Tyler Perry ‘Worried’ If He Would Be A Good Father Because His Dad ‘Was Just Awful’

Tyler Perry

Tyler Perry ‘Worried’ If He Would Be A Good Father Because His Dad ‘Was Just Awful’

Sometimes in life, you have to teach yourself.

Tyler Perry is the epitome of not allowing what you see to determine your outcome. The 54-year-old has been honest over the years about his rocky relationship with the man who raised him, Emmitt Perry Sr., and how he could never figure out why his father-figure “despised” him. For those who may be unaware, it wasn’t until after Tyler Perry’s mother, Willie Maxine Perry, passed away that he learned Emmitt Perry Sr. was not his biological father.

Tyler Perry

In a sneak peek of Oprah Daily’s “The Life You Want” Class, an audience member asks the media mogul, “How did you know that you would be a good father?”

Without missing a beat, Tyler Perry replies,

“I didn’t. I struggled with that and I worried because I didn’t have an example, because this man was just awful, right?” One day I was praying about it, looking in the mirror, and I’m like, ‘God, what do I do?’ And the answer came to me as clear as day, ‘Do it in reverse.'”

Perry shares his 9-year-old son, Aman Tyler Perry, with model and ex-girlfriend Gelila Bekele, 37.

The “Alex Cross” actor continues while chatting with his good friend Oprah Winfrey,

“Do the opposite of what that man did to be ‘an incredible father.’ And that’s what I tried to do. I show my son love and encouragement, and I stand with him when he’s wrong. I straighten him up. I chastise him the right way so that he understands that the correction is done in love. Everything that man didn’t do.”

Perry then takes a moment to clarify that, despite his dad’s mistakes, he “was a great provider.”

“[He] worked his *ss off every day, sunup to sundown. Made sure that the money was coming into the house, made sure all the bills were paid, everything that my mother wanted him to do financially was there as best he could.”

This isn’t the first time that Perry has opened up about his fatherhood journey and his relationship with his son. Last March, during an interview for Audible’s “Michelle Obama: The Light Podcast,” he talked with the former first lady about how he disciplines his child. As he shared a story about how a 6-year-old Aman gave his nanny pushback because he didn’t want to brush his teeth, Perry recalled,

“I said, ‘Listen to me, you are not going to be this way. We love you. We are your parents. You will not behave this way. We taught you better than this. You are a better kid than this. You’re going to be a better man than this.’ And I’m talking to him. I started to get emotional in the moment and I had to leave the room.”

He continued,

“I went out on the balcony I was in tears because I realized that nobody had ever talked, got down and talked to me eye-to-eye and had a conversation with me that I could understand. There was just yelling and cussing and what you’re not and what you’re never going to be.”

To watch the full conversation with Tyler Perry dropping on Feb. 21 at 4 p.m. ET., sign up for Oprah Daily’s “The Life You Want” class.

What are some traits that think make a good dad? Tell us in the comments below!