Risen Magazine: I know you love music; does it have any influence on your game?
Amare Stoudemire: I don’t think so. Music is something that influences my lifestyle, but not really my game.

RM: We interviewed Tupac’s Shakur’s mother, Afeni, a while back. It seems that you and Tupac have similarities, in struggle and passion, and love for your mothers. Even your first name and his middle name, Amar, are similar.
AS: Growing up in the streets of poverty and being able to make it out . . . it’s similar to Tupac’s life and his mother-son relationship. My mom was definitely an inspiration in my life, the things that she stressed and taught me, from a spiritual standpoint. I think it definitely helped.

RM: You could have gone a lot of different ways, but you continued moving toward playing in the NBA. What helped you to do that?
AS: All my friends were in the streets, but I had a goal in mind. I hung out with them, but my goal was to be successful for my family, because at the time they needed some help. That kept me strong. I was always like the mentor among my friends, and I always gave them words of encouragement and tried to lift them above the situation, even at a young age.

RM: Did you ever feel a sense of destiny?
AS: Since the age of eight, I knew I would make it to the NBA. It was an internal feeling I had when I was a kid. When I went to school and played ball or whatever I did with my friends, I was always a little bit better, a little taller, a little faster and that kept my confidence going. I just kept growing as a person and as an athlete.

RM: Your tattoos seem to tell a story.
AS: Yeah, Cartoon, a famous tattoo artist, does most of them. All my tattoos are dedicated to God, really. My kids are young and if I died right now they could get to know me by my tats, what I stand for and what I believe in and how I made it out of poverty. My tattoos are a testimony.

RM: What fuels you more, love or anger?
AS: I think love is a greater fuel. Amare means love, so love is definitely something I cherish. Anger fuels me as well, but not as much as love. You can be in and out of situations, but love helps you not to take it out on anybody else, but to better that situation. Anger can get you started, get you thinking about the situation.

RM: Did you get into a lot of fistfights as a kid?
AS: I got into fights all the time. Whenever I hung out with my older brother, he would make me fight with kids my age. Nine out of ten times I’d end up being the winner. Fighting was a part of our culture. We would wrestle, we loved to slap box. Even now, I rough up some of my friends, just for the love factor, it’s genuine.

RM: What would cause you get into a real fight?
AS: Well, it takes a lot to get me to fight. The person on the other end of it has to do something that pushes my buttons more than twice. I let it go a few times and if they still don’t respect the fact that I’m bein’ genuine about it, they still push my buttons, it sets the alarm off. It takes a lot, but when it happens, it happens.

RM: You walk into an arena with 10,000 people shouting your name, and some of them are booing you. Still, you have to have this confidence and this feeling that you’re nearly superhuman. Yet, being a man of faith, you need to combine that with a sense of humility. How do you pull that?
AS: I look at basketball as my job, my career. My faith is my life, everything besides basketball. After basketball, you still have to have faith, or your spirituality, whatever you believe in. Your career could last fifteen to twenty years, but your spirituality is what gets you over the hump. It’s what keeps you humble, keeps you focused.

RM: You face every distraction in the world on the court, including s