Latest / DA CREW Podcast / SC BOOKGAL & FRIENDS PODCAST|EVERY TUESDAY 8PM EST LIVE ON DA CREW PODCAST

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SC BOOKGAL & FRIENDS PODCAST|EVERY TUESDAY 8PM EST LIVE ON DA CREW PODCAST · DA CREW Podcast

2:39
Speaker 1: Hey, everyone, this is your Girl Scie book out eight
2:43
Speaker 1: four three, and it's another Tuesday night. So you know
2:48
Speaker 1: I'm bringing you a new author and a new book. Okay.
2:53
Speaker 1: So you guys, today's book hits kind of close. Well
2:59
Speaker 1: it doesn't kind it does hit close to home for me.
3:02
Speaker 2: Okay.
3:03
Speaker 1: On October ninth was four years since I lost my
3:06
Speaker 1: mother to cancer. In the book we're going to be
3:10
Speaker 1: talking about, it's gonna be about grief, Okay. So I
3:14
Speaker 1: have an author that is here from Columbus, Ohio. Now Columbus,
3:19
Speaker 1: you get full seasons in one day. Believe you me.
3:24
Speaker 1: I've been there and been through it and never do
3:26
Speaker 1: it again again. So she is going to talk to
3:29
Speaker 1: us about her book. Okay, you guys, I am so
3:32
Speaker 1: excited to have her here with us, and we are
3:35
Speaker 1: going to be talking about the book dealing with grief. Okay.
3:41
Speaker 1: So without further ado, I am going to bring bringing
3:46
Speaker 1: up author key it I am saying it wrong, but
3:51
Speaker 1: it's keiarra ho. Y'all know I'm bad with being soon
3:54
Speaker 1: I act like y'all don't know. Y'all know I'm terrible
3:56
Speaker 1: with it. But chage my head, not my heart, my
4:00
Speaker 1: heart not my head. Charge it to the bad one, okay,
4:04
Speaker 1: because it's like you're gonna try and see. But come
4:07
Speaker 1: on up, Giry, come on up.
4:11
Speaker 3: Hello. It is pronounced kiya. How are you here? Thank
4:21
Speaker 3: you so much for this opportunity.
4:24
Speaker 1: Thank you for being here with us. So before we
4:28
Speaker 1: go any further, tell us a little bit about yourself.
4:32
Speaker 3: So I am Kiya Hope, living in Columbus, Ohio, as
4:35
Speaker 3: you said, and just excited. I'm a military kid, so
4:40
Speaker 3: I've lived in all the different seasons and most of
4:44
Speaker 3: the Actually I think i've hit all the not all
4:46
Speaker 3: the time zone the United States. I'm missing Hawaii. I
4:48
Speaker 3: got to get to Hawaii, but we even lived in
4:50
Speaker 3: Alaska for a while, and so I am so had
4:54
Speaker 3: the opportunity to move around the United States and go
4:57
Speaker 3: and visit different countries. So I like to travel and
5:01
Speaker 3: I work a full time job. I'm also a founding
5:03
Speaker 3: pastor of Covenant Believers Community Church whoop woop, celebrating nine years.
5:08
Speaker 3: So next year we'll be our ten year anniversary, which
5:11
Speaker 3: is so exciting. I know, and I guess I didn't
5:15
Speaker 3: have enough to do, so I started writing books.
5:21
Speaker 1: Is it all all right? Asks her? How do you
5:23
Speaker 1: do it all.
5:24
Speaker 3: I don't know, but by the grace of God, I
5:28
Speaker 3: even went. I graduated with my master in Divinity a
5:30
Speaker 3: couple of years ago, so I was working full time
5:32
Speaker 3: job pastoring and then decided to go and get another
5:35
Speaker 3: master's degree. So, pull, where did you sleep? It was
5:44
Speaker 3: rough sometimes I'm not gonna lie. We'll go to bed
5:46
Speaker 3: sometimes at after eleven and then so I do all
5:49
Speaker 3: my ministry work in the morning. So when I get
5:51
Speaker 3: up in the morning, that's when I'm working on my
5:53
Speaker 3: sermons and Bible study. So I get up about five
5:57
Speaker 3: or five thirty. When I was in school, I was
5:58
Speaker 3: getting up at five and then get ready do my
6:02
Speaker 3: nine to five and then after that it was at
6:05
Speaker 3: that time going to school, and so it was busy,
6:10
Speaker 3: you know. So I tried to have I just really
6:13
Speaker 3: only had Sunday afternoons to myself. So it was a
6:17
Speaker 3: lot of work, but I knew it was for a
6:18
Speaker 3: temporary situation.
6:22
Speaker 1: Understandable, understandable so that military life. Let me ask you
6:28
Speaker 1: a question, Okay, what was your favorite place to live?
6:34
Speaker 3: I think Germany because I was in Germany from age
6:38
Speaker 3: nine to twelve, and it was because we lived on
6:40
Speaker 3: the border of Germany and Austria. So we went to Austria.
6:43
Speaker 3: All this time, I was like fifteen minutes to get
6:45
Speaker 3: to Austria. We did a trip, a two week train
6:49
Speaker 3: trip where we went to all these different countries because
6:52
Speaker 3: there is so you know, Europe, you get places faster
6:54
Speaker 3: than you do in the United States. And so we
6:57
Speaker 3: always had all these experiences and we would go into Germantown.
7:01
Speaker 3: I learned about exchanging money, so I used to watch
7:03
Speaker 3: exchange rates so I can exchange from dollars to deutsch marks.
7:07
Speaker 3: And so it was. It was an awesome experience, and
7:09
Speaker 3: I'm glad I was old enough to remember all of that.
