Latest / Alive, I Guess Podcast / Episode 20 - Black Creativity Be Happenin w/ SōLauren

Transcript

Episode 20 - Black Creativity Be Happenin w/ SōLauren · Alive, I Guess Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_04: I'm a love I guess.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_04: I'm a love I guess in love.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_02: I'm a love I guess.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_02: I'm a love I guess.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_02: So we might as well talk about it.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_03: What's up, y'all?
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_03: Welcome to your safe space.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_03: I'm your host, RJ, and this is the Alive I Guess Podcast.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_03: If you're new here, welcome.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_03: I appreciate you for joining.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_03: And if you've been here, welcome back.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_03: I appreciate you as always.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_03: Today we have a very special episode.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_03: It is the first ever Alive I Guest podcast guest episode.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_03: And when I was thinking of who this person needed to be, it only made sense that it was this individual.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, it's literally the voice you hear to start and end every single episode.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_03: So please help me in welcoming my friend, the amazing multi-talented So Lauren.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_03: What's up?
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_03: How are you doing?
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: I am well, RJ.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: Just thank you for creating and curating this space.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um, for all your listeners and supporters, but just for anybody who's just on their journey and really searching.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, this is a safe space.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: You said that.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_03: I have expressed this a few times, but I'm really, really excited for this conversation.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_03: Um, we always get into some good ones.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_03: But before we get in, I want you, in your own words, to tell the people who are you?
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: Who is so Lauren?
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: Who is so Lauren?
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: So Lauren is someone who shows up authentically as themselves.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_00: I um am someone who loves very deeply and sincerely.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and that love translates not just in my relationships with other human beings, but within the art that I create.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um so when you hear my music or you see that I'm a part of something, just know like all of me was put into it and all the love that I have um is in there.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_00: And um, I believe that that's the type of medicine that we need in the world today.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: So I try to show up as what we need and as who I know I'm meant to be.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um and yeah, that that's me.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: And then of course it's like all the um the talent stuff is one thing.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: Being gifted in in um multiple uh arenas, if you will, is is one thing.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: But I think just who I am, character rock, care who I am as a as my character and how I show up is is the thing that I I always want people to know.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: Like, you're gonna get like the best version of me possible as best I can, you know.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: But but that's who I am in essence.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_03: Absolutely.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_03: And I know that personally, just as a fan, as a friend, like I don't have to worry about who I'm gonna come up against.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: Like it's so put your head on a swivel with you around me.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_00: I want people to feel safe and feel like they can because it's an invitation for them to be themselves too.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: Like when you see somebody showing up authentically as them, is it it it opens it opens up a door for people to be like, you know, maybe I can walk through my own authentic door and see what that looks like.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: And before you know it, it's a whole world full of authentic people.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that's that's the goal.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, that's the goal.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_03: If people are ready for it, not everyone is, and that's fine, but definitely appreciate you because we need that.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_03: Um, before we dive in, so we start off every episode with gratitude.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_03: You know, like to set the stage, make sure we're in a good headspace before we dive in.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_03: So before I say what I'm grateful for, what are you grateful for today?
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_04: Hmm.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: It's you know, that's a loaded question because there's so many things I can pull from.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but because we are at the I'm alive, I guess, podcast, I'm grateful that I'm alive.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_00: And I know that might, you know, sound like a little cliche, like, okay, we're all glad to be, but not everybody is glad to be here, but I really am grateful to be alive.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: It it is something that um I'm starting to realize um is not something to just pass over your head, like, oh, another day.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: No, like the way the world is set up, life should be taken, it should already be precious, but I'm finding it for me to be more and more precious and more of a a thing to like really take more seriously, is not just the okay, I can breathe.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_00: No, somebody can't breathe on their own right now.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I mean?
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_00: Somebody is you know laying up in a hospital somewhere or in a place where they just feel like the pressure's too much and they can't breathe and they don't want to be here, like all those things are real.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: So if you have the opportunity and if you have the will to say, wow, I'm just glad to be here, like be grateful for that.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_00: And then from there, the rest will trickle down.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, the rest will trickle down from I'm just grateful to be alive.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_03: So yeah, no, for sure.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_03: I know the title is I'm alive by guests, but like truly to be alive, like not to just be living, but to be alive is a blessing because so many are just act against us these days.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_02: So many.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_03: Um, well, I am also grateful for that, but in the spirit of today's conversation, I am grateful for creativity because creativity literally got us to this place.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_03: You are creative, I'm a creative.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_03: The world seems to be leaning more into creativity, and I think that's really what we need today.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_03: So we're we're gonna get all into that.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_03: I cannot wait.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_03: Um but so for the sake of giving some background context, yeah.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_03: We met originally in 2023, technically.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_03: Technically, yes, but it was for the project, the Vibrance BW project.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_03: Um, for the listeners, the project was through my wife's photography business.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_03: Um, she hosted a project that took 10 black women um through a photography video and written portion to talk about mental health and healing.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_03: And this was our 10th participant.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_00: And so I was so honored.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it was an amazing time.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_03: Um, can you tell us a little bit about like what that process was like for you?
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_03: I know it was a while ago at this point.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but it's still so very like um near to me because I don't I don't do many projects with everybody.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: Like it would be, I would love to collaborate with everybody in some way, shape, or form, but that's not always the case.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes we find out, you know, later on down the line, we're actually not in the line.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: Like I thought.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: So maybe we shouldn't.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_00: But um with the Vibrance BW project with Janae, that was for me um something that I felt I needed to do for my own healing journey.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_00: It's one thing to be um, you know, to have community while you're um in process of, you know, certain things.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't have to be um uh creativity related, it can just be what you got going on personally.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: And um Jeanne came at a time where I was going through a lot of personal things that were translating into my creativity and they were finding their way merging anyway.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_00: So to um to have someone uh give me yet another space and outlet to um express what I was um holding personally, but also what I was creating because of what was happening personally, um I felt very safe to do so with Janae and with you.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_00: You were you were there as well as the amazing lighting and all the tech stuff, right?
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_00: You you did that, y'all did that.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you, thank you.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: But I've never been a part of a project um that was just me involved.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: I've never been a part of a project that allowed me to just be me.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: And and it was a requirement.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: My authenticity was a requirement.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: Like it was like, please don't hold back.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_00: If it was like a please tell your story in full, it was um be as honest as you want, be as transparent as you want.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and oftentimes for creatives, we're we're told to present or perform, or you know, be the do the artist thing that y'all do, whatever that means.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, right.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_00: And um, that wasn't the case.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: I was able to be very vulnerable.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: I was I was able to um open, I literally gave y'all my journal, like in that like and the ways that we were speaking, it was straight out of my journal, stuff I had been journaling about, um, stuff I had been recording, writing songs about, and so um I was grateful for that.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I don't I don't know many people who care enough to hear about um black women's stories in that way, and black women from all walks of life.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no one was the same.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_00: No, and being a black woman is not a monolith, being black is not a monolith.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_00: So I appreciated the um the variety of blackness in that project.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um, yeah, and the level of care and sensitivity that you all showed to each and every person's story, um yeah, it just it felt good.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: And then to be able to do my story in particular, being able to um film it at um a church that I grew up in, essentially, like that was my family church, my great-grandparents, like that far back.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: And so to have you all in that space, um, yeah, to be able to tell that story was just, yeah, again, very near.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: Still very near to me in memory, but in feeling more than anything.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_03: I found myself like going back to that time.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_03: It was also a very like grief-heavy time for us.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_03: It was so like healing for us on the other side of the camera as it was for you and the other women in that project.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_03: So, you know, thank you.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_00: Run that bike.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we'll see.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_00: TVD.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_03: Um, it takes a lot of work.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_03: I can tell.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_03: So we, as you can tell, we want to do it right.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_00: And you did it right for each and every person.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_00: Like that's what was so dope.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_00: And then the fact that the the photo, some uh the main photo ended up being the not the main photo, because there were several photos that you all took, but we were able to take a photo um from that project and use it for good grief.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: So it's the cover of good grief, me at that piano.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: And so um, yeah, it just yeah, yeah, that that project spawned so much more.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and yeah, it was it was a line from the jump.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: And we, I think we had because the grief was so heavy during that time, that was postponed.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_00: So we had a an original um day to meet up and shoot.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_00: Is it like six months, eight months?
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe nine years old?
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_00: Uh maybe.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, now that I'm thinking about it, because the grief was just it just kept coming in between and then waves.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, you know what?
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, but you all were very sensitive to that, which is like, hey, we understand.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we want you to show up as best you can.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_00: And if you are grieving like that, take your time.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_00: You know, take all the time you need, and we can always do this.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, just thank y'all for that.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that that set a standard for me.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_00: So now anytime someone asks me to do stuff, I'm like, okay.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_00: Hold on.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, let me make sure you're doing like they did.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_00: So thank y'all for real for that.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_03: Of course.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_03: Speaking of projects, now I know I came to you randomly about doing this song, and I the amount of people saying, like, who is that singing?
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_03: And as much as I would love to take the credit, like you did something.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_03: I have a video of me recording my reaction to me first hearing it, and I was literally blown away.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_03: Like it was the perfect song for this type of podcast for the space.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_03: And I know we talked about it briefly about like what we wanted it to be like, but you know, I share what I wanted for it, and then I was like, let's make it happen.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_03: So, like, what what was that like?
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_03: Like building out the song and you know what we talked about, like wanting it to be more like a black sitcom type of vibe, like, because we love a jingle.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we do know we do, we do.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_00: You know, first of all, I just want to say thank you for even thinking of me.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um I mean, who is that?
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_00: I've always appreciated the way that you have supported um my music, um, my art, you know, from the moment you heard it on.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_00: And so to even be asked to, you know, I I'll say serenade your podcast is like that's a that was a big deal for me.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_00: And so um, so thank you for that and for trusting me to, you know, do what needed to be done.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_00: And did.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I really appreciate that.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I really anytime someone asked me to either write a song for them or um a jingle for them, um, I always want to know not just why you chose me, but like what you think I can offer to it.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_00: Because you could have asked anyone, honestly.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_00: You could have done it yourself, you could have even AI'd it if you want to.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_00: Please don't use AI.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_03: Please hire a person.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_00: Please hire a person.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: A talented one.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, because that thing don't know nothing.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_00: They don't know unless I tell it, right?
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_00: So call a person.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I just really listened to you.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_00: And um, I I don't know your whole story, but what I know about your story, I know how important this space is for you and just the things that I've um heard you talk about overcoming and um the challenges that you've had in order to be in the space in the seat that you're in right now.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_00: And so I really took that to heart, but I also didn't want to um crowd the opener, if you will.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't want to do that.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_00: I really wanted it to be more in focus of what you were talking about and why we're doing it.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I don't I don't know what your listeners might be dealing with, um, but I did want them to know, look, we might as well talk about it.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_00: Like, like, can we talk?
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_00: It's a question, it's not saying telling you to talk about it.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_00: It's can we?
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's to invite people.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_00: And so I just wanted it to feel like an invitation.
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_00: I always want things to be an invitation.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_00: I don't want anyone to feel forced to heal, or um, I don't even want you to feel like um even that you have to, I think you should, but that is a choice.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_00: Like I always want to leave it as a choice.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_00: So I wanted that to be felt in the song, but I also wanted people to know um that this is a moment to just check in.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_00: Like, let's just check in.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_00: It don't, it's not the doesn't mean you're gonna, you know, be completely better after, but you'll feel better and you'll at least be in an in motion towards your best self in some way.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_00: So I just wanted that to be felt in the song.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um, yeah, and then I had to call my co-producer, um, who is well versed in the um he's also done uh podcast jingles before for people and shows.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_00: And so um, but I knew he was he would be, he's my engineer, and I I don't I don't call anybody but Wilkes when it's of things of importance, right?
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: To me, to where I'm like, no, this this gotta be a go-to.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_00: A go-to.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so that process was really once I did what I needed to do, I was able to Wilkes, and I I let Wilkes know who you were to me.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_00: Like this, this is this is important to me, you know.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um, yeah, just just do what needs to be done.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_00: And and um, yeah, we we it was fun to say the least.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_00: I've done I did a jingle for um Tony's Chocolanelli.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if y'all have had Tony's, it's at you'll find it at Trader Joe's and all the places.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_00: I like to say it.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_00: They're overseas.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um I wanna say it's it's not Switzerland, don't get me wrong.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_00: Um don't let don't get me wrong.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_00: But anyway, Tony's, you can find Tony's Chocolate Nelly all the time.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_00: But we we were um uh commissioned by them.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um it was my first time and this is like 2016, and um they were like, look, here's a little bag, but we we are in alignment with what you and Soul Development as artists like y'all be talking right.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_00: Y'all are talking freedom, and they are um they they have um it's trade free.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_00: So there's no no slavery involved in Tony's chocolate.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if y'all know about the the the cocoa industry and the chocolate industry, but they are just exploiting the mess out of the same way they do with our cell phones and devices, they're exploiting the mess out of the um the resources um of the motherland.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_00: And so Tony's is one of, if not the only, company that is slave free.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_00: These people get paid well.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: Isn't that crazy to see?
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_00: Ain't that like chocolate?
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_00: Chocolate, right?
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_00: So careful what chocolate you buying.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but they commissioned us to do that, and so again, that was someone that's again, alignment is important where your art and what how you introduce are important.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_00: Not all money is good money.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_00: It ain't everything.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_00: Like you won't catch me writing a jingle for McDonald's.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sorry.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not no yeah, yep, I can say that on wax.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_00: There will be no Mickey D's jingles coming from me.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sure the bag would be nice, but no, well, it's it's an abundant bag, but that bag is also covered in blood and death, and I'm I'm I'm good.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_00: Gotta stand for something, gotta stand for something.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_00: And so, yeah, so your ask is again, and I bring up Tony's as to say that like I've been on a path of being in alignment with people and work and organizations and companies that um are really about literally that life.
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_00: Does that make sense?
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_00: About that life.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_00: And um, yeah, so your ask was like simple and you fam too.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_00: So it's like, what?
