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Speaker 1: Welcome to Jay dot, a production of My Heart Rates.

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Speaker 1: Hello every body, what's up? This is Jay Dot, Ilda

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Speaker 1: podcast is Jill Scott, This is Asia are great in

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Speaker 1: the Dancer? This is like, Yeah, I hate saying my

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Speaker 1: whole line. Let st Clair whole line nine nine. What's

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Speaker 1: up everybody? Today? We are talking about our mothers. We're

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Speaker 1: talking about humanizing our mothers. What does that mean? That

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Speaker 1: means the moment when you realize that your mom, you're

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Speaker 1: the sainted halo wearing handle everything, do everything, can be

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Speaker 1: all things. Mother is a person, a human being, just

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Speaker 1: like yourself. I feel like we should do a disclaimer

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Speaker 1: to our mother's even yours age. I know she's not

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Speaker 1: with us, but she's listening, right, she will make herself

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Speaker 1: known her mistrust and belief. So should have fall off

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Speaker 1: this table at two point two seconds. But don't tell

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Speaker 1: my business in this here got their podcast? Yeah, I

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Speaker 1: know that there is a whole book, There is a

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Speaker 1: whole play about my sweet Mama. There is. But I

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Speaker 1: have to wait. You have to wait. I don't have

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Speaker 1: to wait till till no problems with Joyce. I don't

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Speaker 1: want no problems with either. My mother is six one people.

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Speaker 1: My mother has been six one my whole life, and

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Speaker 1: she's fast. So, so what's your disclaimer, Jail as we

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Speaker 1: go into this conversation, because you know this is your daughter.

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Speaker 1: I love you so much. I don't want to smoke.

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Speaker 1: I don't want to trouble with you. Uh. We're just

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Speaker 1: talking about the moments that you realize that your mother

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Speaker 1: is a human being. I'm gonna talk about her mother,

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Speaker 1: my grandmother. Okay, I'm gonna start there. Let's start there. Yes,

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Speaker 1: I'm gonna start there. This might be a lot for people,

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Speaker 1: but you know, this is what it is. So my

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Speaker 1: grandmother is uh. At the time she was she was

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Speaker 1: slowly fading. And oh do you see that? All right? Okay,

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Speaker 1: I don't want no smoke. What you need my mom?

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Speaker 1: I don't blue, I don't okay. I told you hold

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Speaker 1: my purse off this table, you know, to hit the floor.

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Speaker 1: That's like my money for the next few months. Attention.

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Speaker 1: Go ahead, Jill, just you know, walk with caution. I

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Speaker 1: am okay, here we go. So my grandmother has uh.

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Speaker 1: I've gone to her to find out how she was doing.

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Speaker 1: She knew she was going to pass, and I asked

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Speaker 1: her what she's scared and she said for what. She said,

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Speaker 1: I'm good with my God and I'm tired. I'm tired,

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Speaker 1: and I'm ready to stop this, so don't you worry.

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Speaker 1: That's where her head and heart was. But before she left,

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Speaker 1: my mother said she went to her and was like, Mom,

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Speaker 1: I have a very real question to ask you now.

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Speaker 1: Mind you, the two of them, they spent a lot

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Speaker 1: of time together, and she says, Mom, did you did

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Speaker 1: you ever have an orgasm? And my mom says she

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Speaker 1: smiled real hard and looked off into yonder and said

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Speaker 1: my grandfather's name. Yeah. Yeah. That moment, my mother said,

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Speaker 1: at that time, she said, I realized that my mother.

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Speaker 1: I knew she had a life, she said, but she

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Speaker 1: was she was actually having a life with someone. You know,

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Speaker 1: that she shared her time with someone that she laughed with,

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Speaker 1: Like she knew those things, but it was like some

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Speaker 1: distant thing. You know, your mom is hugged up with somebody.

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Speaker 1: You're like, you know, you kind of pass it off.

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Speaker 1: You don't really take the time to enjoy the fact

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Speaker 1: that someone is loving and kind and generous and sweet

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Speaker 1: to your mom. And that's what I think of, Like

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Speaker 1: what like far as humanizing my grandmother for my mother,

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Speaker 1: humanizing my mother for me. Boy, wait, I gotta, I

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Speaker 1: got a told on on this all. Take a break

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Speaker 1: for a second. Yeah, I gotta. I got a place

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Speaker 1: where it needs be now. I don't want no trouble.

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Speaker 1: I'll tell you, I don't want no trouble. If you

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Speaker 1: have to forgive me today, I have a country in

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Speaker 1: my mouth. I've been Oh, I've been doing dialect coaching

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Speaker 1: for the last is his nickname. I'm sorry, I'm sorry,

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Speaker 1: I'm sorry for kids, I'm sorry. Deal you were explaining

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Speaker 1: your I'm doing dialect coaching, so I'm slipping in and

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Speaker 1: out occasionally. Just shut up. You're so nasty. I love

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Speaker 1: you for that. Learned from listening you. Yeah, biology did that,

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Speaker 1: helf and genealogy, don't there we go, Natsha. I mean

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Speaker 1: my grandmother was a very I don't want to say complicated,

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Speaker 1: but like a complex individual. You know, she had like

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Speaker 1: a very interesting childhood. He was from Wild Virginia. She

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Speaker 1: had become a part of family that had two sets

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Speaker 1: of children, being raised in the same household for two sets,

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Speaker 1: meeting her mother and children from her father and someone else.

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Speaker 1: So marriage and relationships and stuff like that. Really in

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Speaker 1: many ways probably represented a bit of an escape. She

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Speaker 1: also grew up in a household where lots of very

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Speaker 1: quote unquote fair skinned people were. She was very vibrant,

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Speaker 1: she was a young mother. She knew what it was

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Speaker 1: to be a mother alone with no one at a

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Speaker 1: time when that wasn't really happening as much, and she

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Speaker 1: was very much had just so much energy and she

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Speaker 1: was like so full and so as a kid, my

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Speaker 1: experience with her as a kid was just like my

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Speaker 1: Nana is so fun because she always had this really youthful,

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Speaker 1: vibrant energy because I just feel like she always wanted

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Speaker 1: to kind of be a kid because she didn't really

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Speaker 1: get that chance to like kid kids. So she kid kids,

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Speaker 1: kidded with us, you know what I'm saying. So I

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Speaker 1: just always kind of loved that about her. But the

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Speaker 1: thing that humanized her for me was the things I

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Speaker 1: disliked about her. I did not like the way that

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Speaker 1: she treated my mom. They had a very complicated relationship

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Speaker 1: and that I'm still unpacking to this day, And so

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Speaker 1: my Nanna and I were humanized her for me was

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Speaker 1: just trying to come to terms with whether or not

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Speaker 1: I could really rock with her. And because I was

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Speaker 1: so protective of my own mother, and I remember that

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Speaker 1: my mom. One time, my grandmother said something to my

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Speaker 1: mom and I stepped in there and I tried to

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Speaker 1: defend my mother, and my mom went off for me.

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Speaker 1: My mother wasn't a big hitter, but I could tell

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Speaker 1: she was like, she's about hit me, and She's like,

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Speaker 1: don't you ever in your life speak to my mother

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Speaker 1: like that? And I was like, okay. There were lots

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Speaker 1: of different moments with my grandmother like that. I witnessed

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Speaker 1: my grandmother grieve a child that preceded her in death.

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Speaker 1: That was another thing that really humanized her for me,

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Speaker 1: watching her go from being a woman who literally had

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Speaker 1: it all together for me, house immaculate, always in tune

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Speaker 1: with the moment, always present, You're always present. When I

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Speaker 1: saw her grieve and grief hard, I couldn't speak, couldn't talk,

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Speaker 1: wailing like the sound of like a band, she wailing,

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Speaker 1: you know, the type of ancestral wailing. So those were

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Speaker 1: moments for me where I looked at her and I

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Speaker 1: was like, oh, yeah, this is a whole person. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: this is this is definitely a whole person. Yeah. I

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Speaker 1: love that we all have different moments. I was listening

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Speaker 1: to your moments of like humanizing, and I was thinking

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Speaker 1: about my grandmom. And it's funny because I thought about

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Speaker 1: Jills moments and I was like, well, as far as

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Speaker 1: my grandmam, I always knew she was somewhat sexual because

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Speaker 1: she had been married twice. She had five children, and

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Speaker 1: she had three different fathers to build those five children, right,

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Speaker 1: so I always knew that my grandmother. She was a

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Speaker 1: very fly grandmother. She was one of those people that

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Speaker 1: you hear and you go, oh, that's your mom. No,

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Speaker 1: that's my grandma, want a whole bunch of jerysh fly whatever.

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Speaker 1: But she was also a very flat but very like

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Speaker 1: strict in her home. You didn't say, are you get

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Speaker 1: plucked in the head. She was very about getting the switch.

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Speaker 1: She was very about beating you. And you know, for

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Speaker 1: a long time I didn't like my grandmother because my

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Speaker 1: parents had divorced when I was six and I ended

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Speaker 1: up leaving my mother and my grandmother and she was

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Speaker 1: still just as strict, and it was worse because I

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Speaker 1: lived where, which is strange because you know, turn around

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Speaker 1: now she became my best friend like twenty years later.

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Speaker 1: But yeah, right, I mean, he just appreciated all those moments,

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Speaker 1: But the moment that humanized my grandmom for me was

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Speaker 1: seeing as strong as she wasn't as strict as she

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Speaker 1: wasn't as no nonsense as she was, and not about

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Speaker 1: the white man and all this other stuff when it

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Speaker 1: came to her own sons and their ways. I just

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Speaker 1: didn't appreciate the way she handled She had two sons

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Speaker 1: that to me were just I want to be nice

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Speaker 1: about this because I liked one, but he was still

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Speaker 1: not very um friendly and uh, it's very selfish man.

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Speaker 1: One was very selfish and the other one was a

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Speaker 1: selfish in a different way right, and the other one

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Speaker 1: is awful to this day. But I just remember humanizing

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Speaker 1: her when I saw the way she treated them and

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Speaker 1: still let them come in the house and do the

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Speaker 1: things that they did and say the things that they

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Speaker 1: said to my mom and disrespecting that way because my

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Speaker 1: grandma was still like, these are her children, and I

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Speaker 1: just never understood this. So that was the moment for

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Speaker 1: me when she was humanizing my eyes. It's just child,

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Speaker 1: because I'm glad you started with grandmother's Because the grandmothers

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Speaker 1: tell the story, they set the tone for the whole thing. Right,

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Speaker 1: and you know, like how you view your mom, because

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Speaker 1: what humanizes your mother is that thinking about her childhood,

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Speaker 1: that thinking about what made her into the woman that

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Speaker 1: she was. At least that is for me, you know,

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Speaker 1: really looking at what my mom had to deal with,

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Speaker 1: who she grew up with, what were the rules, what

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Speaker 1: was the thinking, what were the experiences? And that really

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Speaker 1: kind of started with my nana. Again. It's interesting because

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Speaker 1: all the things that were quote unquote and perfect about her,

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Speaker 1: they make sense in context. After you get older, you

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Speaker 1: get older, you start to think you don't like it,

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Speaker 1: but you're like, oh, okay. You think about the circumstances

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Speaker 1: of their existence. They think about all of these things

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Speaker 1: instead of just who you are in this house at

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Speaker 1: this moment, providing and caring for me or my brothers

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Speaker 1: and sisters or whatever the case may be. The situations

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Speaker 1: and the circumstances of their life have a really big

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Speaker 1: factor in who they are and why they are the

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Speaker 1: whare they are. Because Jill, when you said to think

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Speaker 1: about your grandma, it's so interesting because although I know

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Speaker 1: my grandmother was a sexual person, when you said that

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Speaker 1: thing about your grand mom and the orgasm in my

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Speaker 1: grandmother's later years, I would frequently ask her about sex,

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Speaker 1: and I sawear to God, and she had a whole

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Speaker 1: silly perspective, like it was my mom and my grandmother

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Speaker 1: actually never talked about that ever. So this was a

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Speaker 1: big moment for my mother to gear up. She said

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Speaker 1: she had been working on the question for days, and

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Speaker 1: she's like, I'm not going to have a lot of

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Speaker 1: time to ask questions that I really want to know,

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Speaker 1: she said. She held her breath for a while, and

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Speaker 1: then she just mom, um, can I ask you? You know,

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Speaker 1: my grandmother's five nine, my mother six one, and my

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Speaker 1: grandmother was very weak at the end, you know, but

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Speaker 1: still my mother was afraid to ask her this very

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Speaker 1: important question to her. And nonetheless, you know, she was

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Speaker 1: so pleasantly surprised to know that her mother had had

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Speaker 1: a full existence, you know that she actually was happy

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Speaker 1: and enjoying her humanity, but so interested she had to

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Speaker 1: wait that late. She was scared to have that conversation

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Speaker 1: because my mom, I believed, when I think about my

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Speaker 1: mom and Grandmam, I think there was just so many

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Speaker 1: secrets between them, things that they both knew but they

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Speaker 1: just did not talk about, you know what I mean.

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Speaker 1: And but there was just like a deep, deep abiding love,

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Speaker 1: like I mean, just that I didn't understand outside the

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Speaker 1: context of she sometimes ain't nice to you, you know,

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Speaker 1: that kind of thing. But it was like they had

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Speaker 1: between them these agreements, these contracts and understandings that were

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Speaker 1: beyond my understanding. When I was younger, and even when

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Speaker 1: I was in my twenties, I didn't fully understand. How

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Speaker 1: about as a mom or I fully I fully understand it.

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Speaker 1: I am absolutely tapped into what that was about. My

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Speaker 1: Nanna desired a life and never allowed herself to fully

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Speaker 1: be swallowed by her circumstances. She fought and resisted many

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Speaker 1: times towards the situations that should have boxed her in

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Speaker 1: choices that she made in love and choices she made

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Speaker 1: in making. My mother and we talked about putting our

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Speaker 1: family business out there. But I'm gonna speak on this.

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Speaker 1: My mother had written a book which she never completely finished,

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Speaker 1: but this story is in the book, and my grandmother

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Speaker 1: has since passed, so I'm gonna speak on it and

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Speaker 1: made my family forgive me if they have an issue,

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Speaker 1: but you know, I'm grown, come see me. What I

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Speaker 1: will say is that my nana did have an affair,

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Speaker 1: and that the identity of my mother's father came into question.