7:14
Speaker 1: So I have to ask that question. Now, one more
7:17
Speaker 1: question about your past. How did you get used to
7:21
Speaker 1: living in Alaska and it being dark all day long? Oh? No,
7:26
Speaker 1: it's a Sunday, sun light all day.
7:28
Speaker 3: On both both.
7:30
Speaker 1: Oh.
7:30
Speaker 3: So we were at Fairbanks. So Fairbanks is only about
7:33
Speaker 3: three months. Some of the extreme places are the six months.
7:36
Speaker 3: I'll tell you the fun thing. So I was in
7:39
Speaker 3: Alaska as a teenager, and the fun thing was ten
7:43
Speaker 3: o'clock at night playing softball because it was still like dust,
7:47
Speaker 3: you know, so it was still light enough you could see.
7:50
Speaker 3: That was the fun thing. Here's something interesting, little tidbit
7:54
Speaker 3: what they would do for the kids who were younger.
7:56
Speaker 3: They would put aluminum foil on the windows to sunlight
7:59
Speaker 3: so the kids would go to leep. But the nighttime
8:02
Speaker 3: was weird because it was pitch black when you go
8:05
Speaker 3: to school, and then it would get fairly not light,
8:09
Speaker 3: but not even dusk, maybe twilight or something around ten
8:13
Speaker 3: or eleven. But by the time you get out of school,
8:15
Speaker 3: it is back pitch black. So it was really that's
8:19
Speaker 3: a lot of depression. There a lot of alcoholism because
8:21
Speaker 3: of all of that. But as a kid, the daytime
8:24
Speaker 3: thing was awesome.
8:26
Speaker 1: You know.
8:26
Speaker 3: The nighttime thing, you just kind of got used to it,
8:29
Speaker 3: but it is I don't I thought it was. I
8:31
Speaker 3: thought it was a great experience. I would have graduated
8:35
Speaker 3: high school from there, except my mother got sick and
8:37
Speaker 3: we had to come back to the Lower forty eight
8:39
Speaker 3: is what they call it. So we had to come
8:40
Speaker 3: back over here so she could get care of Our
8:43
Speaker 3: brother graduated high school from Alaska.
8:46
Speaker 1: Wow, yeah, okay, that's that's that's something. So yeah, what
8:56
Speaker 1: make you okay, y'all? That's mikey. She came straight out
9:01
Speaker 1: what needs you? What made you want to become an author?
9:06
Speaker 3: I always knew I would write, so one of the
9:08
Speaker 3: things in Germany, we didn't have a lot of things
9:11
Speaker 3: to do. I think that's where my artistic side kind
9:13
Speaker 3: of came out. So I had my own little didn't
9:15
Speaker 3: even know what to call him. I used to have
9:16
Speaker 3: my own radio show back then, and so I used
9:19
Speaker 3: to have my brother come on. So I had my
9:20
Speaker 3: little cassette tape and I would record him and i'd
9:23
Speaker 3: make him be my guest so I could ask him questions.
9:26
Speaker 3: And then if he didn't want to act right, I'd
9:28
Speaker 3: have to do my own guests, and I'd change up
9:30
Speaker 3: voices and i'd interview myself. And so that's where I
9:34
Speaker 3: started reading. And I just read everything I could get
9:38
Speaker 3: my hands on, including things I shouldn't have been reading,
9:40
Speaker 3: to be honest. And so as I continued on in life,
9:45
Speaker 3: I was always writing. I wrote for the newspaper, I
9:47
Speaker 3: did this, you know, the yearbook. So I always and
9:51
Speaker 3: I did a couple of poems. Really when I was
9:54
Speaker 3: dealing with my mother's illness, I did a lot of
9:57
Speaker 3: wrote a lot of poems in but I always knew
10:00
Speaker 3: I would write a book. I did not think I
10:03
Speaker 3: would write books, so that part was a surprise. But
10:07
Speaker 3: I think in Germany where the creative of me began
10:11
Speaker 3: to develop.
10:13
Speaker 1: So how many books do you have under your belt
10:14
Speaker 1: right now?
10:16
Speaker 3: I have three while all I'm written in this year,
10:25
Speaker 3: all this year.
10:26
Speaker 1: Congratulations, my sweetheart. I know, like wow, Now, y'all, I'm
10:33
Speaker 1: about to bring up her book cover. Y'all know how
10:35
Speaker 1: I am of my book coutse. Y'all know I am
10:38
Speaker 1: a cover girl. If your book draws me through a cover,
10:44
Speaker 1: there's a good chance I'm reading. Okay, So y'all ready
10:49
Speaker 1: for this one.
10:51
Speaker 2: Here?
11:04
Speaker 3: Okay, So I'm glad you picked up on a transition.
11:08
Speaker 3: That's what this is about. That's why there's a butterfly.
11:11
Speaker 3: So I have to give a shout out to my
11:13
Speaker 3: friend Shelby. She was one initially was working on my
11:17
Speaker 3: book cover so dealing with grief and how to move
11:20
Speaker 3: beyond it. I initially wanted and then drodging this person
11:24
Speaker 3: running across the book cover. And as they were running,
11:28
Speaker 3: I wanted them to transition away from dark gray and blue,
11:32
Speaker 3: to transition into joy, to you know, moving beyond the grief.
11:36
Speaker 3: But she and I were talking one time. So we
11:38
Speaker 3: met at the gym, and so she hadn't shown me anything,
11:43
Speaker 3: and she said, okay, I want to tell you about
11:46
Speaker 3: the book cover. She said, I know you had an
11:48
Speaker 3: idea about it, but I've been working on something and
11:50
Speaker 3: I was thinking about a butterfly, and I was like, okay.