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, but you you are a busy woman.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_03: And I'm like, I am gonna try to make this work.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_00: No, and you came through.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_00: When it's fam, like, you know, and I think that's that's a part of this work too.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I don't ever want to get to industry, if that makes sense.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um, to where like my community can't call on me.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_00: I don't ever want to be out of reach.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_00: And even if I can't, even if my schedule or capacity won't allow, I will always plug you in to someone who will do, takes, takes it like I take it.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like, nah, like this is serious, you know.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_00: That's not gonna treat you like a client in a bag.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_00: That's not how I do that.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I don't believe in doing that.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_00: I don't believe in doing that.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_00: So your ask was right on time, and thank you for even thinking of me.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, thank you.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_03: Like anytime the amount of times I've played that song out in full.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I ain't gonna lie, I did, I did too.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_00: For I just need this just as a reminder to start my day.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_00: Like, you did check in with yourself.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_00: You absolutely did that.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_03: Like, can we talk?
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_03: Can we talk?
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_00: Like, yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_03: You um did what needed to be done, and I appreciate you for it.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_03: But there was no doubt in my mind, which is why you were literally the only person like to do it.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_03: Grateful, grateful.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_03: Um, let's get into some questions.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_03: Let's do it.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_03: Um, so well, we kind of touched on that.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_03: But does creating something for someone else feel different from creating things for yourself?
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_03: Like I know you you have your own music, you're in a group, you do things, but you also perform for other events, other people.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_03: Like what, like, how does that feel?
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um Well, it always feels great because I'm getting a chance to express myself outside of my own thinking and feelings.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_00: So um just even with you and the and and the uh the jingle, like I was like, you tell me what this podcast is about.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what are you doing this for?
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_00: Who is this for?
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, how did you arrive at this place?
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_00: And so, like, if I'm writing for someone or if I'm performing for someone, I always want to ask them, like, what are you going?
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I know you've asked me, but what how do you see me in this?
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_00: Or what is it that you would like me to say or or speak to like through the music, right?
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_00: Or through whatever uh you know, art form I'm that you're asking me to do, right?
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_00: And so um I use my like my expertise, but I'm using your personal feelings, your idea to um to make it happen.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: If that makes sense.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_00: That's not easy.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't seem like.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it is, and then it isn't because there are times when like as a artist I know best.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm trying to like tell the person, hey, I really feel like the best solution would be to do X, Y, and Z.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_00: And they're like, nah, I just wanted it.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like that's when I have to like relinquish, you know, that could part of the control or the creative process and be like, this is what the client wants.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_00: And you give them what they want.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_00: I was in a studio session the other day.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_00: Shout out to Kev Choice, man.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_00: He's got some new music coming.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_00: But I was doing uh one of the records and I was singing it and Kev, I was like, how was that, Kev?
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_00: And Kev was like, that was that was cool.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, yeah, but I think I can do it.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_00: He was like, actually, no, that was great.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_00: Don't you don't have to do it.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, nah, let me do it more.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_00: He was like, you did it.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_00: It's good.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_00: But if you want to go, you know, do it again.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_00: And so I did it again the way I wanted.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_00: And he was like, I still like the one that I liked.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, you know what?
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_00: You, you the boss, man.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: You got it.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and so in the in those moments, I can kind of relinquish.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_00: Now granted Kev is a genius.
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_00: So I can trust that if he says it's there, it's there, you know, and I can put aside my own like my personal, I told him to, I'm like, I I I'm not a perfectionist, but I I do try to at least touch it and see what it is.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not a perfectionist perfection is not, it doesn't exist.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_00: That's what I ended up finding out.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_03: It doesn't really exist.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and you'll drive yourself crazy trying to get it.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: You and granted I appreciate it as a as a mark, right?
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_00: But it's not, it's not a real thing.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_00: And so um though we try for perfection, sometimes he was like, nah, the raw is what I want that raw, take the raw.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I mean?
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_00: If the raw is what you're looking for, then that's what I get.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_00: So those are the only times where it becomes like difficult or challenging.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_00: And even in that, it's kind of like it's not, it's more like a surrender.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_00: Let me say it like that.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_00: It's like where you gotta surrender to hey, if this is what they're looking for, do what they're looking for.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_03: And I mean as we see with certain people, sometimes you should listen to your team because you might say the wrong thing.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_00: Oh yeah.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_03: Bless his heart.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_00: And we can we can we can talk about that.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_00: You know, because there's so much to say there, right?
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_00: There's so much to say.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_00: And I want to say it because there's so much love there.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's the thing.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_00: There's so much love there.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_00: There's so much respect there, right?
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_00: I think for artists it is important for us.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_00: It's like yes express yourself.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_00: Say what you want to say but be open to the critique of those who love and respect you right and don't take um loving critique for haterism if you especially from people who are actively um on the front lines of justice, of um liberation, of um how we free ourselves via art and language like those of us who really do this right and who are in these conversations around language and how um we navigate the um the heavies of the world right yeah yeah and I'm one who follows in the legacy of like the Nina Simones of it is an artist's duty to reflect the times in which we're living in and if that is the case in these times we have to be very careful especially those of us who are um who influence young people and youth and children um and these are the most vulnerable of us right so if there are certain narratives around children and young people that we must be very careful of how we talk around people who abuse children or harm children um physically emotionally spiritually et cetera right we got to be careful around how we throw them in the bunch with people who are against harming children and who want to protect children and the most vulnerable of us right and so though we believe in yes say what you want because people on the other end who do harm children they say whatever they want too and I don't think that those things are right to say but okay if you want to stand on that of saying I can say what I want and okay stand on that but be mindful of who those words may harm right and it's not to say that everything you're gonna say is going to be perfect and land on everybody but there is a temperature and there is a thread and there is a tone and there is a theme around how we say things right um and finding that to be very important.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_00: Like there's certain things you will never hear me say on the record.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_00: You just won't yeah because it doesn't align with my core values and and um and it's not on some like self-righteousness it's not that it's just when you know who you are and when you're authentic yeah and um when you when you consider that's the thing an artist should always consider who this lands on and how this lands if nothing else in that moment think of the survivors what would the survivors say about how you're coupling these people and I get what you're trying to say um but you're not saying it in the right it's not even in the right way it's just what you're saying is just not it's off because it it doesn't it doesn't hold the awareness right and even in the mistake of saying something not being able to to receive the accountability that's the it's the double down it's not even what you said for several because we all get that but it's the double down and I think that's what especially for someone who loves and respects artists who are doing things that we haven't seen done before and are like blazing new trails right especially black ones especially the black ones especially black ones um we and I say that because we are the culture at the end of the day we just are globally it's not just in the states it's globally historically historically since we got up in this thing right yeah we have we have to be so careful and again when we're around children it just it just you know there's a lot I could say there's a whole there's so much I could do this all day on this topic alone but I think I'll say this what it has shown me is that an artist with my level of knowledge education experience I have to do better at showing artists who are uh I think how old is that young okay I'll say a decade behind me ish roughly yeah five to ten behind me right I need to do better at creating spaces where I show you really how to be an artist where I show you hey don't partner with McDonald's I know they gave you this deal but they're really not in alignment you don't even need it you know what I'm saying you don't even need it anyway so let's let's do something else or how about maybe we don't become a feature on a song with someone who you know what I'm saying like things like that like at least having those conversations as to why we should be more careful especially as black artists um especially if we say we care about the culture right and the culture needs to change the culture now is it's not about canceling anybody but it's about holding people accountable and I am not a gatekeeper.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_00: I tell people I'm not a gatekeeper but I do have keys to the gate yeah and so if we need to lock the door on someone for now then we can lock the door and then when it's time to open it yeah let them in yeah once you let me once you once there's that conversation around like you know what I doubled down and I wasn't I probably shouldn't have doubled down I won't die on that hill right and there's the there's the um there are people who I find that if you disagree with accountability you have a problem with love which is you do say more about that you do because love and accountability they're sisters they love each other yeah you can't have one without the other right if I say I love you then that means I'm gonna hold you accountable right to not the you that I see or or and by see I mean the you I want you to be right no it's the you that I'm like no if you tell you if you're the one telling me I want to be a loving person I want to show up as love then that means you have to be held accountable.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_00: And when you say I don't want accountability or I don't want to hold that or I don't want to face that or I don't want to hear that or I don't you can't handle a critique it's not easy.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_00: No it's not easy it hurts accountability.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yes it does shame it's like it's guilt.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_00: But those are things that if we say we want to be better humans that we have to deal with yeah we gotta hold that right yeah because what it does is it allows us when you hold yourself accountable it only allows for you to be not just a better you because we all want to be a better us but like it allows you to love you better and love others better.
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_00: You know and if the goal is to bring more love into the world then that means we're gonna need a whole lot more accountability and people don't want to be and I I wish unfortunate I wish I wish more people would be held accountable and I can't be mad at you we have someone in the highest office in the world and accountability running a whole muck you know and so I understand accountability is not popular.
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_00: No it's not pleasurable sometimes but it's necessary it's necessary and if you really start leaning into the accountability you start wanting it and you start saying stuff like this hold me accountable.
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_03: I be telling people hold me accountable if you see me off my game don't let me mess up please don't have me out here looking crazy hold me accountable because I understand what it what it looks like when when someone um holds me accountable that person really loves me yeah you really care about me so the thing about this whole like accountability online because when I was starting to think about starting this podcast I know I'm not gonna say everything right I try to shape it in a way that lets people know it's my perspective but still I'm on human but sometimes people like project or they just don't agree and so they want to bash you or just point to things that aren't even relative to the point that you're making.
• 33:51
  SPEAKER_00: It's not even a full thought.
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's like what how'd you even come to that you just you you were triggered by what someone said and now you got a lot of nothing to say zero about it.
• 34:03
  SPEAKER_03: Zero there was a circle all around like I was speaking to in one of my earlier episodes about me personally like enjoying being sober and not being able to have the things that I have today versus when I was not sober.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_03: And this person is saying like essentially I won't say but that I was like weak because it's like you could have just quit and still had these things or like whatever he said.
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm just like so you run into things like that and you know I knew that was something we'd be up against but I'm sure you have a lot of people coming at you with their own perspectives and stuff you know here here's a funny thing right because we're all we're full of opinions right but I always we just are we're humans um but I always say um hold your opinion to the fact first especially if you want to comment back on somebody right and even to even when artists mess up right do I think that it is our job to get in the comments and be like you know bash and do the canceling and all that whatever that mess is I'm not here for that right um if we have a disagreement right and um and even if I know I'm right right like I just be knowing I'm like I know I'm right but I'm gonna let you either right even in a moment like that I always invite the person put that based on is that a fact are you speaking from fact or is this like is this your personal experience because I don't question someone's human experiences like if that's what you've experienced then that's one thing.
• 35:50
  SPEAKER_00: But if they're like generalizing something and I'm like that's not even true.
• 35:55
  SPEAKER_03: Like the numbers don't even speak to that the research doesn't contradict themselves like you don't even know what you're gonna do.
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like okay you know those are the type of people I don't even give energy I've been blessed to not have if anything I'm in other people's stuff having these conversations I don't have it on my page because it's just not necessary and I'm and I always try to make sure if I'm if I posted it trust and believe you can you can find all the research that points to what I'm saying is actually true.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_00: Right and whether you believe it or not that's totally up to you.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah um but I always tell people go do read nobody wants that that's too much work I'd rather just fight online and that's silly to me that's such a way so I don't even bother and I hope you don't either if people are coming in like even that person's comment right like I try I I know you I'm sure I try but even that person's comment right like to me that's a projection absolutely you're projecting right like first of all when someone is is trying to tell me how I should do a thing and I didn't ask you that's yeah come on audacious yeah yeah yeah people are really really bold um you know and that's that is the internet that is the world of the internet unfortunately um but that's why I like doing real stuff like this like talk to me to read a book do some research okay like and I'm always like prove me wrong because if I'm not you know if it's if it if if there's more that I need to know tell me yeah like it's all about everybody per se but we are gonna be factual and we are gonna have sound information around our conversation like we're just gonna be talking out of our behind.
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah we're gonna converse with facts like adults yeah so I try I try no I'm I try and and and the and I'm gonna say this the more you and and this is gonna happen with anybody any creative doing the opposite of what um you know mainstream culture is doing right so you try to bring people to a place of let's talk about what we got going on.
• 38:19
  SPEAKER_00: Let me give you my experiences and what I've gone through right anybody trying to help people it's always gonna be one person if nothing that's gonna come in and try to infiltrate and say the things and so it's just a matter of you know us having the the response of like love and peace first I'm gonna give you that first but also I'm I'm I'm I'm going to give you the truth in love whatever and and I'm gonna do my best to do with a smile with a smile as best I can as best I can because I'm really not trying to cause any harm like I'm not trying to give you that energy back but I am going to let you know you are so wrong.
• 38:57
  SPEAKER_03: You are loud and wrong yeah the correction has to be accountability you know but people aren't used to that so not at all don't get there and I'm sure you've dealt with it for a while like I know well let's go back a bit so you grew up in the church have been in the church the black church your entire life and you've been in music in the church and so like even before we get to like the groups and deal with all this as an artist like when did you know that music was like your thing not just something like you enjoy but like this is what you were put here to do.
• 39:37
  SPEAKER_00: That's how I feel maybe you don't yeah yeah but like when did you know I feel like it was always just kind of there um but every time I heard music sang music saw music you know whatever it just was instant joy instant like it was it otherworldly for me you know I think um it was um less about I like that song or I like that beat yeah or I like their voice or I like that like but it was like nah something else is stirring right it's making me um it's making me go deeper than say basketball because I played basketball my whole music and basketball things um I didn't know that oh I balled what I balled how did I not know that I don't know well I don't probably because I don't look like an athlete as much um but I balled hard varsity basketball all four years of high school like I was I'm I was really good really good but um music was just much louder much louder um and so it it didn't and and so I bring the sports thing up because it though I had fun and I was good at it it didn't do the same there wasn't this otherworldly thing around it like it was for music and so yeah I just knew I just knew and the more I knew the more my family would pour into me um my GG put me in piano lessons I didn't stay long I think I did it for like a few months because basketball was calling me and I wanted to play basketball it's very demanding and so um you know my dad plays organ and piano my mom sang my my family had a gospel group here in the Bay Area called Turner Allen and Adams and um you know so I've anytime I was around that like these were ways in which they would pour into me and um it just stuck like it just never went away never went away um and by the time it came to college it was like you know I'm definitely not tall enough to compete.