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Speaker 1: I don't want to really rest on that. What I

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Speaker 1: want to rest on is that there was a lack

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Speaker 1: of love in her life, and there was a lack

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Speaker 1: of understanding in her life. And she had been pulled

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Speaker 1: from childhood into womanhood, into motherhood, and she desired that

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Speaker 1: connection and love and she fought to get it. Now

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Speaker 1: what she completely altogether in her decisions or they quote

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Speaker 1: unquote right, wrong, ethical whatever whatever. Maybe they were, maybe

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Speaker 1: they were not, depending on who was having a conversation,

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Speaker 1: but this was her way. My grandmother had, you know,

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Speaker 1: relationship with a man when I was a young person.

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Speaker 1: You know, my grandfather had passed or whatever, but she

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Speaker 1: had she had a boyfriend. But it wasn't even just

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Speaker 1: a relationships with men, but it was also she worked.

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Speaker 1: She worked job, she loved, she exercised, she played with us,

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Speaker 1: she gardened, she had hobbies, she loved her kids. She

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Speaker 1: enjoyed holidays like she would play games with us, Like

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Speaker 1: during Christmas time, my nan wouldn't just buy as gifts.

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Speaker 1: She would play like prices right, and what's behind during

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Speaker 1: number two? And and all these kinds of things with

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Speaker 1: us as kids. So her thirst for life, that's something

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Speaker 1: that I understood was behind a lot of her decisions.

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Speaker 1: Her relationship with my mother was probably you know, more

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Speaker 1: about the fact that my mother and many black folks

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Speaker 1: have this issue, and black mothers have this issue. My

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Speaker 1: mother had opportunities she did not. My mother could have

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Speaker 1: life that she had to fight for. My mother could

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Speaker 1: just have my mother, she would glow from the inside.

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Speaker 1: I can imagine for a person who had to fight

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Speaker 1: for glow and fight for light, that they couldn't always

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Speaker 1: be as receptive to that light. I think there's probably

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Speaker 1: some resentment there to see someone to to want something

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Speaker 1: so bad and then to see it in somebody else

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Speaker 1: that you gave birth to and they're just doing it

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Speaker 1: so effortlessly, Like as much as you may obviously love

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Speaker 1: your child, at the same time, you're like, damn, you know,

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Speaker 1: you're just glowing all around here, And I had to

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Speaker 1: hustle and work for it and cry over and toil

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Speaker 1: and stress out. You man, you know somewhere in there,

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Speaker 1: like it's easy to the women in my family, I

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Speaker 1: find myself there literal she rose to me like my grandmother.

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Speaker 1: She the house quote on fire, and she got some

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Speaker 1: of her children out, but there was the baby was

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Speaker 1: still in there sleep. He must my uncle must have

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Speaker 1: been about maybe seven months she was. She was downstairs

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Speaker 1: with the other children, so she got them out, and

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Speaker 1: then when she ran back in to get her baby,

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Speaker 1: the firefighters held on to her and they were like, oh,

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Speaker 1: you can't go in there. It's over. You can't go

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Speaker 1: in there. I'm sorry. Man. She fought all five men

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Speaker 1: and got in that house and came out with no

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00:17:26,560 --> 00:17:31,439
Speaker 1: eyebrows and no eyelashes, with her son alive. Those are

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Speaker 1: the women. And you look at these heroes. You look

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Speaker 1: at these strong, powerful women, and you know, particularly mothers

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Speaker 1: and grandmothers were talking about right now, and you you

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Speaker 1: think you can't live up to that kind of greatness

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Speaker 1: or that kind of presence. You know, it's easy to

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Speaker 1: get trapped into your light or you're not like your mom.

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Speaker 1: So you can rebel, you can actually rebel against her

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Speaker 1: own greatness because you don't think that you have what

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Speaker 1: your mother has. It can happen, yes, the and the's

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Speaker 1: the flip side too, of like, because our mothers and

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Speaker 1: grandmothers had to have this this upper strength and this

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Speaker 1: lower strength in this middle strength, there are some things

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Speaker 1: that fell to the wayside. You now can see clearer

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Speaker 1: as a grown up yourself. You know what I mean,

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Speaker 1: especially in the lane of advice and in great relationships,

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Speaker 1: especially in relationships, because I mean, I think that it's

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Speaker 1: very it's interesting. I mean, I think for me, I

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Speaker 1: don't know as you Jill, but I know my mom

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Speaker 1: is single. I think for you Asian, when your mom passed,

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Speaker 1: she was single. My mom is single, right, and the

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Speaker 1: same thing for my my grandmom. So it's interested in

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Speaker 1: this in this conversation when we were first talking about

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Speaker 1: and having I thought about like the moment too, when

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Speaker 1: I had to not go ah with every piece of

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00:19:00,480 --> 00:19:04,800
Speaker 1: advice that was given to me in certain realms where

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00:19:04,920 --> 00:19:07,800
Speaker 1: they may have not excuse me, looking around and see

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Speaker 1: if she's listening excelled or I want to say excelled

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Speaker 1: or at least been in a place that I want

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Speaker 1: to be. Oh, my mother straight up told me better

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Speaker 1: preach that to a point. Amen, Amen, Like, yeah, what

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Speaker 1: I'm saying is my mom straight up told me I

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Speaker 1: got to a point in my marriage. I came to

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Speaker 1: her and I said, listen, I don't know what to

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Speaker 1: do by expanse. She said, sweetheart, you've been married louder

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Speaker 1: than I was. WHOA, Oh right, somebody done a lot

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Speaker 1: of mom, because a lot of mom. Let me tell

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Speaker 1: you what to do. I was like, oh ship, okay, um,

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Speaker 1: because you know I have I have some some friends

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00:19:45,600 --> 00:19:50,840
Speaker 1: where their mothers really are haters when it comes to

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Speaker 1: love and relationships. They really are like they sabotage their

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Speaker 1: daughter's thoughts be because they are by themselves and they

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Speaker 1: don't want to be I don't know if that's what

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00:20:04,600 --> 00:20:06,600
Speaker 1: it is, or they're just thinking or I've been down

330
00:20:06,640 --> 00:20:09,200
Speaker 1: this road so I know everything and he ain't nothing.

331
00:20:09,680 --> 00:20:12,359
Speaker 1: I can tell by the way he walks like you

332
00:20:13,119 --> 00:20:15,520
Speaker 1: don't know that you know he had surgery on his foot,

333
00:20:15,800 --> 00:20:21,840
Speaker 1: like you just you jump up like mama, that's the game. Greens.

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Speaker 1: Give him a shot, man, just give him a shot.

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Speaker 1: That's an interesting moment in your heart space. I don't

336
00:20:27,320 --> 00:20:29,920
Speaker 1: know about job, but that moment where you're like, okay, mom,

337
00:20:30,000 --> 00:20:33,280
Speaker 1: listening here. Yeah, I don't want I don't want to

338
00:20:33,359 --> 00:20:35,800
Speaker 1: do this like I you know, I have a son,

339
00:20:35,960 --> 00:20:39,760
Speaker 1: so it's it's different even with my mentees. I'm like, listen,

340
00:20:40,520 --> 00:20:44,280
Speaker 1: I don't know everything. Bowl I'm trying to tell you.

341
00:20:44,640 --> 00:20:47,040
Speaker 1: I don't want you to make the mistakes I may,

342
00:20:47,240 --> 00:20:52,600
Speaker 1: but maybe I do because they got me here. Everything

343
00:20:52,720 --> 00:20:54,520
Speaker 1: is going to get you where you want to be,

344
00:20:54,680 --> 00:20:57,639
Speaker 1: whether you realize it or not. And that's game. You

345
00:20:57,720 --> 00:20:59,880
Speaker 1: might as well hold on and put that in your pocket.

346
00:21:00,320 --> 00:21:04,399
Speaker 1: You're going where you're intended. You are absolutely going. I

347
00:21:04,440 --> 00:21:06,480
Speaker 1: will tell y'all the one of the moments that humanized

348
00:21:06,520 --> 00:21:09,760
Speaker 1: my mother was the first time she cuts out a boyfriend.

349
00:21:10,600 --> 00:21:14,960
Speaker 1: The first time she cuts out a boyfriend, and I

350
00:21:15,000 --> 00:21:18,040
Speaker 1: was like, you was more stressed over this than I.

351
00:21:18,040 --> 00:21:20,720
Speaker 1: I've never seen you and and I'm gonna have a whole,

352
00:21:20,720 --> 00:21:23,440
Speaker 1: honest moment. And I hope she ain't listening that moment

353
00:21:23,480 --> 00:21:27,679
Speaker 1: when she called me a fucking pussy because I was

354
00:21:27,720 --> 00:21:32,520
Speaker 1: not reacting the way that she thought I should. And

355
00:21:32,680 --> 00:21:37,679
Speaker 1: I'm not talking about being twenty on my post thirty.

356
00:21:37,680 --> 00:21:42,120
Speaker 1: Where did you feel that? So many places to chill

357
00:21:44,400 --> 00:21:47,520
Speaker 1: in my spirit in my chest, like I it was

358
00:21:47,560 --> 00:21:51,600
Speaker 1: just a moment of like, damn, okay, Mom, I love you,

359
00:21:52,440 --> 00:21:55,359
Speaker 1: I don't like this person. Damn, am I really a pussy?

360
00:21:55,440 --> 00:21:58,720
Speaker 1: Because I'm not losing my whole mind and cussing this

361
00:21:58,800 --> 00:22:01,320
Speaker 1: negro out as he takes is things out of the house,

362
00:22:02,040 --> 00:22:06,280
Speaker 1: Like that was a humanizing moment of like, Okay that

363
00:22:06,400 --> 00:22:08,000
Speaker 1: she is she and and me as me, and you

364
00:22:08,040 --> 00:22:11,639
Speaker 1: have to decide to number one, and that's what you

365
00:22:11,720 --> 00:22:19,920
Speaker 1: want to be. Yeah, that's what you want for you. Yeah,

366
00:22:20,600 --> 00:22:32,040
Speaker 1: we'll be back after the break. I've seen a lot

367
00:22:32,080 --> 00:22:35,640
Speaker 1: of sisters that that really try to be their mom's

368
00:22:36,520 --> 00:22:40,520
Speaker 1: but I think it's mostly because they don't know who

369
00:22:40,560 --> 00:22:44,439
Speaker 1: they are. You know, like you're you're really blessed when

370
00:22:44,480 --> 00:22:47,679
Speaker 1: you get a chance to know your mama, to to

371
00:22:47,800 --> 00:22:51,080
Speaker 1: know her insides. Okay, for instance, my girlfriend right now,

372
00:22:51,560 --> 00:23:01,320
Speaker 1: excuse me, she has um dealing with cancer and double

373
00:23:01,400 --> 00:23:06,720
Speaker 1: missectomy kept coming back, and she called me yesterday to

374
00:23:06,840 --> 00:23:11,640
Speaker 1: tell me that she was feeling so ugly because of scars.

375
00:23:12,520 --> 00:23:15,960
Speaker 1: And when I tell you, the woman is absolutely stunning,

376
00:23:16,119 --> 00:23:19,880
Speaker 1: Like she's just stunning. She really is, always has been, skinned,

377
00:23:20,000 --> 00:23:24,400
Speaker 1: just beautiful woman. She's blessed up to have two little

378
00:23:24,440 --> 00:23:28,200
Speaker 1: girls and a husband that is positively there for her.

379
00:23:28,880 --> 00:23:32,480
Speaker 1: And I told her, because I don't know what to do,

380
00:23:32,520 --> 00:23:35,720
Speaker 1: I have to pray before I speak often, and I said, Okay,

381
00:23:35,920 --> 00:23:37,160
Speaker 1: this is what I'm gonna need to do. I'm gonna

382
00:23:37,160 --> 00:23:38,880
Speaker 1: need you to write all of this down. I don't

383
00:23:38,880 --> 00:23:41,600
Speaker 1: want you to start talking about your scars and what

384
00:23:41,760 --> 00:23:44,000
Speaker 1: makes you feel ugly in front of your girls. You

385
00:23:44,040 --> 00:23:46,880
Speaker 1: cannot do that. But what you can do is make

386
00:23:46,920 --> 00:23:49,480
Speaker 1: a journal and let them know who you are at

387
00:23:49,520 --> 00:23:53,440
Speaker 1: this time because they're they're young, and when they turn eighteen,

388
00:23:54,240 --> 00:23:56,240
Speaker 1: this is a book that they are allowed to read

389
00:23:56,840 --> 00:24:00,199
Speaker 1: because they'll think about all the wonderful times, you know,

390
00:24:00,240 --> 00:24:04,000
Speaker 1: when mom made the Halloween costume, and when mom made

391
00:24:04,040 --> 00:24:06,320
Speaker 1: the dinner, and when Mom cheered me at the game,

392
00:24:06,400 --> 00:24:08,960
Speaker 1: and with mom that they had. They'll have no idea,

393
00:24:09,480 --> 00:24:11,680
Speaker 1: you know, if this is the route that you're gonna take,

394
00:24:11,880 --> 00:24:15,119
Speaker 1: they'll have no idea what you withstood. This will be

395
00:24:15,119 --> 00:24:21,280
Speaker 1: a testimony of strength to your daughters. Do that. Do that.

396
00:24:21,560 --> 00:24:24,359
Speaker 1: I can't change anything for you. I wish I could,

397
00:24:25,520 --> 00:24:28,880
Speaker 1: and I absolutely respect your strength and that you're thinking.

398
00:24:29,400 --> 00:24:31,439
Speaker 1: I don't want to beat myself up in front of

399
00:24:31,440 --> 00:24:36,479
Speaker 1: my girls, because that that's something that we passed down

400
00:24:36,960 --> 00:24:39,760
Speaker 1: to our our daughters. You know, if you don't care

401
00:24:39,840 --> 00:24:42,960
Speaker 1: for yourself too much or like yourself too much, there's

402
00:24:43,000 --> 00:24:45,919
Speaker 1: a big chance that your daughter will too. You know,

403
00:24:46,480 --> 00:24:49,520
Speaker 1: so that was that was my little suggestion, and I

404
00:24:49,600 --> 00:24:54,000
Speaker 1: hope that that helps move her forward. I mean, I

405
00:24:54,040 --> 00:24:56,119
Speaker 1: think you're absolutely right. I mean kind of, you know,

406
00:24:56,560 --> 00:24:58,920
Speaker 1: like I told you, like my mother had written this book.