11:54
Speaker 3: So we switched into another part of the workout, and
11:57
Speaker 3: I kept in my mind going, I said, you know
11:59
Speaker 3: what a butterfly. Fly represents change, and if you're going
12:03
Speaker 3: to deal with your grief and move beyond it, that
12:06
Speaker 3: involves change. So I said, I like it. And so
12:09
Speaker 3: she got busy with people who paid her a lot
12:11
Speaker 3: more money than I was offering, and so I ended
12:14
Speaker 3: up going and getting a different designer. But I stuck
12:17
Speaker 3: with the butterfly. And so I told him my vision
12:20
Speaker 3: of what I wanted, and he came up with the
12:22
Speaker 3: half and half. Because we start out, you know, grief
12:27
Speaker 3: hurts like you and I both lost our mothers to cancer,
12:30
Speaker 3: and that's not an overnight process. You're watching this person change.
12:34
Speaker 3: You're watching this person as they're transitioning, you know, from
12:38
Speaker 3: life to death. And so I wanted the book to
12:41
Speaker 3: represent that with the color. So when I look at it.
12:44
Speaker 3: That's what it represents to me. But what I don't
12:47
Speaker 3: want any of us to do is to stay in
12:49
Speaker 3: the point of grief, to get locked into that. And
12:51
Speaker 3: so my prayer for everyone is that and if the
12:54
Speaker 3: book helps them to do that, that would be an honor, honestly,
12:58
Speaker 3: But for us to move beyond and understand that we're
13:01
Speaker 3: still alive, we're still here. That means that we still
13:04
Speaker 3: have work to do. And so for us not to
13:06
Speaker 3: get stuck in the state of grief, but to move
13:08
Speaker 3: beyond it.
13:11
Speaker 1: You know, that's funny because my aunt called me, and
13:14
Speaker 1: she also does that. She calls to you, She calls
13:17
Speaker 1: each one of each one of us, me and my
13:19
Speaker 1: two sisters, and she was like crying. You know, I'm
13:24
Speaker 1: thinking about your mama said she a better pleased than us.
13:28
Speaker 1: I mean, we got to deal with what's going on
13:29
Speaker 1: down here. I'm boy after partying all day long, you know.
13:33
Speaker 1: And I have friends who say, treat you make light
13:38
Speaker 1: of the situation. No, I have my moments, but I mean, really,
13:45
Speaker 1: what you want your family member down here suffering?
13:47
Speaker 2: Mm.
13:49
Speaker 3: So that's how I always look at it, and and
13:52
Speaker 3: that's exactly right, because I watched my mother. And I'll
13:56
Speaker 3: go ahead and tell you one of the things I
13:57
Speaker 3: put in a book here.
13:58
Speaker 1: Now.
13:58
Speaker 3: I shared this with people even before I wrote the book,
14:00
Speaker 3: and they, you know, were very judgmental towards me. But
14:03
Speaker 3: I prayed for my mother to die because at the
14:06
Speaker 3: end of her life, we were crunching up pain pills
14:10
Speaker 3: so that they can get in her system quicker. Nothing
14:13
Speaker 3: that was given to her helped her. She was in
14:16
Speaker 3: immense pain. The cancer had metastasized in her body, and
14:22
Speaker 3: she was just really struggling to breathe. She had no
14:25
Speaker 3: quality of life. She's stuck into bed. She's, like I said,
14:28
Speaker 3: in constant pain. So as a as a Christian, why
14:31
Speaker 3: would I want you to stay in that state? For me,
14:35
Speaker 3: I was eighteen, my brother was twenty, and my parents
14:40
Speaker 3: had us in high school. My mother was thirty five
14:41
Speaker 3: when she died. My brother my dad was thirty seven.
14:44
Speaker 3: So we were a young family and my mother was
14:47
Speaker 3: diagnosed with the cancer initially almost ten years before then.
14:51
Speaker 3: So for her to deal with the cancer going remission,
14:53
Speaker 3: deal with the cancer going remission, and when it came
14:55
Speaker 3: back this time, it came back with a vengeance. So
14:58
Speaker 3: it got to the point where I knew that God
15:01
Speaker 3: would heal her in heaven. I knew that when she
15:04
Speaker 3: got to heaven, she was not going to be hurting,
15:06
Speaker 3: she was not going to be suffering, she would not
15:08
Speaker 3: be struggling to breathe. And I knew that even though
15:11
Speaker 3: I was going to hurt, I was going to cry
15:13
Speaker 3: and it was going to be hard. But I knew
15:15
Speaker 3: that I was going to be okay because I was
15:17
Speaker 3: also saved, and so I knew that I know I
15:20
Speaker 3: will see my mother again. But it was to me,
15:23
Speaker 3: it is selfish to say, I want you to stay
15:26
Speaker 3: in a constant state of pain just so that you're
15:28
Speaker 3: still here for me, when I know that the greater
15:32
Speaker 3: is for you on the other side. You know what?
15:36
Speaker 1: And as the same conversation to you, guys, I had
15:38
Speaker 1: with my daughter. My daughter is now ten, So she
15:42
Speaker 1: was about seven when my mother died, and she knew.
15:45
Speaker 1: She saw it all. They went through the process. All
15:48
Speaker 1: of her grants were there, and I'll never forget her.
15:53
Speaker 1: One Saturday, we went to her house, so we knew
15:56
Speaker 1: that it was going to be close, because she got
15:58
Speaker 1: all her energy and she came and sat in the
16:01
Speaker 1: front room and had all her grands around there except
16:04
Speaker 1: the oldest one, which is my son, he was at work.