• 41:55
  SPEAKER_03: You would have been in there with me.
• 41:57
  SPEAKER_00: I you know I'm saying I was not tall enough to compete and not to say that you can't if you're not tall you can't but for me it was just like this is going to be way more challenging to try to pursue this professionally and there was no way for me to be a music major and a student athlete because of the way that yeah it was no way I could do it because you if you're a music major you got to be in choir and then you have to have your instrument your discipline and mine was piano and so just was not yeah and then you're on the road if you're playing basket there's yeah yeah so I had to make a decision.
• 42:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah I had to make a decision and so music was like I'm still here girl like what you want to do and I was like I'm kicking you.
• 42:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah um but I always wanted to be in music in some way shape or form the artist thing was always there but I just never knew how that was gonna be like I'm black and I'm queer we're you know there we're there but like how do I sneak in to do that and then I'm in the black church.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_00: So then how do I sing secular music and do like because I can't be in the gospel well I could but I have to be quiet about who I am if I'm gonna do that.
• 43:04
  SPEAKER_03: So just yeah yeah no that's that seems like a conflict so I did not grow up in the church.
• 43:11
  SPEAKER_00: Uh my family was not okay because I hear the story I don't know what a Hallelujah night is I don't it's it is the watered down I won't even say what I shouldn't even play it like that.
• 43:22
  SPEAKER_03: It was like the church's way of like not letting us feel left out but in a way for Halloween but it did make us feel left out because I'm dressed up like a shepherd respectfully y'all thing I guess I'm saying it's kind of like those traumas I'm glad you didn't have to experience yeah but like I could only imagine because you know obviously we are both queer and mask presenting like child I'm sure you ran into your own obstacles as a creative, as a person and then you add this layer of being black and queer like What were some things that like you came up against, you come up against, like and how does that like influence your creative process?
• 44:10
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, even things as small as like wearing what I wanted to wear.
• 44:16
  SPEAKER_00: That's not small.
• 44:17
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I say small and compared to like and it's not small, you're right.
• 44:21
  SPEAKER_00: It's not.
• 44:22
  SPEAKER_00: But something like wearing, you have to wear a dress and stockings and kid heels and and and not only that, you're you're um you're the bishop's kid.
• 44:35
  SPEAKER_00: So you can't even like this is not like you're just a kid who goes to church.
• 44:41
  SPEAKER_00: Like you're the you're part of the figure here.
• 44:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 44:45
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I'm saying?
• 44:46
  SPEAKER_00: And so you really, yeah, it was a lot of like presenting the way you're supposed to present as the first family, you know.
• 44:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, but I like baggy clothes and I play basketball and I don't like the boys, you know what I'm saying?
• 45:04
  SPEAKER_00: Or I'm not looking at them like the other girls in church or like you know, doing that.
• 45:09
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not doing that, like they're my friends, and you know, and actually I have a crush on you, but you know what I'm saying?
• 45:15
  SPEAKER_00: Like it's that, like it was a lot of that, and so you know, trying to navigate that, but also like navigating like even purity culture during that time.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_00: It was like having that as like, you know, um no sex and like almost as if you don't even have a sexuality, like we don't so it's just we're not talking about sex, we're not even we're not gonna, and which is dangerous for young people because especially in the church, because there's so many predators around, and so you're not giving them the information on one how to protect themselves, how to be safe.
• 45:50
  SPEAKER_00: They're already doing stuff at school with their friends anyway, it's like you're not stopping anything.
• 45:55
  SPEAKER_00: They're just gonna go find out, and that's dangerous, you know.
• 45:59
  SPEAKER_00: So there was a lot of that.
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_00: So I was just kind of like taking on the the idea of you know, you don't there is no not that there isn't a sexuality, but you're not, you can't be queer, and you know you're not straight, so then just it's just nothing.
• 46:15
  SPEAKER_00: You're just yeah, and so having to exist like that, and then I'm the oldest, so then there's the standard of like doing everything right and and being the example, yeah.
• 46:27
  SPEAKER_00: So there's a lot of pressure around that, and then knowing you're creative on top of and you want to do the opposite, but then they want you to like do church music that you're like, but Christian rap sucks, like they're not rapping as good as Pac is rapping right now, and I'd rather, you know, and so and then also being black and understanding my blackness in granted, the black church is you can call it like one of the blackest places, but it's oftentimes not the safest place for black people, depending on what theology is being taught.
• 47:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and normally the theology is just the theology that was given to them by white supremacists, so there's that.
• 47:12
  SPEAKER_00: So there's a lot of um a lot of layers where that's concerned, at least for me being a child of the black church.
• 47:22
  SPEAKER_00: But what I was able to hold on to is one of those things where it's like, I was thinking about this the other day.
• 47:28
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, the black church has harmed just as many people as it has saved, if that makes sense.
• 47:35
  SPEAKER_00: And depending on who you are, you got a taste of both, right?
• 47:38
  SPEAKER_00: And so I feel like I got the both, you know.
• 47:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um, in some regards, it did a lot of damage, and in other regards, it really was helpful, you know.
• 47:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and the ways in which it helped me, it helped me grow as a musician.
• 47:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um, those are the best musicians and singers you'll ever find is in the black church.
• 47:58
  SPEAKER_00: They're not in the club, they're not at the lounge, they are not on tour, actually.
• 48:02
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 48:03
  SPEAKER_00: They are Sunday morning from 10 to 12.
• 48:05
  SPEAKER_00: You get to see them sing their hearts out and play their hearts out.
• 48:09
  SPEAKER_00: So I got to see that.
• 48:11
  SPEAKER_00: I got to witness that, and I got to take that in.
• 48:14
  SPEAKER_00: And they taught us a lot about our blackness, though, too.
• 48:16
  SPEAKER_00: Like a lot of what I know about black history is because of the black church, right?
• 48:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I wouldn't I wasn't learning it at school, you know.
• 48:23
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, of course not.
• 48:24
  SPEAKER_00: In my black church, we were talking about all the things, right?
• 48:26
  SPEAKER_00: Now it wasn't as radical, but it was definitely black history and information that I wouldn't have got anywhere else.
• 48:34
  SPEAKER_00: So there's a lot, you know, that I got from it.
• 48:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I think what it ultimately did, it really drew me closer to like creator, if you will, God, if you will, and what I believe in how I should show up in outside of whatever the book is trying to tell me, because you can find anything you want in that book.
• 48:58
  SPEAKER_00: If you want to be a warmongerer, you can use the Bible for that.
• 49:02
  SPEAKER_00: If you want to be a person of peace, you can use the Bible for like there's you can use it for anything.
• 49:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and so for me, I decided not so much to like place my entire life on this book, because I know history will show you exactly what that book is and how it is used.
• 49:18
  SPEAKER_00: So I don't place my, you know, my life and my decisions on what that the Bible says.
• 49:24
  SPEAKER_00: That's not, I'm not, I've unlearned those things.
• 49:27
  SPEAKER_00: What I have adopted is this idea of like, well, how do I show up for the least of us, the left out and the looked over?
• 49:37
  SPEAKER_00: How do I show up for the most vulnerable?
• 49:40
  SPEAKER_00: How do I show up for myself?
• 49:42
  SPEAKER_00: You know, do I believe in like the greatest commandment?
• 49:45
  SPEAKER_00: Love your neighbor as yourself.
• 49:47
  SPEAKER_00: So if you have a hard time loving yourself, you're not gonna be able to love your neighbor.
• 49:51
  SPEAKER_00: You'll you'll gladly watch your neighbor get kidnapped by ice.
• 49:54
  SPEAKER_00: You'll gladly watch your trans friends' rights taken away.
• 49:59
  SPEAKER_00: You'll like if you don't love yourself, you have that.
• 50:02
  SPEAKER_00: So I try to remain in that posture, right?
• 50:05
  SPEAKER_00: Of of love and you know, do justice, you know, show mercy, you know, those things and yeah, and just relying on that.
• 50:16
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm grateful for those lessons.
• 50:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I'm glad that even now as I serve in a black church um who's who's nothing like what I grew up in, and I'm really grateful for that space because I would have never um, I would have never thought that a place like that even existed.
• 50:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 50:36
  SPEAKER_00: Like, oh, this is a church where I can be authentically myself.
• 50:39
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 50:40
  SPEAKER_00: Nobody's damning me to hell.
• 50:42
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody says I'm loved, and see you in the afterlife.
• 50:46
  SPEAKER_00: And have like it's like that.
• 50:48
  SPEAKER_00: Like, that's not things that I grew up hearing, you know.
• 50:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um, yeah.
• 50:53
  SPEAKER_00: And just seeing a church be on the front lines of like social justice for real.
• 50:58
  SPEAKER_00: Like they're not playing no games.
• 51:00
  SPEAKER_03: As it should be.
• 51:01
  SPEAKER_00: As it, you know what I'm saying?
• 51:03
  SPEAKER_00: So I get to say in my lifetime that I got to see that there are many black queer people who can't say that, you know.
• 51:09
  SPEAKER_00: And so I get to be in that space, and that space is important to me so that I can remind my other queer folk that um there are spaces.
• 51:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, whatever your experience was with the church, be it or your religion or or person whatever you prescribe to, um, that there are places that and people in your respective religion or spiritual belief system that um that love you and that see you as fully human and um don't see you as a walking abomination and all the things we heard.
• 51:46
  SPEAKER_00: No, that you are fearfully and wonderfully made, that you are made in the image of God, that you are all those things.
• 51:52
  SPEAKER_00: And so I get to be that.
• 51:54
  SPEAKER_00: I get to show up every Sunday as that example and as that representation of like, not like, see, I'm saved and I'm no, I'm me.
• 52:04
  SPEAKER_00: I'm exactly who God made me to be.
• 52:08
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't have to change anything.
• 52:10
  SPEAKER_00: If anything, I'm I'm changing how I treat people.
• 52:12
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 52:13
  SPEAKER_00: If anything, I'm changing how I move in this capitalist society.
• 52:17
  SPEAKER_00: If it, you know what I'm saying?
• 52:19
  SPEAKER_00: That's the only thing that needs to change are those things.
• 52:21
  SPEAKER_00: It's not who you are and who you love.
• 52:23
  SPEAKER_03: Exactly.
• 52:24
  SPEAKER_03: Because I, again, I didn't grow up, so I don't know and understand all the things, but I just I don't think whatever version of God people believe in would intentionally make someone that is the thing that he tells you is not right.
• 52:43
  SPEAKER_03: Like, I just don't believe it.
• 52:44
  SPEAKER_00: So I don't believe God would make you to hate you.
• 52:46
  SPEAKER_00: That's crazy.
• 52:48
  SPEAKER_00: Like that's wild.
• 52:49
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what kind of God is that?
• 52:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you go ahead and keep that God for yourself.
• 52:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, like that doesn't make sense, but that's not what I believe.
• 52:57
  SPEAKER_00: And I'll never believe, I never did, even when I was sitting up under some of those teachings as a kid, and I the thing, that thing in me, the God in me, if you will, be like, that's not true.
• 53:09
  SPEAKER_00: Don't believe that.
• 53:10
  SPEAKER_00: You know, as a child, you have to kind of sit on those things because you, you know, it's survival mode.
• 53:14
  SPEAKER_00: And that's part of why I left to go to school was because I needed to, I needed to, it I needed it just to be me and God, nobody else.
• 53:25
  SPEAKER_00: It's just us.
• 53:26
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 53:27
  SPEAKER_00: You hold me accountable, you show me where to go.
• 53:29
  SPEAKER_00: I don't have, you know, the church's influence over me, my parents, my family's expectation, none of that.
• 53:36
  SPEAKER_00: You guide me only.
• 53:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 53:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm far away.
• 53:40
  SPEAKER_00: So this is not driving.
• 53:41
  SPEAKER_00: No interference.
• 53:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 53:43
  SPEAKER_00: No interference.
• 53:44
  SPEAKER_00: We don't really do that.
• 53:45
  SPEAKER_00: And it and it wasn't until then that I was able to like really like let my hair down, if you say, and just be.
• 53:52
  SPEAKER_00: And even that was interesting to navigate, right?
• 53:55
  SPEAKER_00: Because even black colleges have their HBCUs have their things.
• 53:58
  SPEAKER_00: And I'll be like, wait.
• 54:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, there's always spaces and places with there's a there, that's a whole nother conversation.
• 54:05
  SPEAKER_00: But I will say, like, if it weren't for me doing that, I wouldn't have been able to test whatever theology they were teaching me with what I the theology that was in me from birth, in terms of who I am, who I'm meant to be, what's true and what's real about me, and how that connects with who placed me here, right?
• 54:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 54:27
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and so I have to, I've had to lean into that.
• 54:30
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm so glad that you did not have that experience.
• 54:34
  SPEAKER_00: Unfortunately, there are many queer black church kids, even now, they might be listening now.
• 54:43
  SPEAKER_00: I'm telling you, that thing that's in you that's telling you you know this is some bullshit, naive that they talking.
• 54:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, believe that.
• 54:51
  SPEAKER_00: Believe because that's really the God in you.
• 54:53
  SPEAKER_00: That's God.
• 54:54
  SPEAKER_00: That's that's really God.
• 54:55
  SPEAKER_00: Whatever they're telling, if uh my wonderful dear sister um and collaborator, um, and be imaginative, shout out to Aisha Walker.
