WEBVTT - I Ain't Afraid of No Ghosts (with Jamilah Lemieux) 0:00:03.160 --> 0:00:06.600 Like the fact that like I never look for parking. 0:00:07.040 --> 0:00:08.520 I don't you know what I mean. It may take 0:00:08.560 --> 0:00:10.479 me a couple of minutes, but like I always parked 0:00:10.520 --> 0:00:13.000 near my destination. It's just little things where just feel 0:00:13.039 --> 0:00:16.079 like my folks are taking care of me. You who, 0:00:16.480 --> 0:00:18.919 You got a whole squad sort of coming together to 0:00:18.960 --> 0:00:21.080 make sure that the cars move when they need to. 0:00:21.680 --> 0:00:23.640 And we all can you know what I mean, like 0:00:24.920 --> 0:00:42.840 we all looking for parking. If you talk to your ghosts, 0:00:43.159 --> 0:00:57.840 racist money, martial stuff, you can't tell me. Yep, yep, yep, 0:00:58.080 --> 0:01:01.120 there it is. There it is. Ladies and gentlemen, Welcome 0:01:01.200 --> 0:01:05.920 to another phenomenal episode of My Mama Told Me, the 0:01:06.080 --> 0:01:09.640 podcast where we dive deep deep into the pockets of 0:01:09.720 --> 0:01:13.400 black conspiracy theories and we finally work to prove that 0:01:13.560 --> 0:01:17.279 race relations in this country will never be solved until 0:01:17.319 --> 0:01:23.000 Wes Anderson exclusively starts making movies starring Clifton pal That's right. 0:01:23.120 --> 0:01:26.400 We need the whitest filmmaker and the blackest star of 0:01:26.560 --> 0:01:30.600 every b et plus film to come together and solve 0:01:30.959 --> 0:01:34.240 what is broken in this country. It's the only way, folks. 0:01:34.319 --> 0:01:37.600 I'm your host, Langston Kerman as always coming at you hig, 0:01:37.680 --> 0:01:41.160 baby coming in spry. I'm feeling good today. Baby. I 0:01:41.400 --> 0:01:44.200 got I got a nice little I got some pepper 0:01:44.240 --> 0:01:46.000 in my step, you know what I mean. I got 0:01:46.280 --> 0:01:49.280 I got some some a little hooks fun. You know, 0:01:49.440 --> 0:01:53.440 I'm I'm excited because my guest today she is a 0:01:53.480 --> 0:01:57.920 person who deserves respects. Most of the people I have 0:01:58.000 --> 0:02:01.600 on this podcast are absolute idiot their foods, they're they're 0:02:01.760 --> 0:02:05.080 clowns who just say silly things. But she's a person 0:02:05.120 --> 0:02:08.880 who says very important things and thoughtful things. She's careful 0:02:09.200 --> 0:02:11.760 with the language that she used that she's a journalist, 0:02:12.040 --> 0:02:15.400 she's a cultural critic, and more importantly, she has a 0:02:15.400 --> 0:02:18.120 podcast called Mom and Dad Are Fighting. It's a a 0:02:18.240 --> 0:02:21.120 parenting podcast. You know her, you love her? Please give 0:02:21.120 --> 0:02:27.679 it up for my guests. Ms. Jamilla Lemieux, Hey, Hey, 0:02:27.680 --> 0:02:30.160 thank you for doing this. Thank you for having me. 0:02:30.760 --> 0:02:33.400 Hell yeah, it's gonna be fun. This is uh I 0:02:33.600 --> 0:02:36.480 I you heard it in the intro. We mostly have 0:02:36.600 --> 0:02:40.160 comedians on, so it's always a beautiful treat when somebody 0:02:40.200 --> 0:02:43.560 who uh takes themselves a little more seriously is here 0:02:43.639 --> 0:02:45.919 to help enlighten us in a way that a bunch 0:02:45.960 --> 0:02:48.600 of my dumb friends can't. My career is such a 0:02:48.680 --> 0:02:53.800 great facade for how not serious I take myself, and 0:02:53.919 --> 0:02:56.480 certainly none of my friends take me very seriously. Like 0:02:56.560 --> 0:02:58.400 the fact that I would get that sort of intro 0:02:58.480 --> 0:03:00.840 in my friend's circle is like a what the moment 0:03:00.919 --> 0:03:03.519 to this day, because I really I am the joker, 0:03:03.560 --> 0:03:07.400 I'm the silly one, I'm a friend. So yeah, so 0:03:07.480 --> 0:03:11.040 I I'm hugely disappointed. Now you should be because I 0:03:11.040 --> 0:03:15.040 came adequately unprepared to I did no research. I did. 0:03:16.160 --> 0:03:19.760 Oh that's beautiful. I here. This is always my fear 0:03:19.800 --> 0:03:24.120 whenever a journalist comes on is that you guys do 0:03:24.560 --> 0:03:26.919 my My presumption of the work that you do is 0:03:27.000 --> 0:03:30.160 you're constantly doing research. And so my fear is that 0:03:30.240 --> 0:03:34.040 my my very inadequate research is only going to disappoint you. 0:03:34.240 --> 0:03:36.280 But now that I know you didn't even do anything, 0:03:36.640 --> 0:03:39.000 I feel like I'm gonna be I'm gonna be thriving 0:03:39.040 --> 0:03:44.960 throughout this episode. Hell yeah, I'm excited. So you came 0:03:45.520 --> 0:03:48.920 with a conspiracy theory that I'm super excited about because 0:03:48.960 --> 0:03:53.440 we don't touch on the paranormal. In my opinion, often enough, 0:03:53.680 --> 0:03:56.080 it doesn't come up as often as you might think 0:03:56.080 --> 0:03:59.280 in this podcast, But you said my mama told me 0:04:01.720 --> 0:04:08.240 black people don't see ghosts, So to be fair, that's 0:04:08.240 --> 0:04:11.800 not what I said. I was presented a list of 0:04:12.320 --> 0:04:15.000 conspiracy theories to consider if I didn't have one of 0:04:15.000 --> 0:04:17.479 my own. Yeah, and all the ones I had were 0:04:17.520 --> 0:04:19.919 not fun at all, you know what I mean? Like, like, 0:04:20.320 --> 0:04:21.920 I don't know that we could really I mean, I 0:04:21.960 --> 0:04:24.039 guess we could probably have a great conversation about the 0:04:24.040 --> 0:04:28.920 Popeye's causing sterilization or churches chicken causing sterilization rumor that 0:04:29.080 --> 0:04:32.000 rocks the nineties, but like, how much can we say 0:04:32.040 --> 0:04:33.800 about that? But I thought that this one was really 0:04:33.839 --> 0:04:36.600 interesting because I had never heard it before, and so 0:04:36.640 --> 0:04:38.800 I thought maybe this was something you were familiar with. 0:04:38.839 --> 0:04:40.599 So I wanted to hear from you about black people 0:04:40.640 --> 0:04:43.080 not hearing or not seeing ghosts, because I think I 0:04:43.120 --> 0:04:47.560 have a counterpoint to that. Oh, I might disprove this 0:04:47.640 --> 0:04:51.240 conspiracy that I was not familiar with until tell me 0:04:51.279 --> 0:04:55.520 about it. You're telling me that you selected this just 0:04:55.600 --> 0:04:57.440 so you could flip it on the head and tell 0:04:57.480 --> 0:05:01.520 me why I'm stupid? How dare you, ma'am? How dare you? 0:05:02.440 --> 0:05:07.400 Isn't that what cultural compensators? Yes, and I don't care 0:05:07.480 --> 0:05:10.240 for that at all. No. I I write a lot 0:05:10.360 --> 0:05:13.400 of silly things down, but I do think years ago 0:05:13.440 --> 0:05:16.600 I used to do this bit about having lived with 0:05:16.760 --> 0:05:19.240 a I lived with a white woman for a few years, 0:05:19.279 --> 0:05:23.320 and she was a like an avid believer in like 0:05:23.800 --> 0:05:27.640 ghosts and and the the fact that our apartment was haunted, 0:05:27.640 --> 0:05:29.640 and she used to tell me there was like a 0:05:29.720 --> 0:05:32.360 ghost in our apartment all the time. And we lived 0:05:32.400 --> 0:05:35.120 in fucking where were we living. We were living in 0:05:35.160 --> 0:05:39.559 Crown Heights at the time, on Eastern Parkway. So it's like, nah, 0:05:39.839 --> 0:05:41.680 you don't get to you don't get to play ghost 0:05:41.760 --> 0:05:44.360 games over here when we like are amongst all these 0:05:44.440 --> 0:05:48.840 Jamaican people, you know what I mean. Like we went 0:05:48.880 --> 0:05:52.000 there together. It was it was a joint decision. I 0:05:52.040 --> 0:05:54.120 didn't go like, let me bring this white bitch to 0:05:54.200 --> 0:05:57.000 Karen Heights and see what happens. It was we were 0:05:57.040 --> 0:06:00.560 moving from Boston. We both needed a roommate, and and 0:06:00.600 --> 0:06:04.200 we we teamed up to make that ship happen. You 0:06:04.240 --> 0:06:07.000 came from Boston and thought the safest thing for your 0:06:07.080 --> 0:06:09.919 black life that matters was to move to Crown Heights, 0:06:10.040 --> 0:06:13.400 Brooklyn with a white woman. No, No, no, I thought 0:06:13.440 --> 0:06:16.680 the cheapest thing for my black life was the move 0:06:16.760 --> 0:06:19.000 to Crown Heights. For the white woman, I didn't think 0:06:19.000 --> 0:06:22.479 it was safe. The moment we showed up, I'm glad. 0:06:22.680 --> 0:06:25.159 I'm glad you realized that you were not, in fact 0:06:25.200 --> 0:06:27.599 safe the entire time this year. Oh no, I know 0:06:27.640 --> 0:06:29.960 when I know when a McDonald dis haunted. You know 0:06:29.960 --> 0:06:34.000 what I mean. Our apartment was fine, but everything else 0:06:34.040 --> 0:06:37.400 around that community was not doing well. It's I guess 0:06:37.480 --> 0:06:40.080 better now, I don't. I mean, I lived in New 0:06:40.160 --> 0:06:43.479 York probably around the same time. I loved Crown Heights then, 0:06:44.200 --> 0:06:45.800 but I can just imagine it would have been a 0:06:45.800 --> 0:06:47.920 difficult place for the two if you are to navigame 0:06:48.080 --> 0:06:49.600 or not, I don't know. I feel like they leave 0:06:49.640 --> 0:06:51.520 white women alone. It probably might have been harder for 0:06:51.560 --> 0:06:54.120 me to walk around over there to Niggason. For her, 0:06:54.360 --> 0:06:58.040 they might have just stepped out being called the police, right. 0:06:58.279 --> 0:07:01.400 I feel like, uh, And we were like we were 0:07:01.440 --> 0:07:04.239 on like Crown Heights, we were on like Eastern Parkway 0:07:04.240 --> 0:07:07.480 and Troy, so like we were exactly we were moving 0:07:07.600 --> 0:07:10.400 into sort of like where it becomes that hasidic side 0:07:10.400 --> 0:07:13.320 of things. So I think for a white woman over there, 0:07:13.320 --> 0:07:16.520 they're like, all right, we can make sense of of 0:07:16.680 --> 0:07:20.280 why you're here, whereas like other, I look like an 0:07:20.280 --> 0:07:23.320 outsider no matter what, ain't what direction I go into. 0:07:23.440 --> 0:07:25.200 So it was just a bunch of niggas looking at 0:07:25.200 --> 0:07:28.760 me weird and mean for no reason all day. No, 0:07:29.120 --> 0:07:32.840 there's always been, but every black community has always had 0:07:32.960 --> 0:07:37.120 their guy in the cardigan. I want to be special 0:07:37.200 --> 0:07:44.400 so bad. You know that person went to college. Don't 0:07:44.440 --> 0:07:47.840 mean they like it. Motherfucker's. Motherfucker's still have opinions even 0:07:47.880 --> 0:07:52.000 though they're familiar with it. Okay. So, so that said, 0:07:52.600 --> 0:07:55.320 she was an aver believer in ghosts, and I think, 0:07:55.800 --> 0:07:58.000 and I'm curious to hear where you are with this 0:07:58.040 --> 0:08:01.520 whole thing. I think that ghost personally, I do believe 0:08:02.040 --> 0:08:05.160 that people see what they see. That like, if you 0:08:05.240 --> 0:08:08.560 believe in ghosts, you probably are going to see ghosts. 