16:06
Speaker 1: She had all the little ones around her and she sang, yes,
16:10
Speaker 1: Jesus loves me. She talk to them about listening to
16:15
Speaker 1: their mom and their dad, and she kissed all of them,
16:19
Speaker 1: tell them she loved them, and then she played her
16:21
Speaker 1: song Waymaker, and me and my sisters knew, okay, all right, yo,
16:30
Speaker 1: this is getting kind of okay, go play Kings because
16:34
Speaker 1: we didn't know how to handle it, but we knew
16:35
Speaker 1: what she was doing. She was preparing them. But you
16:38
Speaker 1: know what they did very They they were great. I
16:44
Speaker 1: won't say they were good because everybody did go through counseling.
16:48
Speaker 1: But my daughter was like, I'm happy Grannie's in a
16:50
Speaker 1: better place. Branny's with Auntie Brittany, which was my sister
16:55
Speaker 1: who passed away. Yeah, Auntie Brittany just needed somebody to
16:58
Speaker 1: be with her.
16:59
Speaker 3: Oh.
17:00
Speaker 1: I was like, he was an old leader, but you know,
17:08
Speaker 1: Grannie just wanted to be with Auntie Brady. I'm like,
17:10
Speaker 1: you know, old lead. He go so please, but it
17:13
Speaker 1: made so much sense. And but there were other individuals
17:18
Speaker 1: who I felt the same way, the opposite of how
17:22
Speaker 1: you were feeling. They wanted her to stay. They were praying, Oh, God, healer,
17:27
Speaker 1: and I'm like, it's not that I don't want my
17:30
Speaker 1: mother to be here, said, I don't want.
17:32
Speaker 3: Her to suffer exactly.
17:34
Speaker 1: Yeah, you see this pain, you see it. You see
17:38
Speaker 1: them just not being theirself. They're a shadow of a body.
17:41
Speaker 1: So I totally understand. Yeah, So my next question to
17:47
Speaker 1: you would be who should read your book?
17:54
Speaker 3: So I think so one grief. Most of the time
17:58
Speaker 3: I've run into people who say, oh, I'm not dealing
18:01
Speaker 3: with grief right now, I don't need that. Well, here's
18:04
Speaker 3: the thing. Either one you've experienced it to you're going
18:08
Speaker 3: to experience it, or you already have. Grief doesn't play favorites,
18:12
Speaker 3: and it hits all of us. And that's just the
18:15
Speaker 3: truth of it. When God gave me this book, I
18:18
Speaker 3: didn't think I was grieving either. I was like, God,
18:20
Speaker 3: why are you give me this book? I'm not grieving.
18:21
Speaker 3: I don't need to write this book. So we could
18:24
Speaker 3: talk about that part of it. But this book is
18:27
Speaker 3: for those who want to move beyond the state of grief,
18:34
Speaker 3: those who may be an active grief, and it's also
18:36
Speaker 3: an opportunity to remember our loved ones. So to say
18:41
Speaker 3: anybody dealing with grief is kind of shortcoming. Because one
18:46
Speaker 3: of my friends shout out to him, he just went
18:50
Speaker 3: through a divorce and he read the book and I
18:54
Speaker 3: love it. It's a story, he said. He stayed up
18:56
Speaker 3: till three o'clock in the morning finishing the book, and
18:58
Speaker 3: he told me, he said, even, oh, I'm not dealing
19:00
Speaker 3: with grief for the loss of a family member. I'm
19:04
Speaker 3: dealing with grief and the loss of a marriage. And
19:07
Speaker 3: he told me how the book helped him. So, no,
19:09
Speaker 3: it wasn't. So it was grief period, not necessarily just
19:13
Speaker 3: for dealing with loss of a loved one. But he
19:17
Speaker 3: lost a marriage and that was a huge part of
19:19
Speaker 3: his life and his identity. And so he talked about
19:22
Speaker 3: how the book helped him to move beyond that, how
19:25
Speaker 3: it helped him to recognize, like we talked about the
19:28
Speaker 3: five stages of grief and moving beyond that. Excuse me.
19:33
Speaker 3: And so I was like, wow, thank you so much
19:35
Speaker 3: for sharing that, because it is about grief in general.
19:38
Speaker 3: You can lose a job, and you can lose a pet.
19:41
Speaker 3: Some people grief when they have to move from a house.
19:45
Speaker 3: Excuse me. So grief in any aspect. I am a pastor,
19:52
Speaker 3: so excuse me, I share with you. I just came
19:57
Speaker 3: back from vacation sick. But anyway, and so there are
20:02
Speaker 3: times that I do put my pastor head on because
20:07
Speaker 3: I know my faith. This world is not the end
20:11
Speaker 3: for Christians. We will see our loved ones again.
20:16
Speaker 1: Thereby go excuse me, but why we give her a
20:19
Speaker 1: chance to get some more? Because everybody, y'all know what
20:22
Speaker 1: time it is, right, I told her that.
20:27
Speaker 3: I was praying.
20:28
Speaker 1: I give you, sweetheart, it is okay, It is okay.
20:35
Speaker 1: You are a human. You are humans. Go ahead, take
20:39
Speaker 1: a couple of SIPs, and I explain to you the
20:43
Speaker 1: fun question. Okay, So fun questions always deal with entertainment
20:50
Speaker 1: in the lines of music and actors actress. You know,
20:57
Speaker 1: I love music, and I love movies and I love
21:00
Speaker 1: TV series. So Lifetimes say, we love your book. We
21:10
Speaker 1: would like to turn it into a movie, but you
21:15
Speaker 1: have to cast the leading male in the leading female.