• 55:05
  SPEAKER_00: She told me on a birthday, we were having this conversation on my birthday some years ago, and we got on the topic of love and you know, life, and she was asking me, like, you know, what's and so as I'm telling her how she was like, I'ma just tell you like this if it ain't love, it's a lie.
• 55:26
  SPEAKER_00: And I said, That's been my whole life.
• 55:30
  SPEAKER_03: Wow, yeah.
• 55:31
  SPEAKER_00: That's how I knew something wasn't true, like it didn't sound like love, it didn't feel like like the love that we're taught.
• 55:38
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, God loves you.
• 55:39
  SPEAKER_00: That inner knowing like this don't feel right.
• 55:43
  SPEAKER_00: Like, if it feels like this is a lie, this doesn't feel true.
• 55:46
  SPEAKER_00: If it ain't love, it's a lie.
• 55:47
  SPEAKER_00: And we say on the God is love.
• 55:49
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 55:50
  SPEAKER_00: And we also say God is not human in the sense that God would lie.
• 55:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 55:56
  SPEAKER_00: So if God is love, what y'all telling me ain't making sense.
• 56:00
  SPEAKER_00: It's not making sense what I'm feeling.
• 56:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's a whole big old contradiction.
• 56:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 56:07
  SPEAKER_00: Contradiction.
• 56:08
  SPEAKER_00: So I lean into to the the truth, the truth in love, if that makes sense.
• 56:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 56:15
  SPEAKER_00: The only way you can know what love truly is, and I think that's how I learned love, was I had to get away from some of the the lies, right, that were were told to me.
• 56:25
  SPEAKER_00: And they probably thought they were telling me the truth.
• 56:28
  SPEAKER_03: They probably thought they were doing it to protect you, which came from a place of love.
• 56:33
  SPEAKER_03: So they thought.
• 56:33
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 56:34
  SPEAKER_03: So they thought.
• 56:35
  SPEAKER_00: They thought but it came from a place of indoctrination.
• 56:38
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, and that's the real tea.
• 56:40
  SPEAKER_03: The real T.
• 56:41
  SPEAKER_03: That's the gag.
• 56:43
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's the gag is indoctrination.
• 56:47
  SPEAKER_00: At the end of the day, it wasn't love.
• 56:49
  SPEAKER_00: But when you finally understand what love is, that's why I say lean into that commandment of love your neighbor as yourself, because that's the that is the the cycle of love.
• 57:05
  SPEAKER_00: It shouldn't just begin and end with me.
• 57:08
  SPEAKER_00: It's supposed to be able to spread.
• 57:10
  SPEAKER_00: It's supposed to reach the next person.
• 57:12
  SPEAKER_00: And if it's not doing that, if it's cutting people off, if it's um keeping people away from whatever it is, that's a lie.
• 57:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 57:22
  SPEAKER_00: You telling lies over there.
• 57:24
  SPEAKER_00: Ooh.
• 57:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 57:24
  SPEAKER_03: So I I, as I've come to get older, I understand like love is pain, inevitably, because you can't keep the things that you love.
• 57:36
  SPEAKER_00: You cannot.
• 57:37
  SPEAKER_03: Forever.
• 57:38
  SPEAKER_03: And it makes me think of like your album, Good Grief.
• 57:41
  SPEAKER_03: Well, Project, I don't know, EP.
• 57:42
  SPEAKER_03: I'm not familiar with that.
• 57:43
  SPEAKER_00: Well, no, it was more of a, it was a it was a labor of love.
• 57:46
  SPEAKER_00: It was a project.
• 57:47
  SPEAKER_03: It was like it wasn't even on my list of things to do.
• 57:51
  SPEAKER_03: Oh.
• 57:52
  SPEAKER_03: No.
• 57:52
  SPEAKER_03: If y'all, we we're gonna put all your music and stuff in the description because that's a masterpiece.
• 57:58
  SPEAKER_03: But when I think about like creating, like especially as a black artist or a black creative, like the love that you create from, it's also can be rooted in pain and hurt.
• 58:12
  SPEAKER_03: And so, like, when you're creating, because your music is so like positive and affirming, is it still rooted in like love, or do you pull from like a source of pain as well?
• 58:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, it it's right.
• 58:28
  SPEAKER_00: If I say I'm so Lauren, right, then that means you gotta get all of me authentically.
• 58:35
  SPEAKER_00: And some and sometimes Soul Lauren is in pain.
• 58:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and grief hurts.
• 58:41
  SPEAKER_00: It is painful.
• 58:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's painful.
• 58:44
  SPEAKER_00: I I don't I don't know anybody who says they love grief.
• 58:49
  SPEAKER_00: I've never heard anyone say that they'll take it off.
• 58:52
  SPEAKER_00: This is the most inconvenient part of humanity I've ever witnessed.
• 58:56
  SPEAKER_00: More inconvenient than my phone blacking out earlier.
• 58:59
  SPEAKER_00: Like it's grief, is one of those things you just cannot, you can't solve a lot.
• 59:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you can't solve for why on that one.
• 59:08
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sorry.
• 59:09
  SPEAKER_00: You cannot.
• 59:10
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so there it's a painful process.
• 59:14
  SPEAKER_00: And so when you hear the music, if you hear good grief, though, though I always, like you said, I I my music is positive and it's a and it it is affirming, but I can't reach the positivity of it if I don't tap into the pain.
• 59:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I've heard many healers talk about clean pain before.
• 59:33
  SPEAKER_00: What when you talked about um, you know, not being able to hold on to the things you love all the time, right?
• 59:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and being able to let go.
• 59:42
  SPEAKER_00: We talked about surrender earlier.
• 59:43
  SPEAKER_00: Those are things I I find to be clean pain.
• 59:46
  SPEAKER_00: Facing the things you don't want to talk about or things that are hurtful or things in your past, like that's clean pain, right?
• 59:53
  SPEAKER_00: And we say it's clean um because of what it results in afterwards, right?
• 59:59
  SPEAKER_00: Like it hurts.
• 1:00:01
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, but it's over.
• 1:00:02
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 1:00:03
  SPEAKER_00: The chapters ended, yeah.
• 1:00:05
  SPEAKER_00: And there's there is a cleansing, if you will, that happens, a washing over, right?
• 1:00:11
  SPEAKER_00: Uh a washing, not so much washing away the memory of the pain, it's there.
• 1:00:16
  SPEAKER_00: Like I'll never forget where I was, you know, in certain moments when certain things happen in grief.
• 1:00:22
  SPEAKER_00: I'll never forget those things.
• 1:00:23
  SPEAKER_00: Really sticks.
• 1:00:24
  SPEAKER_03: Can't remember what happened last weekend, but you remember vividly.
• 1:00:29
  SPEAKER_03: I remember vividly.
• 1:00:30
  SPEAKER_00: I can tell you what I had on, what I was wearing, who I was with.
• 1:00:33
  SPEAKER_00: Like I can tell you those things, right?
• 1:00:35
  SPEAKER_00: And and because the pain is real, you know.
• 1:00:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but as a creative, it is my responsibility to transmute the pain and that energy into something useful.
• 1:00:50
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 1:00:50
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I'm saying?
• 1:00:51
  SPEAKER_03: Because it can't just be a dump.
• 1:00:53
  SPEAKER_03: No, we got plenty of black pain and art.
• 1:00:56
  SPEAKER_00: There's tons of that, right?
• 1:00:58
  SPEAKER_00: And and there's room for it, right?
• 1:01:00
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's hard.
• 1:01:01
  SPEAKER_00: If you're black, you're gonna find pain in this process.
• 1:01:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's the most beautiful thing to be.
• 1:01:08
  SPEAKER_00: I love being black.
• 1:01:09
  SPEAKER_00: I wouldn't trade it for anything at all.
• 1:01:11
  SPEAKER_00: I wouldn't even trade the pain of being black.
• 1:01:13
  SPEAKER_00: I can't, it it doesn't um because we because we don't stay in it, if that makes sense.
• 1:01:21
  SPEAKER_00: Like it's something that we just we're able to do something with pain that I just haven't seen anyone else do.
• 1:01:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um, we create the blues.
• 1:01:32
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I'm saying?
• 1:01:33
  SPEAKER_00: We create hip hop, you know what I'm saying, when we're in pain.
• 1:01:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um we create Negro spirituals when we're in pain.
• 1:01:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:01:42
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like we we make we make stuff.
• 1:01:45
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:01:45
  SPEAKER_03: I just went on this tangent of like how we got like a lot of like black foods.
• 1:01:50
  SPEAKER_03: It came from getting scraps that we turned into that's pain.
• 1:01:55
  SPEAKER_00: Like that's literally scraps that weren't never even in our natural diet.
• 1:02:00
  SPEAKER_00: You see what I'm saying?
• 1:02:01
  SPEAKER_03: Turn into gold.
• 1:02:02
  SPEAKER_00: Gold to this day, top-tier cuisine, you know what I mean?
• 1:02:07
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's what we do with the pain.
• 1:02:10
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I am looking toward looking or I look to make music um that alleviates some of our pain.
• 1:02:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:02:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um it's to make medicine, you know.
• 1:02:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um, yeah.
• 1:02:28
  SPEAKER_03: And I mean, as someone who listens, like your music is healing, like truly.
• 1:02:33
  SPEAKER_03: It's gotta be.
• 1:02:34
  SPEAKER_03: And I think you can only get that when you've gone through it, which is why I'm like, look, I might not have all the answers, yeah, but we can talk about it because especially, you know, in the black culture, might as well.
• 1:02:47
  SPEAKER_03: Like in the black culture, it's you put everything, sweep everything under the rug, don't talk about it.
• 1:02:52
  SPEAKER_03: Don't talk about it, and that does a lot of harm.
• 1:02:54
  SPEAKER_00: And so it's like this house stays in this house, we've heard that.
• 1:02:58
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and it's like, no, no, like we need to talk about it because that's just hurting us.
• 1:03:03
  SPEAKER_03: And so if we have to put ourselves out there for the sake of healing, yeah, then so be it.
• 1:03:08
  SPEAKER_03: So be it.
• 1:03:09
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
• 1:03:10
  SPEAKER_03: Because if it starts like a movement of people wanting to be more out and spreading love and healing and correcting things, then let's do it.
• 1:03:20
  SPEAKER_00: But someone else start, somebody's gotta do it, and it's not easy.
• 1:03:24
  SPEAKER_00: It's not easy to like sit with your pain and try to create something.
• 1:03:29
  SPEAKER_00: That's one of the hardest things an artist can do, you know, is to sit, but it's it's again, if you're an artist, different between being an artist and somebody who just like I make songs, that's different.
• 1:03:43
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:03:45
  SPEAKER_00: You have to go deep.
• 1:03:47
  SPEAKER_00: You don't have a choice.
• 1:03:48
  SPEAKER_00: You don't have a choice, you don't have a choice.
• 1:03:50
  SPEAKER_00: You must, you must.
• 1:03:52
  SPEAKER_00: If you ever, if you want your art to be potent, if you want your art to um be impactful, and that's something that I want it to be.
• 1:04:00
  SPEAKER_03: I'm and to last beyond you.
• 1:04:04
  SPEAKER_00: I just sang a cover of um Lauren Hill's X Factor, right?
• 1:04:09
  SPEAKER_00: Please.
• 1:04:09
  SPEAKER_00: I know you see what I'm saying?
• 1:04:11
  SPEAKER_00: She was in pain.
• 1:04:12
  SPEAKER_00: You have to be in pain to write that.
• 1:04:14
  SPEAKER_00: You have to be in pain, brokenhearted enough to write that, to talk about that.
• 1:04:19
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I'm saying?
• 1:04:20
  SPEAKER_00: But look how much of a classic it is.
• 1:04:22
  SPEAKER_00: Look how even I just said the name.
• 1:04:24
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't even sing it, but immediately right to yep, and just even where she draw.
• 1:04:31
  SPEAKER_00: I've I come from, and that's why, and that's another one who follows in the legacy of Anina Simone, right?
• 1:04:36
  SPEAKER_00: When we when we as black artists follow that tradition, not trend.
• 1:04:43
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, black artists, not the trend.
• 1:04:46
  SPEAKER_00: No, no, we have a tradition that we get to draw and a legacy that we get to pull and draw from that shows us how to turn our pain into power, into medicine, into healing, into love.
• 1:05:02
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I'm saying?
• 1:05:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we have that ability.
• 1:05:05
  SPEAKER_00: So projects like a good grief are, you know, my ways of expressing that pain, but through love.
• 1:05:12
  SPEAKER_00: I did that because I love my family.
• 1:05:14
  SPEAKER_00: I love my grandparents.
• 1:05:16
  SPEAKER_00: I love my journey, you know, though hard, throw though painful, though challenging and very layered, you know.
• 1:05:25
  SPEAKER_00: I love my grandparents.
• 1:05:26
  SPEAKER_00: They were this, but they're also the same people that have me sitting up in churches that were sitting with the kid, you know.
• 1:05:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 1:05:34
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and they like you said, they thought that they were doing, and they were to their to the best of their ability, based on what they and yeah, and um I love how um, you know, a lot of folks in in the black church who are deconstructing are talking about, you know, the God of the God of your understanding.
• 1:05:54
  SPEAKER_00: Like that's the that the God of their understanding was like you take your grandkids to church because that's what your grandmama did.
• 1:06:00
  SPEAKER_00: And your grandma before them, and blah blah blah.
• 1:06:02
  SPEAKER_00: So that's you know, and to some extent, yeah, it was that was our safe space as black people, you know, but um that's not the only space, you know.
• 1:06:13
  SPEAKER_00: So spaces like this being being black and using our pain, using your pain to even create this podcast, right?
• 1:06:20
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like using my pain to create good grief, you know, like that's what this is about.
• 1:06:26
  SPEAKER_00: Like, we don't go through for nothing.
• 1:06:29
  SPEAKER_00: Uh a friend of mine came, visited um uh my church maybe a couple weeks ago, and they hadn't heard me sing in a while, too.
• 1:06:37
  SPEAKER_00: It's been a long time.
