Latest / Deeply Well with Devi Brown / Adulting in Cabo with Charlamagne Tha God

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Adulting in Cabo with Charlamagne Tha God · Deeply Well with Devi Brown

• 0:09
  Speaker 1: From grandmothers who whispered in their baby girl in two
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: fathers on dimly lit street corners, instructing young soldiers to
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: always keep their eyes open. You'll be queen, you will fired,
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: you will pass through centuries on the hands of your daughters.
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: They called you wisdom. Proverbs on the backs of diamond
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: eyed school children who growing into hymnals recited by amethyst
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: holding urban philosophers who recited neighborhood commandments out of the
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: windows of restored ALCHEMYO chariots to keep the warmth of
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: their blood, be wise, be smart, being black, Opal Brown
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: courts bloodstone and prayer. Be every form of Jim C.
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: King told, scribe, scribe told son, son, told wife, wife
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: told her daughter, and daughter told. The answer is. And
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: the ancestors told me that you would come to give
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: you wisdom. Thousands They said you would come, Dropping Jam,
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: Dropping the Gym. Alright, Welcome to another episode of The
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: Dropping Gym's podcast and your host, Steppie Brown. This episode
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: is going to be a little bit different. We are
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: recording it out of the country, the first field trip
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: for The Dropping Gym's Podcast. Currently, we are in Los Cabos, Mexico,
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: which is one of my favorite places on Earth, and
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: today's guest is someone I would absolutely consider one to
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: be family, and not just in the way that you
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: say that about people that you're close with or that
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: you really like in an industry way. No, this is
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: an extension of my family, and we are currently embedded
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: in so many hot topics and discussions and conversations about
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: life that I decided while on vacation to pull up
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: my mix and just make this an episode. So this
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: person is on your TV screens regularly, is in your
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: car for your morning commute every morning with the number
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: one rated radio show. They're also a writer in entrepreneur,
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  Speaker 1: a producer, just absolutely everything, and the list just continues
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: to go on and on. So, without further ado, the
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: special guest today is Charlemagne Leonard. The guys, what's happening, Dee,
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: dev what's going on? You're one of the only people
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: that still calls me that because your name is actually
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: so it's Debbie. But don't you know that Debbie Brown? Yeah,
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: but that's your government name. You're still you're still Debby.
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: Your name is Debbie like deVie dev So me and
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: Charlotte have known each other for two seven maybe yeah,
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: so at least like twelve years years. Yeah. Um, and
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: we originally met at that time you were working on
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: the Whitney Williams Show. Yes, I was in my life
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: and I was working at a radio station in l
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: A called k D I was on the come up,
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: you know, I was at that time. I had Jess
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: kind of like got my first paid gig at that station,
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: and I was doing like a lot of voice work.
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: I was doing the weather and traffic and one of
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: the other things that I was doing my stripes was
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: being in quote unquote associate producer on our syndicated show,
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: which was a Wendy Williams show, which is the show
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: that you were on, and that was that was the
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: first place you went from South Carolina, right, you went
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: straight to New York with Wendy. Yeah, from South Carolina,
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: I did. I worked at four radio stations in South Carolina.
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: I worked at the Big d M and then Hot
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: one with three nine in Colombia, and from Hot one
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: with three nine experience. Yeah, and I remember so you guys.
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: Occasionally Wendy would come up just to like meet fans.
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: She would come out to l A like she was
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: trying to build herself in that market. Now, the show
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: did not do well because it's really hard for New
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: York to do well um in l A, in syndication,
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  Speaker 1: the fact, I don't care who you and at that time,
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: she didn't have our TV show, so people weren't familiar
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: with her and they're like, what is going on? Um,
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: But you really like work to establish yourself and to
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  Speaker 1: meet people. I mean, you're one of the most gracious
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: people that I know. Honestly, UM, thank you. Yeah, you're
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: one of those people I'll never forget. We were working
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: together on Hip Hop p o V TV and well
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: was that so long ago? And I'll never forget that
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  Speaker 1: from day one, every single person in that in that room,
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  Speaker 1: whether it was an audience member or it was a
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  Speaker 1: cameraman or whoever, you stopped and shook every single person's hand,
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: looked them in their eye, and had like brief dialogue.
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: It took forever, but you did that with every single person. Um,
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  Speaker 1: and that always stuck with me. Yeah. I just feel
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: like if somebody's in your space, then your space for
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: a reason. And plus all of those people helped to
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: make that show, whatever that show was. You know what
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  Speaker 1: I'm saying From the cameraman, to the produces, to the
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: audience members, like they're all there to make us look good,
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: you know, Like I think sometimes talent, we think too
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: highly of ourselves. We always say things like this show
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: could never work without me. Actually, the show couldn't work
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: without anybody. You know what I'm saying. I couldn't work
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: without the person that has to do all of the
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: equipment and how to do talent you can find. Yeah,
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: those are the unsung heroes. I mean, those are the
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: people whose hands you shake, and you know, you make
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: sure they're good, and when the holidays come around, you
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: send them a bottle or you know, all the food
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  Speaker 1: for the staff. Like, those are the people who make
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  Speaker 1: you look good. So that's the least you can do
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  Speaker 1: and shake their aunt. So how let's go back in
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: thirteen years. How do we become friends? Um? We become
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: friends because it's like l A. L A is like
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: a foreign territory. I've never been to l A before.
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: I had never been to l A. So it's like
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: when I started working Wendy, I started traveling a lot
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  Speaker 1: of places that I never traveled, and I never I've
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: never been to l A. But I mean l a
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  Speaker 1: has always meant so much, you know, at least to
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: me because I'm from South Carolina's been I'm from South Carolina.
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  Speaker 1: You know, at the time, we didn't have our own
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: like history and hip hop. You know, if you're from
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: New York, you you've got a history, like you know,
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: you got your Wu Tangs and your biggies and your
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: nass and your rock cam cares one. When you from
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: South Carolina, you don't have that. So I used to
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: listen to everything. So I used to listen to, you know,
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  Speaker 1: mad music from the East Coast, mad stuff from down
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  Speaker 1: south of Courts and mas stuff from the west. So
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: I felt like I knew what this city was about,
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: you know what I mean. But so it's just like
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: for me when I got there, I just wanted to
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: meet people and and kicking with people, and like you
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: were one of the first people, if if not the first,
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: who was like, Yo, let's I'm gonna show you the
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: city so to speak. You know, I'm like, I'm one
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: of those people that loves being tour guide because I mean,
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: I've lived you know a few places. I've done radio
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: in Houston, a little brief stin in New York, but
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: I'm an l A girl for real. I'm so like
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: southern California, um, and so whenever people are in what
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: I consider to be my city there in l A.
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  Speaker 1: I love playing tour guy because there's so much magic there.
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  Speaker 1: To me, there's so many interesting little crevices all over
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  Speaker 1: Los Angeles, you know. And I like showing people real
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: l A because I hate when people come like, oh yeah,
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: but l A so Hollywood. It's like that is the
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: tiniest part of Los Angeles and no one goes there.
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  Speaker 1: And you put me onto so much two things. You
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: put me on hip hop in tofu to food, thie food,
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: Thie food, hip hop and thie food. She always wanted
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: to eat, always wanted to eat Thai food, my favorite cuisine.
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  Speaker 1: And then like, you put me onto so much dope
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  Speaker 1: ass hip hop like Glasses, Malone, Kendrick, Lamar, Bishop Lamar,
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: Nipsey Hustle, strong On Steady gang like these like Kendrick
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  Speaker 1: and Nipsey weren't popping back then. Actually, at the time,
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: Glasses and Bishop had bigger buzzes, bigger dric Like Glasses
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: had the record with a con Bishop was signed to
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: Dr Dre. What happened to Bishop of a month. I
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: don't know. I know he's still working in music. I
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: ran into him a few years ago in New York,
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: but I know he's definitely still, you know, doing this
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  Speaker 1: thing and working nicehop. Was mad talented. But it's just
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: like your DEVI has to put me on mad hip
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  Speaker 1: hop and we just vibe, like you know, the energy
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: person Like things aren't complicated with me. You know, you
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: meet somebody, you're the vibe with them when you don't.