407
00:24:58,960 --> 00:25:00,879
Speaker 1: I've read it, I know, but I knew a lot

408
00:25:00,920 --> 00:25:03,280
Speaker 1: of the stories in it already. Like I do, think

409
00:25:03,320 --> 00:25:05,240
Speaker 1: that my mother hadn't told me so much about who

410
00:25:05,280 --> 00:25:09,399
Speaker 1: she was as a person is an amazing gift and

411
00:25:09,760 --> 00:25:12,119
Speaker 1: it really has changed me. It has. It has its

412
00:25:12,119 --> 00:25:15,159
Speaker 1: shaped and molded me in ways that I just I

413
00:25:15,200 --> 00:25:17,159
Speaker 1: can't even put my finger on, you know what I mean,

414
00:25:17,280 --> 00:25:20,120
Speaker 1: just having some sense of her humanity. That's one thing

415
00:25:20,160 --> 00:25:21,920
Speaker 1: I have to say. I've really been very in touch

416
00:25:22,000 --> 00:25:24,439
Speaker 1: with is my mom's humanity quite a bit, and it

417
00:25:24,560 --> 00:25:26,639
Speaker 1: helped me a lot in grieving her when she was

418
00:25:26,720 --> 00:25:31,280
Speaker 1: not here in the physical. My mother had cancer and

419
00:25:32,520 --> 00:25:35,800
Speaker 1: you know, she beat that pussy twice. She's doing well,

420
00:25:36,240 --> 00:25:40,200
Speaker 1: very grateful for that. She didn't share much of that

421
00:25:40,280 --> 00:25:43,919
Speaker 1: with me, I think, because you know, I'm the breadwinner

422
00:25:43,960 --> 00:25:46,239
Speaker 1: of my family, so I think she kind of just

423
00:25:46,280 --> 00:25:51,560
Speaker 1: wanted me to, you know, stay focused and too um

424
00:25:51,560 --> 00:25:55,600
Speaker 1: to just keep moving and motivated, like I was auditioning

425
00:25:55,600 --> 00:25:58,320
Speaker 1: for the number one Ladies Detective Agency when we found

426
00:25:58,320 --> 00:26:02,280
Speaker 1: out my mother had cancer. And when I got it

427
00:26:02,359 --> 00:26:08,000
Speaker 1: after the six auditions, she was like, you go, this

428
00:26:08,080 --> 00:26:10,720
Speaker 1: is an incredible opportunity. I want you to go. And

429
00:26:10,760 --> 00:26:13,000
Speaker 1: I was like, mom, but but but she said she

430
00:26:13,119 --> 00:26:16,720
Speaker 1: got some money, right. I was like, well, yeah, She's like,

431
00:26:16,760 --> 00:26:20,040
Speaker 1: well put some on me, you know, make sure I'm

432
00:26:20,080 --> 00:26:23,800
Speaker 1: straight and go head and do what you're gonna do.

433
00:26:25,000 --> 00:26:29,240
Speaker 1: And I was like, okay, as my my girlfriend Alex said,

434
00:26:29,240 --> 00:26:31,240
Speaker 1: she's put some money on it. Put some money on it,

435
00:26:31,320 --> 00:26:34,960
Speaker 1: whatever that thing is. So yeah, that first time, you know,

436
00:26:35,040 --> 00:26:38,119
Speaker 1: she was able to do surpass it and she has sense.

437
00:26:38,920 --> 00:26:44,080
Speaker 1: But we actually haven't had much conversation about that because

438
00:26:44,119 --> 00:26:47,600
Speaker 1: sometimes I think our moms are so strong that you know,

439
00:26:47,640 --> 00:26:51,320
Speaker 1: they don't tell, they don't say the heartaches and the

440
00:26:51,359 --> 00:26:54,440
Speaker 1: troubles and stripes or or you know, they don't share that.

441
00:26:54,680 --> 00:26:57,359
Speaker 1: And for you aged to have a mom to be

442
00:26:57,400 --> 00:27:00,520
Speaker 1: so open and my my mother's way more open than

443
00:27:00,560 --> 00:27:04,440
Speaker 1: my grandmother was. But for you to know your mother, um,

444
00:27:04,520 --> 00:27:09,600
Speaker 1: that that breathes life into your humanity. That that is

445
00:27:09,920 --> 00:27:12,639
Speaker 1: I think I'll gonna shout out your mom because I

446
00:27:13,080 --> 00:27:19,399
Speaker 1: think you're an incredible woman. I am proud to know you. Yeah, man,

447
00:27:20,160 --> 00:27:21,600
Speaker 1: that's what I tell my mom. I'm like, Mom, you know,

448
00:27:21,640 --> 00:27:25,240
Speaker 1: I'm only take a relationship invice from Asia because you

449
00:27:25,280 --> 00:27:29,840
Speaker 1: know it's about goals. But it really is Asia. It's

450
00:27:29,920 --> 00:27:33,359
Speaker 1: just really, it really is. And it's just you know,

451
00:27:35,560 --> 00:27:38,760
Speaker 1: this is the part where I deflect. My mom always

452
00:27:38,840 --> 00:27:43,080
Speaker 1: kind of always believed in love. She really did. And

453
00:27:43,119 --> 00:27:45,159
Speaker 1: you talked about heroes, and for me, like she was

454
00:27:45,200 --> 00:27:48,240
Speaker 1: my hero because I knew how many things could have

455
00:27:48,320 --> 00:27:51,040
Speaker 1: ruined that for her, Like I know all of the

456
00:27:51,080 --> 00:27:54,560
Speaker 1: things that happened to her that that could have destroyed

457
00:27:54,600 --> 00:27:57,640
Speaker 1: her belief in love and the fact that she continued

458
00:27:57,680 --> 00:28:00,400
Speaker 1: to And then it's so funny because like the things

459
00:28:00,400 --> 00:28:03,159
Speaker 1: that people go through, they can they can become like

460
00:28:03,200 --> 00:28:07,320
Speaker 1: their superpower, you know what I mean. And so it's

461
00:28:07,400 --> 00:28:13,080
Speaker 1: interesting that as mothers, that mothers can go down multiple paths.

462
00:28:14,000 --> 00:28:16,639
Speaker 1: You know, it's hard to say which path your mom

463
00:28:16,680 --> 00:28:20,200
Speaker 1: will go down. She's a human. And it's interesting at

464
00:28:20,240 --> 00:28:23,840
Speaker 1: my mother's service, my son, all these people got up

465
00:28:24,760 --> 00:28:26,280
Speaker 1: and I told you that the the way that the

466
00:28:26,359 --> 00:28:28,160
Speaker 1: day that we put my mother to rest was an

467
00:28:28,160 --> 00:28:33,280
Speaker 1: absolute amazing day. I know that sounds crazy, but that

468
00:28:33,359 --> 00:28:36,679
Speaker 1: day was actually one of the most beautiful days of

469
00:28:36,760 --> 00:28:39,800
Speaker 1: my life. The day we laid my mother to rest,

470
00:28:40,280 --> 00:28:43,360
Speaker 1: we all wore white, and I didn't even understand the

471
00:28:43,400 --> 00:28:46,440
Speaker 1: significance of that until later, but we all were white,

472
00:28:47,200 --> 00:28:50,160
Speaker 1: and everyone who came and the amount of people who

473
00:28:50,240 --> 00:28:53,520
Speaker 1: spoke to this part of her. So people will have

474
00:28:53,560 --> 00:28:57,120
Speaker 1: tons of stories about a person, but the fact that

475
00:28:57,200 --> 00:28:59,720
Speaker 1: this same kind of theme came back up many times.

476
00:29:00,120 --> 00:29:02,240
Speaker 1: Who she was in her belief and love, her ability

477
00:29:02,280 --> 00:29:05,640
Speaker 1: to love, and that that was her power. And my

478
00:29:05,720 --> 00:29:09,240
Speaker 1: son said, you know, I want to be like Grandma,

479
00:29:09,640 --> 00:29:12,600
Speaker 1: like I want to be like that. And I said

480
00:29:12,640 --> 00:29:16,280
Speaker 1: to him, I think that's beautiful, son, but I want

481
00:29:16,280 --> 00:29:18,000
Speaker 1: you to be that way. But I also want you

482
00:29:18,040 --> 00:29:21,880
Speaker 1: to understand the pain Grandmam had to experience in her

483
00:29:22,000 --> 00:29:26,280
Speaker 1: life in order for her to have that perspective. It

484
00:29:26,320 --> 00:29:28,320
Speaker 1: has been a gift to know her as a woman.

485
00:29:28,960 --> 00:29:31,000
Speaker 1: And I do think that that is something that's a

486
00:29:31,000 --> 00:29:33,240
Speaker 1: gift you can give your children and the young women

487
00:29:33,320 --> 00:29:35,800
Speaker 1: in your life, because you don't want to send them

488
00:29:35,800 --> 00:29:38,160
Speaker 1: out in the world with this false kind of sense

489
00:29:38,280 --> 00:29:40,680
Speaker 1: of what it is to be a woman and and

490
00:29:40,840 --> 00:29:47,200
Speaker 1: tied into those ridiculous, and it illusion about what womanhood

491
00:29:47,400 --> 00:29:49,320
Speaker 1: is and what that looks like, and for us as

492
00:29:49,360 --> 00:29:54,479
Speaker 1: black women, we're just so inundated. Was so much fuckory

493
00:29:54,520 --> 00:29:59,200
Speaker 1: about what that is. That I'm grateful to have had that,

494
00:29:59,520 --> 00:30:02,200
Speaker 1: but again I didn't know always that that's what that was.

495
00:30:02,240 --> 00:30:03,640
Speaker 1: When I was a kid, I used to think of

496
00:30:03,720 --> 00:30:06,640
Speaker 1: my mom as a pushover. I was very aggressive in

497
00:30:06,720 --> 00:30:09,440
Speaker 1: my late teens and ear I mean, in my early twenties,

498
00:30:09,480 --> 00:30:12,840
Speaker 1: even after I got married, because you're a yeah, and

499
00:30:12,880 --> 00:30:14,920
Speaker 1: I had to pimp out like that that pimps are

500
00:30:15,000 --> 00:30:18,320
Speaker 1: hurt people. You understand what I'm saying. Uh, A pimp

501
00:30:18,440 --> 00:30:20,920
Speaker 1: is not a person who you know, should be admired.

502
00:30:21,320 --> 00:30:24,080
Speaker 1: I was like that because I was trying not to

503
00:30:24,200 --> 00:30:28,000
Speaker 1: be a fool for love, because I was thinking, you know,

504
00:30:28,200 --> 00:30:29,880
Speaker 1: very much like you know, I don't. I didn't want

505
00:30:29,920 --> 00:30:31,960
Speaker 1: to be like my mom at that time in my life,

506
00:30:32,400 --> 00:30:34,480
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, because I didn't understand that

507
00:30:34,560 --> 00:30:37,880
Speaker 1: what she had was some fabulous ship. Okay, So my

508
00:30:37,960 --> 00:30:41,480
Speaker 1: mom stopped working when I was fourteen. She came home

509
00:30:41,520 --> 00:30:44,600
Speaker 1: one day and she just was like, I don't wanna

510
00:30:44,640 --> 00:30:47,640
Speaker 1: do that no more. And I thought we were doing really,

511
00:30:47,680 --> 00:30:50,600
Speaker 1: really well, I mean I was. I thought we were

512
00:30:50,600 --> 00:30:52,800
Speaker 1: doing great. As a matter of fact, you know, there

513
00:30:52,840 --> 00:30:54,960
Speaker 1: was food in the house that I had some clothes,

514
00:30:55,000 --> 00:30:57,160
Speaker 1: not a lot, but I had some, and you know,

515
00:30:57,200 --> 00:31:00,240
Speaker 1: I thought we were doing well. And my mother, you know,

516
00:31:00,400 --> 00:31:04,440
Speaker 1: just really did not go back to work. Odds and

517
00:31:04,600 --> 00:31:08,959
Speaker 1: ends here and there, she would take up something immensely creative.

518
00:31:09,680 --> 00:31:12,160
Speaker 1: And she one day she jumped up and went to

519
00:31:12,240 --> 00:31:14,280
Speaker 1: the docks at four o'clock in the morning, came back

520
00:31:14,320 --> 00:31:18,400
Speaker 1: with more fruit than anybody could ever eat. And I

521
00:31:18,480 --> 00:31:20,520
Speaker 1: was like, what is going on my grandmother and not

522
00:31:20,640 --> 00:31:23,560
Speaker 1: just looking at each other, like what's happening? And if

523
00:31:23,600 --> 00:31:27,400
Speaker 1: she had spent her last And she decided that she

524
00:31:27,480 --> 00:31:30,760
Speaker 1: was going to make smoothies. That she had gotten these books. No,

525
00:31:30,840 --> 00:31:35,680
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm talking North Philly. I'm talking eighties smoothies.

526
00:31:36,280 --> 00:31:39,440
Speaker 1: So she decided she was gonna make smoothies and she

527
00:31:39,600 --> 00:31:43,680
Speaker 1: was going to sell them for ten dollars in North Philly.

528
00:31:44,040 --> 00:31:50,760
Speaker 1: And I was crazy, Okay, So the first day or so,

529
00:31:51,080 --> 00:31:53,200
Speaker 1: you know, she started handing them out, handing them out

530
00:31:53,240 --> 00:31:57,440
Speaker 1: to people. I'm telling you, within three days time I

531
00:31:57,520 --> 00:32:00,840
Speaker 1: was headed out for school six am. My bus came

532
00:32:00,840 --> 00:32:03,440
Speaker 1: in six ten, and I like to meander a little bit.

533
00:32:04,000 --> 00:32:06,680
Speaker 1: I could hardly get down my steps. There was a

534
00:32:06,720 --> 00:32:11,280
Speaker 1: line around the block. I said, what's going on. Oh,

535
00:32:11,320 --> 00:32:13,680
Speaker 1: I'm coming to get some of your um, your mom's smoothies.