• 1:06:39
  SPEAKER_00: And um, they were like, wow, you know, like you sound like you got some been through on your I say, yeah, because I've been through.
• 1:06:46
  SPEAKER_00: Oh like you know, you know, when some like you say, you've been through, you can't fake you can't fake.
• 1:06:51
  SPEAKER_00: I can't teach you.
• 1:06:52
  SPEAKER_00: And that's why I say hire a person to do these things because AI can't, AI ain't been through, yeah.
• 1:06:57
  SPEAKER_00: Like I've been through, yeah, like you've been through, like we've been through.
• 1:07:01
  SPEAKER_00: They don't mm-mm.
• 1:07:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they can't feel that, you know what I mean?
• 1:07:05
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, um, there's an an artist, I won't say the name because I love this artist.
• 1:07:09
  SPEAKER_03: And uh they're an RB, and which is a place where you really you should not you can't they got the rhythm, they ain't got the blues.
• 1:07:17
  SPEAKER_03: And I was just talking to Janae about that.
• 1:07:20
  SPEAKER_00: You cannot fake them blues, you can't you can't, you can't, you know, you can sing the blues, people sing the blues all the time, but like to embody it, yeah, to where where you're unlocking the medicine of the blues.
• 1:07:34
  SPEAKER_00: That's why I say black people created the blues out of our pain, out of our struggles.
• 1:07:39
  SPEAKER_00: Stop playing with us, yeah.
• 1:07:41
  SPEAKER_00: So don't, yeah, when people tap into like and you talking RB, you're talking about our pain.
• 1:07:49
  SPEAKER_00: That was birthed, RB was birthed out of the church.
• 1:07:52
  SPEAKER_00: You don't just make just like the that comes out of the church.
• 1:07:56
  SPEAKER_00: Why do you think all the greatest RB singers sound so good?
• 1:08:00
  SPEAKER_00: Because they went to church, they grew up in church first.
• 1:08:03
  SPEAKER_00: Your favorite producers, all the ones worth their salt.
• 1:08:06
  SPEAKER_00: I'll say anybody that is considered an icon, a goat, whatever you want to call it, guarantee you, you traced it back.
• 1:08:13
  SPEAKER_00: They were at church, but that's that's where you learn how to sing with some benthu.
• 1:08:18
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I'm saying?
• 1:08:20
  SPEAKER_00: You hear the testimony, it's embedded, yeah, and it is a part of our DNA, it's a part of our sound, so you can't fake that.
• 1:08:26
  SPEAKER_00: No, you can't fake that.
• 1:08:27
  SPEAKER_00: And so I try to be as authentic.
• 1:08:29
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I don't have all the like the gospel, you know, vocal isms.
• 1:08:33
  SPEAKER_00: Like I can tap in every now and then, but I'm not, you know, you ain't gonna get Shirley Caesar or somebody, you know what I'm saying?
• 1:08:40
  SPEAKER_00: But we got our time.
• 1:08:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you know that, but like I don't have all of those things, but I have the influence.
• 1:08:48
  SPEAKER_00: And it's and I know how to grab it if need be to pull from you know where that sound comes from.
• 1:08:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you know.
• 1:08:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so yeah, I hope whoever that artist is that they figure it out.
• 1:09:02
  SPEAKER_03: I'll tell you who off camera.
• 1:09:03
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, you can tell me off camera, and I'll tell you if they're gonna get it or not.
• 1:09:07
  SPEAKER_00: They probably won't.
• 1:09:09
  SPEAKER_03: I think we we understand.
• 1:09:10
  SPEAKER_00: This is why we need, you know, we need these conversations.
• 1:09:14
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I think they've gotten as close as they can.
• 1:09:16
  SPEAKER_00: As close as they can.
• 1:09:17
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 1:09:18
  SPEAKER_03: Um, yeah, I there have been a number of times where I've listened to different songs of yours, but like correct me if I'm getting the title wrong.
• 1:09:28
  SPEAKER_03: But is it Find Your Way?
• 1:09:30
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, find your way.
• 1:09:31
  SPEAKER_03: I've listened to that song and some hard moments.
• 1:09:35
  SPEAKER_03: It's my favorite one.
• 1:09:36
  SPEAKER_03: You done made me cry.
• 1:09:37
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:09:37
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, like come on, me too.
• 1:09:41
  SPEAKER_03: Because if you find a better way, let me know.
• 1:09:44
  SPEAKER_00: Because I'm married to none of this, please.
• 1:09:47
  SPEAKER_00: So if you find a better way, let me know.
• 1:09:49
  SPEAKER_00: But I already know that you really don't.
• 1:09:52
  SPEAKER_00: There is no other, there isn't love, is the only way.
• 1:09:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:09:56
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, and that's why I said if it ain't love, I know you're lying to me.
• 1:09:59
  SPEAKER_00: I know you lying.
• 1:10:01
  SPEAKER_00: I know you lying.
• 1:10:02
  SPEAKER_00: That's that is that is that is, and it's painful to know that people that you thought like really loved you was really like lying the whole time, even if it wasn't intentional.
• 1:10:14
  SPEAKER_00: It was that's hard.
• 1:10:15
  SPEAKER_00: But a song like Find Your Way, yeah, you're gonna find the pain.
• 1:10:20
  SPEAKER_00: I'm telling you the whole the timeline.
• 1:10:22
  SPEAKER_00: That's the whole grief that and that was just in a few months.
• 1:10:26
  SPEAKER_00: That wasn't even a year of grief.
• 1:10:28
  SPEAKER_03: That was yeah, that was just a little snapshot.
• 1:10:31
  SPEAKER_00: That was what I could fit into 16.
• 1:10:33
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, you know, like yeah, I like music like um The Blue Hour by Rex Life Robbins.
• 1:10:39
  SPEAKER_00: I almost wear that hat today too, but you know, that I went to um was that August Hall when he was on the tour, and the tour came to San Francisco.
• 1:10:52
  SPEAKER_00: And I went to that tour, and I was still um, I don't even know if Good Grief had was out yet.
• 1:10:58
  SPEAKER_00: I don't remember, but I went with Kariga.
• 1:11:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but we were all still very much so, you know, in the grief of it all.
• 1:11:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but being at a concert where an the artist literally you toured on an album that was about the grief.
• 1:11:14
  SPEAKER_00: About it every night.
• 1:11:17
  SPEAKER_00: Every night?
• 1:11:18
  SPEAKER_00: Oh I can't even imagine that.
• 1:11:21
  SPEAKER_00: Like, that's why y'all have not seen me perform.
• 1:11:25
  SPEAKER_00: I feel it is as far as I can really go.
• 1:11:28
  SPEAKER_00: At least at this time.
• 1:11:29
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 1:11:30
  SPEAKER_00: That's as far as I can go.
• 1:11:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I've yeah, that's about as far as I can go on good grief.
• 1:11:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um, because it it really, it really, really goes there.
• 1:11:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um but I will say this being able to see someone tour from city to city singing songs about their grief.
• 1:11:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um it healed a part of me as an artist because they tell you in the industry that nobody wants to hear about it.
• 1:12:01
  SPEAKER_00: Nobody they won't um support it, right?
• 1:12:06
  SPEAKER_00: It's hard to drive it home, but especially if you're black.
• 1:12:08
  SPEAKER_00: Oh they definitely don't want to hear about your grief.
• 1:12:12
  SPEAKER_00: No, no, not at all.
• 1:12:15
  SPEAKER_00: No one cares, actually.
• 1:12:17
  SPEAKER_00: That's the sad part.
• 1:12:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um but what that tour showed me was that people are ready, at least the ones who are ready.
• 1:12:27
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 1:12:27
  SPEAKER_00: There there is a demographic of people who are looking and searching for music that heals them and guides them through the real stuff, the real life stuff.
• 1:12:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, not just getting you ready for your friend's party or whatever.
• 1:12:41
  SPEAKER_00: Nah, this is life stuff.
• 1:12:43
  SPEAKER_00: And one thing I know about grief, everybody, it's gonna touch everybody.
• 1:12:48
  SPEAKER_00: Some ways are like you came around from that thing.
• 1:12:52
  SPEAKER_00: Try.
• 1:12:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:12:54
  SPEAKER_00: I'd love to see you.
• 1:12:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:12:57
  SPEAKER_00: And when you find a better way, let me know.
• 1:12:59
  SPEAKER_03: Let me know.
• 1:13:00
  SPEAKER_03: Please it's like you think you got away from it, you heal past it, and then something random will come up.
• 1:13:08
  SPEAKER_03: Random.
• 1:13:09
  SPEAKER_00: And you write back like it is the most inconvenient thing, you know.
• 1:13:13
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm grateful to be able to be in the company of artists who are willing to do that.
• 1:13:20
  SPEAKER_00: Kariga Bailey does the same thing.
• 1:13:22
  SPEAKER_00: Soul Development does the same thing.
• 1:13:24
  SPEAKER_00: Like, you know, we talk about because that's real.
• 1:13:28
  SPEAKER_00: There's nothing more.
• 1:13:29
  SPEAKER_00: And if and if you're an artist who, any artist or creative, if you are afraid to talk about your grief or to express your grief through your art, um, you're not ready.
• 1:13:44
  SPEAKER_00: You're not ready.
• 1:13:45
  SPEAKER_00: You're not ready.
• 1:13:46
  SPEAKER_00: You're not ready.
• 1:13:47
  SPEAKER_00: You're not ready, you're not ready, you're not ready.
• 1:13:49
  SPEAKER_00: I don't care how good you are at what you do, you are not ready.
• 1:13:52
  SPEAKER_00: If you are not able, or if you aren't even able to help use your creative creativity to help someone express their art, you're not ready.
• 1:14:00
  SPEAKER_00: Because I'm telling you, this is art imitates life.
• 1:14:05
  SPEAKER_00: It does.
• 1:14:06
  SPEAKER_00: It does, it does, it does.
• 1:14:08
  SPEAKER_00: And you can't have one without the other.
• 1:14:10
  SPEAKER_00: Just like you can't have love without accountability, art and life go hand in hand.
• 1:14:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yep, they are reflections of one another.
• 1:14:17
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so yeah, I I always want to advocate for artists showing up in their grief and in their stuff and in their real.
• 1:14:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:14:26
  SPEAKER_00: Just being honest.
• 1:14:27
  SPEAKER_00: We ain't all got it together.
• 1:14:29
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, please.
• 1:14:31
  SPEAKER_04: No.
• 1:14:31
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:14:32
  SPEAKER_03: And if like you think you do, I'm telling you, in the process, you're gonna learn you do not.
• 1:14:39
  SPEAKER_03: I there have been things that have been uncovered during this process for me, and I'm like, oh, I didn't even know that was a thing.
• 1:14:46
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, but I'm not running from it because this is what it's about.
• 1:14:50
  SPEAKER_03: If you're really doing it from a place of love and you're looking to heal and help, then it's it's gonna be a little messy.
• 1:14:58
  SPEAKER_03: It's not gonna be comfortable.
• 1:14:59
  SPEAKER_00: It's not, and if you're not willing to go there, um are you really alive?
• 1:15:04
  SPEAKER_00: I guess.
• 1:15:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, not like really are you?
• 1:15:07
  SPEAKER_00: If you're like, or are you just existing?
• 1:15:13
  SPEAKER_00: You know, no, I don't know.
• 1:15:14
  SPEAKER_00: Existing is not enough for me.
• 1:15:16
  SPEAKER_00: No, like being alive means I'm actively moving through the things, I'm not running from the things, I'm not um, I'm not avoiding, and I'm not even trying to like I'm not even trying to pretend.
• 1:15:31
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I mean?
• 1:15:32
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I know I'm really being real about it.
• 1:15:34
  SPEAKER_00: Like, nah, life sucks right now.
• 1:15:37
  SPEAKER_00: Life's hard right now, and I'm gonna write a song about it.
• 1:15:40
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I'm saying?
• 1:15:41
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm but I'm not gonna leave it there.
• 1:15:43
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you know what I mean?
• 1:15:44
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not gonna leave it there.
• 1:15:46
  SPEAKER_00: I'm always gonna leave you with the positive side, right?
• 1:15:50
  SPEAKER_00: Even with find your way, like there's still there's hope.
• 1:15:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, there's hope in there.
• 1:15:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, there is there's hope.
• 1:15:57
  SPEAKER_00: There's hope, but we're gonna keep it real.
• 1:16:00
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 1:16:00
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna keep it all the way real.
• 1:16:02
  SPEAKER_00: Because that's all we can do.
• 1:16:03
  SPEAKER_00: That's all we can do.
• 1:16:04
  SPEAKER_03: That's all we can do.
• 1:16:05
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:16:06
  SPEAKER_00: I got a question for you though.
• 1:16:07
  SPEAKER_00: I know this is not my podcast, but I got a question for you because being able to overcome the things that you've overcome.
• 1:16:18
  SPEAKER_00: What made you say a podcast is needed?
• 1:16:26
  SPEAKER_00: Like, was it like I've overcome these things and I don't see or hear, I don't there aren't any podcasts that I could go to or places that I could have gone to?
• 1:16:39
  SPEAKER_00: Or was it uh this is just for me?
• 1:16:42
  SPEAKER_00: And if people win it cool, yeah, like what made you say, like, this is the way that I want to contribute after going through all that I've gone through?
• 1:16:51
  SPEAKER_03: What was Yeah, so it's a bit layered, but originally I got told that I should start a podcast back in 2019 when I was actually going through my first round of being sober.
• 1:17:04
  SPEAKER_03: I was in a group speaking to people, and I guess the way in which I could speak to people, someone's like, you should do a podcast.
• 1:17:12
  SPEAKER_03: I'm like, And you should.
• 1:17:14
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, okay, but I'm like, okay, cool.
• 1:17:16
  SPEAKER_03: So I've kind of kept it in the back of my mind, but then you know, everyone started dropping podcasts, and then it really, really took off in the last few years.
• 1:17:24
  SPEAKER_03: So I was like, nah.