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: And and then there's some people that just like you
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  Speaker 1: really really connect with, you really click with, Like that's
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: my people's like not not just somebody you meet in
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  Speaker 1: passing and you know that person like you know, yeah,
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: I know, I know such a such from l A.
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: But like not Dev is the homie. So it's just
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: like it this was a very organic thing. Yeah, it's
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: been like it's been really dope. I'll tell you. It's
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: kind of a trip, right because I mean, and you're
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: gonna act uber humble right now, but you are such
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: a You've become such a massive star in such a
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: necessary part of the culture, you know, I think, Um,
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: I mean, I was playing this game Black Card Provoked
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: the other day and you were one of the questions, Yeah,
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: I'll show you when we when we saw Yeah. And
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: so it's just so crazy because, like number one, it's
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: like I'm so immensely proud of you and inspired of you,
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: inspired by you. At the same time, it's also kind
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: of a mind trip because like you and me started
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: like we were just we we just existed in this
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: time where the old regime had just kind of stopped,
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: but this new wave hadn't started. Social media was just
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: barely like we were, Like you would tweet and just
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: like you were tweeting into space like there wasn't no
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: one followers or followings or you know, um, and people
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: were really doing real networking on social media like you
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: like if you message somebody, no matter if they were famous,
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: like how famous they were on my Space, they would
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: message you back like it was different people. Yeah, I
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: know me too. Yeah, And at that time, it's like,
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: you know, so anyway, I say this to say, it's
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: so dope because I feel like now looking back at you,
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: having known you in in kind of the before time, right,
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: like you always had this thing about you and it
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: wasn't just that your nuts, right, it wasn't just that
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: you're crazy. But you always had this almost this calmness
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: about your destiny, Like even if you didn't realize it,
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: it's like there was something so much larger than you
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: and you felt it without feeling it. So there was
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: always this level calmness about you. And I think sometimes,
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: especially when you meet people in the industry or entertainment,
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: there's almost this this rushed sense to them. Right, there's
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: this like sometimes over eagerness, but very frazzled kind of
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: energy sometimes because you're trying to get it. You're trying
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: to get it. You're trying to get it, you're trying
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: to Okay, hey, pay attention to me. Okay, I need
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: to meet you. Okay, like the hustle, huzzle, hustle, right,
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: and with you, there was this you were always grinding,
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: like we literally slept on each other's couches. You know,
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: used to fly out for auditions. I don't know why
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: it's been weird, because it's been a lot of people
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: that's been trying to get me to get into acting,
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: But I used to fly out for auditions. I was
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: actually casted for this show. I still don't know what
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: happened to this show to this day, it's literally like
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: I wonder it was like ice Cube and Aaron McGruder
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: and remember when you did that, and it was like me,
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: Jason Weaver, bow Wow, Slank Johnson, I think he was
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: on the cast too, whatever, it was like I was.
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: I went out there for a reading for it, and
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: I couldn't afford that day my car. Yeah, and I drove.
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: I drove to the audition and I slept on your
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: couch the night before and I literally flew right back out.
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying. But it's like that's the
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: type of stuff that we used to do back then,
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: just to try to find ourselves, find what our purpose
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: was in this business. Because I was like, okay, radio,
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: I don't even I think I just got fired from
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: one D at that time. Yeah, because that had to
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: be like I went to Philly. Yeah, man, I forgot
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: about that till just now. But just like your grind
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: has been, it's been crazy like and you've always been
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: making like really high level connections, even if it didn't
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: come to fruition, you know until a few years later,
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: like the just the steps that you took again, it
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: just seemed like there was always this kind of divine
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: guiding light um and I remember like weird ship too,
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: like we were at dinner once with Teddy Riley and Vic.
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: I still don't know how that happened to this day.
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: I remember I text you one later and I was like, Yo,
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: did we go to did we? Did we go to
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: dinner with Teddy Riley? And because it seemed like a
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: dream now, I'm like, how did we? And we didn't
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: have any like social proof of it, that there was
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: no Instagram at the time, or like there was no
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: reason for us. It was Teddy Riley, Villica Fox Glasses
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: was there? Who else? I don't remember? And why why
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: were we all there? Why would it? And you know,
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: I love Teddy Riley, like I'm a I'm an Uptown
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: Record fanatic, like I want to I want to see
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: an Uptown Records movie done one day, Like I love
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: that whole New Jack Swing, Like I look at Teddy
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: the way people look at Dr Dre and look at
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: Ditty like I looked at Teddy in that way. So
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: it's like for me to just be randomly having dinner
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: with him and just he was just giving me mad game.
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: And I remember that night he told me he was like,
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: there's no such thing as a tall superstar. He was.
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: He was like, all superstars are short. He was like,
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: I'm telling you, And I was like, this is mind
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: You just had to be like oh what eight Yeah, yeah,
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: it had to be always a still working with Windy
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: O seven A ways, I'm like, yo, what about jay Z.
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: He's like, jay Z not a stop mind you this
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: old time and he's like, he's not a star. He's like,
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: he is jay Z, but he's not a star. I'm
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: just talking about natural star quality when you walk in
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: the room and everybody's looking at you. Of course he's
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: wrong about that now, but at the time, for whatever reason,
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: it made sense. The logic made sense. I get what
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: he means, like just in the sense of like a
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: certain level of charisma, you know, like not obviously jay
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: Z has charisma, but I mean in the sense of, like,
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: I don't know, I feel like, yeah, maybe like smaller
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: guys do have a little bit more bravado about them. Yeah.
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: And when he broke it down, he was talking about
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: the music induscreen. You think about it, mad, people are
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: super super short, you know what I'm saying, Like this
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: is recently the era of tall rappers. You know what
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: I'm saying, Like Snoop was an anomaly back in the
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: day game. Now you've got J Cole and the Davies
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: and all these Nipsey Hustle, These that's tall rappers were
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: not a thing until now, so it made sense. But
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: it was just random, Like those are good times. And
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: that's why I love l A so much. Like LA
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: was just one of those places where you know what,
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: E l A? Maybe do? L A really made me
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: feel like somebody, what do you mean? Because I don't know.
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: It's like when we went to l A, people there
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: appreciated whatever it was we were doing in a different way,
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: even though when you didn't have like massive success there
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: or nothing like that. For whatever reason, they was like
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: rocking with us for some reason. And I remember I
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: was writing for Ozone and I used to write, um
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: these columns for Old Magazine a time. I remember writing
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: a column about l A about just you know, I
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: was looking forward to come into l A. You know
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: what I'm saying, Like it was it was it was
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: the music, it was the weather, the people like And
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: still to this day, I've got like like relationships in
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: l A because of those times, Like Crowndon is my guy,
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: you know what I mean, because of you. Glasses is
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: still my guy, like these people that I talked to,
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: like on the regular, you know what I mean, like
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: over the acting world. So he's killing and it's it's
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: interesting because he's another one, like when you talk about
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: people who had an energy about them, you know what
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: I'm saying, Like he was one of those guys who
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: had an energy about them, Like you know what, I'm
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: super special person. Yeah, just a good brother, you know so,
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: and it's very smart, has a lot to offer the world,
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: you know, on a on an intellectual level. Just people
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: haven't seen that side yet, I don't think, but I
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: think they will, you know. But just a good dude.