21:21
Speaker 1: But they can only be nineties gospel artists.
21:31
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh, I was rolling with you for a
21:38
Speaker 3: minute until I put that time period. Yeah, gospel artists,
21:46
Speaker 3: My goodness. Okay, So I love Yolanda Adams I'm not
21:50
Speaker 3: as tall as she is or as skinny as she is,
21:52
Speaker 3: but I love her power, Okay, I love her perseverance,
21:57
Speaker 3: so I say she can play me. Let's see. So
22:01
Speaker 3: for my father, so he was not necessarily a practicing Christian,
22:07
Speaker 3: so he'd be tough to pick. God did me to
22:12
Speaker 3: bring him back to the Lord before he died. Oh yeah,
22:17
Speaker 3: I do want to say. My grief book is not
22:18
Speaker 3: just about my mother. It is my mother, my father,
22:21
Speaker 3: A break up, A break up, y'all. Y'all been through
22:24
Speaker 3: some traumatic breakups. Have mercy Jesus and a grandmother, great grandmother. Yeah,
22:31
Speaker 3: in the middle of losing my mother and my grandmother.
22:34
Speaker 3: But anyway, I digress. So, yes, a little juice in there,
22:39
Speaker 3: a little little yeah Jesus. Yeah, I would say what
22:46
Speaker 3: you couldn't tell when I was engaged. But yeah, so
22:50
Speaker 3: we had to do. And the clean version of what
22:53
Speaker 3: I said was, uh, but God him not to be honest.
22:58
Speaker 3: For my dad and my brother, that could be a
22:59
Speaker 3: little tough grandmother, let's do. Uh well, I don't know
23:04
Speaker 3: my grandmother would tell you about yourself. So maybe a
23:07
Speaker 3: Shirley Caesar for one of them. Uh see, I would
23:13
Speaker 3: have picked ante labacity. You told me a gospel singer.
23:19
Speaker 1: You might need to use that leading mo because we
23:21
Speaker 1: still got too more questions.
23:23
Speaker 3: Okay, my bad, My bad. Okay, I don't know for
23:25
Speaker 3: my dad and my brother because my brother was still
23:28
Speaker 3: praying for his salvation praise guard. I don't know. I
23:33
Speaker 3: only got me in the grandmother's dam.
23:35
Speaker 1: Okay. So if I have to think a gospel artist
23:40
Speaker 1: that lives, I want to say, lives on the edge,
23:43
Speaker 1: but has that universal appeal. If he is for lack
23:52
Speaker 1: of word, you guys hold me to that.
23:55
Speaker 3: TI. Yeah, I was singing C. C. Winings. TI trip
24:00
Speaker 3: does as well, Kirk Franklin does. Yeah.
24:03
Speaker 1: The only reason why I said Ti Trivia because my
24:05
Speaker 1: daughter loves TI Triviant.
24:06
Speaker 3: Okay, yes, Jesus, girl, you can dance like that, then
24:11
Speaker 3: we can talk. Said we started.
24:16
Speaker 1: Thank you. We got all these people right what they
24:22
Speaker 1: were only gonna be used for the soundtrack. But now
24:26
Speaker 1: we gotta get the actors. Okay, who would play you
24:32
Speaker 1: in your book?
24:35
Speaker 3: I'm gonna say Angela Bassett off of two of her roles,
24:39
Speaker 3: so one of them and Waiting to Exhale was part
24:42
Speaker 3: of my breakup series. That was one of that had
24:45
Speaker 3: a lot to do during the breakup. And I love
24:49
Speaker 3: her transition when she played Tina Turner, right, when you
24:53
Speaker 3: make that decision that you are no longer the victim
24:55
Speaker 3: because I got tired of being identified as a girl
24:58
Speaker 3: whose mom died, the girl who's mom had cancer. I
25:01
Speaker 3: got tired of that identity because I said, there's more
25:04
Speaker 3: to me than just that. And so there was a
25:08
Speaker 3: transition with Tina Turner, and there was a transition with
25:10
Speaker 3: angelabassad and waiting to exhale. Right, she was no longer
25:14
Speaker 3: the wife that, as Mary J. Blige say, sat by
25:17
Speaker 3: your side for eleven years. I was your sick Taran.
25:19
Speaker 3: So no longer that right, going into an empowerment stage,
25:24
Speaker 3: And that's what that was, what my transition was of
25:27
Speaker 3: this is not who I was eighteen. You can't lock
25:31
Speaker 3: me into that identity at eighteen.
25:33
Speaker 1: You can't.
25:34
Speaker 3: You know, I don't even know who I'm going to be,
25:37
Speaker 3: But I knew it wasn't gonna be the girl whose
25:39
Speaker 3: mom died. I was that was an aspect of my life,
25:42
Speaker 3: but I wanted to be my whole life. So I
25:44
Speaker 3: would say that for her because the roles that she played,
25:47
Speaker 3: and there was always a transition in it, and I
25:50
Speaker 3: like that.
25:51
Speaker 1: That is true. Every role she has played has been
25:55
Speaker 1: some type of transition yep. And always two empowerment.
26:01
Speaker 3: Mm hm.
26:02
Speaker 1: Even a nine to one one, y'all. I love that show.