• 1:17:25
  SPEAKER_03: But then in that to that same note, everybody who should have one, shouldn't have one, like everybody has it, and they're talking about things that really don't matter.
• 1:17:36
  SPEAKER_03: Now, don't get me wrong, there's some great, great podcasts out there.
• 1:17:40
  SPEAKER_03: There are, and I will plug it all day.
• 1:17:43
  SPEAKER_03: Grits and X podcast, like come on, he is talking about some real real stuff, yes, and he's not sugar coating it.
• 1:17:50
  SPEAKER_03: That's right.
• 1:17:51
  SPEAKER_03: And this also came at the time where I discovered him, where I'm getting back into entertaining the idea of starting a podcast because it's like everyone's starting it.
• 1:18:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:18:03
  SPEAKER_03: And, you know, admittedly, I'm like telling myself I can't, you know, make it myself small.
• 1:18:07
  SPEAKER_03: And sure, thank God for my partner who is the biggest supporter and is like had never let it go, was like, you should start this podcast.
• 1:18:16
  SPEAKER_03: Been telling me for years and years and years.
• 1:18:18
  SPEAKER_03: So fast forward, I lose my job, I got all this free time, and there she's like, You should This is the time.
• 1:18:26
  SPEAKER_03: Let's let's just let's just try for fun.
• 1:18:29
  SPEAKER_03: Like, just do it, you don't even have to put it out, but like you don't want to look back and regret it.
• 1:18:34
  SPEAKER_03: So I start entertaining it.
• 1:18:37
  SPEAKER_03: Um, I've also had situations where I have shared things about my story on social media.
• 1:18:44
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 1:18:44
  SPEAKER_03: Um, yes, mainly like drinking, yeah.
• 1:18:47
  SPEAKER_03: Um, because I know there's a stigma in my age group, there's a stigma in culture in general.
• 1:18:54
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, and it's like y'all all out party and drink and do the thing.
• 1:18:58
  SPEAKER_03: I don't drink.
• 1:18:59
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah and you won't force me to drink, and I'm proud to be sober.
• 1:19:03
  SPEAKER_03: And the response I've gotten from that, I'm like, oh, maybe, maybe I should do this.
• 1:19:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:19:10
  SPEAKER_03: And, you know, without getting too far into it, like spiritually, like I've just have gotten signs that like this is what you need to do.
• 1:19:20
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:19:20
  SPEAKER_03: And I feel things were put in my life and removed from my life that kind of were like, now you gotta do it.
• 1:19:28
  SPEAKER_04: You gotta, yeah.
• 1:19:29
  SPEAKER_03: We tried to be gentle.
• 1:19:30
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 1:19:31
  SPEAKER_03: So I'm like, okay, let me let me give it a shot for me to say that at least I did it.
• 1:19:36
  SPEAKER_03: At least you did it.
• 1:19:37
  SPEAKER_03: And then when I let people know that I was gonna do it, like again, the response that I got back, it's like, oh, y'all, y'all need to hear this, like y'all want to hear this.
• 1:19:48
  SPEAKER_03: And um, ultimately at the end of the day, like I'm talking about things that I wish people would have talked about because I know even if it's just one person, there's somebody out there who is listening to this and that needs this, and I'm ultimately helping.
• 1:20:05
  SPEAKER_03: And so, even on the days where it's like, you want to just give it up, give it up quick because it's a lot of work, yeah, and I'm starting from ground zero by myself, and it's me, it's my heart, it's my business.
• 1:20:20
  SPEAKER_03: I'm very private.
• 1:20:21
  SPEAKER_03: I literally have a tattoo that says introvert because I do not put myself out there, and this is very much so putting myself out there.
• 1:20:29
  SPEAKER_03: You are a full-on artist.
• 1:20:32
  SPEAKER_03: Absolutely, yeah.
• 1:20:33
  SPEAKER_03: You are a full-on artist, and I am sensitive about it.
• 1:20:35
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and you are um I'm sensitive about it, and you know that vulnerability aspect is not easy, no, but yeah, I just understand it's deeper than me.
• 1:20:46
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, and I think it's happening at this time because it's needed right now.
• 1:20:52
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, and so I put my personal feelings aside and I do it for something that I understand is bigger than myself.
• 1:20:58
  SPEAKER_00: Bigger than yourself.
• 1:20:59
  SPEAKER_00: That's right.
• 1:20:59
  SPEAKER_00: That's why I say you're an artist because you care about the one.
• 1:21:03
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely the one, especially because you know what you have is needed.
• 1:21:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:21:07
  SPEAKER_00: Um and you're willing to share it vulnerably.
• 1:21:12
  SPEAKER_00: Like I think that's the part of being an artist and a creative that most people shy away from is the vulnerability part.
• 1:21:20
  SPEAKER_00: And that's how you miss the one.
• 1:21:22
  SPEAKER_00: Because the doing, everybody's doing, like you said, everybody has a podcast.
• 1:21:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:21:27
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm doing it with intention and with the the mindset of like this is needed, and one person could use this information.
• 1:21:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:21:37
  SPEAKER_00: You know, um, that to me is like a sign of like, yeah, you're you're you're an artist.
• 1:21:42
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:21:43
  SPEAKER_03: I so I was working with a life coach before this process started.
• 1:21:48
  SPEAKER_03: Shout out to Dr.
• 1:21:49
  SPEAKER_03: Cornell, um, which I will talk about soon.
• 1:21:53
  SPEAKER_03: Um, we knew we would run up against like the blockers, your own personal beliefs.
• 1:21:58
  SPEAKER_03: And so he was asking me, what are you going to tell yourself to keep going when you lose the excitement, the momentum?
• 1:22:07
  SPEAKER_03: And it was that sentiment of like, somebody needs this.
• 1:22:10
  SPEAKER_03: And so I have a sticky note that I have on my desk that I look at every day that says, somebody needs this.
• 1:22:16
  SPEAKER_03: Wow.
• 1:22:17
  SPEAKER_03: They just haven't found it yet.
• 1:22:18
  SPEAKER_03: Keep going.
• 1:22:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 1:22:20
  SPEAKER_03: And I look at it when I want to shut that laptop, when I want to cut that camera, I'm like, you never know how close you can.
• 1:22:28
  SPEAKER_03: You never know who you're impacting.
• 1:22:31
  SPEAKER_00: You just don't know.
• 1:22:33
  SPEAKER_00: And that's why that's enough.
• 1:22:36
  SPEAKER_00: That's enough to keep going.
• 1:22:38
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 1:22:38
  SPEAKER_00: I just needed to know, yeah, you know, because people do podcasts all the time for some people just like to hear themselves talk.
• 1:22:47
  SPEAKER_00: Some people, like you said, ain't talking about nothing anyway.
• 1:22:50
  SPEAKER_00: Zero.
• 1:22:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but when you know that you're talking you're again, this is something that's needed.
• 1:22:54
  SPEAKER_00: No, people need to talk about this.
• 1:22:56
  SPEAKER_00: This is saving somebody's life.
• 1:22:58
  SPEAKER_00: Someone.
• 1:22:58
  SPEAKER_03: And I don't care if it's just one.
• 1:23:00
  SPEAKER_03: If that's because it's me, like at the end of the day, yeah, and I have to honor myself.
• 1:23:06
  SPEAKER_03: And if honoring myself honors others and helps others, so be it.
• 1:23:11
  SPEAKER_03: So if I gotta be the person on the front line, be the one, be the one talk about it, then be the one.
• 1:23:17
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
• 1:23:17
  SPEAKER_03: And uh, you know, I admittedly sometimes get like worried about what people will say, like my family or like what if this person doesn't want me to tell things?
• 1:23:28
  SPEAKER_03: But it's like my mom was like, It's your experience.
• 1:23:31
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:23:31
  SPEAKER_03: She's like, I know you're gonna talk about me, but it's your experience, it's your story.
• 1:23:36
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, you are right.
• 1:23:38
  SPEAKER_00: You good for even like even indulging because I I don't ask.
• 1:23:43
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, I didn't.
• 1:23:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, okay, good, because I'm like, you know, I just I because I feel like at, you know, one, we're grown, but two, like, what is it doing for for me by not sharing my experience, right?
• 1:23:58
  SPEAKER_00: And at the end of the day, if you got a problem with it, then you need to.
• 1:24:01
  SPEAKER_00: That's on you.
• 1:24:02
  SPEAKER_03: That's on you.
• 1:24:03
  SPEAKER_03: That's on you.
• 1:24:04
  SPEAKER_03: That's not my problem.
• 1:24:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's how I experienced you.
• 1:24:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:24:07
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm gonna Yeah, I'm not here to bash.
• 1:24:10
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but this is how it impacted me.
• 1:24:12
  SPEAKER_00: I always tell people be careful how you treat songwriters and creatives because you you might wind up in a song.
• 1:24:19
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 1:24:20
  SPEAKER_00: You know, okay.
• 1:24:21
  SPEAKER_00: You better be careful.
• 1:24:22
  SPEAKER_00: You better be careful.
• 1:24:23
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I'm grateful that I've gotten to a place where it's like I can write a song, but then I also I'm I filter myself in the sense like that we were talking about earlier, like being aware.
• 1:24:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:24:34
  SPEAKER_00: Like, all right, Lauren, now is that for you?
• 1:24:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 1:24:40
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:24:40
  SPEAKER_00: Or, you know, is that for if it's for me, then you that's for you.
• 1:24:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:24:45
  SPEAKER_00: But is that for the masses?
• 1:24:47
  SPEAKER_00: Is it is that helpful?
• 1:24:48
  SPEAKER_00: It's not, okay.
• 1:24:49
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:24:50
  SPEAKER_00: Fine.
• 1:24:51
  SPEAKER_00: Like, delete, delete, delete.
• 1:24:53
  SPEAKER_00: Or I always do this, and I I love being a songwriter because I get to say, I still, because I have the freedom as an artist, like, no, I need to say that as a songwriter and say, but can we say it better?
• 1:25:04
  SPEAKER_00: Is there a way we could say that?
• 1:25:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:25:06
  SPEAKER_00: Like what old boy was saying wasn't it wasn't so much I we understood the sentiment.
• 1:25:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:25:12
  SPEAKER_00: But you could have said that so much better.
• 1:25:14
  SPEAKER_00: In a way that covered all the basics.
• 1:25:16
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:25:17
  SPEAKER_03: Mm-hmm.
• 1:25:18
  SPEAKER_03: But I was like, huh?
• 1:25:19
  SPEAKER_00: But I will never but I'll never double down on a like a particular lyric or topic if I like that's a hill you die on.
• 1:25:28
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, there's just certain hills.
• 1:25:29
  SPEAKER_03: Be prepared.
• 1:25:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no.
• 1:25:31
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:25:32
  SPEAKER_03: Um, well, I have a couple of rapid fire questions for you.
• 1:25:36
  SPEAKER_03: Because like you are an artist, so of course we gotta ask artistic questions.
• 1:25:41
  SPEAKER_03: So and I want you to say the first thing that comes to mind.
• 1:25:44
  SPEAKER_03: First thing.
• 1:25:45
  SPEAKER_03: Like, don't think about it, just well, well, you know, as the thought comes, yeah, okay.
• 1:25:50
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 1:25:51
  SPEAKER_03: First song that made you feel something as a kid.
• 1:25:54
  SPEAKER_00: Who first song?
• 1:25:59
  SPEAKER_00: That's hell hard.
• 1:26:01
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 1:26:02
  SPEAKER_00: First song that made me feel something as a kid, and by kid you mean like however you interpret it.
• 1:26:08
  SPEAKER_00: I want kids, because kids are teen, anything in teen, too.
• 1:26:13
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, I will say this.
• 1:26:14
  SPEAKER_00: Brandy's have you ever made me feel like I hadn't even been in a relationship at that point.
• 1:26:24
  SPEAKER_00: I hadn't had like barely a crush, right?
• 1:26:28
  SPEAKER_00: But something about how that was sung to me just I'll never forget having my crush and walking up them hills in San Francisco and just with my walkman on my headphones, and have you ever almost to tears.
• 1:26:45
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 1:26:45
  SPEAKER_00: Like I'm in this breakup, and there's no relationship.
• 1:26:48
  SPEAKER_00: There's no story.
• 1:26:49
  SPEAKER_00: There's no stories ever.
• 1:26:51
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, I'll have to say, have you ever really did that?
• 1:26:56
  SPEAKER_00: It really took me there.
• 1:26:58
  SPEAKER_00: It took me through there for sure.
• 1:27:00
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 1:27:00
  SPEAKER_00: It hadn't even been through it.
• 1:27:02
  SPEAKER_00: That's what good musical do.
• 1:27:04
  SPEAKER_00: It was, but have you ever for sure?
• 1:27:06
  SPEAKER_00: Oh my God.
• 1:27:07
  SPEAKER_00: Because I'm thinking about, I'm thinking walking up the hill now in my head.
• 1:27:11
  SPEAKER_00: Took you back, huh?
• 1:27:11
  SPEAKER_00: Took me all the way back.
• 1:27:13
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that's why I love music.
• 1:27:14
  SPEAKER_03: Like it can really just take transform you right there.
• 1:27:18
  SPEAKER_03: Right there.
• 1:27:18
  SPEAKER_03: It's my favorite like art form.
• 1:27:20
  SPEAKER_03: Same.
• 1:27:21
  SPEAKER_03: Um, best advice you've ever gotten about your craft.
• 1:27:28
  SPEAKER_00: The best advice I've ever gotten about your craft.
• 1:27:32
  SPEAKER_00: Uh one of my professors at Hampton University told me there's no business like repeat business.
• 1:27:41
  SPEAKER_00: Cause in the show business, they tell you there's no business like show business, right?
• 1:27:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but in why he told us that was like you can get the gig, right?
• 1:27:51
  SPEAKER_00: But if you don't get a the call back, if they don't keep calling you back, like that's not the business.
• 1:27:55
  SPEAKER_00: That just means so there's no business like repeat business.
• 1:27:59
  SPEAKER_00: Like If they call you to do something else again, you you did that.