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: And me and Glass, Me and Glasses talk every other
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: day about nothing, you know, about nothing, and he gets
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: so mad. But I call him a troll. And Glass
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: is one of my best friends in the world. But
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: he's he trolls social media like the most, Like he's
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: a Trump supporter, Like he has that level of troll
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: about him, and he talks about the most outlandish things.
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: He believes it. That's the wild. That's why I like it.
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: That's why I like Glasses though, because glasses is who
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: he is, you know what I'm saying, and like he's
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: not saying things just to say them, you know, like
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: he really means that, and I'll be wanting to know
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: why he feels that way, you know. But those are
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: just lifelong relationships to that for because of you. I
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: didn't know those people. Y'all used to have you in
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: some crazy ship too, because at that time, especially in
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: l A, like everything everything about l A was underground,
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: um still because like like Game obviously had popped off
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: and had huge success, but then it was like ten
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: years after him that there was no next like error Parent,
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: and everyone from coast to coast was just dissing l A.
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: And at that time I was on the come up,
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: you know, so I was like all about underground hip hop.
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: And yes, I used to put you in some interesting
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: positions all the time. I didn't even I don't remember Game,
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: but Game was popping by in no, for sure, he
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: was already a superstar. But I mean after him, there
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: was not really you know. The thing was Game on
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: and I love Game. I think he's a dope lyricist.
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: But people who thought that Game was stereotypical l A.
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: If that makes sense. You know. What I'm saying is
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: the low ride is like always seen that before, you know. Yeah,
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: And I think for people in other areas, they don't
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: realize like like that really legitimately is an active part
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: of our culture. Like it's not. It's not. Oh, I'm
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: still doing the same old thing. Like no, that's how
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: people live. Okay, So let's flash forward. We're in a
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: Mexico right now, Cabo, at Devi's vacation home. We're in Cabo,
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: and I just think it's just so dope when I
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: think of, like, you know, just the people I care about.
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: Like earlier today we were at a beautiful dinner right
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: brand new friends that we met last night, literally wet
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: and um. We were at this gorgeous like hacienda and
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: you know, the outskirts of Cabo, having this incredible fresh
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: lobster meal, talking conversation. It was so beautiful. Yeah, And
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: as we were leaving, you were like, you know, we're adults.
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: We're adults, I mean honestly, like you're putting the cost
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: to the car, baby quests in and move got two
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: three kids at the crib back home, like we got
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: the friends, like our families are vacationing on a random weekend.
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: This ain't no holiday weekend or nothing like that. Like
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: it's just like, yo, DevD is Devin going is away
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: for a month at the crib. Let's pull up on
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: a weekend. Cool. But it's like, and I was saying,
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: like we were really the adults because back in the day,
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: when you was young, you would see these people on
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: TV or you'd see them, you know sometimes, and if
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: you lived in the fluent area, you'd see these fly families.
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: And I think about like my aunt, my aunt Dot
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: and my uncle Jim, Like you know, they always seem
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: to have money. You know, I'm not saying they were rich,
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: but I don't even know if they were. It just
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: used to seem like that. Like they lived in the
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: Pocono they this was cool. And you see them, you
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: see them traveling, you know what I'm saying. And I'm like, yo,
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: we are those adults. Now, we're we're adults. Like we're
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: growing as hell, like with kids and vacations. Like that's
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: wild to me. Like think about a thirteen years ago,
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: me and my wife was together. We weren't married, but
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: we were together. But it's like my mindset was totally different.
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: I was banging all deaths, interns a wild yo. So
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: in your first book, you wrote an entire page about
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: me and about people I worked with that you were
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: sleeping with. Do you know how many people have contacted
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: me about that? Really? What you know? You put me
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: in a bad position. You didn't know though, I know
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: you didn't know. Well, I found out when I read
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: your book. Yeah, listen, Katie was popping. It was Kate
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: was popping. Okay. There's a lot of grown people used
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: to work at Kata who would like to have a
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: good time, and we used to have a good time.
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: It was fun. It was fun times back then. You
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: know what I'm saying. But I'm just saying. I'm saying
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: all I have to say. My mind state was totally
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: different thirteen years. Like I was, I'm immature, you know
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: what I'm saying. And like when you're trying to figure
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: yourself out on a on a on a spiritual level,
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: on a human level, and you you're you're I'm new
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: to this whole industry things, so to speak. You know
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: what I'm saying. Because going from South Carolina, the working
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: when Windy was a totally different levels. I'm on v
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: each one in your mind, you skipped so many levels,
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: like it literally went zero to and it's like you're
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: acting the way you think you're supposed to, Like, oh,
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: this is all you know, this comes to the territory,
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying, Like this is you know,
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: fruit off that tree. Like you're supposed to be with
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: a bunch of different women, You're supposed to be getting high,
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: You're supposed to be wearing Louis Vuitton custom made vest,
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: like a whole bunch of stuff that wasn't necessarily me,
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: and it it left you with such an empty feeling.
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: So what point do you realize that that's not you? Um,
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: I realized it wasn't me when I got fired from Windy,
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying, Um, well, no, I realized
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: it wasn't me while I was through that whole period
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: of even being with one, Because it don't take me
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: long to realize, like, Yo, this ain't it's not for me.
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: Like as soon as I do something and I leave
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: with an empty feeling or a guilty feeling or you know,
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: like it's really just the guilt. And I think the
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: guilt comes from knowing that I know better spiritually, like
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: more so than anything, the guilt of anything I do.
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: Like if I'm in l A and I wake up
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: with three women, right, I feel bad. You know what
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: I'm saying. I do. I feel bad because I know
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: I feel like spiritually I'm not moving away. I want
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: to move And what And is that because you realize
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: that like a decision like that means that you're really
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: living out of ego, Like that's an ego decision, Like
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna bang three random strangers and they're just going
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: to be in my bed and like that's like really
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: ego that like, oh I can Yeah, it was fun
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: because it used to be like, uh, you know when
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: when when like say when they's husband would come to
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: my room in the morning and see this, like oh
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: you're doing you know what I mean. So it's like
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: that was all ego, you know what I mean. I
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: was doing that because I wanted him to see like, yeah,
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: I get it popping, like you know. So it's just
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: like stuff like that. We were younger. Yeah, you're young
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: and dumb. I was just turning thirty around that time,
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: like and and and like you know, Chris Rock told
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: me one time, Chris Rock said every superhero go Triliday superpowers.
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: So at the time you think you got superpowers, you know,
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: until you realize that actually that's really your kryptonite. Kryptonite
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: is that life and that lifestyle because that never made
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: me feel fulfilled. So how do you take it? Because
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: I think especially with all people, but really with men,
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: this is that this is one of the harder parts
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: about I guess, like quote unquote being on your journey,
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: right it's, hey, I really lies that. This doesn't feel good.
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: I know I'm doing the wrong thing. But what propels
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: you to learn how to change your behavior? Because men
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: are raised so much differently than women, right, Like, we
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: are raised to seek out solutions to problems, specifically problems
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: about our feelings, were raised to talk about our feelings,
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: were raised to have very transparent conversations with other people
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: about how we feel. Right, men completely the opposite. You
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: guys have a really hard time sometimes having like friendships
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: with depth other than are you straight? Right? You know, like,
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: you guys have a lot of trouble sometimes getting to depth.
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: So what what takes it from intellectualizing it to embodying it?
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: Because there's a lot of guys, a lot of people
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: that can say oh, yeah, because this is why this,
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: or they read the books right, so they have the
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: language to explain their behavior and they have all the
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: right terminology, but it doesn't change the behavior. How do
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: you get there? I think that, um, the the cycle
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: is breaking because of what you just said. I think
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: that where this generation, this generation of men right here
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: is learning from the mistakes of the men that came
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: before us. Because I'll tell you all the time, I
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: know I was really wrong. I was really wrong from
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: not only the music, the movies and you know, everything
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: that we saw growing up. But I was just raised
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: wrong because of the men around me. Like you know,
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: I can't remember confronting my father about cheating all my
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: mom and him look at me in the eyes and
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: telling me, oh, you only got one girlfriend and laughing
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: and then telling me like, yo, one day you'll understand,
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. Like we learned, like we
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: were visual people, humans are, so we learned from the
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: men that are around us. So you got all these
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: people and music telling us that bitches ain't ship be
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: holes and tricks and you're supposed to dog women out
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: like literally, we were taught to dog women out in
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: order for women to love you more, in order for
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: women to respect you, you had to treat them like ship,
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: like like honestly like not used to tell us it's wild.