0:08:08.600 --> 0:08:13.040 That said, I do think that there's a weird conflation 0:08:13.240 --> 0:08:17.600 that white people do sometimes with scary sounds and and 0:08:17.720 --> 0:08:21.760 sort of like odd objects or experiences with what is 0:08:21.800 --> 0:08:26.040 probably a human experience outside of their their cultural norm, 0:08:26.120 --> 0:08:28.880 if that makes sense. Okay, So I'm gonna sound super 0:08:28.880 --> 0:08:33.840 hotep hat Okay, hold on, that's how they get you. 0:08:35.520 --> 0:08:37.400 But that's how they get you. This is seriously how 0:08:37.400 --> 0:08:39.560 white people try to get you, for real. But she 0:08:39.640 --> 0:08:42.080 has one of my favorite podcasts, a little Bit of 0:08:42.160 --> 0:08:45.600 Juju and the host Juju Bay, because she articulated this 0:08:45.640 --> 0:08:47.120 in a way to really kind of helped me to 0:08:47.160 --> 0:08:50.640 make sense of it. So what are ghosts? Right? Those 0:08:50.640 --> 0:08:53.680 are dead people, right, people that used to be dead. 0:08:54.080 --> 0:08:56.880 So that's your grandparents, that might be one of your 0:08:57.080 --> 0:09:00.320 you know friends, we're grown friends, you know what I mean? 0:09:00.440 --> 0:09:05.320 Like people we've known, Were they cars? Were they monsters? 0:09:05.360 --> 0:09:08.520 So why do we have this negative idea when we 0:09:08.600 --> 0:09:11.600 think of ghosts? You know, we think of people or 0:09:11.640 --> 0:09:14.160 spirits have been here before, you know. And I get 0:09:14.200 --> 0:09:17.520 part of it is just popular culture has glamorized or 0:09:17.559 --> 0:09:20.000 you know, there's been a lot of movies and TV 0:09:20.080 --> 0:09:22.280 shows and books that since her around the idea of 0:09:22.600 --> 0:09:25.800 haunting or somebody coming back with a bad you know, 0:09:25.880 --> 0:09:28.200 intention or not wanting to do something good. And then 0:09:28.240 --> 0:09:32.000 there's you know, videos and and books and you know, 0:09:32.080 --> 0:09:34.160 even when you're a little kid about ghosts coming back 0:09:34.200 --> 0:09:36.240 to do good things. But it's still kind of like 0:09:36.400 --> 0:09:41.320 this weird being that's outside of you. It's not aspirational. 0:09:41.440 --> 0:09:44.520 In fact, it's usually kind of portrayed as if these 0:09:44.520 --> 0:09:47.800 spirits are stuck, you know, like they shouldn't be able 0:09:47.800 --> 0:09:49.840 to talk to you, they shouldn't be in the house, right. 0:09:50.000 --> 0:09:54.160 Even Casper is a boy who wishes he wasn't dead. 0:09:54.240 --> 0:09:56.800 He's nice, but he's like, funk, I wish I was 0:09:56.840 --> 0:10:01.720 still kicking it, right, And so when are in some 0:10:01.840 --> 0:10:05.680 of the African traditions that we were stolen from, our 0:10:05.800 --> 0:10:12.040 ancestors communicated with ancestors, right, with people who had gone 0:10:12.040 --> 0:10:14.160 on to the other side. You saw it depicted in 0:10:14.280 --> 0:10:16.800 Black Panther right on some level, and I guess that's 0:10:16.880 --> 0:10:20.320 most people's kind of mainstream introduction to to that level 0:10:20.320 --> 0:10:24.479 of ancestral veneration, right, the idea that like I respect 0:10:24.600 --> 0:10:27.520 and I care for and I talked to my ancestors, 0:10:27.600 --> 0:10:31.720 so like so to me, when I think of ghosts, 0:10:31.760 --> 0:10:34.200 are people that were here, Like those are my ancestors, 0:10:34.200 --> 0:10:36.680 and like I do have a communication with them because 0:10:36.679 --> 0:10:38.920 I talked to them and I set out food for them. 0:10:39.040 --> 0:10:40.920 I have an altar set up in my house. I've 0:10:40.960 --> 0:10:44.920 gone full California bioble girl in the past two years, 0:10:44.960 --> 0:10:48.559 but It's like the most powerful thing that I've ever done. 0:10:48.840 --> 0:10:51.000 And I think it's something that black people need to 0:10:51.000 --> 0:10:53.600 tap into and white people need to tappen and other 0:10:53.640 --> 0:10:56.520 folks who haven't find out what your ancestors did and 0:10:56.559 --> 0:10:58.000 t happened that I have a lot of white blood 0:10:58.000 --> 0:10:59.439 and me I'm here. At some point I'm going to 0:10:59.520 --> 0:11:01.640 figure out, like, Okay, well what did my ancestors on 0:11:01.679 --> 0:11:04.240 that side? What were their spiritual rituals. I hope it 0:11:04.320 --> 0:11:07.160 wasn't killing black people, you know what I mean, Like 0:11:08.360 --> 0:11:11.439 it probably was in you know, but like what were 0:11:11.440 --> 0:11:14.160 the things they did to honor their ancestors and they're dead? 0:11:14.200 --> 0:11:16.079 And like, I think that that's something that we should 0:11:16.520 --> 0:11:19.640 as as African Americans. We have not been taught that, 0:11:19.880 --> 0:11:22.640 you know, like in church, you're taught the spirits are bad, 0:11:22.800 --> 0:11:26.200 and the movies you're taught they're scary. These are your 0:11:26.200 --> 0:11:29.440 people set out, you know, your grandma's favorite candy bar 0:11:29.920 --> 0:11:33.600 and a glass of water and a white candle for her. Wow, 0:11:34.120 --> 0:11:37.360 it doesn't have to be something super involved or crazy. 0:11:37.400 --> 0:11:40.960 Start small, but start talking to your ghosts. Start talking 0:11:41.000 --> 0:11:43.840 to your ghosts, is what you're telling me. But I 0:11:43.920 --> 0:11:47.520 have so many questions because this is a completely new 0:11:47.559 --> 0:11:50.839 idea to me. Right, I've never I've never once been 0:11:50.920 --> 0:11:54.719 encouraged to talk to any ghosts. In fact, I think 0:11:54.840 --> 0:11:57.280 I've always functioned of the presumption that if I do 0:11:57.400 --> 0:12:00.920 not talk to them, they will not bother me. We 0:12:00.920 --> 0:12:04.240 we can, we can live at peace amongst each other. Right, 0:12:04.720 --> 0:12:08.199 So what am I meant? What is this candle meant 0:12:08.240 --> 0:12:11.160 to do? Like it? Is this just a way of 0:12:11.200 --> 0:12:14.360 initiating the conversation at the point that I've initiated it. 0:12:14.600 --> 0:12:18.680 Are they coming to me like themselves as they were living, 0:12:19.120 --> 0:12:22.880 or is it like some weird dementia version of that 0:12:22.880 --> 0:12:26.240 that person who was gonna say, some weird scary ship 0:12:26.360 --> 0:12:31.000 that I gotta process. So that depends what your level 0:12:31.240 --> 0:12:34.080 of communication is and right, And there are people who 0:12:34.120 --> 0:12:38.840 have powers where they can really communicate beyond what the 0:12:38.880 --> 0:12:42.600 average person can write. I am, not, to my knowledge, 0:12:42.640 --> 0:12:44.760 one of those people. And I'm certainly not a guide 0:12:44.800 --> 0:12:47.360 or a teacher or you know, I'm still relatively new 0:12:47.400 --> 0:12:52.120 to you know, ancestral veneration myself. But as I understand it, 0:12:52.200 --> 0:12:54.319 when you light a candle and you make the offering 0:12:54.360 --> 0:12:57.240 of water food, you know, maybe some of their something 0:12:57.280 --> 0:12:59.600 that reminds you of them. Maybe if you these are 0:13:00.000 --> 0:13:02.199 people that you know and you have to have, you 0:13:02.200 --> 0:13:04.559 should have a separate all ste for your relatives from 0:13:04.600 --> 0:13:07.000 your friends. You know, you can do something for friends 0:13:07.120 --> 0:13:09.280 and other people you admire too, but for your family, 0:13:09.320 --> 0:13:11.520 you want to have a place where it's like here's 0:13:11.600 --> 0:13:14.560 big Mama, here's Granddaddy. You know, like here's my cousin 0:13:14.600 --> 0:13:16.600 passed away. Like you don't talk to the same ship 0:13:16.760 --> 0:13:19.080 with your with your grandma that you talk with your 0:13:19.320 --> 0:13:23.240 your ghost homies exactly. That would be different, you know, 0:13:23.559 --> 0:13:26.400 and like you know, you can go to that space. 0:13:26.520 --> 0:13:28.839 I go twice today. Some people go a few times 0:13:28.840 --> 0:13:31.760 a week. Some people go as they feel compelled to 0:13:31.800 --> 0:13:35.800 do so, you know, and you can talk to them, 0:13:35.840 --> 0:13:37.319 you know, I kind of talk to them as a group, 0:13:37.520 --> 0:13:39.959 you know. I just say I'm thankful that they're part 0:13:40.040 --> 0:13:42.920 of my life, that they care for me, that I'm 0:13:43.040 --> 0:13:45.760 I'm part of this family that I come from, you know, 0:13:45.840 --> 0:13:47.680 and that that I hope they're well, and that I 0:13:47.720 --> 0:13:50.160 hope they accept my offering. You know, it's usually a 0:13:50.160 --> 0:13:52.400 plate of whatever food. I don't eat breakfast, but I 0:13:52.440 --> 0:13:55.720 make them breakfast. But like I when I eat dinner 0:13:55.720 --> 0:13:58.120 at night, I set out a plate for food for them. 0:13:58.160 --> 0:13:59.599 Like if I don't cook, then if I go to 0:13:59.640 --> 0:14:02.360 popye as a good tupopeye chicken sandwich. You know, I 0:14:02.440 --> 0:14:05.360 went out from my you know, my big hobies and 0:14:05.400 --> 0:14:10.199 the sky and you know it in terms of communication, 0:14:10.280 --> 0:14:12.880 and I won't share everything because it's personal, but like 0:14:12.960 --> 0:14:14.880 I haven't really openly talked to me about any of 0:14:14.920 --> 0:14:18.560 this before. You know, sometimes there's messages, right sometimes like 0:14:18.600 --> 0:14:21.240 there's something you were trying to see clarity on, you know, 0:14:21.320 --> 0:14:24.400 maybe the that you were working on that just figures 0:14:24.440 --> 0:14:26.640 itself out and you're like, oh, this is how I ended. 0:14:27.120 --> 0:14:29.360 You know. For me, it could be something that I'm 0:14:29.360 --> 0:14:32.960 writing and you know, or or just material that i'm 0:14:33.000 --> 0:14:35.520 you know, something that I've been noodling on, like an 0:14:35.680 --> 0:14:38.920 essay just kind of starts and and spills out of 0:14:38.960 --> 0:14:41.040 my you know, brain and I just got to pull 0:14:41.120 --> 0:14:42.840 over and put it in my notes app So it's 0:14:42.840 --> 0:14:45.640 not that it always happens like when I'm at the alter, 0:14:46.080 --> 0:14:47.880 you know what I mean, But just these little things 0:14:47.880 --> 0:14:51.120 that have been unlocked. I got you. So let me 0:14:51.200 --> 0:14:53.760 ask you a little bit about this food because this 0:14:53.880 --> 0:14:58.040 is I WoT, I'm dumb and I loved it. So 0:14:58.160 --> 0:15:01.840 you put out some Popeye's, right you have you ever 0:15:01.960 --> 0:15:05.480 seen a bite taken out of that bad boy? No, 0:15:05.480 --> 0:15:08.480 nobody's gonna eat the food. Nobody's gonna eat the food, 0:15:08.600 --> 0:15:10.800 and you don't have to do Some people will do 0:15:10.960 --> 0:15:13.080 a part, like if they're eating a sandwich, they just 0:15:13.120 --> 0:15:15.600 cut off piece of the sand you know what I mean, 0:15:15.720 --> 0:15:19.000 Like I, if it's a meal, I usually they'll usually 0:15:19.040 --> 0:15:20.960 get a smaller portion than what I feed us. But 0:15:21.080 --> 0:15:22.640 sometimes it's kind of like, you know, I'm gonna give 0:15:22.640 --> 0:15:24.240 you the big piece of chicken. I gotta for a 0:15:24.280 --> 0:15:26.720 piece of the big piece of chicken out. And to me, 0:15:26.760 --> 0:15:29.880 it's just this kind of like sign of respect and acknowledgement. 