536
00:32:14,440 --> 00:32:16,800
Speaker 1: I had one in the morning and I didn't have

537
00:32:16,880 --> 00:32:20,720
Speaker 1: to eat again all day long. I said, what, Yeah,

538
00:32:20,760 --> 00:32:22,800
Speaker 1: this is how I'm gonna lose my weight. Oh this

539
00:32:22,880 --> 00:32:25,120
Speaker 1: is Oh, your mom's smoothies made me feel like what

540
00:32:25,240 --> 00:32:28,480
Speaker 1: she put in there. Everybody's talking about my mother's smoothies.

541
00:32:28,560 --> 00:32:31,680
Speaker 1: All of a sudden, she has a business. She did

542
00:32:31,720 --> 00:32:35,880
Speaker 1: that until she was finished with it, and then all

543
00:32:35,920 --> 00:32:39,400
Speaker 1: of a sudden, no more smoothies. And we've been back

544
00:32:39,440 --> 00:32:42,240
Speaker 1: from it was like feast or famine, and we went

545
00:32:42,280 --> 00:32:44,760
Speaker 1: back to families and having a sense being a kid

546
00:32:44,800 --> 00:32:47,200
Speaker 1: and seeing someone with that kind of freedom in their mind,

547
00:32:48,200 --> 00:32:54,640
Speaker 1: it's fantastic. And she decided to make pants once. All

548
00:32:54,680 --> 00:32:56,960
Speaker 1: of a sudden, the whole neighborhood is walking around in

549
00:32:57,040 --> 00:32:59,840
Speaker 1: my mother's pants. It was like that with the address sign,

550
00:33:00,120 --> 00:33:02,720
Speaker 1: it was like that she found a piece of furniture.

551
00:33:03,000 --> 00:33:06,280
Speaker 1: She brought this thing home and bought a sander, and

552
00:33:06,360 --> 00:33:09,200
Speaker 1: she taught me how to stay in polyera thing, and

553
00:33:09,320 --> 00:33:12,000
Speaker 1: she she got this thing and it was something somebody

554
00:33:12,040 --> 00:33:14,400
Speaker 1: had painted white and it was it was a dresser.

555
00:33:14,640 --> 00:33:17,120
Speaker 1: It looked crappy. She got all the paint off of it.

556
00:33:17,120 --> 00:33:20,720
Speaker 1: It was beautiful wood underneath sanded it. She sold that

557
00:33:20,800 --> 00:33:24,800
Speaker 1: thing for I think four hundred dollars. You know, this

558
00:33:24,880 --> 00:33:29,440
Speaker 1: is this is who my mother is. But the sporadic

559
00:33:29,680 --> 00:33:33,880
Speaker 1: nature of it all is why I have five, six, seven,

560
00:33:33,960 --> 00:33:39,480
Speaker 1: eight nine jobs because the end between the lean times

561
00:33:39,880 --> 00:33:46,800
Speaker 1: were lean, okay, like lean, like how are you gonna

562
00:33:46,800 --> 00:33:50,760
Speaker 1: get to school? What? What are you gonna eat today? Like?

563
00:33:51,560 --> 00:33:55,000
Speaker 1: You know? So this is why. And I love to

564
00:33:55,080 --> 00:33:58,640
Speaker 1: be creative. I love to do things that give me joy,

565
00:33:58,680 --> 00:34:01,680
Speaker 1: but I also don't want to go through the lean

566
00:34:01,800 --> 00:34:05,560
Speaker 1: times if I can manage it, because part of me

567
00:34:06,040 --> 00:34:11,359
Speaker 1: psychologically fears it, which is why there is Costco and

568
00:34:11,400 --> 00:34:16,200
Speaker 1: I are really great friends because I over compensate because

569
00:34:16,239 --> 00:34:19,799
Speaker 1: I remember that, and I remember the trades, you know,

570
00:34:19,840 --> 00:34:22,320
Speaker 1: the baskets where people would drop off food and stuff.

571
00:34:24,120 --> 00:34:26,360
Speaker 1: It's so fascinating because I just it's so many different

572
00:34:26,400 --> 00:34:28,920
Speaker 1: moms with so many different stories. I'm like, now you

573
00:34:28,960 --> 00:34:30,680
Speaker 1: made me think of my mom and how she did

574
00:34:30,680 --> 00:34:33,480
Speaker 1: the flip side where she decided to skip her dreams

575
00:34:33,480 --> 00:34:36,480
Speaker 1: and just dedicate her life to United Airlines for forty

576
00:34:36,520 --> 00:34:39,319
Speaker 1: five years because she wanted to keep her daughter in

577
00:34:39,400 --> 00:34:43,080
Speaker 1: private school. And she although I have the best daddy

578
00:34:43,160 --> 00:34:45,920
Speaker 1: in the damn world, he wasn't always the most financially

579
00:34:45,920 --> 00:34:49,040
Speaker 1: stable daddy in the whole damn world. So she wanted

580
00:34:49,080 --> 00:34:50,759
Speaker 1: to make sure that I had to clothes, and I

581
00:34:50,800 --> 00:34:52,760
Speaker 1: had a home, and I lived in these certain places

582
00:34:53,080 --> 00:34:56,840
Speaker 1: and so here she is now retired, like I'm taking

583
00:34:56,840 --> 00:34:59,080
Speaker 1: real estate classes. I want to sell homes because I've

584
00:34:59,120 --> 00:35:01,719
Speaker 1: always had a pass and for homes and decorating things

585
00:35:01,760 --> 00:35:05,000
Speaker 1: like that. I'm just like, wow, like, if only you

586
00:35:05,000 --> 00:35:06,960
Speaker 1: would have had a moment and not for nothing, I

587
00:35:07,000 --> 00:35:08,800
Speaker 1: thank her for those years because if that, I wouldn't

588
00:35:08,800 --> 00:35:12,759
Speaker 1: have seen the world. If not for those and I

589
00:35:12,800 --> 00:35:14,680
Speaker 1: wouldn't have met I would have met Jill Scott and

590
00:35:14,719 --> 00:35:17,840
Speaker 1: montro Switzerland if not for that, you know what I'm saying.

591
00:35:17,880 --> 00:35:21,520
Speaker 1: But it's just mom's stories and just a different route

592
00:35:21,520 --> 00:35:25,000
Speaker 1: of sacrifice that they make and and and to my

593
00:35:25,040 --> 00:35:26,279
Speaker 1: mom is funny because I was like, Dawn, I was

594
00:35:26,320 --> 00:35:28,279
Speaker 1: feeling bad because I'm like I told the story of

595
00:35:28,280 --> 00:35:31,839
Speaker 1: how she cuts out the boyfriends. But I understand all

596
00:35:31,880 --> 00:35:34,400
Speaker 1: that because my mom has one child, she has one daughter.

597
00:35:34,800 --> 00:35:37,920
Speaker 1: She is the biggest warrior for me. I will go

598
00:35:38,000 --> 00:35:41,279
Speaker 1: through beast with friends and she continues them on even

599
00:35:41,280 --> 00:35:46,280
Speaker 1: though we had You know what I'm saying like that is,

600
00:35:45,760 --> 00:35:48,839
Speaker 1: Mom said, you can't cut off my ride or die.

601
00:35:49,120 --> 00:35:51,760
Speaker 1: You can't cut it off once you turn that fast

602
00:35:51,760 --> 00:35:53,880
Speaker 1: set on. She said, Wait a minute, Ain't that the

603
00:35:53,960 --> 00:35:57,200
Speaker 1: one was it was that five, six, seventeen years ago?

604
00:35:57,280 --> 00:36:01,600
Speaker 1: Didn't she say? She showed she was me as a mother.

605
00:36:01,760 --> 00:36:04,000
Speaker 1: I won't lie. That's me as a mother. That's what's up.

606
00:36:04,280 --> 00:36:07,359
Speaker 1: I called people raggedy who who? That who that? That's

607
00:36:07,360 --> 00:36:14,600
Speaker 1: that raggedy girl. That's that raggedy mean boy matter. He

608
00:36:14,640 --> 00:36:18,600
Speaker 1: can't come with my threshold. I love it though, But

609
00:36:18,760 --> 00:36:22,480
Speaker 1: you know, if I didn't have that kind of relationship

610
00:36:22,520 --> 00:36:25,719
Speaker 1: with my mom where it helped me with my own

611
00:36:25,840 --> 00:36:28,480
Speaker 1: kids really for real, for real in a lot of ways,

612
00:36:28,520 --> 00:36:31,799
Speaker 1: because my mother's acceptance of me helped me when I

613
00:36:31,840 --> 00:36:35,080
Speaker 1: had to really kind of dig deep for my own daughter.

614
00:36:35,960 --> 00:36:39,640
Speaker 1: And um, I was really kind of messy as a teenager,

615
00:36:40,080 --> 00:36:41,880
Speaker 1: you know, just really all over the place. You know

616
00:36:41,960 --> 00:36:44,440
Speaker 1: what I'm saying, and like I was really a smart

617
00:36:44,520 --> 00:36:46,600
Speaker 1: I was like the kid that the teachers couldn't stand

618
00:36:46,640 --> 00:36:48,680
Speaker 1: because it's like, you know, she's smart, but she like

619
00:36:48,760 --> 00:36:51,879
Speaker 1: it's checked out, you know what I mean. Like, so

620
00:36:52,280 --> 00:36:55,040
Speaker 1: they would call my mom and we're like, can we

621
00:36:55,080 --> 00:36:58,480
Speaker 1: just get her to focus for like four months in

622
00:36:58,520 --> 00:37:03,040
Speaker 1: the game. So but this kid I got. I'm serious, man.

623
00:37:03,440 --> 00:37:06,320
Speaker 1: I grieved my mother hard because I needed to find

624
00:37:06,360 --> 00:37:10,040
Speaker 1: out where she got the ability to accept me the

625
00:37:10,080 --> 00:37:14,480
Speaker 1: way that she did, because when I needed it, I

626
00:37:14,520 --> 00:37:17,759
Speaker 1: needed it for my own kid. And it was like

627
00:37:17,880 --> 00:37:20,359
Speaker 1: it was so stressful for me because I was like

628
00:37:20,680 --> 00:37:22,719
Speaker 1: this the moment when I need to leg in her

629
00:37:22,800 --> 00:37:25,799
Speaker 1: lap and ask her, Yo, what do I do with

630
00:37:25,920 --> 00:37:29,040
Speaker 1: this girl? How do I love her? You know what

631
00:37:29,080 --> 00:37:31,719
Speaker 1: I'm saying. But I had mentioned this to you guys

632
00:37:31,760 --> 00:37:35,480
Speaker 1: before that. Again, my mom always used to think that

633
00:37:35,520 --> 00:37:38,279
Speaker 1: she was too soft. That was like my whole thing

634
00:37:38,400 --> 00:37:41,399
Speaker 1: was she's great love, but too good, like you don't

635
00:37:41,400 --> 00:37:44,920
Speaker 1: have enough boundaries, sis, When it was my mother's ability

636
00:37:44,920 --> 00:37:49,680
Speaker 1: to radically love eventually helped me save my relationship with

637
00:37:49,719 --> 00:37:54,000
Speaker 1: my own daughter because I knew I was able to

638
00:37:54,040 --> 00:37:57,399
Speaker 1: remember the type of compassion that she had for me,

639
00:37:57,719 --> 00:38:01,239
Speaker 1: and it was like this kid, you sis, this is

640
00:38:01,280 --> 00:38:04,160
Speaker 1: how you're gonna heal for real, for real, like this

641
00:38:04,239 --> 00:38:06,759
Speaker 1: is this is where you're healing. It gonna go to

642
00:38:06,800 --> 00:38:09,919
Speaker 1: the bone marrow. It was like, you're going to have

643
00:38:10,040 --> 00:38:13,680
Speaker 1: to have a radical compassion in this situation. You have

644
00:38:13,760 --> 00:38:16,400
Speaker 1: to love in a way that seems like, should not

645
00:38:16,520 --> 00:38:21,440
Speaker 1: be disciplined in this kid. Shouldn't not be mad, should

646
00:38:21,560 --> 00:38:26,000
Speaker 1: not be upset? Nasis, No, you should not. No, you

647
00:38:26,120 --> 00:38:29,719
Speaker 1: should not. That's how my mother really changed my life

648
00:38:30,480 --> 00:38:35,400
Speaker 1: because when I realized that, yeah, that that that that

649
00:38:35,400 --> 00:38:38,399
Speaker 1: that ship right there, and the turn that the women

650
00:38:38,440 --> 00:38:42,120
Speaker 1: in this generation took, these boomer black women, that how

651
00:38:42,160 --> 00:38:47,440
Speaker 1: they took a very different approach to mother. And oh yes,

652
00:38:47,560 --> 00:38:49,360
Speaker 1: I gotta get my mom and our mom's credit on

653
00:38:49,400 --> 00:38:53,200
Speaker 1: that one, because yes they did, yes, and very difference.

654
00:38:53,680 --> 00:38:58,960
Speaker 1: They spoke to us more, they spoke to us. Yeah, yeah,

655
00:38:59,040 --> 00:39:03,520
Speaker 1: we could speak back. Yes, still not as much as

656
00:39:03,520 --> 00:39:07,319
Speaker 1: these kids today, but more. Yeah. Wait, I don't know

657
00:39:07,360 --> 00:39:11,680
Speaker 1: what you mean. I feel like they started the normalizing

658
00:39:11,760 --> 00:39:15,360
Speaker 1: free black children, the idea of raising free black children,

659
00:39:15,400 --> 00:39:18,520
Speaker 1: black children in their minds, not just their bodies, and

660
00:39:18,680 --> 00:39:21,279
Speaker 1: parents who could be your friend. But still disciplinarians. The

661
00:39:21,320 --> 00:39:23,719
Speaker 1: concept of being a friend in a disciplinarian too, I

662
00:39:23,760 --> 00:39:27,480
Speaker 1: think started with our parents. I totally agree with that.

663
00:39:27,840 --> 00:39:29,799
Speaker 1: I don't think there was anything like that prior to

664
00:39:29,840 --> 00:39:32,920
Speaker 1: their generation. I am very, very grateful for the many

665
00:39:33,040 --> 00:39:36,000
Speaker 1: nights my mother and I shared drinking man of Chevits,

666
00:39:37,360 --> 00:39:43,279
Speaker 1: listening to Milly Jackson, Honey. Yes, the first time I

667
00:39:43,320 --> 00:39:46,080
Speaker 1: ever got high, I was with my mom. Yes, I'm

668
00:39:46,080 --> 00:39:51,160
Speaker 1: grateful for those moments. Now she's retired. Yes, and Grandma.