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: And we talked about this a little bit earlier, like
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: it's wild to me. I've really been trying in my
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: mind to pinpoint when misogyny took over in music to
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: the level that it has right um, And I really
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: feel like, and I could be wrong. I'm early in
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: my research, but I really feel like it was like
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: the Nwa era. It was that moment in time that
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: things shifted in such a way that we have never
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: recovered from when it comes to like our interpersonal relationships
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: between men and women, like having conversations about intimacy and
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: having certain expectations of behavior. Everything changed around the time
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: frame of NWA. Before that, the songs were beautiful right
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: like you were you were, you were talking to women
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: in a completely different way. Yeah, And that's why, that's
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: why it's like an emotional roller coaster for a man,
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: right Because I grew up mother was Jehovah witness. Grandmother
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: was a Baptist, father studied a long so my father
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: was a witness too. When he got into Islam, like
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: he was giving me the autobiography of Malcolmax. He was
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: giving me Message to the Black Man Byolagh Muhammad. I
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: was reading from Niggas to God by Kill. So being
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: that I was getting all of this different information, I
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: knew I was supposed to treat my women like queens.
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: I knew I was supposed to protect and provide for
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: for my for my sisters. I knew all of that.
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: But then you got your hip hop ship. And and
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: before even before that, though, you had queenl ty F
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: for making songs like you and I t y. So
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: to me, it was corny to call a woman a bitch,
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. I used to think that
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: all of those rappers who were calling women bitches and
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: holes were lame. But then eventually those dudes that was
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: calling those women saying, oh, then music just sounded way
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: better than the positive ship, you know what I'm saying,
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: Like like like the the Death roadship was sounded way
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: better than what was coming from the East Coast. Because
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: you gotta think about it, you had all in the
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: same gang. You had your head of for self destruction.
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: You had all of these songs that were uplifting and
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: trying to empower us as a people and teaching us
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: how to just love each other and not be violent
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: towards each other and not be violent towards our women.
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: But then it got to a point where, like I said,
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: that nineties death O ship just sounded better. So you
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: go from knowing knowing better to WHOA well, the ship's catchy. Yeah,
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: snooped him saying do this, but rackon him saying do this,
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: And then you had see the Lord's Tucker and then
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: got all the money and the like see the Lord's
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: Tucker came out. Everything she was saying was true, and
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: we said for her she said hate. Everything she was
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: saying was absolutely true. So this just me I feel
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: like we're the first generation of men who are breaking
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: the cycle, meaning that we realized the error always and
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: we're realizing it at a aid when we're young enough
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: to know better and do better, Like I still got
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: my father then is like telling me, yo, what you're
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: doing is right? You know what I'm saying. Like, but
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: they's sixties something years old, so they're stuck in a
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: lot of their ways. Like I looked at what my
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: father did to my mom in in in our family,
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: and I said, I don't want to be that. I
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: don't want to do that. You know what I'm saying.
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: I want to be the exact opposite. I want to
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: be faithful to my wife. You know what I'm saying.
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: I don't want to break up my my my my home.
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: I don't want to end up you know, while I'm
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: out here with a bunch of chicks getting a divorce,
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: and then I gotta come see my kids on weekends.
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying, Like, I want to be
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: here for for my my family. And I think that also,
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: like you said the conversation, like men are having these
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: conversations with each other, like men are going to therapy.
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying, Men are understanding that it's
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: okay to be vulnerable, Like you don't gotta put on
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: a front and pretend to be hard. Yeah, things things
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: bother us, you know what I'm saying, Like like like
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: I love hearing Like I was listening to the Offset
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: album you got a song called um uh, don't Lose Me,
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: and he's saying that's what CARDI told him, don't lose me.
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: And I'm listening to this song and I'm like, Yo,
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: this is so dope, because that's exactly what it is
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: like when you are blessed to have a woman in
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: your corner who's really your better half and who really
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: makes a house a home and who really is like
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: a great nurturer to your children and a great nurturer
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: to you because she's poured so much into you to
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: make you a better human. So now you can only
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: hope to pour, you know, pour it right back into her.
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: When you have that, you lose. If you lose that,
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: like you understand like you're losing, like like people get
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: upset and they lose their smartphones and stuffing, like you're losing,
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: like you're losing something that you can never recover from.
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: And I've never seen a man ever in my life
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: leave his woman go to another situation and life becomes
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: better for them. I've I've never seen it. I've never
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: I've seen I've seen every man I know who left
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: the woman for another woman. The quality of life goes down,
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: their their their professional life goes down. They're never happy.
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: Like my father told me all the time, like I'm
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: just do the work. Peace. They never had peace. You
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: always tell me the worst mistake have made leaving your moup.
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying. It was just like I'm
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: not gonna make those same mistakes. Yeah, I'm not. I refuse,
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: Like I think that the illest thing you can do
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: is just continue to you know, pour into your relationship.
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: You know, I find I find the relationships between men
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: and women to be so fascinating. Man. And I've done
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: years of therapy, right and in my marriage, we've done
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: a couples therapy. I wanted to become a therapist, a
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: psychologist at one point. Um, it's really we've become not
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: just so desensitized and disconnected with violence and and things
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: that we watch right Like that That's a big thing
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: that people talk about, is like how desensitize your coming
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: because of the world Star videos or Academics videos that
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: you're seeing murder or pain or tragedy so quickly in
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: between sandwich and between the rest of your day. We're
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: also getting so desensitized when it comes to like what
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: love and relationship is or should look like, because we're
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: so used to seeing people aired out, you know, quote unquote,
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: or we're so used to the dysfunction, and we've found
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: the toxicity to be entertaining. But I think what people
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: don't realize men men who are messing on the side
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: with women, or women who are side checks with men
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: that think that they have a shot at happiness with
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: this person, which you don't understand, is that on a
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: soul level, it's not just about you know, sometimes people
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: can break up. It's fine, right, life, life happens. If
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: you are appealing to the lower side of somebody, you
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: can never have happiness with them if you're appealing to
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: their lowest self, like okay, yeah, they chose you. You
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: guys quote unquote had sex, you know, like um. But
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: for him to do that, he had to really compartmentalize
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: his integrity. He had to really hide the shame that
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: he feels. He had to lie right, he had to
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: do certain things that proved to be character flaws. So
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: that means he's operating as the lower version of himself
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: versus when you make great decisions for your life that
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: feel good, you don't have to cover up that, you
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: don't have to lie about that, you don't have to,
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: you know, try to rearrange to make sense. You're your
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: highest self. You feel great about your life and about
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: you when you're making serving choices. So I think what
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: people don't understand is that when whether it's cheating or not,
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: when you're making decisions that are counterintuitive to that, when
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: you're making decisions that just speak to your lowest self,
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: there can never be happiness. Like I've been in situations
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: where I've been out of town. You wake up in
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: the morning, you got another chick in your bed. You
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: get a FaceTime from your wife and and and and
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: your daughter, and you're like, oh, shoot, that's my wife.