0:15:30.120 --> 0:15:33.840 You know. Also it's it sounds similar to like in 0:15:33.880 --> 0:15:37.080 the Bible when you like cut a goat, like you 0:15:37.320 --> 0:15:39.960 you chop a goat head off, and you know like, yeah, 0:15:40.000 --> 0:15:42.040 this goats for you God, and then the other goat 0:15:42.240 --> 0:15:44.040 is for us, and we eat that goat. But this 0:15:44.240 --> 0:15:47.280 no essentially yeah, like we we don't eat this one. 0:15:47.880 --> 0:15:50.360 And so you can do that with Popeyes. I didn't 0:15:50.360 --> 0:15:52.560 know that I do it with if I have a 0:15:52.600 --> 0:15:56.040 milkshake or Starbucks or something, I don't finish it, you 0:15:56.080 --> 0:15:57.680 know what I mean? Like I say, if I don't 0:15:57.680 --> 0:15:59.960 pour some out, usually if I have an alcoholic spe 0:16:00.080 --> 0:16:01.920 or drink, I usually pour some out, you know. But 0:16:01.920 --> 0:16:03.520 if I'm out in public, I can always pour my 0:16:03.600 --> 0:16:06.440 drink out, So I just leave some you know. Okay, 0:16:06.480 --> 0:16:09.080 I got you, So let me ask you. This is 0:16:09.160 --> 0:16:12.600 this a practice that you grew up with in like 0:16:12.720 --> 0:16:16.000 your childhood home or is this something you then? I 0:16:16.000 --> 0:16:18.560 know you said you you've really gotten into it later 0:16:18.600 --> 0:16:21.320 in life, but like, is that something that that you 0:16:21.480 --> 0:16:24.400 created for yourself or were you being taught that by 0:16:24.440 --> 0:16:28.000 by your parents, by the people before you whatever. No, 0:16:28.200 --> 0:16:31.000 I didn't get any of this growing up. Interestingly enough, 0:16:31.080 --> 0:16:36.280 my father practices or practice or religious tradition that involves 0:16:36.320 --> 0:16:39.480 some of these kind of rituals. But we were kind 0:16:39.480 --> 0:16:41.360 of allowed to make our own decisions. I didn't live 0:16:41.360 --> 0:16:42.600 in the house with him, and we were all kind 0:16:42.640 --> 0:16:44.880 of like allowed to make our own decisions about like 0:16:44.920 --> 0:16:48.080 how we wanted to engage virtuality. So I explored a 0:16:48.120 --> 0:16:51.560 few things. But now, this is something I discovered quite 0:16:51.560 --> 0:16:56.480 recently in the past two years, and what motivated that 0:16:56.720 --> 0:17:01.880 transition into welcoming spirits in this way because you know, 0:17:01.960 --> 0:17:04.439 like you said, if we live in a in a 0:17:04.560 --> 0:17:08.239 society that teaches us that ghosts are scary, and so 0:17:08.400 --> 0:17:11.720 for me, as a person who treats them like some 0:17:11.840 --> 0:17:16.119 scary motherfucker's, I think I would feel hesitant to start 0:17:16.160 --> 0:17:19.480 to treat ghosts differently. So was there something in your 0:17:19.520 --> 0:17:21.840 life beyond I know you said you you listen to 0:17:21.880 --> 0:17:26.640 that podcast, but like, is there anything that prompted you deciding, like, Yo, 0:17:26.800 --> 0:17:29.240 I'm not gonna be scared of them anymore, I'm gonna 0:17:29.240 --> 0:17:32.320 welcome them in a different way. I was never scared 0:17:32.359 --> 0:17:34.600 of ghosts, you know, Like I hadn't thought, like I 0:17:35.240 --> 0:17:38.359 kind of always thought, to what extent I thought about 0:17:38.359 --> 0:17:41.040 it that if people were communicating with me, it was 0:17:41.119 --> 0:17:43.640 usually in my best interests, you know what I mean. 0:17:43.760 --> 0:17:47.000 Like I hadn't crossed anybody, so like nobody should be 0:17:47.040 --> 0:17:49.000 coming back mad at me, you know what I mean. 0:17:49.080 --> 0:17:51.399 Like if anybody, if somebody's on the other side, and 0:17:51.440 --> 0:17:53.600 if they've got of all the people in the world 0:17:53.600 --> 0:17:55.399 they have access to there trying to talk to me, 0:17:55.440 --> 0:17:58.239 they're probably trying to have it back, you know. But 0:17:58.359 --> 0:18:02.560 like I can't remember the inciting moment. I just remember 0:18:02.640 --> 0:18:05.920 that that I noticed. And I was living in Brooklyn 0:18:05.960 --> 0:18:07.960 at the time where I first started really kind of 0:18:08.000 --> 0:18:11.280 noodling around this stuff. But I noticed that a lot 0:18:11.320 --> 0:18:14.600 of the women around me were doing these things when 0:18:14.640 --> 0:18:18.000 I really admired, and that they would talk about, you know, 0:18:18.960 --> 0:18:22.320 their ancestors, and they were talking about their ancestors in 0:18:22.320 --> 0:18:24.040 a way that I wasn't, because when I talked about 0:18:24.080 --> 0:18:26.080 my ancestors, I might as well have been talking about 0:18:26.119 --> 0:18:28.080 like Malcolm X and Harriet Up, you know what I mean, 0:18:28.080 --> 0:18:31.040 like we would say ancestors or you know, probably at 0:18:31.080 --> 0:18:33.040 some in an event or a dinner where people were 0:18:33.040 --> 0:18:35.960 pouring libations for their you know, I was thinking of 0:18:36.080 --> 0:18:40.400 those people like more still than I was my own family, 0:18:40.800 --> 0:18:43.000 and you know, it kind of started me doing some 0:18:43.200 --> 0:18:45.920 just kind of thinking about how it was disconnected from 0:18:46.119 --> 0:18:48.199 most of my you know, my the people when you 0:18:48.240 --> 0:18:50.800 think of your your folks, like your grandparents, you know, 0:18:50.880 --> 0:18:53.080 like how I was, you know, my past. Most of 0:18:53.080 --> 0:18:55.200 mine passed away when I was pretty young, so I 0:18:55.240 --> 0:18:57.240 didn't get to know them, you know, and so we 0:18:57.240 --> 0:19:00.719 didn't really have a relationship. And how I had some 0:19:00.760 --> 0:19:03.160 resentment about some things that happened before I was born, 0:19:03.200 --> 0:19:04.679 and just some stuff I need to work through, and 0:19:04.720 --> 0:19:06.639 so kind of send me on a journey of thinking 0:19:06.680 --> 0:19:09.880 about them. And over time, you know, I became aware 0:19:09.920 --> 0:19:12.919 of ultra building and the idea of like trying to 0:19:12.960 --> 0:19:16.359 actually communicate with them, and so you know, I picked 0:19:16.440 --> 0:19:20.680 up some books, listen to some podcasts and some Instagram streams, 0:19:20.760 --> 0:19:22.880 and you know, again like I'm not an expert, but 0:19:23.119 --> 0:19:24.919 you know, I would say to that my ancestors are 0:19:25.000 --> 0:19:26.800 my religion at this point. You know, this is kind 0:19:26.840 --> 0:19:30.080 of what my spiritual practice like primarily is, and I 0:19:30.119 --> 0:19:33.960 feel very good about it. You know. I talked to 0:19:34.000 --> 0:19:37.080 them and then I pray, and I just I've never praised, 0:19:37.119 --> 0:19:38.639 so I said day in my life. You know, like 0:19:38.680 --> 0:19:42.359 I've just never been that consistent spiritually, and this is 0:19:42.400 --> 0:19:43.800 just I don't know, I just feel like my life 0:19:43.800 --> 0:19:48.399 has been going well. Like things have been good, you know, 0:19:48.480 --> 0:19:51.320 They've been It's it's a pandemic, like I'm suffering like 0:19:51.359 --> 0:19:54.480 everybody else. I definitely have sometimes the past two years. 0:19:54.520 --> 0:19:56.080 But you know what I mean, like in general, my 0:19:56.119 --> 0:19:59.520 ability to deal with it has been improved. Like you 0:19:59.640 --> 0:20:03.400 hit your our own stride in sort of like accepting 0:20:03.960 --> 0:20:07.000 of I guess, uh, these new rituals in your life. 0:20:08.240 --> 0:20:11.760 It's fascinating to me because I think the way you're 0:20:11.880 --> 0:20:15.479 articulating this I've never thought of. But I do think 0:20:15.960 --> 0:20:19.720 that is something really important in sort of taking ancestors 0:20:19.760 --> 0:20:23.359 as a word, from like this generic space of like 0:20:23.840 --> 0:20:26.080 the you know, the people we find in a in 0:20:26.119 --> 0:20:29.879 a high school textbook, to people that are literally people 0:20:29.880 --> 0:20:33.440 who were connected to what becomes your day to day 0:20:33.800 --> 0:20:36.800 the experiences that are right in front of you. And 0:20:37.040 --> 0:20:40.880 I would argue there's probably a level of like intentionality 0:20:41.080 --> 0:20:44.879 right that, Like for black people especially, we are trained 0:20:45.400 --> 0:20:49.440 to not see our our own people as valuable and 0:20:49.560 --> 0:20:52.160 just to be like, well, you know these big, hyperbolic, 0:20:52.800 --> 0:20:55.280 extreme names, those are the ones you should you should 0:20:55.280 --> 0:20:57.920 look up to. But your grandma and ship and I 0:20:58.080 --> 0:21:01.800 gotta ever think about her as a valuable human on 0:21:01.840 --> 0:21:04.840 the planet whatever. And it's like, Malcolm X is not 0:21:04.880 --> 0:21:09.320 the reason you're alive, what I mean, like like that 0:21:09.400 --> 0:21:11.959 was not his walk. I didn't say that, but you 0:21:11.960 --> 0:21:14.760 know what I mean, Like your your grandparents met and 0:21:14.760 --> 0:21:17.320 and made a serious of decisions that led to your 0:21:17.359 --> 0:21:20.200 you know, one of your parents being here and unlessie 0:21:20.240 --> 0:21:23.200 you're being here, and like that alone is something to honor, 0:21:23.240 --> 0:21:25.800 and like you can have a complicated relationship with these people, 0:21:25.960 --> 0:21:29.160 you know, for some unfortunate that I don't have abuse 0:21:29.320 --> 0:21:32.960 or or trauma related to any of my ancestors, you 0:21:33.000 --> 0:21:35.200 know what I mean, that I know of or anything 0:21:35.280 --> 0:21:38.040 like that. But I know that you know, there are 0:21:38.119 --> 0:21:40.400 people who do you know what I mean, And that's 0:21:40.440 --> 0:21:43.679 to work through that. And what I've heard about it, 0:21:43.720 --> 0:21:45.800 and again I'm not the expert, is that you know, 0:21:46.240 --> 0:21:49.040 the people who may have harmed you on this side 0:21:49.760 --> 0:21:52.439 might be the ones working the hardest to help you 0:21:52.480 --> 0:21:55.760 out on the other side. You know, perhaps the grandparent 0:21:55.800 --> 0:21:59.119 who was very miserly and unkind, you know, becomes the 0:21:59.160 --> 0:22:02.359 generous parent, you know figure on the other side. But 0:22:02.400 --> 0:22:04.560 the one thing I want to make sure I connected 0:22:04.640 --> 0:22:08.480 is like the music you played or the little hotep 0:22:08.600 --> 0:22:14.040 sound bite thing that our ancestors who were enslaved, you know, 0:22:14.359 --> 0:22:20.360 came with these practices and were prohibited from practicing openly, 0:22:20.640 --> 0:22:22.560 you know what I mean, and so they began to, 0:22:22.960 --> 0:22:26.720 depending on where they were located, hide their religious practices 0:22:26.800 --> 0:22:29.040 and their ways of showing reverence to ancestors and staying 0:22:29.040 --> 0:22:32.080 connects them in other things, and certain parts of the 0:22:32.119 --> 0:22:37.399 world that was Africans hiding their spiritual practices and Catholicism, right, So, 0:22:37.480 --> 0:22:40.480 which is why if you go to certain parts of 0:22:40.520 --> 0:22:42.879 New York and you see all these you know, black 0:22:43.280 --> 0:22:48.679 Spanish speaking people, you know with Catholic you know all around, 0:22:48.680 --> 0:22:51.240 and they're not Catholic, you know what I mean, it's 0:22:52.000 --> 0:22:55.399 really really fascinating, Like we've always figured out ways to 0:22:55.560 --> 0:23:00.359 do what we've always done. And you know, from every 0:23:00.400 --> 0:23:04.000 history of Africa that I've I've come across, like something 