669
00:39:51,200 --> 00:39:53,000
Speaker 1: I gotta sneak my mom with a little cookie, a

670
00:39:53,040 --> 00:39:58,759
Speaker 1: little piece of candy or something. I feel, mom, but

671
00:39:59,000 --> 00:40:03,319
Speaker 1: still thank God, so I can dip into her stash.

672
00:40:03,360 --> 00:40:08,799
Speaker 1: We tried to cook Thanksgiving dinner that night. Talk about

673
00:40:08,800 --> 00:40:11,719
Speaker 1: a high asked mess, the two of us trying to

674
00:40:11,760 --> 00:40:14,680
Speaker 1: cook this food. I'm just gonna put this out here.

675
00:40:14,719 --> 00:40:18,480
Speaker 1: I tried to wash the turkey. Don't ever try to

676
00:40:18,480 --> 00:40:20,719
Speaker 1: wash the turkey after get in hot with your mama. Here,

677
00:40:21,000 --> 00:40:23,960
Speaker 1: you tried to wash the turk? How to do wash it? Asia?

678
00:40:25,480 --> 00:40:29,160
Speaker 1: I left that thing in the saint because I couldn't

679
00:40:29,200 --> 00:40:31,200
Speaker 1: pick it up because it was wrong and it was

680
00:40:31,320 --> 00:40:34,120
Speaker 1: big and it was happy. It was slippery, and I

681
00:40:34,239 --> 00:40:40,440
Speaker 1: was like it's dead. My mom like, yeah, that's dad, girl,

682
00:40:40,480 --> 00:40:44,560
Speaker 1: watch that dad turkey and seizing it up. I have

683
00:40:44,680 --> 00:40:48,080
Speaker 1: to get up. She and she literally said this. I

684
00:40:48,080 --> 00:40:53,160
Speaker 1: ain't getting out because you're a lightweight Asian. Damn, my

685
00:40:53,239 --> 00:40:55,520
Speaker 1: mama said, not getting your Mama said you're a lightweight.

686
00:40:55,520 --> 00:40:57,600
Speaker 1: That's what she said. Yeah, she put me, she she

687
00:40:57,640 --> 00:41:00,239
Speaker 1: put me to bed to seek my mother. I didn't

688
00:41:00,280 --> 00:41:03,000
Speaker 1: do that. She's not interested in that. She saw something

689
00:41:03,120 --> 00:41:07,359
Speaker 1: terrible one time and believes that all all things will

690
00:41:07,400 --> 00:41:09,319
Speaker 1: make you pull your skin off. Girl. Had we had

691
00:41:09,320 --> 00:41:11,200
Speaker 1: to high roaches from my grandmother. She was at a

692
00:41:11,320 --> 00:41:17,040
Speaker 1: party and saw somebody use acid and the lady ran

693
00:41:17,080 --> 00:41:19,799
Speaker 1: into the ocean and started pulling her skin off. And

694
00:41:19,840 --> 00:41:24,080
Speaker 1: my mother was like, drunks, all drugs, everything that's that

695
00:41:25,600 --> 00:41:31,440
Speaker 1: started trying to this day like I say this because

696
00:41:31,480 --> 00:41:36,080
Speaker 1: of my mother. I say this if any time somebody

697
00:41:36,200 --> 00:41:40,600
Speaker 1: tells you that I died of an overdose, no, that

698
00:41:41,600 --> 00:41:47,400
Speaker 1: somebody killed me. I'm not the one, because I'm not

699
00:41:47,560 --> 00:41:50,560
Speaker 1: the one. I'm not the one. I'm not the one.

700
00:41:50,880 --> 00:41:56,080
Speaker 1: I'm not you said skin off? Oh no, that probably

701
00:41:56,120 --> 00:41:59,439
Speaker 1: be me just by proxy. Like I'm not interested. Don't

702
00:41:59,480 --> 00:42:05,920
Speaker 1: you worry about it. Okay, fear not. Let me ask you,

703
00:42:06,080 --> 00:42:09,160
Speaker 1: just as moms, do y'all think that, like your kids

704
00:42:09,200 --> 00:42:11,520
Speaker 1: are kids? I feel like a kind of answer this question,

705
00:42:11,760 --> 00:42:14,160
Speaker 1: but do you think that they're getting the most humanized

706
00:42:14,280 --> 00:42:19,000
Speaker 1: version of you? Like pure? For sure, I think they are,

707
00:42:19,120 --> 00:42:21,600
Speaker 1: But they almost didn't even though I had the background

708
00:42:21,640 --> 00:42:25,960
Speaker 1: that I did, because the patriarchy is strong, you know

709
00:42:26,040 --> 00:42:29,000
Speaker 1: what I mean, And so it's hard as a woman

710
00:42:29,160 --> 00:42:31,600
Speaker 1: to fight that. A lot of times you you still

711
00:42:31,760 --> 00:42:35,680
Speaker 1: do find yourself hiding your humanity from people because you

712
00:42:35,760 --> 00:42:37,560
Speaker 1: think you're supposed to be strong and you're supposed to

713
00:42:37,640 --> 00:42:39,799
Speaker 1: handle everything, and that's what I need. So I would

714
00:42:39,840 --> 00:42:41,719
Speaker 1: be lying if I said I didn't buy into some

715
00:42:41,800 --> 00:42:44,520
Speaker 1: of those things, even with my own children, even though

716
00:42:44,600 --> 00:42:47,840
Speaker 1: I had this positive experience with my mother. The world

717
00:42:48,239 --> 00:42:51,160
Speaker 1: is very intense, so you tend to buy into those

718
00:42:51,239 --> 00:42:54,319
Speaker 1: things even though you have something to counteract it, which

719
00:42:54,360 --> 00:42:56,959
Speaker 1: is why I'm always saying, as a black person and parent,

720
00:42:57,080 --> 00:43:00,120
Speaker 1: you have to kind of consistently be pushing back at

721
00:43:00,160 --> 00:43:02,719
Speaker 1: the ship, you know what I mean. And so yeah,

722
00:43:02,800 --> 00:43:04,800
Speaker 1: I went through that. I went through that, and I

723
00:43:04,960 --> 00:43:08,120
Speaker 1: also went through the realization and the self actualization that

724
00:43:08,200 --> 00:43:11,600
Speaker 1: I said Okay, Nah, these kids need to know you're

725
00:43:11,600 --> 00:43:13,759
Speaker 1: a human being. You need to set boundaries, you need

726
00:43:13,800 --> 00:43:16,840
Speaker 1: to take care of yourself. And I'm lucky enough to

727
00:43:16,920 --> 00:43:19,239
Speaker 1: have come up during the time where words like self

728
00:43:19,320 --> 00:43:24,560
Speaker 1: care are part of our national vocabulary and our common vocabulary.

729
00:43:24,880 --> 00:43:28,560
Speaker 1: So those are things I've been is trauma what you're

730
00:43:28,560 --> 00:43:35,359
Speaker 1: talking about? Exactly? Exactly? Yeah, so yes day, no kids

731
00:43:35,400 --> 00:43:37,840
Speaker 1: benefited from from that, but I had to do the

732
00:43:37,880 --> 00:43:41,120
Speaker 1: work still. See that's the thing. It doesn't matter who

733
00:43:41,239 --> 00:43:43,920
Speaker 1: your mama is or is it. You can't really escape

734
00:43:43,960 --> 00:43:46,719
Speaker 1: the work. The work is gonna always you know what

735
00:43:46,800 --> 00:43:49,920
Speaker 1: I mean. I think the jet has benefited from me

736
00:43:50,120 --> 00:43:54,759
Speaker 1: being the whole around him. He asked me questions like

737
00:43:54,840 --> 00:43:57,320
Speaker 1: how did you rest? It was like you got a

738
00:43:57,400 --> 00:43:59,160
Speaker 1: lot going on. I could see it in your face.

739
00:43:59,320 --> 00:44:02,839
Speaker 1: There's literally nothing that I can hide from that boy.

740
00:44:03,920 --> 00:44:07,439
Speaker 1: What he who asked me, Mom? What is that? Look

741
00:44:07,480 --> 00:44:09,880
Speaker 1: at me deep in my soul and I'm like, what

742
00:44:10,160 --> 00:44:14,839
Speaker 1: He's like that thing? It's bothering you, mom? I could

743
00:44:14,880 --> 00:44:19,000
Speaker 1: see it? What is that? And I he freaks me

744
00:44:19,120 --> 00:44:22,480
Speaker 1: out when he does it, Like he's a really sweet

745
00:44:22,680 --> 00:44:26,960
Speaker 1: and intense human being, and I can't hide even if

746
00:44:27,000 --> 00:44:30,480
Speaker 1: I wanted to. He can see me, so in those moments,

747
00:44:30,520 --> 00:44:34,120
Speaker 1: you never say I don't. I won't do that, because

748
00:44:34,120 --> 00:44:37,480
Speaker 1: that means I have to honor his instinct and whatever

749
00:44:37,719 --> 00:44:40,880
Speaker 1: gifts that have been given to my grandmother, you know,

750
00:44:40,920 --> 00:44:43,640
Speaker 1: who could tell you somebody's calling before the phone rang

751
00:44:43,719 --> 00:44:46,799
Speaker 1: and who it was. Or my mother, who can heal

752
00:44:47,360 --> 00:44:50,279
Speaker 1: people with her touch and her words to to me,

753
00:44:50,480 --> 00:44:53,160
Speaker 1: whatever it is that I have, I don't want to

754
00:44:53,320 --> 00:44:56,680
Speaker 1: negate it for him. He's absolutely right, there's a thing,

755
00:44:56,760 --> 00:44:58,840
Speaker 1: and sometimes I don't even know what the thing is.

756
00:44:59,239 --> 00:45:01,880
Speaker 1: I've gotta look and see what it is, and then

757
00:45:01,960 --> 00:45:05,680
Speaker 1: we talk about it. Whatever it is. I need him.

758
00:45:05,719 --> 00:45:08,560
Speaker 1: It's important that he be able to speak his mind

759
00:45:08,800 --> 00:45:11,880
Speaker 1: and him share whatever's going on in him. I need

760
00:45:12,000 --> 00:45:15,160
Speaker 1: him to know that he's all right because these kids now,

761
00:45:15,520 --> 00:45:17,359
Speaker 1: you know a lot of young people are taking their

762
00:45:17,480 --> 00:45:21,719
Speaker 1: lives and because of bullying, because of not being able

763
00:45:21,760 --> 00:45:24,279
Speaker 1: to keep up in school, or whatever the case may be.

764
00:45:24,520 --> 00:45:27,200
Speaker 1: It's happening a lot where I am, and I just

765
00:45:27,480 --> 00:45:29,760
Speaker 1: you know, I want to make sure that I'm super

766
00:45:29,920 --> 00:45:35,640
Speaker 1: present in his emotional growth and his spiritual growth, you know,

767
00:45:35,880 --> 00:45:37,920
Speaker 1: his mental growth. I want to be there for that

768
00:45:38,520 --> 00:45:43,520
Speaker 1: so him seeing me stressed out and me taking deep breaths,

769
00:45:43,960 --> 00:45:46,920
Speaker 1: or me taking a walk, or him walking with me,

770
00:45:47,040 --> 00:45:48,839
Speaker 1: and I'm like, I just don't want to talk right now,

771
00:45:49,320 --> 00:45:52,840
Speaker 1: and he's like okay, you know, for him to see it,

772
00:45:53,120 --> 00:45:56,920
Speaker 1: to know that that sometimes I'm not all right. Sometimes

773
00:45:56,960 --> 00:46:04,000
Speaker 1: I'm really upset. Sometimes I'm mad, you know, just or

774
00:46:04,120 --> 00:46:07,719
Speaker 1: having an anxiety attack because these things occurred to a man,

775
00:46:08,160 --> 00:46:10,359
Speaker 1: I have my oldest child read me Girl like a book,

776
00:46:11,160 --> 00:46:13,239
Speaker 1: right that. Like I said, it's so many, so many

777
00:46:13,320 --> 00:46:15,680
Speaker 1: things came to life after my mother passed, but I

778
00:46:15,719 --> 00:46:18,520
Speaker 1: would have to say that it was that experience also

779
00:46:18,680 --> 00:46:23,360
Speaker 1: that showed me how it was important, even more so

780
00:46:23,920 --> 00:46:26,960
Speaker 1: than I had been doing that my children saw my humanity,

781
00:46:27,640 --> 00:46:30,440
Speaker 1: that they saw the grieving process and they understood what

782
00:46:30,560 --> 00:46:33,040
Speaker 1: that was and how you didn't come out of it

783
00:46:33,160 --> 00:46:35,320
Speaker 1: and moved through it, you know what I mean. And

784
00:46:35,440 --> 00:46:39,160
Speaker 1: so that was really a great learning tool for us.

785
00:46:39,960 --> 00:46:43,520
Speaker 1: Whereas sometimes the trauma of a parent can break everything down,

786
00:46:44,239 --> 00:46:46,720
Speaker 1: but if it's used as a learning in a teaching moment,

787
00:46:46,920 --> 00:46:50,120
Speaker 1: it can be really really profound for your children to

788
00:46:50,200 --> 00:46:53,000
Speaker 1: see you in that way. But even before there's some

789
00:46:53,120 --> 00:46:57,160
Speaker 1: sort of calamity in the everyday calamities. I think it

790
00:46:57,280 --> 00:47:00,480
Speaker 1: is so profound that you're saying, hey, you know, I

791
00:47:00,560 --> 00:47:02,400
Speaker 1: need some room. I'm not and I can't talk to

792
00:47:02,400 --> 00:47:05,160
Speaker 1: you right now. And those are those are boundaries that

793
00:47:05,239 --> 00:47:08,640
Speaker 1: I learned over time to do because there was always

794
00:47:08,719 --> 00:47:14,560
Speaker 1: that little voice, the little little guy that you have

795
00:47:14,719 --> 00:47:18,680
Speaker 1: to be and you have to be present, you have

796
00:47:18,800 --> 00:47:21,400
Speaker 1: to be there to be present all the time. I

797
00:47:23,000 --> 00:47:25,560
Speaker 1: really feel like that that's I'm sorry, um, like you

798
00:47:25,719 --> 00:47:27,920
Speaker 1: forgive me now, It's okay. I was just gonna say,

799
00:47:27,920 --> 00:47:30,200
Speaker 1: I'm excited for y'all. I mean, I don't know if

800
00:47:30,400 --> 00:47:32,200
Speaker 1: if motherhood is in the future for me, whatever, but

801
00:47:32,360 --> 00:47:35,400
Speaker 1: for y'all, I'm excited because I see you as humans

802
00:47:35,600 --> 00:47:39,200
Speaker 1: and as mothers and developing these human relationships with your kids.