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: And she's like, oh, I hide under the covers and
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: and and immediately you feel like, first of all, who
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: funk are you? And and and and why am I
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: around you? But then he's like, you can't. You ain't
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: no better than her. You're entertaining this. You know what
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: I'm saying this is, this is you not even remotely
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: being your best. You're submitting to your lower nature. To
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: being that. You're submitting to your lower nature. She's doing
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: she's feeding that, she's feeding that, and she thinks that's cool,
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: Like she thought that was like she really thought that
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: was dope. Like when I when I got off the
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: phone now because my dumbass didn't answer the phone. When
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: I got off the phone, she goes, I'm a good
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: side chick, ain't now And I'm like, wow, that don't
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: feel good, Like that's not I'm not that's that's really
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: I'm feeding my lower nature. I'm feeding all my lord desires.
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: Like that's something bumbshit like that. And also, why would
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: anyone want to rise to the occasion to treat you
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: better if you're plainly stating that that's all it takes
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: for you, you know, like that that the lowest form
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: of whatever someone has to offer is enough for you.
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: That's always what they'll give you. Yeah, But also too,
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: it's like they can't rise to the higher nature because
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: it's not destined for them to rise to the higher nature.
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: Like this is divine when I tell when I say,
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: we're adulting and we're with our families and we're on vacation,
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: like this is deep, this is divine. This is that
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: this is the highest levels of ourselves. Like we're out
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: here because we want, you know, mental wellness, Like we're
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: feeding ourselves. We're feeding our souls right now. Like you
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: come to Cobo to feed your soul. You invite your
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: friends here because you want them to get their souls
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: fairn til we come here we feel that energy. You
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: can't get that with no side, chick, you know what
• 35:55
  Speaker 1: I'm saying, Like you're gonna be sneaking around in hotels
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: late at night in two in the morning. It's like
• 36:01
  Speaker 1: there's nothing to be fed there, So like they couldn't
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: rise to that occasion if they tried. Yeah, you can't
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: get that with a with a side, check a side, dude.
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: You can't get that with surface people, you know, like
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: you know, even people who just surround themselves with people
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: that only speak to the surface of who you are. Yeah,
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: that's that's where you're feeding your ego and not your soul.
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: That's really what you're doing, and you're setting yourself up
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: for a lonely life. And nobody wants that because at
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: the end of the day, truthfully, do not really feel
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: like there's none of this matter is anyway, Like we're blessed,
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. But at the end of
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: the day, when you're seventy eighty years old, you know
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: what I'm saying, all you're going to have is your
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: peace of mind and all you're gonna have is your soul,
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: and you want both of those things to be pure,
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: pure as possible, so the only energy you're going to
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: want around you, and at that age, you should only
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: be attracting positive energy. Like you think about the woman
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: that we just left right put out. She is and
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: I know people, I know a woman like her, my people,
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: jan but she's so pure, her energy is so pure,
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: she's only going to attract other pure souls. So you
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: look at it and you say, oh, so crazy that
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: she randomly would invite people to our house. That's not random,
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. That's God saying, Yo, you
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: have a attraction to this person in some way, it's
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: a magnetism, Like this person is like you. Y'all are
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: like minded, y'all are y'all are y'all are attached to
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: the soul and some type of energy, Like you're not
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: just inviting random people over, like you know what I'm saying.
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: Like that only happens when you get to a certain
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: age and a certain level of experience where you're just
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: pure and peaceful, Like you know, the people that are
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: coming into your life are just good, solid people. So
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: like you, we're all going to get to that age
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: where that's all we have is energy. So when we
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: get to the age where all you have is energy,
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: you want your energy to be like you don't want
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: to be lonely. Can you imagine still being old and
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: feeling and secure, you know what I'm saying, having regrets,
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: you know what I mean? Like like like like upset
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: because of the poor choices that you made when you
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: was young, when all you really had to do with
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: the right thing. It's so much easier to do than
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: you imagine, so much like me, I want peace of mind. Yeah,
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: I think to like people a thing that I've had
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: to learn, and I guess the thing that we need
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: to be a little bit more gentle with our elders
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: about is us being who we are right now right
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: Having self discovery is a luxury, and it's the first
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: time in history on such a broad and mainstream level
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: have people been able to actually do something like beyond
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: the Journey or find themselves or you know everything the
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: books that exist, seeing Instagram posts, you know, having you know,
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: extra extra income that you can make for yourself to
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: do things for yourself. This self care, like all of
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: that is so recent obviously, you know, there have been
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: things that have existed for since the dawn of time,
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: but usually only a few people got to know that
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: stuff and it definitely was not done or set on
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: a mainstream level. So when we're super blessed in that too,
• 39:15
  Speaker 1: it's not for everybody in this lifetime, and we have
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: to be okay with that, you know, because that's another
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: thing like when you start to do the work and
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: you change, it seems so common sense and you want
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: everyone in your life to have that and experience that,
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: but they also have their own curriculum. They were put
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: on this earth to learn their own things and their
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: own time, and it's not our decision when or how,
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: you know. I mean, that's the biggest thing, like this
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: knowing that things happen for everybody else on their time
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: and and not yours. But the only thing we can
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: do is be vessels, you know. I'm saying, like I said,
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: when you know better, you do better. But you also
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: teach better, you know, and and it will happen in
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: your your actions. I saw I saw Joe Biden retweets
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: something the other day and it was interesting because it said, um,
• 39:59
  Speaker 1: the guy ACTU really named me Nipsey Hustle and Joe
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: and he was like, yo, y'all think Joe Budden is
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: a dope podcaster. But he said what Joe did was
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: get dope at life. You know what I'm saying. He
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: and he said, yo, and he said, Charlottage, Nipsey, and
• 40:12
  Speaker 1: Joe Budden all became better people. Yeah, and I truly
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: and that too. Yeah, I mean, I don't. I don't
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: know Gucci. That's funny because I know Gucci because we
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: all see the evolution, so you can see it. But
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: I mean I've I've I've had conversations with Nipsey and
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: Joe and all them, so I know I've seen I'm
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: doing Joe forever. But it's just like, yeah, and that's
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: something that I always said to myself, like if I
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: become a better person, everything else will fall into place.
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: We had this conversation a couple days ago. I was like, yeah,
• 40:39
  Speaker 1: I don't the professional is easy at this point as
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: long as you keep getting better as a human being
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: and sharing that journey, sharing that experience. I wrote a
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: whole new book because of that experience of just me
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: going to therapy and you know, you know, coming to
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: terms with my mental health and then I'm learning so much,
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: you know, new stuff about me. But then also learning
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: new stuff about my family, which helps me be better
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: because I'm realizing, like, Okay, a lot of the things
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: that I feel, a lot of things that I go through,
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: this is hereditary, you know what I'm saying. And it
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: helped me to Like when I found out my father
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: has been getting a check for mental health for thirty
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: plus years, and he tried to kill himself thirty years ago.
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: And he only told you that after he read your books. Yes,
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: when he told me this Thanksgiving A two thousand eighteen,
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: he was teen. The twelve different medications, he tried therapy
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: two or three times a week. You know, he wanted
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: to kill himself thirty years ago. I never knew any
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: of this, But it makes me look at him different
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: now because now I realized, Okay, those times we has
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: to visit him in rehab and when he was alcoholic
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: or he was on coke, stuff like that, he was
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: self medicating. Like I understand that he was going through
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: a lot of trauma, you know what I'm saying. Like
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: I can think of you know, beatings that I used
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: to get when I was young that I didn't think
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: nothing of back then. Him was like God, damn, don't
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: act up. Or you're gonna get beat with that extension,
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: or your pop's gonna make you go take a bath.
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: Now you think about how extreme that was, because hurt people.
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: Hurt people, you know what I'm saying. So it's just
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: like all of that helped me to love him in
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: a different way and understand him in a different way.
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: And it helps me to love myself in a different
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: way and understand myself in a different way because I realized,
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: like yo, in order to really be better humans, we
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: all have to break these cycles, you know what I'm saying.