• 1:28:04
  SPEAKER_00: So at least as it pertains to my craft.
• 1:28:06
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that makes sense.
• 1:28:07
  SPEAKER_00: So business like repeat business.
• 1:28:09
  SPEAKER_03: Um worse advice.
• 1:28:11
  SPEAKER_03: Oh because I'm sure.
• 1:28:14
  SPEAKER_03: Worse advice.
• 1:28:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um sing or write music that's like popular, like or cookie cutter.
• 1:28:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, like or and by popular mean like, well, this is what everybody's writing about.
• 1:28:31
  SPEAKER_00: So you need to have a song about such and such.
• 1:28:32
  SPEAKER_00: Cause this is like yeah, like advice like that is horrible.
• 1:28:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:28:37
  SPEAKER_00: Uh people trying to tell you to create based on trends and things like that.
• 1:28:42
  SPEAKER_00: Like, nah.
• 1:28:43
  SPEAKER_00: If you're an artist, create what you are supposed to create and what you know is in you.
• 1:28:47
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
• 1:28:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but horrible advice.
• 1:28:50
  SPEAKER_03: I agree.
• 1:28:51
  SPEAKER_03: And that goes with anything.
• 1:28:53
  SPEAKER_03: That's why I'm not a fan of like TikTok and stuff.
• 1:28:55
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I'd be like, What are you doing, people?
• 1:28:58
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, that's cringe.
• 1:29:00
  SPEAKER_00: Horrible advice that I've gotten.
• 1:29:02
  unknown: Okay.
• 1:29:03
  SPEAKER_03: Um the typical one artist, living or past, you wish you could collaborate with.
• 1:29:11
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I hate to do brandy again.
• 1:29:13
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, I know that's your grand.
• 1:29:15
  SPEAKER_00: But since you said that's living.
• 1:29:20
  SPEAKER_00: But who has gone on?
• 1:29:26
  SPEAKER_00: Ooh.
• 1:29:27
  SPEAKER_00: Ooh.
• 1:29:28
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna say Pac.
• 1:29:30
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna say Pac.
• 1:29:31
  SPEAKER_00: Really?
• 1:29:32
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I'm gonna say that.
• 1:29:32
  SPEAKER_00: That'd be a dope album.
• 1:29:34
  SPEAKER_00: I would I would definitely say I would love to would have loved to collaborate with Pac.
• 1:29:38
  SPEAKER_00: And especially now, too, because I feel like if he were here, he would be just upset.
• 1:29:45
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, he would be pissed at what is going on right now.
• 1:29:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I feel like we could write something together that would like be impactful, you know.
• 1:29:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:29:55
  SPEAKER_00: That would speak to the times that we're living in.
• 1:29:58
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 1:29:59
  SPEAKER_00: I would pay for that.
• 1:30:00
  SPEAKER_00: I would too.
• 1:30:02
  SPEAKER_00: Man, I would pay to work with Pac, you know.
• 1:30:04
  SPEAKER_03: That would be beautiful.
• 1:30:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but for sure, Tupac Shakur.
• 1:30:08
  SPEAKER_03: Um, what's a song you wish you had written?
• 1:30:11
  SPEAKER_00: Oh god, there's so many.
• 1:30:14
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus.
• 1:30:17
  SPEAKER_00: Songs that I a song that I wish I wrote.
• 1:30:22
  SPEAKER_00: Ooh.
• 1:30:25
  SPEAKER_00: Man, that's tight because there's so many.
• 1:30:33
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, you really got me on for a rapid fire.
• 1:30:36
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, I'ma just say anything that Stevie Wonder wrote, anything he wrote, I wish I wrote it.
• 1:30:43
  SPEAKER_00: I wish I wrote it.
• 1:30:45
  SPEAKER_00: I wish I wrote anything he wrote.
• 1:30:47
  SPEAKER_00: It don't matter.
• 1:30:48
  SPEAKER_00: I do love Stevie.
• 1:30:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, anything Stevie, you can, yeah, it don't matter.
• 1:30:53
  SPEAKER_00: Pick a song.
• 1:30:54
  SPEAKER_00: As I wish I wrote, oh, I so wish I wrote that.
• 1:30:57
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it's my favorite Stevie Wonder's room.
• 1:30:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:31:00
  SPEAKER_00: Any one of his, anything of him.
• 1:31:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I wish I wrote it.
• 1:31:04
  SPEAKER_03: Timeless, honestly.
• 1:31:06
  SPEAKER_03: Um favorite black sitcom theme song.
• 1:31:11
  SPEAKER_00: Dang, this is so hard.
• 1:31:17
  SPEAKER_00: Um Living Singles.
• 1:31:23
  SPEAKER_03: I knew you were gonna say that but between that.
• 1:31:26
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, Moesha I love, but there's so many different versions of that based on the season.
• 1:31:30
  SPEAKER_00: So it's like some there's some versions that I love more, but that living single man, it on you got Queen Latif on there rapping and singing.
• 1:31:41
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what you go like, yeah.
• 1:31:44
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, you can't beat it.
• 1:31:45
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, a slap.
• 1:31:46
  SPEAKER_03: It's a slap and it slaps, right?
• 1:31:48
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, okay.
• 1:31:51
  SPEAKER_03: Last one.
• 1:31:52
  SPEAKER_03: What emotion do you want people to feel when they hear your music?
• 1:31:59
  SPEAKER_03: An emotion that I want people to feel, or like thing, if you can't think of like an emotion.
• 1:32:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:32:07
  SPEAKER_00: I want them to feel the spirit, and they can define that for themselves, but they'll know it when they feel it, you know?
• 1:32:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's what I want people to feel.
• 1:32:25
  SPEAKER_00: I want you to know that, like, when I was creating this, the divine was present.
• 1:32:32
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I mean?
• 1:32:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, like yeah, that's what I want people to feel.
• 1:32:38
  SPEAKER_00: The divine.
• 1:32:40
  SPEAKER_00: Well, thank you.
• 1:32:40
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I feel it.
• 1:32:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I don't I don't create without it.
• 1:32:45
  SPEAKER_00: I just don't.
• 1:32:46
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like I I it's not it's not possible to create what I want to create, yeah, if that makes sense.
• 1:32:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:32:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's not possible without it.
• 1:32:54
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, the divine.
• 1:32:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:32:57
  SPEAKER_00: That was a great rapid response question.
• 1:33:00
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 1:33:00
  SPEAKER_00: You know how to come correct.
• 1:33:01
  SPEAKER_00: No, you came all the way correct, man, because you had me thinking, like, wait a minute.
• 1:33:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:33:07
  SPEAKER_00: Dang, I'm gonna be pondering on these more all week, too.
• 1:33:10
  SPEAKER_00: Like, just to be like, yeah, just to go deeper for myself.
• 1:33:14
  SPEAKER_03: Cause you know, I know you so much, but like, yeah, there's some some deeper questions about like smaller parts.
• 1:33:23
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, you know.
• 1:33:24
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 1:33:24
  SPEAKER_00: That's that's but they're also deep when I think about it.
• 1:33:27
  SPEAKER_00: Like, gosh, like songs that really made me feel as a child, but awesome.
• 1:33:32
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:33:33
  SPEAKER_03: My first song that I think of what?
• 1:33:36
  SPEAKER_00: Pony by Jenuine.
• 1:33:38
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, if I'm if if I'm being if I'm being for real, middle school was that was we all we all wanted a little pony at that.
• 1:33:50
  SPEAKER_00: I was not in middle school.
• 1:33:52
  SPEAKER_00: I was in middle school.
• 1:33:52
  SPEAKER_00: What how were you in that song?
• 1:33:54
  SPEAKER_00: I was four.
• 1:33:55
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 1:33:55
  SPEAKER_00: So that's a little different.
• 1:33:57
  SPEAKER_00: At four and pony is different.
• 1:33:59
  SPEAKER_00: It was than 12 and pony.
• 1:34:01
  SPEAKER_02: That I said, oh, I like to.
• 1:34:03
  SPEAKER_00: 12 and pony is different.
• 1:34:04
  SPEAKER_02: I took it literally.
• 1:34:06
  SPEAKER_02: You did.
• 1:34:07
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah, you were four.
• 1:34:09
  SPEAKER_02: You didn't miss it.
• 1:34:10
  SPEAKER_00: You didn't know.
• 1:34:12
  SPEAKER_00: So here's the thing.
• 1:34:13
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't necessarily know what pony meant, but I knew that it didn't mean it wasn't no pony.
• 1:34:20
  SPEAKER_00: It was no pony and fall.
• 1:34:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:34:21
  SPEAKER_00: And my mom was real good at like telling us what songs meant.
• 1:34:25
  SPEAKER_00: Like if she would turn a song off, we'd be like, hey, but we like, no, that means that it we'd be like, well, guess we won't be hearing that.
• 1:34:35
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks, mom.
• 1:34:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but yeah, that pony.
• 1:34:38
  SPEAKER_00: I'm yeah, pony and fours.
• 1:34:40
  SPEAKER_03: That's yeah.
• 1:34:42
  SPEAKER_03: Everyone who knows me knows pony.
• 1:34:44
  SPEAKER_03: That's my song, which is whole.
• 1:34:46
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it was a it was fire.
• 1:34:47
  SPEAKER_00: We ain't heard, we hadn't heard anything like that before.
• 1:34:51
  SPEAKER_00: In terms of like, yeah, we just they were in their bag.
• 1:34:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they were in their bag.
• 1:34:56
  SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
• 1:34:57
  SPEAKER_00: They were in their bag when they when they did that, and I hadn't seen dancing like that.
• 1:35:01
  SPEAKER_00: That he was giving like magic mic.
• 1:35:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, um, chipping deals.
• 1:35:07
  SPEAKER_00: We hadn't seen an artist dance like that, yeah, and all the gyrating and things, but yeah.
• 1:35:14
  SPEAKER_03: And that's not even my playing field, but it looked good.
• 1:35:17
  SPEAKER_00: It looked good, he looked amazing, not my playing field either, but I can appreciate humanity looking good.
• 1:35:25
  SPEAKER_00: We we can I can appreciate it, okay?
• 1:35:27
  SPEAKER_00: And that's as far as it goes.
• 1:35:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, the appreciation ends there, ends right there, ends and begins there, truly.
• 1:35:35
  SPEAKER_00: Appreciate what the Lord has done all over you, but leave it over there.
• 1:35:38
  SPEAKER_03: Okay, leave it over there from the bar.
• 1:35:40
  SPEAKER_03: No, well, this has been absolutely amazing.
• 1:35:45
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, phenomenal.
• 1:35:46
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you for this conversation.
• 1:35:49
  SPEAKER_03: We need to let the people know where they can find you.
• 1:35:51
  SPEAKER_03: What do you have coming up?
• 1:35:53
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, because I'm waiting on new music, and it is so on the way.
• 1:35:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you can find me um at so Lauren Adams on Instagram.
• 1:36:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I'm usually there.
• 1:36:06
  SPEAKER_00: I'm on TikTok and stuff too.
• 1:36:08
  SPEAKER_00: I don't run the page, um, but I'm there.
• 1:36:12
  SPEAKER_00: Every now and then they hand me the phone to um respond back.
• 1:36:15
  SPEAKER_00: Like, oh, someone responded.
• 1:36:16
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm not as active on there.
• 1:36:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:36:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um, let's see.
• 1:36:21
  SPEAKER_00: Music-wise, so none of my music is on any of the streaming platforms right now because streaming platforms just treat artists like we're not artists.
• 1:36:32
  SPEAKER_00: And it's sad.
• 1:36:33
  SPEAKER_00: So if you are looking for my music and you want to support, um you can find me at soulren.bandcamp bandcamp dot com.
• 1:36:44
  SPEAKER_00: Soulorin.bandcamp.com.
• 1:36:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and all my music is there.
• 1:36:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um yeah, you can just tap in with me.
• 1:36:55
  SPEAKER_00: Like I'm really just a person, you know what I mean?
• 1:36:59
  SPEAKER_00: Like, yeah, I don't do the artist celebrity thing.
• 1:37:03
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I I just like human to human.
• 1:37:06
  SPEAKER_00: Let's just keep it.
• 1:37:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:37:08
  SPEAKER_00: I just like that.
• 1:37:09
  SPEAKER_00: Um that's not to say I don't know who I am.
• 1:37:12
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 1:37:12
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 1:37:12
  SPEAKER_00: Because you must.
• 1:37:13
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't mean that.
• 1:37:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:37:14
  SPEAKER_00: But it just means like you don't have to, that's not a part of I don't carry that, like, yeah.
• 1:37:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I connect with people.
• 1:37:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so yeah, just tap in Facebook, but I don't really be on there.
• 1:37:27
  SPEAKER_00: I'm trying to think of all the places that I'm at.
• 1:37:29
  SPEAKER_00: And you can always come see me in Berkeley at the way.
• 1:37:32
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 1:37:32
  SPEAKER_00: Every Sunday at 10.
• 1:37:34
  SPEAKER_00: Every Sunday.
• 1:37:35
  SPEAKER_03: 10 a.m.
• 1:37:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you can pull up and just come and visit.
• 1:37:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um, yeah, I'm in Soul Development.
• 1:37:41
  SPEAKER_00: S O L stands for Source of Light.
• 1:37:44
  SPEAKER_00: So you can find us.
• 1:37:45
  SPEAKER_00: I'm always doing work with them, um, doing some great work, soul development, working with um the Valkyries and our young people in um in the juvenile detention centers.
• 1:37:58
  SPEAKER_00: So, yeah, doing a lot of that work and just partnering with people who want to do right by people.
• 1:38:06
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're doing any of that, holla at me.
• 1:38:09
  SPEAKER_00: Um, new music is coming.
• 1:38:11
  SPEAKER_00: My album.
• 1:38:12
  SPEAKER_00: I think we talked about it briefly during um uh when we did the vibrant speed w, but here goes everything is on the way.
• 1:38:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um, the rollout is beginning.