0:23:04.000 --> 0:23:06.600 we've always done has been talking to our ancestors. So 0:23:06.720 --> 0:23:09.480 I think it's just a great opportunity that African Americans 0:23:09.520 --> 0:23:12.240 have that most of us have been scared out of 0:23:12.280 --> 0:23:14.960 participating it or just have never heard somebody talk about 0:23:14.960 --> 0:23:17.720 it like this before. Yeah, and I think you you 0:23:17.800 --> 0:23:22.120 made a really interesting point that that I think helps 0:23:22.200 --> 0:23:26.199 to sort of ease someone into this experience or at 0:23:26.240 --> 0:23:30.040 least considering an experience like this, which is the fact 0:23:30.080 --> 0:23:34.400 that like your grandparents and you may have a complicated 0:23:34.440 --> 0:23:38.359 relationship or your ancestors and you may may have a 0:23:38.400 --> 0:23:43.320 complicated relationship and that's okay. I think ghosts for for 0:23:43.400 --> 0:23:47.119 the average consumer are are sort of treated as like 0:23:47.240 --> 0:23:52.800 the scary entities because they themselves are just bad people 0:23:53.000 --> 0:23:57.439 or complicated people, or people that still needed to solve 0:23:57.480 --> 0:24:00.800 a problem that got left behind. And in a lot 0:24:00.800 --> 0:24:04.399 of ways, the human experience is that. So there is 0:24:04.480 --> 0:24:08.880 no good ghosts and bad ghosts. It's just complicated individuals 0:24:08.920 --> 0:24:12.040 who can either lift you up or help you answer 0:24:12.160 --> 0:24:15.800 questions that maybe you you couldn't answer yourself, or help 0:24:15.840 --> 0:24:19.000 you find free parking wherever that can exist. But one 0:24:19.040 --> 0:24:22.800 way or the other are there for for resolve more 0:24:22.880 --> 0:24:26.399 than adding conflict. As you're you're sort of putting it, 0:24:26.440 --> 0:24:28.720 I think, yeah, we just you know, we don't. And 0:24:28.960 --> 0:24:31.800 that's not to say that you know, there aren't spirits 0:24:31.800 --> 0:24:35.119 that may have bad intentions, but like that's not our 0:24:35.200 --> 0:24:38.560 definitive history of engaging with ghosts, you know, like as 0:24:38.560 --> 0:24:42.240 the people for us, engaging with ghosts means talking to 0:24:42.520 --> 0:24:45.840 our dead and and speaking to them with respects or 0:24:45.880 --> 0:24:48.520 just thinking about how black people do funerals, you know 0:24:48.560 --> 0:24:52.080 what I mean, Like just that there's a level of 0:24:52.119 --> 0:24:55.720 performance for a lot of them, you know, the ritual 0:24:55.760 --> 0:24:58.600 of the repast and kind of like who cooks and 0:24:58.720 --> 0:25:01.800 what they cook or or you know, just the amount 0:25:01.840 --> 0:25:04.959 of time that we spend together. I think, you know, 0:25:05.080 --> 0:25:09.480 on those occasions is and how it's spent is on 0:25:09.560 --> 0:25:11.880 some level, I think, a nod to how we used 0:25:11.880 --> 0:25:14.080 to feneralize I did, you know what I mean? I 0:25:14.080 --> 0:25:16.840 think the thing that was missing is that for a 0:25:16.880 --> 0:25:20.119 lot of people, the communication of the conversation stops there, 0:25:20.720 --> 0:25:23.120 you know. But but but I've always throughout my life 0:25:23.200 --> 0:25:25.320 heard people talk about you know, it may just be 0:25:25.359 --> 0:25:27.840 posting an Instagram picture and they're writing it to the 0:25:27.920 --> 0:25:30.919 dead homie, you know what I mean, or people talking 0:25:30.920 --> 0:25:33.280 about you know, sometimes I feel my mother's presence and 0:25:33.320 --> 0:25:35.080 I just talked to her, you know. Like I think 0:25:35.119 --> 0:25:38.000 a lot of people are engaging in their day to 0:25:38.080 --> 0:25:41.919 day life without calling it anything in particular. Do you 0:25:42.040 --> 0:25:46.680 think that the hesitancy to call it something in particular 0:25:46.800 --> 0:25:50.080 or to to directly align it with what you're describing 0:25:50.119 --> 0:25:53.200 with like an altar and sort of like this active 0:25:53.280 --> 0:25:56.480 effort to place food in front of the altar towards 0:25:56.920 --> 0:26:01.320 your your ancestors is connected to black people's relationship with 0:26:01.359 --> 0:26:04.800 religion in this country that like you know, we we 0:26:05.000 --> 0:26:09.000 got a heavy hand of Christianity like slapped on top 0:26:09.040 --> 0:26:11.480 of us. Do you think that that is in any 0:26:11.480 --> 0:26:15.679 way in obstruction to what we're moving towards in your 0:26:15.960 --> 0:26:20.360 your description of ghosts. Absolutely, And there are people far 0:26:20.480 --> 0:26:23.560 smarter than me who can really make the connection between 0:26:23.960 --> 0:26:26.679 what goes down and and you know a lot of 0:26:26.720 --> 0:26:30.960 our average Black churches and some of our traditional stuff 0:26:31.000 --> 0:26:33.320 and how there's a through line, you know what I mean, 0:26:33.400 --> 0:26:37.600 like how it's not all brand new and native to America. 0:26:38.320 --> 0:26:41.280 Some of this is our traditional spiritual practice. It's just 0:26:41.320 --> 0:26:44.080 showing up with this other religion that we've been you know, 0:26:44.119 --> 0:26:47.840 introduced to. But like, yeah, I mean there's a deep 0:26:47.920 --> 0:26:52.679 fear of African spirituality and Africans that lives in a 0:26:52.720 --> 0:26:55.600 whole lot of African American people, and uh, you know, 0:26:55.840 --> 0:26:59.720 fear of I mean we've been made to feel infeori 0:27:00.160 --> 0:27:03.080 and the inferiority complex is not limited to like what 0:27:03.119 --> 0:27:05.439 we think of African Americans on some levels, what we 0:27:05.440 --> 0:27:07.840 think of who we were before we got here, you know, 0:27:08.240 --> 0:27:11.199 like not thinking of us as industrial. I mean there 0:27:11.200 --> 0:27:12.960 are some people that only can think of us as 0:27:13.040 --> 0:27:16.359 kings and queens before you know, slavery. And then there 0:27:16.359 --> 0:27:19.439 are people that can't think of us as having a 0:27:19.520 --> 0:27:22.359 society and having ristules and things that matter, you know, 0:27:22.400 --> 0:27:25.600 that just kind of thinks of us as these our ancestors. 0:27:25.640 --> 0:27:28.000 Is these folks that were just kind of there until 0:27:28.160 --> 0:27:30.080 they were uprooted, you know, but that they don't have 0:27:30.080 --> 0:27:34.800 any real imagination or curiosity around who they were before. 0:27:34.960 --> 0:27:39.560 But like also as a means of survival, you know 0:27:39.640 --> 0:27:42.080 what I mean, Like on the plantation, you had to 0:27:42.160 --> 0:27:44.600 hide these things. And so for some people the hiding 0:27:44.720 --> 0:27:47.080 was how do I get creative and and figure out 0:27:47.080 --> 0:27:49.560 a way to stay true to myself? And for others 0:27:49.640 --> 0:27:52.560 it was how do I, you know, assimilate into something 0:27:52.720 --> 0:27:55.560 that you know, it is safer and easier for me 0:27:55.600 --> 0:27:58.320 to deal with, you know, how do I survive my circumstances, 0:27:58.600 --> 0:28:01.199 which I think connects really nicely back to what you 0:28:01.240 --> 0:28:05.800 were saying about, like the this adopting of like Catholic 0:28:05.960 --> 0:28:11.199 candles for non Catholic not services, but experiences. It's just 0:28:11.720 --> 0:28:14.160 we are using what is placed in front of us 0:28:14.400 --> 0:28:18.120 to express ourselves however we can. And it doesn't necessarily 0:28:18.119 --> 0:28:21.359 matter if this is the right equipment for the job. 0:28:21.440 --> 0:28:24.280 The job is just getting done however we needed to 0:28:24.320 --> 0:28:28.439 get done. That's essentially the story of our lives as 0:28:28.480 --> 0:28:31.040 black people, right, Like, we don't always have the quote 0:28:31.080 --> 0:28:34.040 unquote right equipment, but somehow we have to figure out 0:28:34.080 --> 0:28:36.359 how to get through. And that's what we've done, you know. 0:28:36.520 --> 0:28:38.360 And a big part of the reason that we've gotten 0:28:38.360 --> 0:28:41.880 through is our relationship to religion, both our traditional religion 0:28:41.920 --> 0:28:45.400 and our relationships Christianity. But it's also in some ways 0:28:45.520 --> 0:28:47.920 held us back because there are things that we don't 0:28:48.000 --> 0:28:50.640 challenge and things that we don't interrogate or you know, 0:28:50.760 --> 0:28:54.800 attitudes that are incredibly detrimental that are funnel through the 0:28:54.880 --> 0:28:57.200 church that you know, are a lot of our people 0:28:57.200 --> 0:29:02.640 are successful to. It's tricky. Yeah, White Jesus, uh, he ain't. 0:29:02.760 --> 0:29:04.840 He ain't done the best for us. I think there 0:29:04.840 --> 0:29:07.920 are times, right, I love White Jesus, but he's not 0:29:08.000 --> 0:29:10.840 always the best. There there's a bunch of hurt that 0:29:10.880 --> 0:29:15.000 comes along with at least the representation of him. For sure. 0:29:15.240 --> 0:29:19.280 There's there's the hurt of the representation. There's the way 0:29:19.320 --> 0:29:23.360 that black queer people have been made to hide, you know, 0:29:23.560 --> 0:29:29.080 in the music ministry, right, hide in the dance ministry, 0:29:29.360 --> 0:29:32.479 hide you know, with their little friends and and you 0:29:32.520 --> 0:29:37.520 know at gatherings. There's the ways that black women, you 0:29:37.560 --> 0:29:40.040 know a lot of black women are in these deeply 0:29:40.080 --> 0:29:45.160 emotional and on some level unhealthy relationships with their pastors, 0:29:45.320 --> 0:29:47.160 you know what I mean. It becomes the man of 0:29:47.200 --> 0:29:49.760 the household, even though he's not the man of the household, 0:29:49.800 --> 0:29:52.120 and they're tithing money that they don't have and making 0:29:52.200 --> 0:29:55.440 sure that he's getting a new Cadillac or his mortgage 0:29:55.440 --> 0:29:58.040 paid off for his anniversary. But they're struggling to make 0:29:58.120 --> 0:30:02.680 ends meet, and so, you know, contorting to some ideas 0:30:02.720 --> 0:30:07.640 about gender that that don't really work necessarily for us, 0:30:07.880 --> 0:30:12.480 but that have been funneled to us through religion. You know. Yeah, 0:30:12.680 --> 0:30:14.640 let me ask you this last question before we go 0:30:14.720 --> 0:30:17.720 to break you are you are a mother, and I'm 0:30:17.760 --> 0:30:22.240 curious to know how this newer practice in your life 0:30:22.280 --> 0:30:26.080 now relates with your daughter. It's this something that you 0:30:26.120 --> 0:30:28.760 are teaching her as well. Are you at all worried 0:30:28.800 --> 0:30:31.200 that she's gonna like bring this up at school and 0:30:31.200 --> 0:30:33.200 then people are gonna be like, get your weird ass 0:30:33.200 --> 0:30:36.560 out of here. With the ancestors and the altars and 0:30:36.600 --> 0:30:39.200 all that is this is this something you're worried about, 0:30:39.200 --> 0:30:41.920 are you like? Hell yeah, this is an exciting let's 0:30:41.920 --> 0:30:44.720 dig in. You know what I thought, Hell yeah, this 0:30:44.800 --> 0:30:47.360 is exciting. Let's dig in. And I brought her into it, 0:30:47.560 --> 0:30:50.960 you know, after not very long. You know, I have 0:30:51.160 --> 0:30:54.640 told her that the altar is among the