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: And we can't repair the trauma that our parents went through,
• 42:34
  Speaker 1: but we can repair the trauma that we went through
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: and have a better understanding of our parents trauma to
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: make sure our kids don't have to deal with that,
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: you know what I mean. So yeah, like you said,
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: it's very what you said is true. Was like, this
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: is a new era of self discovery for so many
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: of us. But we have the luxury to do that.
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: You know, they didn't have that luxury. How can I
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: can you have that luxury when you're a mother in
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: South Carolina making twenty tho dollars a year, Yeah, and
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: you got five kids? Like when when did my mom
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: have a chance to discover herself? You know, I guess
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: when she went to the Kingdom Hall maybe that was
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: probably her her refuge. But like, when did my pops
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: have a chance to discover himself? You know what I'm saying,
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: Like they didn't. We have that luxury. It's such a gift.
• 43:21
  Speaker 1: It really is such a gift. And it's like I
• 43:23
  Speaker 1: I get excited to think of, like what are we
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: gonna in fifty years? Right when when people are writing
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: about today, what are going to be the ramifications? On
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: one hand, it's gonna be a little scary when you
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: think about the impact social media maybe has had on
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: us or you know what all the Internet babies are
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: going to grow up to be. But on the flip
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: side of that, the yend to the yang is this
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: real chance to change the course of generations by healing traumas.
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: Like I'm I'm a huge believer that the only way
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: to truly create a generational change, specifically in communities of color,
• 43:59
  Speaker 1: but this also applies to everybody, is by helping people
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: learn how to be whole, Like you can absolutely right,
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: we can change our destinies economically, and you know, all
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: these all these other ways, like people are always talking
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: about like advancements in different spaces. No matter how much
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: money you make, if you are broken, it will make
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: no change or difference. When you give somebody the opportunity
• 44:23
  Speaker 1: to seek wholness, when you give them the tools to
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: do that, and they are then able to share those things,
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: that's the only way we're really going to see a
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: significant impact in the whole world. I think that we
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: can attempt wholeness, and even attempting wholeness is the biggest
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: part of the journey of the battle. You know, um
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: describing for perfection, and I feel like that's what that's
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: what it is like. It's it's always a constant process
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: of trying to get to that wholeness. I don't know
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: if we ever will truly, And I get what he's saying,
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: but I wouldn't when I look at it. I look
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: at it from a standpoint of even calling it perfection
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: is so ego based and unattainable, whereas like wholeness is
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: such a personalized completion, you know, it's such a It's
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: like I want to make the most serving choices for me.
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: I want to do what's right because it's right, because
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: it's right, simple, I promise you. Man. Like it's because
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: I've always felt like I'm guided by a high power, right,
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: and I know that high power is always watching me.
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: And always say that the bad things that happened to
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: me are because of my poor choices, the good things
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: that happened to me or because of God. But then again,
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: I don't believe it necessarily good are bad experiences. I
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: believe that's all just part of a process. And I
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: believe like God just has me going through this process
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: at all times. And like, I know that there's a
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: high power always paying attention to what I'm doing. That's
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: why I want to do us right, you know, saying
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: you know how they say your characters who you are
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: when nobody's watching. Yeah, but there's always a higher power watching,
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: so just always makes sure you're constantly doing the right
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: thing in the universe. Yeah, Like you like, no matter
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: how good we think something makes us feel like on
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: a subconscious psyche level, you always know what you're doing.
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: You know what you're doing. Do you want to take
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: on that level of shame or guilt that may not
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: service immediately, but that will always sit with you in
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: the pit of your stomach. I don't want that because
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: I feel like ship and not only I feel like
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: like I'm full of ship, and I think I don't
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: like to do is feel like I'm full of ship
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: because I can't sit here and bullshit you like I
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: know if I know I'm if I know I'm doing
• 46:37
  Speaker 1: some foul ship, like that's why I'm not good with it.
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: Like I can't lie to my wife, you know what
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: I'm saying. I can't pretend to be something that I'm not,
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: you know what I mean, And it's much more fun
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: to listen. Women know first of all, everything, They know
• 46:50
  Speaker 1: everything like I can. I can see the difference in
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: my wife because she knows that I'm out here doing
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: what the hell I'm supposed to be doing, you know
• 46:59
  Speaker 1: what I'm saying. Like our our intuitive power is honestly
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: second to none, at least for women that are are
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: tapped into the goodness of themselves. I've and I'm not
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: even trying to say this boastfully, I've never been wrong
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: any any insight that I've had, anything that I have
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: thought that has come to me about anything. And I'm
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: not talking about like you know, some of that stuff.
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: I mean specifically, like even like, hey, watch out for
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: that person or hey, this person in our life, I
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: think it's gonna end up like this, or that I've
• 47:30
  Speaker 1: never once, ever, once been wrong. Damn, it's wild. And
• 47:37
  Speaker 1: I think you know, God, when your heart is good,
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: God heightens your intuition. I like to part. So I
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: do feel that I have a lot of vision into
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: many of the things that happened in my life in
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: a way that I cannot always explain. I dream about
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: stuff it happens. It's the most bizarre thing. I think
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: that the older you get to your senses, I heightened
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: because I feel way more than I felt. Well, no,
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: I've always felt, but I can really I feel people's pain,
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: I feel people's happiness. I feel empathy in a way
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: that I never felt empathy before. Like I had to
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: stop myself today because I was working out and I'm
• 48:15
  Speaker 1: looking out at the waters we're working out, and I'm like,
• 48:18
  Speaker 1: it's somebody that has I know it's done me wrong,
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: and like I see their world crumbling, and I'm happy
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: that their world is crumbling. But then I also get
• 48:25
  Speaker 1: sad because I don't really wish bad on nobody. But
• 48:29
  Speaker 1: then like for just like these brief moments and I'm
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: in the gym, I'm thinking about beating the person up
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: and all kind of stuff. And then it's like it's
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: like God said to me, could you chill out and
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: let me handle this? You don't have to do nothing
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: all right by and by the way, I don't even
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: think that's God that's that punishes you when you're wrong.
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: I just think that's just what happens you. You you
• 48:49
  Speaker 1: put some negative energy, I think it's gonna all come
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: back to you. Not The only person that can get
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: you out of it is God. But he didn't do
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: that to you. You know what I'm saying, Like, I don't,
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: I don't. I don't ever feel that way. That's so,
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: But that's what my mind, and my mind was just like,
• 49:02
  Speaker 1: could you just let the universe do what it does? Like?
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: And you know, like so in Sanskrit, karma the word
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: everyone always overuses. It just means action, that's it. And
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: it's just an action. Um. So it's always going to happen,
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: and you're not always going to realize I got karma
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: because of what I did here? You know it really
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: does it ever happen that way? Especially like something um
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: that used to drive me crazy. It's like I'd be like, well,
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: I wonder if that person when something bad happens, we're
• 49:32
  Speaker 1: gonna say this is happening to me because what I
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: did to Debbie, that would never happen. People are too
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: self involved for that to be the case. But you know,
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: I don't know something I've really worked towards because I've
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: had I've had some significant betrayals in my life. I
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: went above and beyond for people, and then they came
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: in and for whatever reason decided that they wanted to
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: shoot on me and make my life hard. You know,
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: that's not gonna stop me from showing of the other people.
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying, because I feel like that's
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: sometimes what the devil wants. The devil wants you to
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: have a bad experience with an individual and then you
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: stop doing your work. He wants to be changed. Yeah.
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: I'm not gonna stop doing my work. I'm not gonna
• 50:14
  Speaker 1: stop being a public servant. I'm not gonna stop being
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: here from people just because this one person decided they
• 50:20
  Speaker 1: wanted to shoot on me. Because I know what I
• 50:22
  Speaker 1: did for that individual, and that individual knows no matter
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: how you act, no matter how much. You go around
• 50:29
  Speaker 1: and tell everybody else I'm I'm a terrible person and
• 50:32
  Speaker 1: the worst experience you like whatever, you know, the truth
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: that that was always like a big source of my anxiety.