• 1:38:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so you can listen to some snippets on my Instagram page and you know, hear what's coming.
• 1:38:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um, got some fire.
• 1:38:29
  SPEAKER_00: It is RB related, um, but everybody can listen to it.
• 1:38:34
  SPEAKER_00: You can play it in a car with your grandma, and she's not gonna get offended.
• 1:38:38
  SPEAKER_00: You can play it in a car with a four-year-old.
• 1:38:40
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 1:38:40
  SPEAKER_00: They won't be, you know, trying to gyrate and things, you know.
• 1:38:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but it's just good music, you know.
• 1:38:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so that's coming this summer.
• 1:38:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um, what else?
• 1:38:52
  SPEAKER_00: What else?
• 1:38:53
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, I'm doing like a um, I don't want to call it a tour because people get, they be thinking, having expectations.
• 1:39:02
  SPEAKER_00: But I am going to be um traveling more and performing more of the music.
• 1:39:07
  SPEAKER_00: You be able to hear more of good grief.
• 1:39:09
  SPEAKER_00: I'm finally ready to go perform, like find your way, and you'll get more than I feel it this time around.
• 1:39:15
  SPEAKER_00: So yes, yeah.
• 1:39:17
  SPEAKER_00: Like I'm just I'm doing things, I'm growing.
• 1:39:20
  SPEAKER_00: If anything, there's more happening on the inside of me than there is on like in the outside.
• 1:39:25
  SPEAKER_00: And that that actually reflects what's happening, getting ready to happen on the outside.
• 1:39:29
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm super excited.
• 1:39:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I'm trying to get some muscles.
• 1:39:33
  SPEAKER_00: So if somebody has a trainer.
• 1:39:36
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, I'm not a trainer, but I can get some more.
• 1:39:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um you know, um, yeah, I am trying to get some muscles so I can, you know, feel stronger, if that makes sense.
• 1:39:46
  SPEAKER_00: It's not so much the aesthetics.
• 1:39:48
  SPEAKER_00: I'm happy with me.
• 1:39:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I want, you know, when there's that that that body you see.
• 1:39:58
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, you know I know.
• 1:39:59
  SPEAKER_00: I know you know.
• 1:40:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:40:00
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I know.
• 1:40:01
  SPEAKER_00: And they just want to pop out.
• 1:40:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:40:03
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, I'm I am looking to do that aesthetically.
• 1:40:06
  SPEAKER_00: But um, other than that, like it's just goodness and upward and forward motion is what I like to say.
• 1:40:13
  SPEAKER_00: That's happening.
• 1:40:13
  SPEAKER_00: Upward and forward.
• 1:40:15
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah.
• 1:40:16
  SPEAKER_00: So just be on the lookout, just be ready to support.
• 1:40:18
  SPEAKER_00: That's all I gotta say.
• 1:40:19
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 1:40:20
  SPEAKER_03: Be ready to support.
• 1:40:21
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, don't want to hear no excuse.
• 1:40:23
  SPEAKER_03: It's not on the show.
• 1:40:24
  SPEAKER_00: Support black creators, okay?
• 1:40:27
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, if you're here, you should know.
• 1:40:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, like come on, support your black creators, absolutely, but yeah, that's it.
• 1:40:34
  SPEAKER_00: And whatever else RJ wants me to do.
• 1:40:37
  SPEAKER_00: That's what I that's what I'm doing.
• 1:40:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, if I could catch you, yeah, I know.
• 1:40:42
  SPEAKER_00: Busy woman to catch up with.
• 1:40:43
  SPEAKER_00: There's a lot going on.
• 1:40:44
  SPEAKER_00: But that's a good thing.
• 1:40:44
  SPEAKER_00: It is a good thing.
• 1:40:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it is a good thing.
• 1:40:46
  SPEAKER_00: It's a God thing.
• 1:40:47
  SPEAKER_00: That's what I've been finding out.
• 1:40:48
  SPEAKER_00: It's a god thing.
• 1:40:48
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 1:40:49
  SPEAKER_00: Because I ain't doing it.
• 1:40:50
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not making myself busy.
• 1:40:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:40:55
  SPEAKER_00: It's a blessing.
• 1:40:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but yeah, that's what's happening.
• 1:40:58
  SPEAKER_00: That's what's happening.
• 1:40:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:41:00
  SPEAKER_00: Any appreciation.
• 1:41:01
  SPEAKER_03: Final thoughts.
• 1:41:02
  SPEAKER_03: Anything you want people to leave this episode with having.
• 1:41:07
  SPEAKER_00: Don't be afraid to take care of yourself for real.
• 1:41:10
  SPEAKER_00: Like go there with yourself.
• 1:41:13
  SPEAKER_00: If it's um getting a therapist, if it's getting a trainer, if it's um thinking more positively about yourself, speaking over yourself positively.
• 1:41:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um do the thing that scares you the most right now.
• 1:41:30
  SPEAKER_00: The thing that you're like avoiding, the thing that like um, yeah, that makes you be like, I know if I just did this, things would just start falling into do that thing, take that lead, take the lead.
• 1:41:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um realize that you are you're worth that leap.
• 1:41:55
  SPEAKER_00: You are absolutely worth it.
• 1:41:57
  SPEAKER_00: If it's if you have a mind to do it, do it because you're worth you're worth it.
• 1:42:03
  SPEAKER_00: You're worth doing that.
• 1:42:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um yeah.
• 1:42:07
  SPEAKER_00: Eat clean if you can, move your body, just don't be afraid to go there with yourself to take that kind of care.
• 1:42:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um yeah, don't be afraid to quit things that need to be quit, you know, things that no longer serve you.
• 1:42:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um yeah.
• 1:42:26
  SPEAKER_00: Just do the things.
• 1:42:28
  SPEAKER_00: You know what you gotta do.
• 1:42:29
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I don't have to tell you.
• 1:42:31
  SPEAKER_00: We know what we gotta do.
• 1:42:32
  SPEAKER_03: We know.
• 1:42:32
  SPEAKER_03: We know it's the thing we try and make excuses to not do.
• 1:42:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I'm as I'm saying as I'm telling to myself, go on and get the muscles, Lauren, go on and feel that pain.
• 1:42:41
  SPEAKER_00: Just because I'm a cardio head fam.
• 1:42:43
  SPEAKER_00: Oh man, and can't nobody see me in no cardio.
• 1:42:47
  SPEAKER_00: You're right.
• 1:42:47
  SPEAKER_00: And lift why can't you?
• 1:42:49
  SPEAKER_00: But lift now, lifting, I feel like I can I have no problem with doing it.
• 1:42:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's just the the act of doing.
• 1:42:57
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I don't know.
• 1:42:58
  SPEAKER_01: That's my favorite part.
• 1:42:59
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 1:43:00
  SPEAKER_00: Like, once I'm in it, it's fun, but it's like the start.
• 1:43:02
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, uh put me on the stairs.
• 1:43:06
  SPEAKER_00: By choice?
• 1:43:07
  SPEAKER_00: I'd rather do the stairs than I'd rather do cardio than.
• 1:43:11
  SPEAKER_00: I know this is like totally off topic, but I'd rather do cardio than anything.
• 1:43:15
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 1:43:16
  SPEAKER_00: I would much rather uh stairs.
• 1:43:20
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, stairs is like the last cardio, but I would rather do it.
• 1:43:24
  SPEAKER_00: Lifting is like it's so repetitive to me.
• 1:43:29
  SPEAKER_00: It's like, okay, now do 10, do three sets of it's like that.
• 1:43:33
  SPEAKER_00: So it's going up the stairs over and over.
• 1:43:36
  SPEAKER_00: I know, but it's like, I don't know.
• 1:43:38
  SPEAKER_00: It's something about it.
• 1:43:39
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna go yuck you yum.
• 1:43:41
  SPEAKER_00: I'm working through it.
• 1:43:42
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know what it's about.
• 1:43:43
  SPEAKER_00: And I've done it, that's the thing.
• 1:43:44
  SPEAKER_00: I've done it before.
• 1:43:45
  SPEAKER_00: Lifting is not like a thing I haven't done.
• 1:43:47
  SPEAKER_00: I've had cuts in my arms and things before, but it's just we can get in there, do it, do it.
• 1:43:55
  SPEAKER_00: I'm trying to get back.
• 1:43:56
  SPEAKER_00: I'm trying to get back to that, you know.
• 1:43:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I'm a I'm I'm a I don't know how do you call it?
• 1:44:01
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know what the proper term is now.
• 1:44:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I I was one of I was in that crew of people who were into fitness and weight loss when it wasn't popular and it was the team, no days off.
• 1:44:15
  SPEAKER_00: So I lost a hundred plus pounds before.
• 1:44:19
  SPEAKER_00: So I've like that was, you know, I'm like, all right, I've done the things.
• 1:44:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:44:24
  SPEAKER_00: So it's now it's like do it again.
• 1:44:26
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like, do it again.
• 1:44:27
  SPEAKER_00: It was hard the first time.
• 1:44:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:44:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm not going for, you know, the weight loss part, it's just the transformation part.
• 1:44:33
  SPEAKER_00: This is a new wave of transformation for me.
• 1:44:36
  SPEAKER_00: It's like keeping the muscles and sticking to it.
• 1:44:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:44:39
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I like being soft and squishy, but there's an aesthetic I am after.
• 1:44:44
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, I was part of that toxic crew of folks who were we live, we learn.
• 1:44:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I learned.
• 1:44:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:44:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:44:51
  SPEAKER_00: I've I've learned to not to be more kind to my body and just be, yeah, love you, whatever it's doing.
• 1:44:59
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 1:45:00
  SPEAKER_00: Do the work, but love you through it.
• 1:45:03
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm I'm I'm back to that.
• 1:45:04
  SPEAKER_00: And so now I'm ready to transform again, I guess.
• 1:45:07
  SPEAKER_00: Look, again, I guess.
• 1:45:09
  SPEAKER_00: I guess.
• 1:45:10
  SPEAKER_00: I guess part of being alive.
• 1:45:11
  SPEAKER_00: Part of being alive.
• 1:45:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:45:12
  SPEAKER_00: So um, look, y'all pray for me.
• 1:45:15
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, I got you.
• 1:45:15
  SPEAKER_03: And likewise.
• 1:45:16
  SPEAKER_00: You can do that.
• 1:45:17
  SPEAKER_00: Hold me accountable.
• 1:45:18
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, I can do that.
• 1:45:19
  SPEAKER_00: Be like, you've been lifting this week.
• 1:45:20
  SPEAKER_00: No, cardio.
• 1:45:22
  SPEAKER_00: Nah, it's like, nah, I gotta lift more.
• 1:45:24
  SPEAKER_00: I gotta lift more.
• 1:45:25
  SPEAKER_02: You got it.
• 1:45:25
  SPEAKER_00: You got it.
• 1:45:27
  SPEAKER_00: But thank you, RJ.
• 1:45:28
  SPEAKER_00: I appreciate you.
• 1:45:29
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 1:45:29
  SPEAKER_00: This was lovely.
• 1:45:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um, yeah.
• 1:45:31
  SPEAKER_00: We'll do it again in another season.
• 1:45:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:45:34
  SPEAKER_00: Because there's many more to come.
• 1:45:36
  SPEAKER_00: I know there is.
• 1:45:36
  SPEAKER_00: Because we we're non-stopping.
• 1:45:38
  SPEAKER_00: I'm excited for you.
• 1:45:39
  SPEAKER_00: Y'all support RJ.
• 1:45:40
  SPEAKER_00: This is this is this is a good space.
• 1:45:43
  SPEAKER_00: It's more than a safe space.
• 1:45:44
  SPEAKER_00: I want you to know that.
• 1:45:46
  SPEAKER_00: It's more than a safe space.
• 1:45:47
  SPEAKER_00: You you are doing the Lord's work.
• 1:45:50
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 1:45:51
  SPEAKER_00: You do the Lord's work.
• 1:45:53
  SPEAKER_00: You are.
• 1:45:53
  SPEAKER_00: No, you are.
• 1:45:54
  SPEAKER_00: You really, really are.
• 1:45:55
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah.
• 1:45:56
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 1:45:57
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 1:45:57
  SPEAKER_00: Appreciate you.
• 1:45:58
  SPEAKER_00: Anytime.
• 1:45:59
  SPEAKER_00: Anytime.
• 1:46:00
  SPEAKER_03: Well, that is it for this episode.
• 1:46:03
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, make sure y'all are following us on social media.
• 1:46:07
  SPEAKER_03: Hit the email if you have any inquiries, feedback, concerns.
• 1:46:11
  SPEAKER_03: All of So Lauren's information will be in the description so you can find her, her music, everything that we talked about there.
• 1:46:19
  SPEAKER_03: And make sure y'all are following us on the Patreon.
• 1:46:21
  SPEAKER_03: It's just seven, it's just seven dollars.
• 1:46:23
  SPEAKER_03: That's it.
• 1:46:24
  SPEAKER_03: That's it.
• 1:46:24
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, I got you.
• 1:46:25
  SPEAKER_03: Thanks.
• 1:46:25
  SPEAKER_03: Don't even worry about it.
• 1:46:27
  SPEAKER_03: Something like.
• 1:46:28
  SPEAKER_03: But you know, this has been a pleasure.
• 1:46:31
  SPEAKER_03: I appreciate you.
• 1:46:32
  SPEAKER_03: Can't wait to do it again.
• 1:46:33
  SPEAKER_03: Absolutely.
• 1:46:34
  SPEAKER_03: And as always, I'm RJ.
• 1:46:37
  SPEAKER_03: This is the Alive I Guest podcast.
• 1:46:39
  SPEAKER_03: And I'll see y'all same time next week.
• 1:46:41
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:46:42
  SPEAKER_03: You gonna sing us out?
• 1:46:44
  SPEAKER_04: I'm alive.
• 1:46:46
  SPEAKER_04: I'm a live I guess I guess.
• 1:46:47
  SPEAKER_04: I'm a love again.
• 1:46:50
  SPEAKER_04: I'm a love I guess.