence of blackness and what it looks like to learn and to be. intelligent and to teach you know yeah yeah I love that if there's any advice that you could give to young artists who are trying to just navigate this industry who are trying to like you create their their own content what is the advice that you would give them we are all dreamers and I think that I had a crazy dream last night and I'm gonna get to the point with this but I had a crazy dream last night and it just didn't make any sense. Most dreams don't make

any sense. Right. Sometimes I'm like, what was that about? They don't. And even when you wake up and you tell your mom who is a nurse and who's been struggling to take care of four kids, her whole life, that I'm going to be a movie and a TV star, that dream to your mom sounds crazy. It's because it is. There's such a small amount of people who can do it. But there are people who can do it.

And so when you dream crazy and you have these big dreams, you have these big dreams, you have to do the same amount of work that the dream is. So if the dream is insane, doing the same amount of work to dream. Dreams don't make sense. So you have to do a senseless amount of work. That means waking up and going to the gym

if you don't want to. That means eating a certain way if you don't want to. That means putting together looks if you can't afford a stylist or getting the styles if you needed. It means going to every class that you can go to singing every song that you can sing, training and dance, training in theater, reading, going to people and helping

them, getting help with tape. It means doing the impossible. These dreams are impossible. There's a song that says dream the impossible dream, but nobody talks about the impossible work. Boy, don't make me shout up in here.

Nobody talks about the impossible work, and so I would encourage people if you want to accomplish the dream, accomplish the work. It has to match. Yes. And so you see people who you love on TV like Fatima.

And then you also see Fatima on brand campaigns, on this podcast, on film, on doing everything. She's our fashion goat. Like she is doing all the things because her dream is impossible. Yeah. And she's doing the impossible amount of work.

So that's what I encourage. Just work. Do the work. And if you're tired, go to sleep and wake up and work again. You can't outwork. You cannot, talent can never outwork ethic. When you have that work ethic, that's what's going to take you through. Yes.

Work. Work. I love that. Ooh, that is so good. I wanted to ask you, I don't know if we've ever talked about this. but with all the work, how do you ground yourself when it gets too heavy? I struggle with that. Really?

Yeah, because I think that what has happened is, and this is personal, I have for so long been so laser focused on the work that a lot of my life is kind of taking a back seat. Like, I'm not married. I don't have kids. I don't, you know, and so much of that personal stuff, I found to be less significant because I was working. And so I'm in the point now where I'm getting.

a little bit older and it's looking a little lonely you stand around in your house and it's like oh everybody all right you know you can't find nobody sit at the breakfast table you know but I I there I found I find ground in like solace and just neutrality in other human like friends and even a phone conversation of FaceTime you call me every now and then and we'd be on their phone we'd go for two hours right you're like oh lord i gotta go do you know it's just how it is but that helps to ground me just talking to other people being with other people and i i feel like a lot of my life is work even when i'm enjoying it like i can get grounded in my own things especially if i'm like auditioning for something or learning a script or filming you know

on something else it helps me to just go into something i care about that i love that i've developed like a child like Riley, you know. But I find that in family and in food, I like to cook. Oh, baby. I'll tell you, he can cook. I, I, I, I, why did you move to New York? You too far. I know, you gotta just, you be up there all the time.

Yeah, I need to slather. Please. Cook for me. Please. She can also cook. We can cook. We're actually twins. No, literally everything you're saying, I'm like, that's me.

We like the same person. We like the same person. We're both air signs. Anyway, I find that in just the right people. And I also find it in just understanding when to lead things. Yeah. When to stop talking to certain people, when to say no. That's a whole other podcast episode, when to say no.

But you, you, I have been able to build a nucleus inside of myself that no matter what is going on around me, I know where to go when I need stillness, when I need. peace and that has come with therapy that has come with age and it's also come with just the knowledge of just being around people who I've seen do the same things and God of course understanding that

the possibility it's just not to preach but people there's so much to be said about different religions or you know modern day will make you feel like you know subscribing to any type of organized religion is something that is

less than smart or less than scientific but I think that in my life without a doubt I know that none of this would be possible without God and I know it and so it ain't even up for discussion for me and so God and the way that I pray in the way that I manifest has been just a beautiful beautiful thing because there is proof yes there is proof like even when you get in a situation where you feel like this is the worst thing that could ever possibly happen how many times if you're you you've been in that worst thing that it happens and then it gets figured out and so I think that I always say it to myself but I say it to other people too how many times does God have to show you until you're able to say you know what you got it please yes because we love to try to figure it out

ourselves we do we can't fit digging a deeper hole I mean go sit down somewhere really you know but yeah I find I find my center in God I find it in art I find it in food I find it in fashion You know? I love a little piece of clothes. Listen. I need to stop. I need to stop. I got to stop.