• 50:38
  Speaker 1: A big source of my anxiety was like knowing that
• 50:40
  Speaker 1: I wasn't living the way I was supposed to live.
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: So when bad things would happen to me, I know
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: that that was my fault, Like I caused that to
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: happen because of a poor choice that I mean because
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: if energy that I may have been given out, that
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: wasn't right. But when you when you really are submitting
• 50:56
  Speaker 1: your will to your higher nature, when you're submitting your
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: will to the God, and you you just realize whatever
• 51:03
  Speaker 1: happens in your life is just part of the process. Like, yeah,
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: things may happen that people may look at me like,
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: oh that's messed up. You don't have your losses and
• 51:11
  Speaker 1: stuff like that. But I don't trip because I feel like, Okay,
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: God is clearly blocking me. You know what I'm saying
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: from something. You know what I'm saying. Nobody at blocking
• 51:19
  Speaker 1: something from me? You know what I mean? Like this
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: isn't part of your path right now? I want you
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: to continue to keep doing what you're doing. But I'm
• 51:27
  Speaker 1: closing this door for a reason, and I'm not gonna
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: question it, you know what I'm saying, Like, I'm not
• 51:32
  Speaker 1: gonna question it. Of course, in your mind you'd be like, damn,
• 51:35
  Speaker 1: why did that happen? Or why did I lose this?
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: Why did I lose that? It's because I wanted you
• 51:40
  Speaker 1: to you know what I mean, same way I went out.
• 51:42
  Speaker 1: You don't ask that question when you get blessed with something,
• 51:44
  Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying. When I bless you with something,
• 51:46
  Speaker 1: you don't ask why God Like like, so don't ask
• 51:50
  Speaker 1: when I decided to close the door. I'm really the
• 51:53
  Speaker 1: best CEO out here, like I know what. Like That's
• 51:55
  Speaker 1: that's how I really feel like God, because God is like, yo,
• 51:58
  Speaker 1: I know what's best for you because they he really
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: does or she really does. I don't know what it
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: really does. You know what I'm saying. God's timing is
• 52:05
  Speaker 1: perfect always always, and I just I sit back and
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: I watch you, like you know, he always puts me
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: into situations that I need to be in. Yeah, you
• 52:16
  Speaker 1: know what I'm saying, that's not what I want to
• 52:19
  Speaker 1: need to be always, and it's always the right people,
• 52:23
  Speaker 1: it's always the right situation, and it's just like that
• 52:28
  Speaker 1: shift is what makes all the difference. And I think
• 52:30
  Speaker 1: that's especially what gives you and whatever it is that
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: you're doing longevity, because the thing that gets overused is
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: the idea of purpose. I have to find my purpose.
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: All of our purpose is to be of service. Anything
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: else you do is just add a little skill sets
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: that you made have. But when you realize that, no
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: matter what job title you have where whether it's radio
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: superstar and author like you or you know, teacher or
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: McDonald's drive through employee, if what you're doing comes from
• 53:03
  Speaker 1: a place where you recognize that your goal in life
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: is to be of service to others, you have found
• 53:09
  Speaker 1: your purpose. You're walking in purpose. Purpose is not one thing.
• 53:13
  Speaker 1: It's not my purpose is that I'm going to be this. No,
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: that's ego, that's career services. All of our purpose, everything
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: else is the details. I learned that a while ago,
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: like you know, your true purpose comes with service to others.
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: I remember reading that in the Power of Intention by
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: Wayning W. Diet. And the reason I hold on to
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: that so much is because you don't have to be
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: rich to be of service. You don't have to be,
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: you know, in a certain position to be of service,
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: like anybody can serve, you know, And that's what really
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: makes me feel fulfilled. Like I say it all the time.
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: If I was a ballplayer, I would much rather leave
• 53:46
  Speaker 1: the league and assistant points. You know what I'm saying,
• 53:49
  Speaker 1: Because when you leave the league assists, you're helping other people.
• 53:52
  Speaker 1: That's what life is about to me, Like, that's that's
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: what really makes me feel fulfilled at this point in
• 53:59
  Speaker 1: my life. And when you even talking about like divine purpose,
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: it's like, yo, at the age I am now, I
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: totally can look back at every single situation in my life,
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: whether you label it good, whether you label it bad,
• 54:13
  Speaker 1: it all served a greater purpose every I mean every
• 54:18
  Speaker 1: single situation. Such a great job of illustrating that in
• 54:22
  Speaker 1: both your books, Like it's such your books are incredible.
• 54:26
  Speaker 1: First of all, I was like shot shot right, I
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: always wrote, though write for old Then my mom was
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: that people was teaching, so I would like always be
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: writing short stories and stuff like that. I wasn't too
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: shure I could write a book England. But that's why
• 54:41
  Speaker 1: I got my man, Chris Monroe, to teach me how
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: to actually write a book, you know, but because I
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: could always wanted it was wild because I know you
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: very well and we have a lot of like really
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: deep conversations a lot that I read that book and
• 54:53
  Speaker 1: there were so many new facets I didn't know, and
• 54:56
  Speaker 1: there was so much like Gym's you know, so many
• 54:59
  Speaker 1: things is in there where I was like, wow, oh wow,
• 55:03
  Speaker 1: you know, so I think that's such an awesome thing
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: to be able to do when you're already a transparent person,
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: but then you're still like digging deeper and you're giving
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: people the unexpected. Absolutely, I mean that's what books do,
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: those books, you know, it causes you to go deep
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: and like as you're writing these things, and especially with
• 55:20
  Speaker 1: my second book, because of therapy, like my therapist helped
• 55:24
  Speaker 1: me to understand my feelings more so. Being that I
• 55:27
  Speaker 1: could understand my feelings more and I started to like
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: deal with the trauma from things that happened to me
• 55:33
  Speaker 1: when I was younger. It enabled me to be able
• 55:37
  Speaker 1: to explain what I was feeling better yes, you know,
• 55:43
  Speaker 1: and then take it deeper. And that's what therapy taught
• 55:45
  Speaker 1: me to was self inquiry. Like the best tool you
• 55:49
  Speaker 1: can give yourself is to ask your own self questions
• 55:51
  Speaker 1: about you, and even when you think you have an answer,
• 55:54
  Speaker 1: ask again and ask again, and then you just go
• 55:57
  Speaker 1: deeper and deeper and deeper, and before you know, your
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: crying three year old and remember why you're you know,
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: you know, it's so crazy because like I feel like
• 56:05
  Speaker 1: I wrote Chikun too early. Yeah, and and like you know,
• 56:10
  Speaker 1: because Chiokun is really just me scratching the surface because
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: like I said, it's so much that I learned. I
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: learned about my father and his issues and how a
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: lot of this stuff is hereditary, and you know, like
• 56:22
  Speaker 1: even my little sister she deals with things. And like
• 56:25
  Speaker 1: you know, I grew up not liking my little sister
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: because of how disrespectful I used to think she was,
• 56:31
  Speaker 1: but she was dealing with her own mental health issues,
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. So it's just like that
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: made me look at her in a different way and
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: start loving her more, you know, I mean, being the
• 56:41
  Speaker 1: big brother she probably always needed. So it's just like
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: it's so much, yeah, Like it's just so much I've
• 56:47
  Speaker 1: learned about myself, you know, in the past a couple
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: of years. But I feel like that once again, that
• 56:55
  Speaker 1: book wasn't for me. You know that that book is
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: something that needed to be in the ecosyce them in
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: two thousand, in in eighteen, you know what I'm saying. Yeah,
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: it'll definitely be more books. But I did like the
• 57:07
  Speaker 1: conversation was the conversation about mental health and our community
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: has been elevated so much over the past few years,
• 57:14
  Speaker 1: and you know, this book is just something that just
• 57:17
  Speaker 1: needed to be out there. I wasn't even I didn't
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: even set out to write a book about mental health
• 57:21
  Speaker 1: or anything like. I just was I'm going to talk
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: about my experiences and and and in the process of
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: me talking about my experiences, everybody around me like, yeah,
• 57:28
  Speaker 1: you know, this is a book about mental health. Like
• 57:30
  Speaker 1: you're going to therapy and you're talking about your anxiety
• 57:32
  Speaker 1: and PTSD and trauma from the things that happened to
• 57:34
  Speaker 1: you when you was young, and like, yo, this is
• 57:37
  Speaker 1: something that's never been done before. I'm like, oh, okay.