26:04
Speaker 1: But this is new nine one one that got on
26:05
Speaker 1: I can't deal with. He lost Bobby, he had what
26:10
Speaker 1: was the basketball player? Uh Fox, Rick Fox? You know
26:16
Speaker 1: she went there with her the name of that one, right,
26:21
Speaker 1: and he helped to empower her. So all of that,
26:23
Speaker 1: I look at at people, and because we should be
26:26
Speaker 1: ever evolving, I guess maybe that's where I'm going. That
26:30
Speaker 1: is true, because I mean there are four seasons, and
26:35
Speaker 1: I think we changed twice as much. So all right,
26:41
Speaker 1: Lifetime said, all right, this is beautiful. We got you
26:44
Speaker 1: all settled. We're going to do the movie. But then, Hi,
26:49
Speaker 1: this is Oprah Winfrey, and I want to give you
26:51
Speaker 1: the opportunity to write with your favorite author, your favorite
26:59
Speaker 1: pass sterial author.
27:04
Speaker 3: And why Okay, so let me say this. My favorite
27:09
Speaker 3: genre of book or murder mysteries, not.
27:16
Speaker 1: Story.
27:16
Speaker 3: But I'm being honest. I love to catch the murderers.
27:20
Speaker 3: Those are my favorite things. I know. I write nonsense, Christian,
27:24
Speaker 3: that's the next book gonna work. But I promise you
27:26
Speaker 3: my favorite books. I got these lovely devotionals and all
27:30
Speaker 3: of this stuff. But I promise you when I'm ready
27:32
Speaker 3: to curl up in my chair with my tea and
27:35
Speaker 3: my blanket. We somebody died, and we gotta said somebody died.
27:41
Speaker 3: She got somebody.
27:45
Speaker 1: So if you had that opportunity, well, let's you know what,
27:49
Speaker 1: let's strike that if you had the opportunity to write
27:53
Speaker 1: a murder mystery with any body, anybody, it doesn't matter
27:59
Speaker 1: who it is, Who would it be and what would
28:03
Speaker 1: be the title?
28:05
Speaker 3: Oh? He almost got away? Oh okay, okay, and that
28:16
Speaker 3: and that scene comes me from The Color Girls with
28:18
Speaker 3: Frank he almost got all my stuff? Uh so you know,
28:23
Speaker 3: the murderers always think they won't get caught, right, So
28:25
Speaker 3: he almost got away. See. I read so many different authors.
28:30
Speaker 3: I'm in my mind. I'm thinking of all my favorite
28:32
Speaker 3: TV shows, of which detectives and things. But I guess
28:36
Speaker 3: I would have to go with Gosh, I just forgot
28:40
Speaker 3: her name. Her her thing actually just got turned into
28:42
Speaker 3: a series on ABC. Uh will Trent series? Oh my gosh,
28:49
Speaker 3: you have to look it up. Uh yeah, so she
28:51
Speaker 3: I've read all, I've read all of her books. I'm
28:56
Speaker 3: gonna mess myself up because I'm really bad when it
28:58
Speaker 3: comes to the names of my authors.
29:00
Speaker 1: Me too, Me too.
29:04
Speaker 3: But she has you know, Karen Slaughter, so she is
29:08
Speaker 3: one who I love. I like if it's an FBI
29:11
Speaker 3: book or Cia all of that. I read all of that,
29:14
Speaker 3: if it's a police detective. But I am just into
29:18
Speaker 3: murder mystery. And so I used to read romance when
29:21
Speaker 3: I was in college, and now I'm just like, so
29:24
Speaker 3: nobody died, Like, what do you know? It does not intrigue.
29:30
Speaker 3: I've transitioned as well. But I think I would like
29:33
Speaker 3: to write a short series of a cute little romance,
29:37
Speaker 3: but it would have to be like a short you know,
29:39
Speaker 3: like a couple of short stories or something. I don't
29:42
Speaker 3: think I could write a murder mystery, but I like
29:44
Speaker 3: to read them.
29:46
Speaker 1: Well, maybe you can put the romance and the murder
29:48
Speaker 1: mystery together.
29:50
Speaker 3: Because he almost got away.
29:54
Speaker 1: I'm sorry.
29:58
Speaker 3: So let me ask you a question.
30:00
Speaker 1: I bet you used to sit down there and watch murder.
30:02
Speaker 3: She wrote, didn't you absolutely Columbus? Look, the old school
30:07
Speaker 3: was Colombo Murder? She wrote, Mattlock. Okay, my age, right,
30:15
Speaker 3: you know in the last I say, two or three years,
30:18
Speaker 3: I got turned on to Perry Mason like that was
30:21
Speaker 3: in black and white. That is how old that one is.
30:23
Speaker 3: But I was just I mean, honestly, if somebody died,
30:26
Speaker 3: I got to help these people solve the murder. We
30:28
Speaker 3: got to go find the murderer. Sherry me soon.
30:32
Speaker 1: Oh, sit up there and watch matt Antela Lansbury. I
30:40
Speaker 1: tell her said, somebody gonna kill them too if they're
30:42
Speaker 1: too noisy, especially Mattlock. He's always pop out of nowhere,
30:47
Speaker 1: like what are you doing? Man?
30:49
Speaker 3: I would not be friends with Angela Lansbury because somebody
30:51
Speaker 3: around her always dies. She's not a good person to
30:54
Speaker 3: be friends with. Okay, I was like, no.
30:58
Speaker 1: It's true.
31:00
Speaker 3: I think Colombo is probably one of my favorite detectives
31:05
Speaker 3: because he would always pretend like he was oblivious, didn't
31:08
Speaker 3: know what was going a fumbling, bumbling detective, but he
31:11
Speaker 3: always got his man or woman.
31:13
Speaker 1: Here you go. I can only hit you with the
31:17
Speaker 1: end the heat of the night. I can sit up
31:18
Speaker 1: there looking at all day and even got a RUFU
31:21
Speaker 1: channel for Indie heating night y'all so two o'clock in
31:26
Speaker 1: the morning.