Let's put ourself. Now I'm putting myself in it. Please. Maybe a, I'm trying to think what else I got coming up. Okay, unless it's like for work, a shopping fast until the holidays. Like till tomorrow. Never mind. It is currently the holidays.

It's the holidays. I can do a shopping fast until, like, like, until the new. year. Okay, to the new year. 60 days. Yeah. For ourselves that if it's shopping like for Christmas, for your family, that doesn't count. I'm going to put them in it too. Hey guys, you saw it here first. I'm going to fast. I don't know when this airs, but today

is, what is it, October 24th. We're going to say 24th. Just because of the stuff that I didn't buy people before. So post-date a check. This is it, guys. And so I'm on it. It's Crystal's I'm on a fast, Merry Christmas to you all. Jesus is the reason for the season. Yes, he, oh, yes, he is.

Oh, yes, he is, yeah. All that, all of that, yeah. Cancel Christmas, guys. It's about God. Amen. I love you, Brian. I love you more. No, seriously.

I'm so proud of you. Thank you for being. I have watched you grow. I'm not going to cry today. I've watched you grow and mature over the years and just the artist that you are, the man that you are, the friend that you are. I couldn't ask for a better friend.

And I'm just, I'm happy to have you and share my platform with you just to share you with the world even more because I don't think you do this enough to like actually let people in. So thank you for allowing me to interview you and just have that conversation so that they can know you more. because you are truly an incredible human. I just love you. Thank you for this comfortable and safe space.

Yeah, no, seriously. I love it. So tell the people where we can find you. You got merch. Are you still on the college tour? I just wrapped the college tour. Okay, that was amazing too. Thank you, thank you.

Yeah, I just wrapped the college tour. But there will be merch available at hbcusical.com. We're also working on a collaboration line that I can't speak to now, but it's going to be crazy. I can't wait you to show you this. I can't wait to show you this stuff and of course Instagram, Twitter, TikTok

at Brian Jordan Jr., and also at Riley the mixtape go streaming everywhere that you stream it's out there, it did really great numbers in the first week crazy and so I'm so blessed thank you so much Chris You are welcome

That was such an inspiring conversation with Brian and a reminder that when you trust your calling you can create something bigger than yourself. Thank you for tuning in to another episode of the Keep It Positive, Sweetie show. Don't forget to subscribe, leave a review, and share this with someone who could use a little positivity.

Until next time, I will see you guys and make sure you keep it positive, sweetie. Bye. On a recent episode of the podcast, Hunting for Answers, I highlighted the story of 19-year-old Lichet Dungey. But she never knocked on that door. She never made it inside. And that text message would be the last time anyone would ever hear from her. Listen to Hunting for Answers from the Black Effect Podcast Network on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.

What are the cycles fathers passed? that suns are left to heal. What if being a man wasn't about holding it all together, but learning how to let go? This is a space where men speak truth and find the power to heal and transform. I'm Mike De La Rocha. Welcome to Sacred Lessons.

Listen to Sacred Lessons on the IHartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Dr. Lari Santos from the Happiness Lab here. It's the season of giving, and this year my podcast, The Happiness Lab, is partnering with Give Directly, a non-profit that provides people in extreme poverty with the cash they need as part of the Pods Fight Poverty campaign. Our goal this year is to raise $1 million, which will bring over 700 families out of extreme poverty. Your donation will put cash directly in the hands of these families in need, and they'll get to

decide how to use it, whether that's school transportation, purchasing livestock, or starting a business. Plus, if you're a first-time donor, your gift will be matched by giving multiplier, which means more money for those in need. Visit givedirectly.org slash happiness lab to learn more and to donate. That's give directly.org slash happiness lab. Hi, I'm Radhidavlukaya and I am the host of a really good cry podcast. This week, I am joined by Anna Runkle, also known as the crappy childhood fairy, a creator, teacher, and guide helping people heal from the lasting emotional wounds of unsafe or chaotic

childhoods. That talking about trauma isn't always great for people. It's not always the best thing. About a third of people who were traumatized as kids feel worse when they talk about it. Get very dysregulated. Listen to a really good cry on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. The show was ahead of its time to represent a black family in ways the television hadn't

shown before. Exactly. It's Telma Hopkins, also known as Aunt Rachel. And I'm Kelly Williams or Laura Winslow. On our podcast, welcome to the family with Telma and Kelly. watching every episode of Family Matters. We'll share behind-the-scenes stories about making the show. Yeah, we'll even bring in some special guests to spill some tea.

Listen to Welcome to the Family with Telma and Kelly on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.