• 57:40
  Speaker 1: So that's when I brought him a man doctor ish
• 57:42
  Speaker 1: to give the clinical correlations so people could read this.
• 57:46
  Speaker 1: So people could read this book and just decide to
• 57:48
  Speaker 1: actually go out there and start doing more self discovery,
• 57:50
  Speaker 1: like like that this book is the beginning stages of healing,
• 57:53
  Speaker 1: not only for myself but just for a lot of
• 57:56
  Speaker 1: different people. So that's why mean when I said I
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: feel like I wrote a two earlier, but and maybe not,
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: because you know, this is what God wanted. This is
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: what God put on my heart to do and put
• 58:06
  Speaker 1: out there. And you know, I get so many you know,
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: hits on social media and people walk up to me
• 58:12
  Speaker 1: in the street and tell me, man, I started going
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: to therapy because of you, and you know, yo, I'm
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: starting to like deal with my own issues because of
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: what you were talking about and shook one and I'm like,
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: that's that's dope. Like so this just like I said,
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: some things are bigger than you, and this is definitely
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: bigger than me. That's incredible. I really feel like listening
• 58:32
  Speaker 1: to you talk that you embody the hero's journey. Are
• 58:34
  Speaker 1: you familiar with that? Joseph Campbell? The Hero's Journey? So
• 58:38
  Speaker 1: it's all about um basically fighting your demons, slaying your dragons.
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: But the only way to really complete the circle of
• 58:46
  Speaker 1: your transformation of self is by then sharing that information
• 58:49
  Speaker 1: with others, by bringing it back to where you were
• 58:52
  Speaker 1: from to share it. UM and that's what that's what
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: elevates you, that's what stands you in your purpose, that's
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: what you know gives you more of a handle in destiny.
• 59:03
  Speaker 1: And that's exactly what you're doing. And I think that
• 59:05
  Speaker 1: that's why you've been so wildly successful, because you're so
• 59:09
  Speaker 1: authentically yourself in every stage of yourself. You know, and
• 59:14
  Speaker 1: then you're not afraid to share mistakes, you're not afraid
• 59:16
  Speaker 1: to share pitfalls, and you're not afraid to say, hey,
• 59:19
  Speaker 1: I thought I knew it all then, but now I've
• 59:22
  Speaker 1: learned this, and here I am. And then at the
• 59:24
  Speaker 1: next stage, now I've learned this, and here I am.
• 59:26
  Speaker 1: What is an amazing stage because I felt this shift
• 59:32
  Speaker 1: and I was trying to think back, like, yo, I
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: don't remember feeling like this at third. I don't remember
• 59:38
  Speaker 1: feeling like this at twenty. I might have felt like
• 59:41
  Speaker 1: it's a team, but I can't go I felt like
• 59:43
  Speaker 1: that at team because you're in double digits. Now it's
• 59:48
  Speaker 1: an event. Yeah, and I'm in forty definitely in the
• 59:54
  Speaker 1: vetin it's a great milestone. But I'm talking about like
• 59:56
  Speaker 1: I could feel myself shift into a different dimension, almost
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 1: like a different level of consciousness. Can describe it like
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 1: everything changed at forty and I'm at the point right
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 1: now where I don't know ship everything I thought I
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: knew about myself, everything I thought I knew about life,
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 1: I don't know anything. Like, I don't like all, Like
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 1: my old playbook is gone. Seriously, I birth like it
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: don't serve me. Yeah, that doesn't serve me at all.
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 1: So it's just like at forty, I'm just I'm kind
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 1: of just living if that makes yeah, Like I'm not
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 1: trying to bed fluid. I'm not trying to control anything.
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 1: I'm not trying to, uh say, hey, I'm gonna do
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 1: this and then this will happen. I'm just living. I
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: just want to be your best father, best husband, best friend.
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 1: Everything else will fall into place. That's that's genuinely how
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 1: I feel. It was the only three things I am
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: absolutely sure about. I'm going to be a great father,
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 1: a great husband, and a great dream. Everything else on
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: the place. Always that's the cheat code. Everyone always wants
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 1: to know, how do you balance it all? How do
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 1: you do this? How do you become successful? What you
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 1: just described is it that's simple and also that difficult.
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 1: You strive to be the best, highest, version of you,
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 1: separated from ego and everything. And people would always say, oh,
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: how do I want to in my career? How do
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 1: I do this? What's the best way? Strive to be
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 1: the best, most whole version of yourself, most compassionate, kindest
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 1: version of yourself? All of that. Everything else is a
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 1: byproduct of that for everything else all in the place,
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 1: And I feel like it makes me a better It
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 1: makes me a better Everything happened conversation of yesterday. By point,
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 1: I'm like, yo, I don't care about anything professionally. I
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: don't have any professional goal. Look like I know that
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 1: sounds why. I don't be wrong. I got you know,
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 1: of course I got you know. I project wanted to
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 1: produce this show. Yeah, you have a lot in the pipeline.
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 1: Yeah if I do a late night show, cool. But
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 1: it's like I'm not pressed. Yeah you know what I'm saying,
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 1: Like these are just ideas I want to get out
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 1: and everything that I'm doing really does serve a higher purpose,
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 1: Like it's a it's a it's a lesson and everything.
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 1: Like you know, I'm not doing any project that it's
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: not gonna make somebody think about what's going on in
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 1: their actual life. You know what I'm saying, Like, I
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 1: feel like art is the best way to teach people,
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 1: even when we talk about you know, uh, infidelity and
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 1: you know, how to treat women like what caused us
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: to do these things in the birthplace, Most of the
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 1: times art, you know what I'm saying. And art is
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 1: a reflection of life. So all these dudes were doing
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 1: in their music was reflecting what gods were doing in
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 1: real life. So now the narrative has changed because brothers
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 1: are embracing like being with one woman and you know,
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 1: being married and aising their families and you know, being
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: vulnerable and doing the work you know, dealing with them
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 1: in the hub. Wanted every all of that. So the
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 1: art is the best way to reflect the thing that
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 1: I do TV, you know books. It has to serve
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 1: a bigger purpose and it has to you know, make
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 1: people want to be the best version of the I
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 1: love it. We gotta in this interview because it's our
• 1:03:21
  Speaker 1: last night in Mexico and we're gonna go. We are
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 1: gonna go to the fire pit and mix. Morris, I
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 1: love you so much to thank you, thank you for
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 1: being on the show. And yeah, give a ship big
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 1: thank you for listening to this episode of the Dropping
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 1: Gems podcast. This show is executive produced by Adrian Scott
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 1: and me Debbie Brown. Our theme music was created by
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 1: producer day One and the poem that you heard at
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 1: the beginning of the show, well that was created especially
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 1: for us by award winning poet and I'm the Elk
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 1: for If you have a quick moment right now, please
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 1: hit subscribe on the show and if you like what
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 1: you heard, take it a step further and give us
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 1: a five star rating. Until next time, you connect with
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 1: me on I g at Debbie Brown or my website
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 1: Debbie brown dot com. Be blessed, h