803
00:47:39,280 --> 00:47:41,120
Speaker 1: And I know, for one thing that me and my mom,

804
00:47:41,600 --> 00:47:43,400
Speaker 1: that's the one thing that we do have. And in

805
00:47:43,480 --> 00:47:46,319
Speaker 1: the sense of knowing when something's going on with your

806
00:47:46,360 --> 00:47:48,440
Speaker 1: mom without or even saying it, I will say that

807
00:47:48,880 --> 00:47:51,360
Speaker 1: in the last years of my grandma. My grandma passed

808
00:47:51,360 --> 00:47:53,160
Speaker 1: a couple of years ago at ninety three, and she

809
00:47:53,320 --> 00:47:56,480
Speaker 1: was going through Alzheimer's for you know, five years before that.

810
00:47:56,600 --> 00:47:59,560
Speaker 1: But I was living in California, FaceTime and my mom

811
00:47:59,640 --> 00:48:02,479
Speaker 1: every day making sure things were good. But I knew

812
00:48:02,760 --> 00:48:04,279
Speaker 1: looking at her face when it was time for me

813
00:48:04,360 --> 00:48:06,200
Speaker 1: to jump on a plane, you know what I mean.

814
00:48:06,480 --> 00:48:08,560
Speaker 1: And so I look at y'all and I go, this

815
00:48:08,719 --> 00:48:10,600
Speaker 1: is this is gonna be so great for the future,

816
00:48:10,680 --> 00:48:13,000
Speaker 1: because it's gonna it's gonna be so great for the

817
00:48:13,080 --> 00:48:15,880
Speaker 1: bond and for what's to come as they get older,

818
00:48:15,960 --> 00:48:18,279
Speaker 1: as you get older, and not having to even say things,

819
00:48:18,360 --> 00:48:22,200
Speaker 1: and then just being there for you. You know. I

820
00:48:22,280 --> 00:48:25,440
Speaker 1: want to say two things, my dear. Number one, I

821
00:48:25,560 --> 00:48:30,520
Speaker 1: want to tell you, friend, you were absolutely incredible with

822
00:48:30,680 --> 00:48:35,240
Speaker 1: your grandmammy. You were You were so present and so loving,

823
00:48:36,000 --> 00:48:39,320
Speaker 1: and you had fun and she laughed with you and

824
00:48:39,480 --> 00:48:43,320
Speaker 1: she danced and it was great as a woman to

825
00:48:43,520 --> 00:48:46,080
Speaker 1: see you that way and to see her that way.

826
00:48:46,160 --> 00:48:48,800
Speaker 1: You did a wonderful job. I know, you know, but

827
00:48:48,920 --> 00:48:51,600
Speaker 1: I'm I'm just throwing it out there, so you just

828
00:48:51,760 --> 00:48:56,080
Speaker 1: amazing to ensure that you know, I enjoyed it you did.

829
00:48:56,400 --> 00:48:59,360
Speaker 1: I mean, having time with three generations of your family

830
00:48:59,440 --> 00:49:01,520
Speaker 1: of women in one room. And that's why I used

831
00:49:01,520 --> 00:49:03,040
Speaker 1: to post it all the time, because I wanted people

832
00:49:03,080 --> 00:49:04,840
Speaker 1: to understand you know I was blessing because I know

833
00:49:04,920 --> 00:49:08,040
Speaker 1: everybody who goes through Alzheimer's it's not always a joyous thing.

834
00:49:08,120 --> 00:49:10,239
Speaker 1: That doesn't always turn you into a joyous person. My

835
00:49:10,320 --> 00:49:12,560
Speaker 1: grandmother was not as joyous as she was when she

836
00:49:12,680 --> 00:49:16,960
Speaker 1: had Alzheimers. Like, but that time that you spend, that

837
00:49:17,080 --> 00:49:19,680
Speaker 1: time that I spent touching her face and like kissing

838
00:49:19,760 --> 00:49:21,640
Speaker 1: her and her like holding me in the bed at night.

839
00:49:21,960 --> 00:49:24,239
Speaker 1: I just want to always encourage people that that is

840
00:49:24,360 --> 00:49:26,680
Speaker 1: like stuff that makes me so close to her now

841
00:49:26,760 --> 00:49:28,439
Speaker 1: where I know I talked to her like she here,

842
00:49:28,560 --> 00:49:30,719
Speaker 1: like it is nothing. I can feel her on my face,

843
00:49:30,800 --> 00:49:32,759
Speaker 1: I feel when she's kissing me. I talked to her

844
00:49:32,760 --> 00:49:34,839
Speaker 1: when I get blessings because I know you over here

845
00:49:34,880 --> 00:49:36,799
Speaker 1: in his ear, I hear you. You know so I'm sorry,

846
00:49:36,840 --> 00:49:39,080
Speaker 1: but I mean thank you. So I'll just say that too.

847
00:49:39,360 --> 00:49:41,880
Speaker 1: Please love on your your elders, just love him up

848
00:49:43,280 --> 00:49:46,680
Speaker 1: and and sorry, sorry, sorry, don't you dare, don't you

849
00:49:46,760 --> 00:49:50,600
Speaker 1: don't have to apologize for anything, age, just don't. And

850
00:49:51,560 --> 00:49:56,359
Speaker 1: what you said, Agia is everything. When you share your

851
00:49:56,480 --> 00:50:01,040
Speaker 1: humanity with your children, you free them. You've freedom and

852
00:50:01,160 --> 00:50:06,640
Speaker 1: that deep kind of unfiltered, unwavering love. That's what we

853
00:50:06,719 --> 00:50:10,680
Speaker 1: need as parents, and it's not easy, but it really

854
00:50:11,080 --> 00:50:16,600
Speaker 1: is worth the trip. We'll be back after the break.

855
00:50:17,880 --> 00:50:28,640
Speaker 1: Coming up next on the show, What's on Your Heart

856
00:50:29,160 --> 00:50:31,200
Speaker 1: an occasional segment where we're check in with people we

857
00:50:31,360 --> 00:50:35,800
Speaker 1: respect about how they're really feeling. Hot on, y'all, I

858
00:50:35,880 --> 00:50:40,640
Speaker 1: think there's somebody calling. That must mean it's time for

859
00:50:41,719 --> 00:50:47,160
Speaker 1: what song? Hot Hey, y'all will see. The thing is,

860
00:50:47,440 --> 00:50:50,000
Speaker 1: this woman is a scholar and an activist whose life

861
00:50:50,040 --> 00:50:53,960
Speaker 1: work is to develop innovative solutions to challenges facing the poor,

862
00:50:54,320 --> 00:50:59,839
Speaker 1: particularly Black mothers and their children. That person is Dr

863
00:51:00,040 --> 00:51:04,479
Speaker 1: Janice Dats Janis Johnson Dyets, but in my life, she's

864
00:51:04,560 --> 00:51:08,640
Speaker 1: the Aga whisperer. So you all get an opportunity to

865
00:51:08,920 --> 00:51:11,840
Speaker 1: hang with her on today and also to she's an author,

866
00:51:12,160 --> 00:51:15,879
Speaker 1: she's a PhD. She's the mother of Marley Das, who

867
00:51:16,080 --> 00:51:19,520
Speaker 1: is the thousand Black Girl books. Young activists don't get

868
00:51:19,560 --> 00:51:21,800
Speaker 1: to drop in Asia and the author of Parents Like

869
00:51:21,920 --> 00:51:26,040
Speaker 1: It matters how to raise joyful, change making girls. That's

870
00:51:26,080 --> 00:51:28,480
Speaker 1: what happens when you guys trust me with the intro.

871
00:51:28,880 --> 00:51:31,479
Speaker 1: I leave the important stuff out. That's why y'all gotta

872
00:51:31,520 --> 00:51:35,080
Speaker 1: stop giving me these responsibilities. You said it was important

873
00:51:35,080 --> 00:51:37,960
Speaker 1: to us, That's all it was import exactly. Well, thank you,

874
00:51:38,080 --> 00:51:40,479
Speaker 1: thank you, thank you. I am delighted to be here.

875
00:51:40,600 --> 00:51:42,800
Speaker 1: I'm a big fan of the show. I listened to

876
00:51:42,920 --> 00:51:46,360
Speaker 1: the show as Asia. No. I have lots of thoughts

877
00:51:46,400 --> 00:51:48,920
Speaker 1: on the show. On every episode, I have extra thoughts

878
00:51:49,320 --> 00:51:52,480
Speaker 1: on everything. So I am excited to be here. There's

879
00:51:52,480 --> 00:51:55,600
Speaker 1: a lot of things on my heart today, but probably

880
00:51:55,640 --> 00:51:59,440
Speaker 1: the biggest one is I've been thinking about the power

881
00:51:59,600 --> 00:52:03,400
Speaker 1: of so realization, the power of our childhood and the

882
00:52:03,520 --> 00:52:07,280
Speaker 1: stuff that we learn as children and how they stay

883
00:52:07,400 --> 00:52:11,759
Speaker 1: with us, particularly the things that we love and the

884
00:52:11,920 --> 00:52:16,480
Speaker 1: things that we found challenging about our parents. And you know,

885
00:52:16,600 --> 00:52:18,760
Speaker 1: like we get to a certain age and we wonder

886
00:52:18,840 --> 00:52:22,560
Speaker 1: why we're behaving like our parents and why we take

887
00:52:22,640 --> 00:52:26,000
Speaker 1: on their attributes, etcetera. And I just keep thinking about

888
00:52:26,560 --> 00:52:31,200
Speaker 1: what kids are exposed to, the values, the ideas, the

889
00:52:31,360 --> 00:52:34,520
Speaker 1: practices in their household, and how that just takes a

890
00:52:34,640 --> 00:52:38,720
Speaker 1: hold of you at this deep, deep level and doesn't

891
00:52:38,800 --> 00:52:42,920
Speaker 1: let you go. And for me, this is important because

892
00:52:43,640 --> 00:52:47,400
Speaker 1: you know, I'm interested in children and their development. I'm

893
00:52:47,440 --> 00:52:51,600
Speaker 1: also interested in how we create more generations of children

894
00:52:51,640 --> 00:52:56,120
Speaker 1: who are going to positively impact the world. And if

895
00:52:56,200 --> 00:53:00,840
Speaker 1: you're early socialization says that the notions of justice and

896
00:53:01,000 --> 00:53:06,640
Speaker 1: truth and morality are just about you and yours, then

897
00:53:06,760 --> 00:53:08,799
Speaker 1: we really don't end up getting people who are really

898
00:53:08,880 --> 00:53:12,719
Speaker 1: invested in reorganized or restructuring the world. And so that

899
00:53:12,880 --> 00:53:16,840
Speaker 1: early engagement has kind of become obsessive to me about

900
00:53:16,960 --> 00:53:19,160
Speaker 1: what we're showing our kids and what we're saying to

901
00:53:19,280 --> 00:53:23,360
Speaker 1: them really early on, about what they should value, and

902
00:53:23,840 --> 00:53:26,960
Speaker 1: what our own actions, the things that we do, what

903
00:53:27,239 --> 00:53:30,520
Speaker 1: messages our children extract from watching us do those things.

904
00:53:30,760 --> 00:53:33,000
Speaker 1: So that that's probably the biggest thing on my my

905
00:53:33,160 --> 00:53:35,880
Speaker 1: head today because I watched my husband do some stuff

906
00:53:36,640 --> 00:53:40,200
Speaker 1: and I was like, I must start learned that real early.

907
00:53:40,520 --> 00:53:43,840
Speaker 1: You must have learned that real early. And I watched

908
00:53:43,880 --> 00:53:46,600
Speaker 1: myself do stuff, and I know I learned it really early,

909
00:53:47,200 --> 00:53:50,160
Speaker 1: and I didn't let it go. Like my whole framework

910
00:53:50,440 --> 00:53:53,240
Speaker 1: for the work I do isn't because I have a PhD.

911
00:53:53,320 --> 00:53:57,120
Speaker 1: It's my grandmother, right, my grandmother. When I was a kid,

912
00:53:57,880 --> 00:54:00,680
Speaker 1: my grandmother had this particular practice. There were thirteen of

913
00:54:00,800 --> 00:54:05,400
Speaker 1: us living in retreat St. Mary, and she and my

914
00:54:05,520 --> 00:54:08,359
Speaker 1: grand aunts and my aunt joys. Please tell these people

915
00:54:08,360 --> 00:54:11,040
Speaker 1: where retreats St. Mary Is. So, I was born in

916
00:54:11,200 --> 00:54:14,080
Speaker 1: sant Ancis Bay Hospital in Jamaica, and I grew up

917
00:54:14,080 --> 00:54:16,440
Speaker 1: in a town of four hundred and thirty three people

918
00:54:17,160 --> 00:54:21,960
Speaker 1: in and I lived for the first nine years of

919
00:54:22,120 --> 00:54:26,919
Speaker 1: my life ten without electricity, running water, indoor running water,

920
00:54:27,040 --> 00:54:30,759
Speaker 1: indoor plumbing, etcetera. And walked, you know, somewhere between three

921
00:54:30,800 --> 00:54:34,200
Speaker 1: to five miles each day. So when Dr Janis says

922
00:54:34,360 --> 00:54:36,640
Speaker 1: I used to walk barefoot in the snow, well not

923
00:54:36,760 --> 00:54:41,040
Speaker 1: the snow, because that's Jamaica. Wait wait when when Dr

924
00:54:41,160 --> 00:54:46,279
Speaker 1: Janis tells that story, she's telling the real story. So

925
00:54:46,640 --> 00:54:50,360
Speaker 1: in in nineteen eighty we moved to Kingston with indoor

926
00:54:50,440 --> 00:54:52,879
Speaker 1: plumbing and electricity, et cetera. But I grew up where

927
00:54:52,920 --> 00:54:55,759
Speaker 1: we salted the meat in order to have it for

928
00:54:55,840 --> 00:54:59,560
Speaker 1: the next day, where the kitchen outside where my grand

929
00:54:59,560 --> 00:55:03,360
Speaker 1: aunt and my cousins we cooked, and we had rabbits

930
00:55:03,400 --> 00:55:06,160
Speaker 1: and chickens and the cows. You had to and before

931
00:55:06,200 --> 00:55:08,279
Speaker 1: school you wake up and you get a couple and tea,

932
00:55:08,600 --> 00:55:11,080
Speaker 1: You walk a couple of miles. You have to go

933
00:55:11,440 --> 00:55:15,759
Speaker 1: tend to things. They come back in. You have planted avocado,

934
00:55:15,880 --> 00:55:18,000
Speaker 1: piece of hard or bread, and some tea and then

935
00:55:18,000 --> 00:55:24,560
Speaker 1: you walk. So thirteen of us and um we were privileged,

936
00:55:26,080 --> 00:55:29,960
Speaker 1: which is funny to say. We were supremely because we

937
00:55:30,120 --> 00:55:33,040
Speaker 1: owned the land we lived on and we had more

938
00:55:33,120 --> 00:55:37,800
Speaker 1: resources than many. So before dinner every night, my grandmother

939
00:55:38,040 --> 00:55:40,359
Speaker 1: would have us paired up those of us who were

940
00:55:40,440 --> 00:55:44,520
Speaker 1: like five, our six and younger, and then my older brothers.

