Brandy Norwood

I love basketball.

Mom would kill me if I showed my navel.

I have so much more to go through as a young lady. But oh my God. I feel like I can do anything.

I was rapping as a hobby. It was something I did for my friends and just played around on ideas and stuff like that.

There’s a lot of people out there who go through hard times, and they feel alone. They feel like nobody is there. But I’m in the same boat.

I’ve just got to get that album out. I have to get it out, if it’s the last thing I do.

We let Willow cut her hair. When you have a little girl, it’s like, how can you teach her that your in control of her body? If I teach her that I’m in charge of whether or not she can touch her hair, she’s going to replace me with some other man when she goes out into the world. She can’t cut my hair, but that’s her hair. She has got to have command over her body. So when she goes out into the world, she goes out with command that it’s hers. She is used to making those decisions herself. We try to keep giving them those decisions until they can hold the full weight of their lives.

Having lots of siblings is like having built-in best friends.

A few years after my first son was born, he wanted to know how we chose his name, so I began reading him the story of Noah’s Ark.

The times when Barack and I are at our most relaxed are when we invite some friends over who we have known forever. And you put a little music on top of that? Some good food? It renews your spirit to get back in the game.

I have not been a good father, but no father has loved his children more. Like my father, I decided the best thing I could do for my kids was work and provide. Fortunately, I’ve been able to do that. Unfortunately, my work was on the road, and that’s meant a life of one-nighters.

I’ve been a loner all the time throughout my life… I haven’t been the best father… Many times… my children have accused me of not giving them enough attention. And, frankly, I never have been good at handling that.

Those who have never had a father can at any rate never know the sweets of losing one. To most men the death of his father is a new lease of life.

[On his mother] She certainly ran her own race… I thought my mother was nuts.

Growing up, I was taught that a man has to defend his family. When the wolf is trying to get in, you gotta stand in the doorway.

When your children arrive, your heart becomes a room with wide open windows.

You don’t choose your family. They are God’s gift to you, as you are to them.

They say that no matter how old you become, when you are with your siblings, you revert back to childhood.

Nothing can stop me from loving my brother.

I have to be in tune with my husband, where he is, how he’s feeling. I have to be in tune with where my family is. The same thing is true in the work that I do. It’s all about me feeling where people are. So that’s why I try to be really present, even when I’m on a rope line. I never take for granted my interactions with people. And it’s never black-and-white. I’m usually reading the crowd, reading the people that I’m with. I guess if this role has changed me, it’s improved my ability to do that. I’ve gotten better at sensing where people are at any given time.

Growing up, I was taught that a man has to defend his family. When the wolf is trying to get in, you gotta stand in the doorway. He has to get through you first before he gets into the house to get your family. I’m one of those guys who wants to be in that door.