number of 0:30:54.680 --> 0:30:57.240 things that happened in our household that might be different 0:30:57.360 --> 0:31:00.600 than what other people doing their households. And so our 0:31:00.640 --> 0:31:03.200 household business is our business. So you don't need to 0:31:03.240 --> 0:31:07.280 tell anybody everything. We eat, what we what I put 0:31:07.280 --> 0:31:10.200 out for home. Who comes through here? Like you know, 0:31:10.480 --> 0:31:14.400 I think the traditional the tradition of a black mama's 0:31:14.400 --> 0:31:17.760 business is her business is something that I have managed 0:31:17.800 --> 0:31:21.960 to indoctrinate. It's her that's very smart. You stack tradition 0:31:22.080 --> 0:31:25.360 on tradition, and it sort of protects the tradition from 0:31:25.400 --> 0:31:30.640 being damaging for both you and hers as she's navigating 0:31:30.680 --> 0:31:34.360 the world as a young person. Hell yeah, all right, 0:31:34.480 --> 0:31:36.200 we're gonna take a break. We'll be back with more 0:31:36.240 --> 0:31:39.000 than me, a little new and more. My mama told me. 0:31:48.240 --> 0:32:05.120 And we are that. No, no, yep, yep, we're back. 0:32:05.400 --> 0:32:09.040 We're back. We're still here with more, Jamila Lemieux, more 0:32:09.040 --> 0:32:11.840 and my mama told me, we're still talking about the 0:32:11.880 --> 0:32:15.680 possibility that goes do in fact exists and that black 0:32:15.720 --> 0:32:19.760 people can see them again. I was I was bamboozled 0:32:20.520 --> 0:32:23.840 with this episode. I was presented this as if Jamila 0:32:24.240 --> 0:32:27.640 believe this or at least considered this, And it turns 0:32:27.640 --> 0:32:29.920 out this was just a character study. This was just 0:32:30.000 --> 0:32:35.880 her chance to make me feel shame at uh at 0:32:35.960 --> 0:32:39.400 presenting this very dumb idea in the first place. Do 0:32:39.520 --> 0:32:42.760 you feel like, and this is I guess maybe a 0:32:42.800 --> 0:32:45.160 good question to lead us into some of the research 0:32:45.240 --> 0:32:48.000 that I did, do you feel like in relation to this, 0:32:48.000 --> 0:32:52.960 this con this this conversation around the ancestral uh plane, 0:32:53.000 --> 0:32:56.880 around these these ancestors that you're experiencing things with, do 0:32:56.920 --> 0:33:00.560 you feel like they've ever presented themselves in an actual, 0:33:00.720 --> 0:33:05.680 like physical form. Have you seen one of your ancestors before? No, 0:33:06.080 --> 0:33:09.640 I have not. Are you at all concerned that that 0:33:09.760 --> 0:33:12.840 might happen and that changes your relationship with them? It 0:33:13.000 --> 0:33:16.360 might change the relationship. I'm not concerned about it. You know, 0:33:16.520 --> 0:33:20.840 That's that's something I worry over. Okay, You're like, if 0:33:20.840 --> 0:33:23.880 it happens, we'll figure it out. Things. It's just not 0:33:23.920 --> 0:33:25.680 a thing to SIW my mind. It's not like what 0:33:25.720 --> 0:33:28.560 if they walked through. I'm like, nobody's gonna bite the sandwich, 0:33:28.720 --> 0:33:31.840 you know, and just that that would be the part 0:33:31.920 --> 0:33:36.520 that sucks me up. I could not handle somebody biting 0:33:36.520 --> 0:33:39.040 the sandwich. And still I don't think I can handle 0:33:39.080 --> 0:33:41.240 that either. But it's not gonna happen. I feel confident 0:33:41.280 --> 0:33:44.360 the sandwich won't be bidden unless my child decides to 0:33:44.680 --> 0:33:47.560 violate what I've explicitly instructed her, which is that we 0:33:47.560 --> 0:33:50.800 don't eat the altru food. Don't you dare eat that sandwich? 0:33:50.880 --> 0:33:53.560 Al right? Well, fair enough, you have much more faith 0:33:53.600 --> 0:33:57.320 than I do that, Uh, people are gonna be reasonable 0:33:57.360 --> 0:34:00.640 about not eating those sandwiches. Let's dig into some of 0:34:00.680 --> 0:34:03.600 this research, because I think some of this might I 0:34:04.000 --> 0:34:06.720 don't know what it does anymore, actually, because I think 0:34:06.760 --> 0:34:10.680 you've you've spoken so eloquently about some of like what 0:34:10.760 --> 0:34:12.960 you consider to be ghosts. But I'd be curious to 0:34:13.000 --> 0:34:16.480 hear what you think about what the standard beliefs of 0:34:16.560 --> 0:34:20.640 ghosts are sort of being communicated as through like I guess, 0:34:20.719 --> 0:34:23.920 research and science, if we want to call some of 0:34:23.960 --> 0:34:27.000 this that. So, a study from this company you give 0:34:27.400 --> 0:34:30.840 shows that forty one percent of Americans believe in ghosts, 0:34:30.840 --> 0:34:35.080 and only twenty percent of those people actually claim to 0:34:35.200 --> 0:34:38.440 have seen a ghost. So almost half of us think 0:34:38.480 --> 0:34:42.359 ghosts are real. Only about of us actually feel like 0:34:42.440 --> 0:34:47.960 we've we've encountered some sort of paranormal spirit. That's interesting. 0:34:48.200 --> 0:34:51.160 I mean I'm not surprised that those numbers, you know. 0:34:51.520 --> 0:34:55.000 I I also think, like, I don't know, like we're 0:34:55.040 --> 0:34:59.359 obviously from something very vast and complicated, right, Like, so 0:34:59.440 --> 0:35:03.120 the idea that it just ends at death, it's easy 0:35:03.160 --> 0:35:08.000 to believe otherwise, because like what a just fascinating thing 0:35:08.120 --> 0:35:10.200 that the world is, you know what I mean, Like, 0:35:10.760 --> 0:35:12.719 you know, we don't know what the other side looks like, 0:35:12.800 --> 0:35:15.680 so I think why not believe in something else? I mean, 0:35:16.000 --> 0:35:18.200 we could be I could be completely Ryan, could just 0:35:18.239 --> 0:35:21.719 die and that's the end. But like I feel good, 0:35:22.800 --> 0:35:27.239 you know, thinking otherwise, Like it it feels nice. It 0:35:27.320 --> 0:35:29.919 feels like you're a part of something. So I don't 0:35:29.960 --> 0:35:32.600 really see the harm. And you know, people just kind 0:35:32.600 --> 0:35:35.319 of blindly, you know, the majority of us who have 0:35:35.360 --> 0:35:38.080 not seen a ghost believing that there is some sort 0:35:38.120 --> 0:35:43.160 of spiritual matter. Yeah, what's especially fascinating if in this 0:35:43.360 --> 0:35:46.919 um this sort of like research study that they did 0:35:47.120 --> 0:35:51.600 is that forty percent of Americans believe that ghosts exists, 0:35:51.920 --> 0:35:56.080 but forty three percent of Americans believe that demons exists. 0:35:56.440 --> 0:36:00.239 The number actually like spikes a little bit when you 0:36:00.320 --> 0:36:03.520 start putting this in a different context. And I'd be 0:36:03.600 --> 0:36:06.239 curious to hear your thoughts on why you think that 0:36:06.360 --> 0:36:09.839 might be. Why are we more Keep in mind, they've 0:36:09.920 --> 0:36:13.400 only eleven percent of those people actually think they've seen 0:36:13.440 --> 0:36:16.080 a demon or encountered a demon, but they are much 0:36:16.120 --> 0:36:20.879 more faithful, much more. They're more faithful regarding demons than 0:36:20.920 --> 0:36:24.600 they are regarding ghosts. Why is that. I think it's 0:36:24.680 --> 0:36:29.160 because of the the desire to believe that there's some 0:36:29.440 --> 0:36:32.400 evil force responsible for some of the things that happened 0:36:32.440 --> 0:36:36.279 in the world, as opposed to recognizing the evil of 0:36:36.360 --> 0:36:39.920 human beings, you know, to like the idea that a 0:36:40.000 --> 0:36:43.600 devil figure is responsible for our problems, as opposed to like, 0:36:43.760 --> 0:36:46.000 no students an asshole and he shut up at school. 0:36:46.160 --> 0:36:49.960 You know, everybody looked the other way like he was 0:36:49.960 --> 0:36:52.640 an asshole for a very long time. You know. Yeah, 0:36:52.680 --> 0:36:56.480 it's like BL's above, didn't get him. That's that's him. 0:36:55.960 --> 0:37:01.879 That's always was, you know. And so if spirits come 0:37:02.000 --> 0:37:06.080 from humans or if spirits you know, become humans, I 0:37:06.120 --> 0:37:08.920 guess depending on how you look at that process. But like, 0:37:09.760 --> 0:37:12.319 ultimately I can't imagine that they're all good, you know, 0:37:12.440 --> 0:37:14.959 like I don't believe that like just because somebody's dead, 0:37:15.000 --> 0:37:17.560 like now you know, they're they're on the winning's team, 0:37:17.600 --> 0:37:19.600 or they just want everybody to live, right, I think 0:37:19.640 --> 0:37:22.839 that's an ideal outcome for most people. And and and 0:37:22.880 --> 0:37:25.440 I think that perhaps that might be the outcome for 0:37:25.520 --> 0:37:27.480 most people that they're trying to do something, you know, 0:37:27.600 --> 0:37:29.440 like that you get to go in the good direction 0:37:29.520 --> 0:37:33.640 when you're done. But you know, I also would suspect 0:37:33.680 --> 0:37:35.680 that a lot of the people who said they've seen 0:37:35.719 --> 0:37:38.080 a demon like I would be dying to know the 0:37:38.120 --> 0:37:40.120 percentage of them that were like talking about their like 0:37:40.200 --> 0:37:45.160 ex spouse, you know what I mean. I'll show you 0:37:45.160 --> 0:37:52.759 a Facebook you know, like a bitch live on third God. Yeah, 0:37:52.800 --> 0:37:57.120 I I do think these terms right there so vast 0:37:57.760 --> 0:38:00.520 when you when you really break them down, a demon, 0:38:00.600 --> 0:38:04.000 a ghost, whatever it is that it it has the 0:38:04.040 --> 0:38:08.160 potential for me to just apply it as I see fit, 0:38:08.360 --> 0:38:11.600 or or to put it on someone or something that 0:38:11.719 --> 0:38:14.560 may not in fact be that, but in my life, 0:38:14.600 --> 0:38:20.239 in my very subjective experience, they represented something frustrating or 0:38:20.280 --> 0:38:24.080 sad or evil as it were enough that I was like, 0:38:24.200 --> 0:38:28.920 that thing is ungodly, that thing is is undead or 0:38:28.960 --> 0:38:31.680 whatever it is that that sort of motivates you calling 0:38:31.760 --> 0:38:36.439 someone a demon or something demonic. Yeah, I definitely think 0:38:36.640 --> 0:38:39.080 you know, it's going to make the distinction between dead 0:38:39.120 --> 0:38:43.680 and evil. Yeah, everything that's dead is not even that 0:38:44.719 --> 0:38:47.160 kind of the bad guy because you're you know, you're dead. 0:38:47.239 --> 0:38:49.080 But it's something you said earlier, Like there are so 0:38:49.120 --> 0:38:53.080 many movies like even Casper, you know, like the dad 0:38:53.160 --> 0:38:56.200 wants to be still here and so everything that they're 0:38:56.200 --> 0:38:58.279 doing is motivated by that. But like as I would 0:38:58.280 --> 0:39:02.120 imagine it, and the dead are aware of their circumstances 0:39:02.120 --> 0:39:04.560 and that they are not you know, up for renewal. 0:39:04.680 --> 0:39:07.000 Like that's some movie stuff, you know, where it's like, well, 0:39:07.000 --> 0:39:08.560 if you do this, then the third you can go 0:39:08.640 --> 0:39:11.520 back and and and be alive again. So like they're 0:39:11.560 --> 0:39:13.359 not trying to come back, they're not trying to take 0:39:13.360 --> 0:39:15.520 over your body, they're not trying to take over your life, 0:39:15.719 --> 0:39:19.759 you know, because they can't. Yeah, we've had this conversation 0:39:19.800 --> 0:39:23.759 a few times on the podcasts regarding like aliens, right, 0:39:23.880 --> 0:39:26.880 that there's like this weird instinct on the part of 0:39:26.960 --> 0:39:31.719 human beings to presume that aliens have human motivations, right, 0:39:32.160 --> 0:39:36.040 And it's the same I think applies for for spirits. 