941
00:55:44,680 --> 00:55:47,680
Speaker 1: My brothers are eight and six years older than me.

942
00:55:48,320 --> 00:55:52,000
Speaker 1: We had to deliver food two people in the community.

943
00:55:52,120 --> 00:55:53,839
Speaker 1: She told us they were our family. We had more

944
00:55:53,880 --> 00:55:57,520
Speaker 1: resources in them because we had cattle, we had um land,

945
00:55:57,600 --> 00:56:00,040
Speaker 1: so you know, like you grow cocoa, banana planting of

946
00:56:00,120 --> 00:56:02,279
Speaker 1: our set stuff. They would make the dinner and we

947
00:56:02,440 --> 00:56:05,120
Speaker 1: take it to people, and you had to do that

948
00:56:05,160 --> 00:56:07,600
Speaker 1: before you could eat your dinner. So you do that,

949
00:56:07,880 --> 00:56:09,839
Speaker 1: you walk a mile or two, you drop off the food,

950
00:56:10,000 --> 00:56:11,960
Speaker 1: you come back, and then you can eat dinner. And

951
00:56:12,400 --> 00:56:16,439
Speaker 1: when my grandmother died, all these people were at the church.

952
00:56:16,640 --> 00:56:20,000
Speaker 1: We went to an Anglican church in retreat, and I

953
00:56:20,200 --> 00:56:22,200
Speaker 1: was joking with my mother. I was like, Yo, don't

954
00:56:22,239 --> 00:56:24,000
Speaker 1: these people know how to use a condom? Like why

955
00:56:24,080 --> 00:56:28,800
Speaker 1: do we have so many in this family? Right? My

956
00:56:29,120 --> 00:56:32,759
Speaker 1: mother said to me they're not family. I was like,

957
00:56:33,600 --> 00:56:36,719
Speaker 1: so you're telling me, Mr, my whole life give these

958
00:56:36,760 --> 00:56:39,440
Speaker 1: people food and I have not related to to them

959
00:56:39,480 --> 00:56:41,840
Speaker 1: at all. And she's like, no, it was the tradition

960
00:56:41,920 --> 00:56:44,880
Speaker 1: of her mother before her and her mother before her

961
00:56:45,480 --> 00:56:50,040
Speaker 1: that if you have surplus, you share, right. And so

962
00:56:50,200 --> 00:56:52,080
Speaker 1: I think about the work that I do now that

963
00:56:52,200 --> 00:56:55,600
Speaker 1: people attribute to a whole host of things, and I

964
00:56:55,680 --> 00:56:58,880
Speaker 1: think about that early, that early training of what it

965
00:56:59,000 --> 00:57:02,160
Speaker 1: means to be in community with people and to share

966
00:57:02,200 --> 00:57:05,040
Speaker 1: your surplus. And so those are the things that stay

967
00:57:05,120 --> 00:57:08,160
Speaker 1: on my mind. What like what what values do we

968
00:57:08,320 --> 00:57:12,680
Speaker 1: learn really early and how we end up expressing them?

969
00:57:12,800 --> 00:57:16,720
Speaker 1: And I'm just grateful that the value of reciprocity, generosity

970
00:57:16,760 --> 00:57:19,160
Speaker 1: and community was one that was so central to my

971
00:57:19,240 --> 00:57:23,880
Speaker 1: development that now I can operationalize it by forming foundations,

972
00:57:24,000 --> 00:57:29,000
Speaker 1: raising a kid, building stuff. So that's what's on my mind. Yes,

973
00:57:30,360 --> 00:57:33,920
Speaker 1: let me ask you this. So a big catchphrase right

974
00:57:33,960 --> 00:57:35,760
Speaker 1: now or thing that people are hearing a lot is

975
00:57:35,800 --> 00:57:40,280
Speaker 1: I want to raise free black children. And it's kind

976
00:57:40,320 --> 00:57:43,080
Speaker 1: of vague for me, to be honest, trying to wrap

977
00:57:43,160 --> 00:57:45,720
Speaker 1: my mind around what does a free black child look like?

978
00:57:45,880 --> 00:57:48,360
Speaker 1: What do they sound like? How do they walk, how

979
00:57:48,400 --> 00:57:52,640
Speaker 1: do they talk? And I just am curious to hear

980
00:57:52,920 --> 00:57:56,520
Speaker 1: what does this free black child look like to you? No,

981
00:57:56,880 --> 00:57:58,959
Speaker 1: I mean I don't. I don't actually don't think about

982
00:57:59,000 --> 00:58:03,120
Speaker 1: free black children very much. I really think about free

983
00:58:03,360 --> 00:58:06,120
Speaker 1: black adults. And I just don't think you can have

984
00:58:06,280 --> 00:58:11,360
Speaker 1: free Black children without adults being free, because if adults

985
00:58:11,400 --> 00:58:15,520
Speaker 1: are in bondage, quite frankly, how can their children be free. Literally,

986
00:58:15,600 --> 00:58:17,320
Speaker 1: just sitting here thinking that, I was like, am I free?

987
00:58:18,600 --> 00:58:20,440
Speaker 1: Adults need to be in the business of trying to

988
00:58:20,480 --> 00:58:23,440
Speaker 1: be free. And one of the ways I think adults,

989
00:58:23,520 --> 00:58:27,720
Speaker 1: particularly Black folks, got to think about freedom is the

990
00:58:27,840 --> 00:58:30,600
Speaker 1: one they need, an operative definition that you can actually

991
00:58:30,640 --> 00:58:37,000
Speaker 1: agree upon. Right, Yes, you know, individual families can have

992
00:58:37,120 --> 00:58:40,640
Speaker 1: notions of freedom. For many black communities and black members,

993
00:58:40,720 --> 00:58:44,160
Speaker 1: freedom is having enough money, right, So, like there's economic

994
00:58:44,560 --> 00:58:49,320
Speaker 1: and clearly you can without economic liberty, like you you

995
00:58:49,480 --> 00:58:54,000
Speaker 1: if you can afford to eat and grow and take

996
00:58:54,040 --> 00:58:56,920
Speaker 1: care of yourself, then I don't I don't know how

997
00:58:57,000 --> 00:59:01,160
Speaker 1: freedom is particularly possible. That's why freedom and economic justice

998
00:59:01,240 --> 00:59:04,320
Speaker 1: have to be linked. Um, but you need to kind

999
00:59:04,320 --> 00:59:08,000
Speaker 1: of freedom in your soul, right are free from bondage

1000
00:59:08,080 --> 00:59:12,040
Speaker 1: kind of stuff where when you lay at night, you

1001
00:59:12,200 --> 00:59:15,920
Speaker 1: feel peaceful, right like, So our work goes around this

1002
00:59:16,000 --> 00:59:19,240
Speaker 1: principle of my aunt. And in my aunts it says like,

1003
00:59:19,360 --> 00:59:21,640
Speaker 1: at the end of the nights, your soul feel as

1004
00:59:21,760 --> 00:59:24,680
Speaker 1: light as a feather, and you have these forty two

1005
00:59:24,760 --> 00:59:28,120
Speaker 1: principles that you recite in the morning, right and these

1006
00:59:28,160 --> 00:59:31,360
Speaker 1: principles says, it's a pledge. I affirmed that I will

1007
00:59:31,440 --> 00:59:34,360
Speaker 1: not lie. I affirmed that I will not engage in

1008
00:59:34,520 --> 00:59:36,880
Speaker 1: things that harm my community. I affirmed that I will

1009
00:59:36,920 --> 00:59:38,640
Speaker 1: do these things. So you you make this kind of

1010
00:59:38,720 --> 00:59:41,120
Speaker 1: promise each day, and at the end of the day,

1011
00:59:41,720 --> 00:59:44,360
Speaker 1: you then said to say, I did not lie, I

1012
00:59:44,520 --> 00:59:47,280
Speaker 1: did not harm, I did not do these things. So

1013
00:59:48,080 --> 00:59:51,000
Speaker 1: in that respect, your spirit is then filled with levity

1014
00:59:51,240 --> 00:59:54,400
Speaker 1: and it is as a feather. So I think if

1015
00:59:54,480 --> 00:59:57,000
Speaker 1: individuals make a pledge in the morning to live a

1016
00:59:57,080 --> 00:59:59,240
Speaker 1: life of freedom. So I think, if you do those

1017
00:59:59,320 --> 01:00:02,280
Speaker 1: things and then you feel really free to the idea

1018
01:00:02,360 --> 01:00:04,400
Speaker 1: that's in my head, which is like, then you passed

1019
01:00:04,440 --> 01:00:07,240
Speaker 1: that on you, You raise your children that way, your

1020
01:00:07,240 --> 01:00:10,520
Speaker 1: communities that way, and then children grow into that, and

1021
01:00:10,640 --> 01:00:13,760
Speaker 1: then we can have aspirations for their life beyond this

1022
01:00:13,920 --> 01:00:16,360
Speaker 1: moment and for them to be free. But I think

1023
01:00:16,400 --> 01:00:18,880
Speaker 1: freedom should be really at the end of the day,

1024
01:00:19,160 --> 01:00:23,960
Speaker 1: it's like, the investment in their freedom is the investment

1025
01:00:24,000 --> 01:00:27,920
Speaker 1: in your own freedom. If you're not fully invested and

1026
01:00:28,040 --> 01:00:31,520
Speaker 1: engaged in that, then you're not doing this future work.

1027
01:00:31,920 --> 01:00:34,800
Speaker 1: You are not doing this future work. And for us,

1028
01:00:35,040 --> 01:00:38,520
Speaker 1: for for black mothers, this is not the discussion. Come

1029
01:00:38,600 --> 01:00:42,280
Speaker 1: on now, This is not the discussion anyone was having

1030
01:00:42,360 --> 01:00:46,600
Speaker 1: with us prior to having any dead on children. No,

1031
01:00:47,320 --> 01:00:50,800
Speaker 1: this is not nobody's talking. So this book, I say

1032
01:00:50,800 --> 01:00:53,440
Speaker 1: any thing, which I know is going to be irritating,

1033
01:00:53,560 --> 01:00:56,880
Speaker 1: but it's very important. Is precisely that light. Yeah, I say,

1034
01:00:57,400 --> 01:01:00,680
Speaker 1: you cannot have joyful change making girls if you don't

1035
01:01:00,760 --> 01:01:05,200
Speaker 1: have joyful change making parents, particularly joyful change making mamas,

1036
01:01:05,680 --> 01:01:08,880
Speaker 1: You're not. It's just not gonna happen. It's not like

1037
01:01:09,360 --> 01:01:11,520
Speaker 1: the do as I say, not as I do, that

1038
01:01:11,600 --> 01:01:14,760
Speaker 1: ain't gonna work out. It ain't gonna work. So if

1039
01:01:14,880 --> 01:01:17,840
Speaker 1: you want whatever you want for your children, you should

1040
01:01:17,920 --> 01:01:20,800
Speaker 1: be it. Come on book so you can model them.

1041
01:01:21,000 --> 01:01:23,840
Speaker 1: One more time, is that whatever you want for your children,

1042
01:01:24,040 --> 01:01:26,840
Speaker 1: you need to be it so that they can see

1043
01:01:26,920 --> 01:01:30,320
Speaker 1: the model of what is possible. And that is very

1044
01:01:30,440 --> 01:01:33,360
Speaker 1: different from the way many of us were raised. And

1045
01:01:33,520 --> 01:01:36,440
Speaker 1: can I say this one little thing is that whatever

1046
01:01:36,520 --> 01:01:39,080
Speaker 1: you want to be, also you need to sort out

1047
01:01:39,200 --> 01:01:41,360
Speaker 1: what you want to be, what you want your children

1048
01:01:41,440 --> 01:01:44,080
Speaker 1: to be, because whatever it is you have to be you,

1049
01:01:44,320 --> 01:01:46,320
Speaker 1: you have to be that first. But make sure what

1050
01:01:46,440 --> 01:01:48,600
Speaker 1: you're trying to be you just sort of that out.

1051
01:01:49,960 --> 01:01:52,280
Speaker 1: It is okay because some of us be trying to

1052
01:01:52,360 --> 01:01:54,240
Speaker 1: be some ship. We don't need to be trying to be.

1053
01:01:54,880 --> 01:01:57,120
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm just gonna put that out there. Okay,

1054
01:01:57,520 --> 01:02:04,880
Speaker 1: somebody's sort it out. Take the slow man. Whoa. I'm

1055
01:02:05,000 --> 01:02:08,880
Speaker 1: telling you right now that that it feels like you

1056
01:02:09,040 --> 01:02:14,560
Speaker 1: just dropped a weight on my head and shoulders. That

1057
01:02:15,240 --> 01:02:20,600
Speaker 1: is both terrifying and exciting when somebody offers you freedom,

1058
01:02:23,280 --> 01:02:26,640
Speaker 1: when somebody offers you freedom on the platter here it is.

