Adam Brody Reflects on His Marriage to Leighton Meester: 'She's My Moral Compass and North Star'

The usually private Adam Brody is shedding some light on his relationship with Leighton Meester, his wife of seven years.

During an appearance on Monday's episode of Anna Faris' Unqualified podcast, Brody recalled how the stars first met and reflected on how their love story unfolded.

"I was on The O.C., and that was coming to an end and Gossip Girl was starting. Josh Schwartz produced both shows," said the actor, 41. "The first time we met, that whole cast was eating at Canter's [in Los Angeles] and I lived at Canter's for, like, my entire 20s. I was leaving and he introduced all of us and then [I] bumped into her, like, two or three times over the next couple of years."

"Then we did this movie together, The Oranges. I was seeing someone at the time," he continued. "So we met kind of through mutual work friends off and on. We didn't get together until about a year after that movie, when I was single."

Brody said he was immediately "very attracted" to Meester — "she's a heavenly creature," he noted — though he "had no idea whether she was a good person or not."

"And in fact, [I] assumed she probably wasn't for, like, the first handful of years I didn't know her … just because [of her role on] Gossip Girl," he admitted.

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It wasn't until they started dating that Brody began to recognize the real-life human behind Gossip Girl's Blair Waldorf.

"And come to find out she's literally Joan of Arc," he said of Meester, 34. "She is the strongest, best person I know. She is my moral compass and North Star, and I just can't say enough good things about her character."

The California native, who wed Meester in 2014, said she's "the kind of person where even as a 4-year-old, she would have been perfect," stressing that "nobody has a bad thing to say about her."

Brody also opened up about how the former Single Parents star has made him want to be better.

"Marriage, being an adult and having a family, it was a new frontier for me where before that, I kind of felt, like, I don't have to change. If you don't like me, then you don't like me," he told Faris. "This is who I am, and it's unreasonable to ask anyone to change anything. But, if you're in a long commitment and you've got responsibilities, I do understand now — it's still a struggle — it's healthy to kind of adjust a few things."

Brody and Meester welcomed their daughter Arlo, 5, in 2015. Their son's birth was confirmed last September. In October, the Kid Detective star spoke to PEOPLE about the couple's growing brood.

"It's been pretty magical," he said at the time. "It's such a crazy time for everyone and we're so, so, so fortunate that we have some of the security we do and have the flexibility with our jobs we do."

"We talk about it all the time and we're just ridiculously fortunate and lucky," he added. "To be more or less quarantined during [this] time — the last trimester of pregnancy and the fourth trimester, if you will — has its benefits."