0:39:36.080 --> 0:39:39.759 There's no reason that a spirit that has made it 0:39:39.880 --> 0:39:43.799 past this mortal plane to show back up and be 0:39:43.960 --> 0:39:50.040 like still desiring fucking sneakers and Bodega sandwiches or whatever 0:39:50.080 --> 0:39:52.440 it is, Like, Oh, I've seen the other side. Now, 0:39:52.480 --> 0:39:54.000 I want to go to the d m V. I 0:39:54.040 --> 0:39:56.840 know all the mystery of the universe. I want to 0:39:56.880 --> 0:40:00.080 get on the train sitting next to somebody who's no, 0:40:01.600 --> 0:40:03.880 they got better shipped to do I think, I hope. 0:40:03.960 --> 0:40:06.600 And if they don't, God damn, that's sad. That. Uh, 0:40:06.760 --> 0:40:09.000 that's that's where we stopped. That's the case. Let me 0:40:09.040 --> 0:40:11.680 come back then, Yeah, I'm gonna come back. I'm gonna 0:40:11.680 --> 0:40:13.960 come back cool as funck. If this is as good 0:40:14.000 --> 0:40:16.359 as it is. Uh, I think I'll have it all 0:40:16.400 --> 0:40:20.400 figured out once I die. So the other thing that 0:40:20.480 --> 0:40:23.960 I think actually might be very helpful in our conversation 0:40:24.040 --> 0:40:28.400 around like the ancestors and spirituality is I wanted to 0:40:28.760 --> 0:40:31.160 the question that sort of kept popping up because there 0:40:31.160 --> 0:40:34.680 were all these statistics about who believes in ghosts. Republicans 0:40:34.680 --> 0:40:39.480 apparently believe much more commonly than Democrats, women tend to believe. 0:40:39.560 --> 0:40:42.320 In fact, four year to women with four year degrees 0:40:42.360 --> 0:40:46.400 are sort of like the the biggest advocates of ghosts existing, 0:40:46.480 --> 0:40:50.040 I guess, in the country. But then education, in almost 0:40:50.040 --> 0:40:53.839 an opposite direction, says that the more educated you are, 0:40:53.960 --> 0:40:57.240 you tend to believe less. Right, there's all these statistics, 0:40:57.280 --> 0:40:59.359 but the question that kept popping up in my head 0:40:59.480 --> 0:41:02.520 is why do we believe in ghosts in the first place, 0:41:02.600 --> 0:41:05.759 Like what is the motivation behind that? And one of 0:41:05.800 --> 0:41:09.040 the main things that seem to keep popping up was 0:41:09.280 --> 0:41:13.920 this idea that it is the human mind trying to 0:41:14.080 --> 0:41:18.000 make sense of things that we can't explain. That like 0:41:18.520 --> 0:41:20.759 there's a bunch of ship in the universe that that 0:41:20.800 --> 0:41:23.239 doesn't make sense to us, and the best thing we 0:41:23.280 --> 0:41:27.920 can do is try to add logic to the unexplained, 0:41:27.960 --> 0:41:30.880 and sometimes the easiest way to do that is to 0:41:30.960 --> 0:41:35.160 call it a spirit or a ghost or an ancestor 0:41:35.200 --> 0:41:39.319 whatever it is. Absolutely, I mean, so much of what 0:41:39.360 --> 0:41:41.680 we say and think is us trying to make sense 0:41:41.719 --> 0:41:44.839 of our circumstances in the world around us, you know. 0:41:45.080 --> 0:41:48.840 And again like especially because the way you know, the 0:41:48.920 --> 0:41:53.080 bad goes through the demon idea is used, I think 0:41:53.719 --> 0:41:57.080 looking for excuses to explain things as opposed to really 0:41:57.120 --> 0:41:59.759 get into the core of what happened and and and 0:42:00.200 --> 0:42:02.680 is what something that a lot of people are just 0:42:02.840 --> 0:42:06.200 prone to do. And this again not disparaging the presence 0:42:06.239 --> 0:42:08.319 of spirits, but I think that the reasons that people 0:42:08.360 --> 0:42:11.760 believe in spirits and and goes, they're not always connected 0:42:11.800 --> 0:42:16.160 to what I believe, you know, continual spirit presence. To 0:42:16.239 --> 0:42:21.400 be right, that we all sort of find our own motivations, 0:42:22.000 --> 0:42:25.640 good and bad for our belief and some of those 0:42:25.760 --> 0:42:30.080 motivations are just uh, making patterns, and some of them 0:42:30.080 --> 0:42:33.479 are like I am seeking a way to to sort 0:42:33.520 --> 0:42:36.920 of like feel good and feel present in the world. 0:42:36.960 --> 0:42:39.640 And some of that comes through talking to these ancestors. 0:42:40.640 --> 0:42:43.880 So one of the things that that they talked about 0:42:44.000 --> 0:42:46.760 in one of the articles I read is this idea 0:42:47.480 --> 0:42:52.839 of creating logical patterns. Right, Like, there's this this term 0:42:52.880 --> 0:42:57.520 that they used, uh paranoia paranno leia. Is that what 0:42:57.680 --> 0:42:59.600 how you say it? I don't know. I'm not to 0:42:59.760 --> 0:43:03.560 learn mid Man, but it basically explains that, like the 0:43:03.719 --> 0:43:07.480 human brain has this tendency when we see blurred images 0:43:07.600 --> 0:43:12.200 or when we hear like weird muffled sounds, to want 0:43:12.320 --> 0:43:17.600 to add human words or images to that to make 0:43:17.640 --> 0:43:20.400 sense of it. So it sort of explains like why 0:43:20.520 --> 0:43:23.160 when we when they have those haunted house shows, right 0:43:23.480 --> 0:43:25.440 and they walk through the haunted house and you hear 0:43:25.480 --> 0:43:27.800 a weird sound and they go, do that's that ghost? 0:43:27.880 --> 0:43:30.719 Just say suck my dick, and then you they play 0:43:30.760 --> 0:43:32.239 it back and you're like, you did say it's like 0:43:32.320 --> 0:43:37.080 my dick. It's because of how easily suggestible our brains 0:43:37.120 --> 0:43:40.520 are when it comes to creating those those rhythms and 0:43:40.600 --> 0:43:45.320 patterns when it comes to these sounds. Yeah, it made 0:43:45.360 --> 0:43:50.359 me feel like, in a way, the suggestion of this 0:43:50.480 --> 0:43:54.480 existence doesn't it doesn't eliminate the possibility of these sounds 0:43:54.600 --> 0:43:57.840 coming from a source that we didn't expect them to, 0:43:58.360 --> 0:44:02.600 but it does tell you that we decide what we 0:44:02.719 --> 0:44:05.839 can receive from it. If that makes sense that, like, 0:44:05.920 --> 0:44:09.239 if somebody decides to tell me that the ghost is 0:44:09.360 --> 0:44:12.600 mad at me, I will interpret the ghost as being 0:44:12.640 --> 0:44:15.719 mad at me. Whereas if I just listened to the 0:44:15.800 --> 0:44:18.560 sound on my own, maybe I could hear something more 0:44:18.640 --> 0:44:28.240 peaceful or friendly inside of that ghost noise. Hell yeah. 0:44:28.400 --> 0:44:31.640 So the other thing that I thought was really interesting 0:44:31.640 --> 0:44:34.960 and some of this research was like the idea of 0:44:35.120 --> 0:44:38.479 people summoning spirits, and I think this connects a little 0:44:38.480 --> 0:44:40.920 bit to what you were talking about in terms of 0:44:40.960 --> 0:44:45.799 summoning spirits as a means of coping with trauma, especially 0:44:45.840 --> 0:44:48.799 like the pain of losing a loved one, And you 0:44:48.880 --> 0:44:51.720 sort of talked about that earlier, with like people writing 0:44:51.719 --> 0:44:56.000 messages on like Instagram, Facebook, whatever, saying like we miss you, 0:44:56.040 --> 0:44:58.480 We've been thinking about you, remember when this happened. All 0:44:58.520 --> 0:45:02.400 of that, and that being while we see that's a 0:45:02.480 --> 0:45:05.759 public connection that we're seeing, they suggest that some of 0:45:05.800 --> 0:45:08.520 the reasons that people claim to see a ghost in 0:45:08.560 --> 0:45:12.640 their home is sort of a more physical I guess 0:45:12.840 --> 0:45:16.759 outpouring of that exact same feeling. That makes sense, you know, 0:45:16.920 --> 0:45:19.040 and again back to the idea of us trying to 0:45:19.080 --> 0:45:22.520 cope with the set of circumstances around us, it would 0:45:22.560 --> 0:45:26.359 make sense that as a response to trauma, you know, 0:45:26.560 --> 0:45:30.800 the way that we're engaging with that idea is oftentimes 0:45:30.880 --> 0:45:35.480 one that's designed to bring us comfort. Yeah, and interesting 0:45:35.880 --> 0:45:38.640 sort of in a nice way. In terms of the 0:45:38.640 --> 0:45:42.960 percentage of people who who claim to see ghosts of 0:45:43.000 --> 0:45:45.879 them and this surprised me. Percent of the people who 0:45:45.920 --> 0:45:49.279 said that they had a ghostly encounter said that that 0:45:49.400 --> 0:45:52.680 encounter had at least one upside to it, such as 0:45:52.760 --> 0:45:56.440 like a sense of connecting to others, So like they're 0:45:56.520 --> 0:45:59.480 seeing more often than not, the people who are seeing 0:45:59.520 --> 0:46:03.840 ghosts are not having a bad time afterwards. Yeah, you 0:46:03.880 --> 0:46:06.359 know what, I had been curious. I wonder how many 0:46:06.360 --> 0:46:09.440 of those like I saw a ghost are literally like 0:46:10.040 --> 0:46:14.960 I saw something that looked like a ghost or a figure, 0:46:15.280 --> 0:46:19.799 or you know, like I stumbled across a copy of 0:46:19.800 --> 0:46:22.279 my father's high school yearbook in the middle of the 0:46:22.280 --> 0:46:24.680 living room, you know what I mean, and it felt 0:46:24.719 --> 0:46:28.480 like he was there some ship, meaning that like you 0:46:28.719 --> 0:46:33.040 didn't actually see your father, but it was just you 0:46:33.080 --> 0:46:36.200 saw this picture and you had a feeling as if 0:46:36.200 --> 0:46:38.640 your father was there because of like the feelings that 0:46:38.719 --> 0:46:40.920 came up and looking through the book something like that, 0:46:41.040 --> 0:46:43.359 or like, you know, maybe feeling like a picture fell 0:46:43.400 --> 0:46:45.360 off the wall and it was your grandmother trying to 0:46:45.400 --> 0:46:49.719 tell you something. You know, like that kind of like encounter. 