31:27
Speaker 3: Can't sleep that is so true, true, it is always on.
31:34
Speaker 1: Always. I love roucoul for doing stuff like that. Let
31:37
Speaker 1: me stop, I digress. As we come to a close,
31:43
Speaker 1: can you please tell what would you like to say
31:48
Speaker 1: to your new readers, old readers and up and coming readers.
31:54
Speaker 1: What do would you like to say to them?
31:57
Speaker 3: I would like to say, I wrote a book call
32:00
Speaker 3: this is so. This is from my church people. Okay,
32:03
Speaker 3: those who go to church, you take all your sermon
32:06
Speaker 3: notes and one one little book, right, and so because
32:11
Speaker 3: I also had to add other stuff in there. So
32:13
Speaker 3: one you take your notes every Sunday, and then at
32:16
Speaker 3: the end of the month, I have a thing to
32:17
Speaker 3: help you reflect over your pastor's sermons over the last month.
32:21
Speaker 3: And then I also give you something. I'm really big
32:23
Speaker 3: on spiritual growth, right, transition, If you'll see that about me,
32:26
Speaker 3: I'm really big about transition. And so every month I
32:29
Speaker 3: have a question in there for you to think about
32:31
Speaker 3: for your spiritual growth. And then at the end of
32:33
Speaker 3: the year, once you've completed that whole year, I give
32:36
Speaker 3: you some more stuff. So there's that German notebooks. And
32:39
Speaker 3: then of course you mentioned my book dealing with Grief
32:41
Speaker 3: and how to Move Beyond it and published in the
32:44
Speaker 3: last two weeks.
32:45
Speaker 1: But gold.
32:48
Speaker 3: This is the journal that goes with it. So this
32:51
Speaker 3: journal evolved more than I thought that it would. I
32:54
Speaker 3: thought initially I was just going to take a couple
32:57
Speaker 3: other chapters from the book, give you something journal prompt,
33:00
Speaker 3: blah blah blah, and I wasn't going to include all
33:02
Speaker 3: the chapters. And then I would hear from people what reid,
33:05
Speaker 3: those who had already read the book of what resonated
33:07
Speaker 3: with them, and I was like, oh, so I need
33:10
Speaker 3: include all of the chapters. And I added some others
33:14
Speaker 3: from some of the feedback that I got from people,
33:16
Speaker 3: And I am working on another book. So what I
33:20
Speaker 3: would like to know is stick with your girl. We
33:23
Speaker 3: are doing big things. Okay. So one of the things,
33:30
Speaker 3: like I said, I talk a lot about spiritual growth.
33:32
Speaker 3: I talk about evolution. I talk about growing and evolving.
33:36
Speaker 3: So five years ago, did I know that I would
33:39
Speaker 3: be doing all of this? No, Like I said, I
33:41
Speaker 3: knew I would write a book. I did not know
33:44
Speaker 3: I would write books. So that was something that just
33:47
Speaker 3: kind of came out of the blue. So I don't
33:51
Speaker 3: know all the types of books I'm going to write.
33:53
Speaker 3: Right I'm listening to the Holy Spirit. Because here's the thing.
33:56
Speaker 3: So when I got ready to write a book, this
33:58
Speaker 3: is not the book that I was working on. I
34:01
Speaker 3: was listening to a webinar that teaches you how to
34:03
Speaker 3: write books. And God said, dealing with grief and how
34:06
Speaker 3: to move beyond it. And I said, no, I'm not grieving.
34:08
Speaker 3: What are you talking about? So I got multiporting. So
34:11
Speaker 3: I've got this guy up here and I'm listening to
34:13
Speaker 3: the webinar. God said it again, dealing with grief and
34:16
Speaker 3: how to move beyond it. So I was like, okay,
34:18
Speaker 3: and he gave me the first five chapters. So I
34:22
Speaker 3: was like, whoa. So I still haven't written a book
34:24
Speaker 3: that I was working on initially. So I don't know
34:28
Speaker 3: all the books I'm going to write. Are all the
34:29
Speaker 3: things I'm going to do. I'm just going to listen
34:31
Speaker 3: to the whole spirit and follow him. So follow me
34:35
Speaker 3: as I follow Christ.
34:36
Speaker 1: As Paul said, So, now, since be talking about follow you,
34:42
Speaker 1: how about you give us the run down on social
34:44
Speaker 1: media and anything else that you may have coming up.
34:48
Speaker 1: How can we follow you?
34:50
Speaker 3: Okay? So my YouTube page is pitiful, y'all come help
34:55
Speaker 3: me out, okay, kyah, hold, go to go to YouTube.
34:58
Speaker 3: I am so low on followers and all of that,
35:00
Speaker 3: and I'm gonna do better with videos. But I am
35:02
Speaker 3: on YouTube, i am on Instagram, I am on you LinkedIn,
35:09
Speaker 3: I am on TikTok, and I'm on threads. So one
35:14
Speaker 3: thing that I do do Here's a reason you should
35:17
Speaker 3: follow me, is that I post something inspirational. Either's something
35:21
Speaker 3: to help you deal with grief, something I'm always tying
35:24
Speaker 3: it back to grief. Of course, as my books evolve,
35:26
Speaker 3: it'll be with that. But so sometimes there are some
35:29
Speaker 3: people who may never buy my book, and that's okay,
35:32
Speaker 3: But what I hope that they get from the post
35:34
Speaker 3: is some encouragement to hang in there. There are gray
35:37
Speaker 3: days right for the book. There are days that are
35:40
Speaker 3: that are gray and dark and you just feel like
35:42
Speaker 3: you can't go on. And I want to give you
35:44
Speaker 3: inspiration to tell you that there is hope, and so
35:48
Speaker 3: I make I make the post just to kind of
35:50
Speaker 3: encourage people throughout. I'm gonna try to do better with videos.