0:46:50.120 --> 0:46:52.400 I wonder how many of those would be counted him 0:46:52.440 --> 0:46:56.520 on the like you know, I saw a ghost moments. Yeah, 0:46:56.840 --> 0:46:59.640 I mean, I think again. It sort of goes nicely 0:46:59.719 --> 0:47:03.080 back to that idea of like patterns, right that, like 0:47:03.760 --> 0:47:06.680 if if I am having an emotional day, or if 0:47:06.719 --> 0:47:09.360 I am thinking about a person that I'm missing, and 0:47:09.400 --> 0:47:13.200 then something big enough happens around me or small enough, 0:47:13.560 --> 0:47:16.399 and that might be enough for me to feel like 0:47:16.520 --> 0:47:19.640 that was them trying to communicate to me, when in fact, 0:47:20.080 --> 0:47:22.160 I don't know if it's them trying to communicate to me, 0:47:22.239 --> 0:47:26.040 But the communication it maybe doesn't matter. Maybe it's just 0:47:26.120 --> 0:47:32.879 the feeling that it brings it legitimacy. Yeah, it's kind 0:47:32.880 --> 0:47:35.279 of nice in that way where this doesn't have to 0:47:35.320 --> 0:47:38.279 be scary or traumatic if you don't want it to be, 0:47:38.520 --> 0:47:40.520 and if you do, I don't know, you're a sick fuck. 0:47:40.640 --> 0:47:45.560 Enjoy yourself. There's also a fair amount of evidence, it 0:47:45.640 --> 0:47:49.600 seems like, of people blaming ghosts, and I'm curious to 0:47:49.640 --> 0:47:51.839 hear your thoughts on this. There are lots of people 0:47:51.880 --> 0:47:54.440 who claim that that some of these ghost sightings might 0:47:54.480 --> 0:47:58.320 be connected to mental illness or at least schizophrenia, unchecked 0:47:58.320 --> 0:48:01.399 sleep paralysis, over use of l s D are all 0:48:01.520 --> 0:48:05.920 things that they're saying essentially can lead a person to 0:48:06.120 --> 0:48:09.240 feel like they're having a paranormal experience when in fact 0:48:09.400 --> 0:48:14.719 is it's just all in their head. People hallucinate. But 0:48:14.840 --> 0:48:19.239 does that make it real? Does that make it less? Like? 0:48:19.280 --> 0:48:22.560 Where where do you think that that that falls in 0:48:22.719 --> 0:48:27.440 terms of its legitimacy on the hallucination scale? Like you know, 0:48:27.520 --> 0:48:30.480 I mean, I think the legitimacy will be for them, 0:48:30.520 --> 0:48:34.680 like to what ability are they able to reckon or 0:48:34.600 --> 0:48:38.200 or to parts like I thought I saw something because 0:48:38.239 --> 0:48:40.880 I had a bad trip, you know, or because I 0:48:40.880 --> 0:48:43.960 was off my meds versus No, I know for a 0:48:44.000 --> 0:48:45.759 fact that I had this encounter. And that's not to 0:48:45.800 --> 0:48:47.680 say the people that are you know, dealing with the 0:48:47.719 --> 0:48:54.000 psychological emergency or drug dependency can't have a legitimate encounter too. 0:48:54.080 --> 0:48:56.720 But you know, I think we definitely would be careful 0:48:57.440 --> 0:49:02.600 between you know, lining up somebody maybe having a passing moment, 0:49:02.640 --> 0:49:05.319 what a spirit and somebody you know, thinking that the 0:49:05.360 --> 0:49:08.560 wall is talking to them because they're on LSB. Okay, 0:49:08.600 --> 0:49:11.960 So so if I'm understanding you correctly, then it that 0:49:12.000 --> 0:49:15.200 would mean that if it feels real to me, it 0:49:15.320 --> 0:49:20.880 is real, and the justification for that afterwards doesn't that's 0:49:20.920 --> 0:49:24.160 a a thing that that needs to be parsed out personally. 0:49:24.440 --> 0:49:27.960 It isn't necessarily something for us to decide for them, 0:49:28.239 --> 0:49:30.879 not that it's real, but that it's a valid experience 0:49:30.880 --> 0:49:33.319 that you had. You know, like during this period of time, 0:49:33.400 --> 0:49:36.120 you felt like the toaster was talking to you, So 0:49:36.239 --> 0:49:38.799 like what kind of lasting impact does that have on you? 0:49:38.840 --> 0:49:41.279 Do you understand now that it didn't really talk to you? 0:49:41.560 --> 0:49:44.120 Do you? Are you able to use this toaster anymore? 0:49:44.520 --> 0:49:47.480 Is it like off limits? Now? We gotta get at 0:49:47.520 --> 0:49:50.160 the house, you know. I think it's a thing to 0:49:50.200 --> 0:49:52.480 be dealt with as opposed to lack a truth to 0:49:52.520 --> 0:49:56.839 be accepted. I got you. Yeah, Okay, there's a subjective 0:49:57.400 --> 0:50:00.360 nature to this, but that doesn't mean that you didn't 0:50:00.400 --> 0:50:06.280 objectively have an experience. The experience is real, even if 0:50:06.440 --> 0:50:11.239 the the byproduct of that experience is something that we should, uh, 0:50:11.360 --> 0:50:15.120 we should have more conversations about if nothing else that's fair. 0:50:15.360 --> 0:50:18.560 There is also sort of like what they call paranormal 0:50:18.920 --> 0:50:23.440 uh side effects that happened in our brain. Like, for example, 0:50:23.600 --> 0:50:26.560 there was a scientist. This this dude who basically thought 0:50:26.560 --> 0:50:29.640 that he like, while working really late at night in 0:50:29.719 --> 0:50:32.759 a lab, thought that he could hear a ghost or 0:50:32.800 --> 0:50:35.680 see a ghost moving next to him. And he was 0:50:35.760 --> 0:50:40.200 a super skeptic, hated the idea of of sort of 0:50:40.200 --> 0:50:43.600 paranormal activity being a real thing, and he decided to 0:50:43.760 --> 0:50:46.200 sort of like try to dig through to see if 0:50:46.200 --> 0:50:49.160 he can make sense of of what this thing was, 0:50:49.560 --> 0:50:51.680 and ended up finding out that there was a fan 0:50:51.800 --> 0:50:55.439 nearby him that was basically spinning out of frequency something 0:50:55.520 --> 0:50:59.000 they called the fear frequency, which was like eighteen point 0:50:59.160 --> 0:51:03.400 nine hurts, that was spinning at such a slow pattern 0:51:03.920 --> 0:51:06.399 he couldn't pick it up. The human ear isn't able 0:51:06.440 --> 0:51:09.560 to pick up stuff below twenty hurts, but it was 0:51:09.960 --> 0:51:13.120 enough for our brain to start to try to make 0:51:13.200 --> 0:51:17.960 sense of things, thus creating the illusion of ghostly sounds 0:51:18.000 --> 0:51:23.000 and ghostly movement. And so he says that that maybe 0:51:23.080 --> 0:51:26.960 the justification for a lot of our ghostly experiences is 0:51:27.040 --> 0:51:29.640 the stuff around us moving in a way or or 0:51:29.760 --> 0:51:32.839 making noises in a way that aren't perceptible to our 0:51:32.920 --> 0:51:36.600 human ears and eyes, but are in fact happening in 0:51:36.640 --> 0:51:41.560 the real world independent of any spiritual bodies. He did 0:51:41.600 --> 0:51:45.359 a lot of research. I just read stuff and then 0:51:45.400 --> 0:51:48.600 repeat it back. I don't know. Do you think that 0:51:48.640 --> 0:51:53.480 the fear of frequency in any way bumps against any 0:51:53.520 --> 0:51:57.879 of your your beliefs, the stuff that you've been practicing 0:51:58.000 --> 0:52:02.560 with your your altar and scestral sort of like prayers 0:52:02.600 --> 0:52:05.279 and whatnot. I don't think so, just because fear is 0:52:05.320 --> 0:52:09.960 just completely devoid, like just not present in that relationship. 0:52:10.160 --> 0:52:12.400 Like I just don't have any fear around the practice 0:52:12.680 --> 0:52:17.120 I got you. So it's it doesn't matter, because I 0:52:17.120 --> 0:52:20.359 think the fear frequency, even the language around it, does 0:52:20.480 --> 0:52:24.839 suggest that ghosts or whatever we're seeing hearing blah blah 0:52:24.880 --> 0:52:28.600 blah is scary, and to your point, we shouldn't be 0:52:28.760 --> 0:52:31.879 or you're not treating this as a scary thing, So 0:52:31.920 --> 0:52:36.040 it doesn't really matter. That's fair. Okay, this is the 0:52:36.120 --> 0:52:37.920 last thing that I'll bring up to you before we 0:52:37.960 --> 0:52:41.000 go to break. The one thing that's sort of like 0:52:41.080 --> 0:52:43.839 really started to ring out to me in terms of 0:52:43.840 --> 0:52:47.400 this conversation around like all of these these illusions of 0:52:47.440 --> 0:52:49.640 the mind, be it be a mental illness to be 0:52:49.680 --> 0:52:52.720 at the fear frequency. All of these things are the 0:52:52.719 --> 0:52:57.840 the idea that they are in some ways terms and 0:52:57.840 --> 0:53:02.480 and sort of like connotations I guess that are created 0:53:02.520 --> 0:53:05.560 by white people, that white people sort of like create 0:53:05.680 --> 0:53:09.160 the language and logic around these things. And so our 0:53:09.360 --> 0:53:11.799 understanding of ghosts, and I think you've spoken to this 0:53:12.000 --> 0:53:15.640 pretty well so far, it seems like our understanding of 0:53:15.680 --> 0:53:19.960 ghosts is largely limited to what white people want us 0:53:19.960 --> 0:53:23.440 to understand ghosts to be in a lot of ways. 0:53:23.480 --> 0:53:26.160 That is, so long as like the media and the 0:53:26.200 --> 0:53:30.120 things that we read are connected to fear and to 0:53:30.719 --> 0:53:34.640 sort of like ghosts being people in in fucking you know, 0:53:34.760 --> 0:53:38.920 colonial outfits, then we are always going to understand them 0:53:38.920 --> 0:53:42.520 as like this scary, dangerous thing and not, as you said, 0:53:42.840 --> 0:53:46.440 something a little more peaceful or helpful in your life. 0:53:46.920 --> 0:53:51.239 Yes physically, yes, Like I don't really even have much 0:53:51.360 --> 0:53:55.040 asked that I just said, like, there's been I think 0:53:55.040 --> 0:53:58.200 in recent years of movement of people, you know, I 0:53:58.280 --> 0:54:00.640 say young people in the broadest sense, because I'm still 0:54:00.640 --> 0:54:04.200 including myself, but you know, millennials on down that have 0:54:04.360 --> 0:54:09.160 been exploring spirituality and who have been tapping into some 0:54:09.239 --> 0:54:12.520 of the things that people came before us did. And 0:54:13.000 --> 0:54:15.680 you know, I think that I will continue to hear 0:54:15.719 --> 0:54:18.680 more about folks doing that, you know, and you'll see 0:54:18.760 --> 0:54:21.520 more of an influence of this sort of thinking in 0:54:21.640 --> 0:54:25.760 pop culture with black folks here and there, and hopefully 0:54:25.800 --> 0:54:31.160 that'll influence, um, you know, a reconsideration of what white 0:54:31.160 --> 0:54:34.960 folks have told us about ghosts and about our dead. Yeah, 0:54:35.200 --> 0:54:38.680 we can we can reconsider the white stories. We can 0:54:38.760 --> 0:54:41.480 make this a new if we if we all built 0:54:41.520 --> 0:54:44.279 altars in our in our homes. Is it like in 0:54:44.320 --> 0:54:45.759 the front of your house or is this like in 0:54:45.800 --> 0:54:50.200 a private, quieter spot. It's in my living room. There's 0:54:50.200 --> 0:54:54.359 a divider, a role, Irish screens, so it's like it's 0:54:54.440 --> 0:54:57.080 kind of obscure, you know. And sometimes if I'm gonna 0:54:57.080 --> 0:54:58.920 have people in the house, I don't really want, you know, 0:54:59.280 --> 0:55:02.040 all eyes on my stuff. I can close it up. 0:55:02.719 --> 0:55:04.920 Hell yeah, So you don't have to make this a 0:55:04.960 --> 0:55:08.760 public experience. But we can all build altars and and 0:55:08.760 --> 0:55:12.399 and privately start to break some of these, uh, these 0:55:12.400 --> 0:55:17.040 white teachings as it were. Okay, we're gonna take one 0:55:17.040 --> 0:55:18.840 more break. We'll be back with more to me, a 0:55:18.840 --> 0:55:32.000 little mill and more. My mama told me, we need 0:55:32.760 --> 0:55:52.000 a back. Yeah, We're back here with more, Jamille, little more. 0:55:52.120 --> 0:55:54.920 My mama told me, we're still talking about ghosts, the 0:55:54.960 --> 0:55:59.879 ancestral plane and breaking white habits. I guess breaking our 0:56:00.040 --> 0:56:03.360 are white beliefs out in the world. Let's play a 0:56:03.440 --> 0:56:05.799 quick game, and we we have one last game that 0:56:05.840 --> 0:56:07.640 we love to play on the podcast. This is a 0:56:07.640 --> 0:56:09.839 new game. It's a brand new game that I cooked 0:56:09.920 --> 0:56:13.279 up special for this episode. It's called I'm Dreaming of 0:56:13.320 --> 0:56:26.080 a White Spirit. I'm Dreaming of a White Spirit. It's 0:56:26.080 --> 0:56:28.600 a it's a fun game where Jamila, I am going 0:56:28.680 --> 0:56:33.760 to introduce to you a few stories of white celebrities 0:56:33.840 --> 0:56:36.160 because I tried to look up black celebrities who said 0:56:36.160 --> 0:56:39.240 that they saw ghosts, and truly, there were very few 0:56:39.560 --> 0:56:43.040 who would even talk about it. I think Rihanna at 0:56:43.080 --> 0:56:45.319 one point had like a quote where she was like, 0:56:45.440 --> 0:56:47.319 I don't eat at that restaurant no more. I get 0:56:47.360 --> 0:56:49.919 eerie vibes there. But like that was kind of the 0:56:50.000 --> 0:56:52.480 extent of it. So there aren't a lot of like 0:56:52.600 --> 0:56:57.719 ghost stories from famous black people. But well, yeah, you 0:56:57.760 --> 0:57:00.840 probably can't afford to to talk to in the media 0:57:00.880 --> 0:57:04.319 about whatever you're you're experiencing in your home. But there 0:57:04.320 --> 0:57:06.600 are lots of white celebrities who are like bugging I'll 0:57:06.640 --> 0:57:08.560 tell you about it. So I just would love to 0:57:08.600 --> 0:57:10.960 read you some of these stories and get your thoughts 0:57:10.960 --> 0:57:14.560 on them. Hell yeah, So let's let's start with a 0:57:14.600 --> 0:57:17.160 fun one. This is a nice one. Let's start with 0:57:17.200 --> 0:57:21.960 my boy, Matthew McConaughey. Matthew McConaughey. In two thousand nine, 0:57:22.480 --> 0:57:26.200 he shared a story that his his home was haunted 0:57:26.200 --> 0:57:29.640 by his spirit name Madame Blue. He says, I was 0:57:29.680 --> 0:57:32.400 not even under the influence, and she was there. She 0:57:32.600 --> 0:57:35.120 wasn't that happy. It didn't seem like she was going 0:57:35.160 --> 0:57:37.520 to be much fun to hang around or have in 0:57:37.600 --> 0:57:40.120 my house. So I went ahead and stood my ground. 0:57:40.360 --> 0:57:42.360 I opened the door, and I said, you can move 0:57:42.440 --> 0:57:45.520 around all you want, but I'm not going anywhere. For weeks, 0:57:45.560 --> 0:57:47.680 everyone that came to the house said the same thing, 0:57:48.120 --> 0:57:51.160 that someone's down the hall. There's somebody down in that hall. 0:57:51.520 --> 0:57:56.800 He says that Madam Blue basically eventually stopped messing with 0:57:56.880 --> 0:58:00.160 him and eventually let him and his guests, uh, just 0:58:00.360 --> 0:58:03.880 enjoyed their home. Your thoughts. Just like a white man said, 0:58:04.160 --> 0:58:06.760 yell at the ghost. That's his first thought. I'm gonna 0:58:06.840 --> 0:58:09.320 yell at it. I'm gonna tell her to stop I 0:58:09.440 --> 0:58:13.160 moved into her house. She been here, who knows how 0:58:13.240 --> 0:58:15.880 long she could have been This could have been her land, 0:58:16.400 --> 0:58:18.960 and here you come. I'm a yell let her. If 0:58:19.000 --> 0:58:21.960 her name is Madame Blue, she's been there a long time, 0:58:22.160 --> 0:58:25.680 she's been there. Well, she's definitely that's her territory. And 0:58:25.720 --> 0:58:28.880 Matthew mcconaugheytes said no, I'm not leaving. And apparently Madame 0:58:28.960 --> 0:58:31.640 Blue gave up. Maybe she realized he was a decent 0:58:31.760 --> 0:58:34.920 enough dude minus the yelling at her part. Oh that 0:58:35.040 --> 0:58:37.040 she was like, I don't know, he's got his shirt off. 0:58:37.040 --> 0:58:40.320 He seems like he might have just legitimately gotten on 0:58:40.360 --> 0:58:43.120 her nerves. Like he seems like he'd be pretty chatty 0:58:43.160 --> 0:58:45.560 when he smokes. And I could see like Madame Blue 0:58:45.600 --> 0:58:51.480 being like, okay, well nothing's Matthew McConaughey has trapped you 0:58:51.480 --> 0:58:54.080 in a corner vibes, you know what I mean. And 0:58:54.080 --> 0:58:55.800 as a ghost, you don't want to be trapped in 0:58:55.840 --> 0:58:58.520 a corner. You're already you've got enough going on. We 0:58:58.600 --> 0:59:02.160 got enough going on. So okay, here's a here's another 0:59:02.240 --> 0:59:05.360 fun one. Jenna bush Hagar and you know the daughter 0:59:05.440 --> 0:59:09.960 of George bush Uh. She claims that during her time 0:59:10.000 --> 0:59:13.320 in the White House that she had a number of 0:59:13.440 --> 0:59:17.160 mysterious spirits sort of interact with her. She said, I 0:59:17.240 --> 0:59:20.160 heard ghosts. I was asleep. There was a fireplace in 0:59:20.240 --> 0:59:22.160 my room, and all of a sudden, I heard nineteen 0:59:22.200 --> 0:59:25.400 twenties music coming out. I could feel it. I freaked 0:59:25.400 --> 0:59:27.680 out and ran into my sister with room. She was like, 0:59:27.760 --> 0:59:31.040 please go back to sleep. This is ridiculous. Could have 0:59:31.080 --> 0:59:33.760 been some of those slaves have built the White House. 0:59:34.200 --> 0:59:37.400 Could have been some of them dad iraq Eas that 0:59:37.480 --> 0:59:41.640 were like slaughtered because of her daddy's stupid war. Some 0:59:41.720 --> 0:59:44.440 of the US soldiers that were killed because of her 0:59:44.480 --> 0:59:46.840 daddy's stupid war. I'm sure there were a lot of 0:59:47.040 --> 0:59:51.120 spirits that are displeased with the Bush family. Yeah, And 0:59:51.160 --> 0:59:54.120 it makes me wonder how many of these these unhappy 0:59:54.200 --> 0:59:57.120 spirits are more in your brain that like, you know 0:59:57.360 --> 1:00:00.440 what your daddy did, and maybe that's just living in 1:00:00.440 --> 1:00:04.440 in your spirit. You are articulating it in a in 1:00:04.520 --> 1:00:07.520 an odd way around your heart to look at it. 1:00:07.520 --> 1:00:10.000 I think it's a very good way to look at it. Okay, 1:00:10.120 --> 1:00:13.000 here's here's another one. We'll do two more. This is 1:00:13.160 --> 1:00:18.080 Demi Lovado. Demi Lovado. They said that they were haunted 1:00:18.120 --> 1:00:21.600 by a bad spirit. Not by a bad spirit, excuse me, 1:00:21.640 --> 1:00:24.480 but by a little girl. I think her name is Emily. 1:00:24.960 --> 1:00:27.560 I've been at had a medium come over, and and 1:00:27.680 --> 1:00:30.800 ghost hunters, and they both told me the same name, Emily. 1:00:31.040 --> 1:00:33.200 There were so many times that I saw her when 1:00:33.240 --> 1:00:36.320 I was growing up. Lovado wrote, I believe that everyone 1:00:36.400 --> 1:00:38.640 can tune into that part of their mind. I think 1:00:38.680 --> 1:00:41.240 I have a really strong connection to the afterlife. When 1:00:41.240 --> 1:00:43.280 I walk into the room I can tell if something 1:00:43.320 --> 1:00:48.360 has happened there or not, or if a hotel is haunted. Okay, 1:00:48.960 --> 1:00:52.120 you think you think Demi Lovado is connected like you? Now? 1:00:52.160 --> 1:00:55.120 I hope they're good enough to call two sets of 1:00:55.320 --> 1:00:58.320 ghostbusters that like don't communicate with each other like Okay, 1:00:58.320 --> 1:01:00.480 bat the name is Emily, you know what I mean? Like, 1:01:01.080 --> 1:01:04.880 but it's two different entities and dide I know each other, 1:01:05.080 --> 1:01:07.840 have no prior relationship. Both came up with the name Emily. 1:01:07.960 --> 1:01:10.160 It's kind of hard not to think there's something to that. 1:01:10.880 --> 1:01:16.040 Fair enough, Okay. Last one, my boy, Keanu Reeves said 1:01:16.080 --> 1:01:20.160 that he's he's had ghostly experiences. Reeves claims that he 1:01:20.280 --> 1:01:23.439 saw a ghost as a child living in New York City. 1:01:23.480 --> 1:01:26.200 I'm probably like six seven years old. He said, we'd 1:01:26.200 --> 1:01:29.400 come from Australia and nanny in the bedroom. My sister 1:01:29.560 --> 1:01:32.480 is asleep, she's sitting over there. I'm hanging out. There 1:01:32.520 --> 1:01:34.760 was a doorway and all of a sudden, this jacket 1:01:34.800 --> 1:01:37.960 comes waving through the door, this empty jacket. There's nobody, 1:01:38.000 --> 1:01:40.640 there's no legs, it's just there and then it disappears. 1:01:40.640 --> 1:01:43.000 He explains, he said, I was a little kid and 1:01:43.040 --> 1:01:46.040 I thought, okay, that's interesting. And I looked over at 1:01:46.040 --> 1:01:49.400 the nanny and she was making this terrified face and 1:01:49.440 --> 1:01:53.080 I'm like, oh wow, so that was real. It's possible. 1:01:53.520 --> 1:01:55.600 You've got enough money to have a nanny. You probably 1:01:55.640 --> 1:01:58.040 your family probably did some bad stuff. So maybe it's 1:01:58.040 --> 1:02:00.280 the same as like the bushes, just on a smaller level. 1:02:00.440 --> 1:02:05.480 You know, there might be there's bodies buried in the repace. 1:02:06.880 --> 1:02:10.280 So we're just in Australia with our nanny, Like, excuse me, 1:02:10.360 --> 1:02:14.680 Sarkian I did, like, my favorite part of this is 1:02:14.680 --> 1:02:17.080 that there he doesn't like go like And then I 1:02:17.120 --> 1:02:19.600 talked to the nanny and we figured it out together. 1:02:19.720 --> 1:02:22.479 He's just like, oh yeah, she's Serpen so it must 1:02:22.480 --> 1:02:24.760 have been real and then went to sleep like, yeah, 1:02:25.160 --> 1:02:26.960 you don't want to help her feel better, Big beast 1:02:27.040 --> 1:02:29.479 still be sitting right in that very spot. That would 1:02:29.520 --> 1:02:31.800 be the mystery of my life that I had to 1:02:32.240 --> 1:02:37.200 figure out. Dog, If a moving jacket seems so much 1:02:37.240 --> 1:02:41.880 scarier than if it's a person, I can let's talk, 1:02:42.000 --> 1:02:45.480 we can work this out. But if it's just a jacket, God, 1:02:45.520 --> 1:02:50.120 I'm sucked up forever. That's that's about a scary can get. Yeah. 1:02:50.560 --> 1:02:53.000 All right, well, Jamila, I think we did it. I 1:02:53.000 --> 1:02:55.760 think I think we nailed this episode. Thank you for 1:02:55.840 --> 1:02:58.000 doing this. Could you tell the people at home where 1:02:58.040 --> 1:03:00.040 they could find you and what cool ship you of 1:03:00.160 --> 1:03:03.600 going on? Yeah? You can find me at Jamila Lemiu 1:03:03.720 --> 1:03:06.160 dot com to learn more about my work. Um, I'm 1:03:06.200 --> 1:03:10.480 one social media at Jamie Lemiu. Depending on where this airs, 1:03:10.560 --> 1:03:14.560 I have a story coming out that I'm like terrified of. 1:03:15.240 --> 1:03:17.280 People may talk about it. I don't know when you're 1:03:17.280 --> 1:03:20.080 gonna air this, so I can't say what it. We'll 1:03:20.160 --> 1:03:22.280 keep up with me on social media. I'm a freelance writer. 1:03:22.680 --> 1:03:25.520 I have I've done stuff for The Arly Times and 1:03:25.560 --> 1:03:29.560 Playboy and The Cut, and I've got a big story 1:03:29.600 --> 1:03:31.760 coming up, and like I'm waiting for the editor to 1:03:31.800 --> 1:03:33.600 hit me with like the okay, here's when I dropped. 1:03:33.640 --> 1:03:35.520 So it's like I can't even really promote it, but 1:03:35.640 --> 1:03:38.680 like you might remember that you heard me on this 1:03:38.720 --> 1:03:40.560 podcast when you see the story. It might be a 1:03:40.600 --> 1:03:43.160 little bit of a thing. All right, Well, keep your 1:03:43.280 --> 1:03:46.920 keep your eyes and ears peeled for that big story 1:03:46.920 --> 1:03:49.880 and follow Jamila on on all of her ship and 1:03:50.000 --> 1:03:51.960 uh as always, you can follow me at like Saint 1:03:52.000 --> 1:03:56.080 Kerman and please subscribe, do whatever nonsense you're meant to 1:03:56.120 --> 1:04:00.760 do the podcast to make people care about them and yeah, okay, 1:04:00.960 --> 1:04:08.440 we did it by because I've been growing babies my 1:04:08.600 --> 1:04:16.200 crop chips in your pans Ocola bears are racist. He 1:04:16.440 --> 1:04:21.480 also players hosting the money versions de many Turkey stuff. 1:04:22.720 --> 1:04:24.360 I can't tell me nothing,