35:54
Speaker 3: I'm gonna do better with videos, that's my pledge. But
35:59
Speaker 3: most time I'm like, I don't have time, but.
36:07
Speaker 1: I understand, I'm gonna write I'm gonna do this video,
36:12
Speaker 1: and you look like, oh, man, hold on, I'm tell
36:14
Speaker 1: you yeah.
36:18
Speaker 3: So but yeah, I just want to say that I'm excited.
36:21
Speaker 3: I thank you for this opportunity to come and share
36:24
Speaker 3: my story and pump up the book. And and I pray,
36:28
Speaker 3: honestly for for anyone dealing with grief. I pray that
36:32
Speaker 3: you don't get stuck in that there is hope on
36:35
Speaker 3: the other side. There still can be joy in your life.
36:38
Speaker 3: And so grief is a stage. One of the things
36:40
Speaker 3: I have in there is don't stay in the state
36:42
Speaker 3: you're in. You're in a state of grief, but don't
36:44
Speaker 3: stay in it. You talked about how your mother was
36:46
Speaker 3: preparing everyone to say goodbye. I have a chapter prepared
36:49
Speaker 3: to say goodbye. I never realized my mother was prepared
36:52
Speaker 3: to say goodbye to me until I wrote the book,
36:55
Speaker 3: So I had a couple of Yeah. I didn't realize
36:59
Speaker 3: it until I was writing, and I was like, oh,
37:01
Speaker 3: my gosh, she was. I thought I was just, you know,
37:05
Speaker 3: preparing to say goodbye her and she was doing the
37:07
Speaker 3: same to me. So it's, uh, it's it's just that's all.
37:12
Speaker 3: It was a blessing for me. It was very cathartic
37:15
Speaker 3: because as I was writing, it was five years since
37:17
Speaker 3: my father passed, and so it was it was good
37:21
Speaker 3: to write about that and just to really prayerfully hopefully
37:25
Speaker 3: help someone else.
37:27
Speaker 1: So you guys, remember, it's not always about losing someone.
37:31
Speaker 1: It's about losing maybe a job, an animal, something you
37:37
Speaker 1: had to let go and you're grieving over it. So
37:40
Speaker 1: don't think that this book is only for when a
37:43
Speaker 1: family member or someone you know has passed away. No, actually,
37:46
Speaker 1: you know, grieving is a part of closure.
37:49
Speaker 3: So it is right because I have the breakup chapter,
37:52
Speaker 3: the break up chapters in there. And then I also
37:55
Speaker 3: had a friend who retired and they brought on a
37:58
Speaker 3: state of grief for her because it was like, well
38:00
Speaker 3: now what not? Oh yes, So when she read the
38:04
Speaker 3: book and we talked about it, and she said, because
38:06
Speaker 3: grief is grief, and I said, you're absolutely right, and
38:09
Speaker 3: so even retirement can we think it's all exciting, but
38:13
Speaker 3: sometimes it's like, well now what do I do?
38:17
Speaker 1: Absolutely right, So you guys go grab the book and
38:21
Speaker 1: we're gonna bring it up on more time for you
38:23
Speaker 1: all so you can see this beautiful book tonight. You
38:38
Speaker 1: got all their social media information is strolling at to bomb,
38:41
Speaker 1: so go give her some followers. I promise she'll do
38:45
Speaker 1: one video before twenty five.
38:49
Speaker 3: I promise.
38:50
Speaker 1: I promise better I post, I do post.
38:54
Speaker 3: I mean I'm gonna do better on videos.
38:56
Speaker 1: So he does post. I have to bet. I've seen
38:59
Speaker 1: her posts and I think I'm following you or we
39:01
Speaker 1: might be already friends. But she does post me, you know,
39:07
Speaker 1: and by yourself. I need to do the same thing.
39:09
Speaker 1: And I promise. I know y'all been saying this for
39:12
Speaker 1: how many years now, I promise, as.
39:14
Speaker 3: I always say, we're gonna make new life resolutions, not
39:17
Speaker 3: New Years because years changed, but.
39:21
Speaker 1: New Year's resolution. I get through day one and that's
39:23
Speaker 1: about it. I'm not even food by something this year.
39:29
Speaker 3: What you want to do for your life, that's my
39:32
Speaker 3: pastor hat right there. Life. There you go.
39:37
Speaker 1: Thank you for being with me tonight, Miss Hope, and
39:41
Speaker 1: you guys, like I said, go grab the book, very
39:44
Speaker 1: very very much needed for everybody because we're all gonna
39:48
Speaker 1: lose something. So how about we just put this in
39:50
Speaker 1: our back pocket for awesome Arsenal trying to learn some
39:56
Speaker 1: new words. But you guys, it's another Tuesday night. Make
40:00
Speaker 1: sure you join me. Next Tuesday, I'm gonna be on
40:04
Speaker 1: the road, okay, you guys. So I'm going to the
40:07
Speaker 1: South Carolina Library Conference, So i will be interviewing Melanie
40:12
Speaker 1: Joy and we're gonna be talking about her book next Tuesday,
40:17
Speaker 1: same time. APM. Again, Thank you, mss Hope, and you
40:22
Speaker 1: guys remember there's no such thing as an old book
40:25
Speaker 1: because not everybody has read every book. You guys have
40:29
Speaker 1: a great night. Bye.