1059
01:02:27,000 --> 01:02:29,760
Speaker 1: That's how you get it. Gavin An, your kids gave

1060
01:02:29,840 --> 01:02:37,640
Speaker 1: it to that. Yo. I I gotta hold myself. I

1061
01:02:37,720 --> 01:02:42,760
Speaker 1: got to hold my monel goodness, it seems to reason

1062
01:02:42,880 --> 01:02:51,080
Speaker 1: out that accountability accountability it is. It's your it's your story,

1063
01:02:51,240 --> 01:02:53,640
Speaker 1: your children are in it. I mean, I think that

1064
01:02:53,800 --> 01:02:56,040
Speaker 1: the way that we've done parenting is to say that

1065
01:02:56,080 --> 01:02:59,560
Speaker 1: the kids are the star of the story, then the protagonist,

1066
01:03:00,000 --> 01:03:04,040
Speaker 1: and you are somehow an extra in the story. Right.

1067
01:03:04,160 --> 01:03:06,120
Speaker 1: So we said, I gotta pour everything into my kid.

1068
01:03:06,560 --> 01:03:08,640
Speaker 1: I just gotta, I gotta pour it into I'm doing

1069
01:03:08,720 --> 01:03:12,960
Speaker 1: it for my kid, and I'm like, you anna have

1070
01:03:13,120 --> 01:03:17,160
Speaker 1: to be a leading main character in the story. And

1071
01:03:18,320 --> 01:03:20,600
Speaker 1: that I think is hard because then you get to

1072
01:03:20,680 --> 01:03:23,160
Speaker 1: like be like the reason I'm working so late, the

1073
01:03:23,240 --> 01:03:25,640
Speaker 1: reason I'm doing all of this, the reason I'm not exercise,

1074
01:03:25,680 --> 01:03:27,600
Speaker 1: and the reason I'm not sleeping, it's because i have

1075
01:03:27,720 --> 01:03:30,440
Speaker 1: to do this for my kids, right, And so you

1076
01:03:30,640 --> 01:03:34,720
Speaker 1: get to under prioritize yourself and you get to feel

1077
01:03:34,760 --> 01:03:39,200
Speaker 1: pious and great because you did it all for your kids.

1078
01:03:39,480 --> 01:03:43,360
Speaker 1: And then those same children don't want any of the

1079
01:03:43,480 --> 01:03:46,560
Speaker 1: things that you have done because they barely saw it going.

1080
01:03:47,280 --> 01:03:51,560
Speaker 1: They always saw the bed walking out the door, and

1081
01:03:52,240 --> 01:03:56,680
Speaker 1: you didn't. You didn't sell the seat you planted. So

1082
01:03:56,880 --> 01:03:59,959
Speaker 1: in the book, I have a chapter, the shortest chapter,

1083
01:04:00,000 --> 01:04:04,560
Speaker 1: they're devoted to this thing called ACE adverse Childhood Experiences,

1084
01:04:04,720 --> 01:04:07,760
Speaker 1: and I say, you need to know your aces, right,

1085
01:04:07,840 --> 01:04:12,960
Speaker 1: you need to know where you experience some level of trauma.

1086
01:04:13,720 --> 01:04:16,920
Speaker 1: And I give an exercise so each chapter has assignments

1087
01:04:16,960 --> 01:04:19,800
Speaker 1: and exercises, so you like them, you can go to them.

1088
01:04:19,880 --> 01:04:22,200
Speaker 1: You don't like that one, you can try another one. Right,

1089
01:04:22,240 --> 01:04:24,600
Speaker 1: So every single chapter has it, and it teaches you

1090
01:04:24,840 --> 01:04:28,640
Speaker 1: how to go through your aces. Know your aces, have

1091
01:04:28,760 --> 01:04:32,760
Speaker 1: an understanding of your aces, and once you've attended to them,

1092
01:04:33,400 --> 01:04:36,320
Speaker 1: then you're in a position to really find joy for yourself.

1093
01:04:36,760 --> 01:04:41,720
Speaker 1: Right And you can't aspire for people. Even your children

1094
01:04:41,720 --> 01:04:44,280
Speaker 1: are people, right Like, once they leave you, they they

1095
01:04:44,400 --> 01:04:47,840
Speaker 1: own people. You can't aspire for people what you have

1096
01:04:48,000 --> 01:04:50,080
Speaker 1: not achieved for yourself. It is one of the things

1097
01:04:50,120 --> 01:04:52,520
Speaker 1: I say all the time about teachers, right Like, I

1098
01:04:52,640 --> 01:04:54,520
Speaker 1: tell teachers all the time. I was like, you can't

1099
01:04:54,520 --> 01:04:57,280
Speaker 1: inspire great messy were great, right Like, once you work

1100
01:04:57,320 --> 01:05:00,840
Speaker 1: on your greatness that you can inspire greatness. And right like,

1101
01:05:01,280 --> 01:05:03,400
Speaker 1: I need you to invest in your development. And I

1102
01:05:03,480 --> 01:05:06,640
Speaker 1: think institutions have to invest in teachers because they're trying

1103
01:05:06,760 --> 01:05:09,120
Speaker 1: to educate the next generation. So like, if you don't

1104
01:05:09,160 --> 01:05:12,160
Speaker 1: invest in teachers, then you're not gonna get greatness out

1105
01:05:12,240 --> 01:05:15,439
Speaker 1: of your children. So I'm like, ma'am, sir, you ain't

1106
01:05:15,440 --> 01:05:18,640
Speaker 1: great though, you're not imaginative for interest in So it's

1107
01:05:18,640 --> 01:05:21,600
Speaker 1: all right, right, So I think it's the same thing

1108
01:05:21,680 --> 01:05:24,560
Speaker 1: for caregivers. Caregivers want their children to be great. But

1109
01:05:24,640 --> 01:05:26,800
Speaker 1: I'm like, how are you great? I gotta ask you

1110
01:05:26,920 --> 01:05:29,240
Speaker 1: to We're talking about a lot of self work, and

1111
01:05:29,960 --> 01:05:33,400
Speaker 1: some people don't necessarily see that this kind of work

1112
01:05:33,800 --> 01:05:38,640
Speaker 1: is tied into let's say public life. And I really

1113
01:05:38,760 --> 01:05:42,320
Speaker 1: want you to help us in this moment to tie

1114
01:05:42,800 --> 01:05:46,360
Speaker 1: what it seems like a very personal investment into what

1115
01:05:46,640 --> 01:05:52,520
Speaker 1: that looks like and let's say public health and law,

1116
01:05:52,920 --> 01:05:55,800
Speaker 1: politics and all these kinds of things. So how how

1117
01:05:55,840 --> 01:05:59,640
Speaker 1: do we go out into the world and present this systemically?

1118
01:06:00,200 --> 01:06:04,680
Speaker 1: All right? So I make an argument that joyfulness is

1119
01:06:05,000 --> 01:06:13,800
Speaker 1: intricately linked to change making, all right, all right? So right,

1120
01:06:14,320 --> 01:06:23,880
Speaker 1: so alright, so work that's sober it is the work

1121
01:06:24,000 --> 01:06:27,640
Speaker 1: of gratitude, Like this is the work of gratitude. You're

1122
01:06:27,720 --> 01:06:34,320
Speaker 1: groups before, right, Grateful people are reciprocal people given people,

1123
01:06:34,520 --> 01:06:39,200
Speaker 1: because when you're grateful, you share, you have an abundance. Right.

1124
01:06:39,640 --> 01:06:44,480
Speaker 1: Change making is about reciprocity. It is about caring for

1125
01:06:44,760 --> 01:06:48,960
Speaker 1: and being connected to your community. So when you're given,

1126
01:06:49,680 --> 01:06:52,800
Speaker 1: you are not given in a way that says but not,

1127
01:06:52,840 --> 01:06:55,520
Speaker 1: I gotta help y'all because y'all suck. You're given in

1128
01:06:55,600 --> 01:07:00,080
Speaker 1: an abundance framework, and therefore you can think beyond on

1129
01:07:00,240 --> 01:07:03,880
Speaker 1: this moment to think about how we can give to

1130
01:07:04,120 --> 01:07:06,520
Speaker 1: change structures. So let me walk you through just a

1131
01:07:06,600 --> 01:07:09,680
Speaker 1: little bit from a different angle. If you are joyful,

1132
01:07:09,880 --> 01:07:14,800
Speaker 1: if you have this internal optimism and gratitude and this

1133
01:07:15,000 --> 01:07:18,920
Speaker 1: feeling of reciprocity inside of you, you are also thinking

1134
01:07:18,960 --> 01:07:22,200
Speaker 1: about future generations to ensure that they also have it.

1135
01:07:23,400 --> 01:07:25,320
Speaker 1: So that is going to allow you to take stock

1136
01:07:25,400 --> 01:07:28,280
Speaker 1: of the inequities that are present. So you're gonna take

1137
01:07:28,360 --> 01:07:34,360
Speaker 1: stock of racism, sexism, homophobia, agism, able ism, and you're

1138
01:07:34,400 --> 01:07:37,640
Speaker 1: gonna say that these things will interrupt people's ability to

1139
01:07:37,760 --> 01:07:42,000
Speaker 1: feel gratitude and reciprocal And because you feel this way,

1140
01:07:42,640 --> 01:07:46,200
Speaker 1: this goodness, this internal goodness, you're going to want to

1141
01:07:46,280 --> 01:07:49,720
Speaker 1: be in relationship with other people who feel that community

1142
01:07:49,960 --> 01:07:55,280
Speaker 1: and connectedness. For change to occur, it requires that we

1143
01:07:55,440 --> 01:08:01,280
Speaker 1: are even more connected two people. So joyful people are connected,

1144
01:08:01,360 --> 01:08:05,560
Speaker 1: people who have gratitudes and notion of reciprocity, who are

1145
01:08:05,680 --> 01:08:09,439
Speaker 1: thinking about ways to make the world and themselves better

1146
01:08:09,960 --> 01:08:14,000
Speaker 1: for the future. So by their very nature, they're committed

1147
01:08:14,320 --> 01:08:18,800
Speaker 1: to change making, which is what we call social activism, etcetera.

1148
01:08:20,200 --> 01:08:23,280
Speaker 1: But you cannot do that and have the optimism to

1149
01:08:23,479 --> 01:08:26,080
Speaker 1: keep doing it each day, to stand on the hill,

1150
01:08:26,200 --> 01:08:29,559
Speaker 1: to register people to vote, to change systems, to feed people,

1151
01:08:29,640 --> 01:08:33,200
Speaker 1: to fight racism, to rewrite, to sing songs that says

1152
01:08:33,280 --> 01:08:36,200
Speaker 1: that people matter, to love on each other, to hold

1153
01:08:36,240 --> 01:08:38,680
Speaker 1: each other's hand, if you don't have that joy, So

1154
01:08:39,320 --> 01:08:43,960
Speaker 1: that's that comes out that to anybody else here and

1155
01:08:44,080 --> 01:08:50,280
Speaker 1: explosion I did, and Teddy Penderbras I did. Ladies and gentlemen,

1156
01:08:50,439 --> 01:08:54,840
Speaker 1: I suggest that you wholeheartedly go back and listen to

1157
01:08:54,960 --> 01:09:03,679
Speaker 1: this particular conversation again and again and again and again.

1158
01:09:04,400 --> 01:09:12,280
Speaker 1: That's because I certainly will. I certainly will. There are

1159
01:09:12,360 --> 01:09:15,360
Speaker 1: times when we get together and we have these conversations

1160
01:09:15,400 --> 01:09:18,160
Speaker 1: and we're all just going going back and forth and

1161
01:09:18,520 --> 01:09:22,200
Speaker 1: throwing out ideas and thoughts and feelings. This is one

1162
01:09:22,640 --> 01:09:26,160
Speaker 1: where I just had to shut the fuck up and listen.

1163
01:09:26,880 --> 01:09:31,240
Speaker 1: And that is an art of communication and art of conversation.

1164
01:09:31,840 --> 01:09:34,400
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for being with us, Thank you

1165
01:09:34,520 --> 01:09:45,680
Speaker 1: for sharing your insights. Dr Janice Johnson, Diez God God, Whoamica? Jamkeup?

1166
01:09:56,720 --> 01:10:07,640
Speaker 1: How do you eat an elephant? One by side? What's up? Y'all. It'

1167
01:10:07,720 --> 01:10:10,360
Speaker 1: Steves again a producer on the show, and I am

1168
01:10:10,439 --> 01:10:13,799
Speaker 1: here to bring you the resources as usual, and today

1169
01:10:13,880 --> 01:10:16,799
Speaker 1: I'll give another shout out to Dr Janice Johnson Dias

1170
01:10:16,880 --> 01:10:20,080
Speaker 1: this book which is fresh off the press. It's called

1171
01:10:20,320 --> 01:10:24,360
Speaker 1: Parents Like It Matters how to raise joyful, change making girls.

1172
01:10:24,960 --> 01:10:27,320
Speaker 1: And even if you don't have daughters or are not

1173
01:10:27,560 --> 01:10:29,560
Speaker 1: a parent, it can be a good tool to have

1174
01:10:29,840 --> 01:10:32,599
Speaker 1: in the tool shed if you are invested in self

1175
01:10:32,680 --> 01:10:35,920
Speaker 1: development and soul work, as Dr Johnson Dias puts it.

1176
01:10:36,560 --> 01:10:39,040
Speaker 1: And of course we can take the time to acknowledge

1177
01:10:39,080 --> 01:10:41,920
Speaker 1: that our mothers our whole human beings. All right, y'all.

1178
01:10:42,040 --> 01:10:48,439
Speaker 1: Until next time, we want to thank you so much

1179
01:10:48,479 --> 01:10:51,000
Speaker 1: for listening to us today. It has been a pleasure.

1180
01:10:51,360 --> 01:10:59,439
Speaker 1: Jay dot Ill Yeah, yeah, the laugh of just silly.

1181
01:11:03,080 --> 01:11:06,240
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to Jill Scott presents j dot

1182
01:11:06,320 --> 01:11:26,839
Speaker 1: Il the Podcast. This podcast is hosted by Jill Scott,

1183
01:11:27,000 --> 01:11:31,560
Speaker 1: Layah st Clair and Agent Graden Danceler. It's executive producers

1184
01:11:31,600 --> 01:11:35,200
Speaker 1: are Jill Scott, Shawn g and Brian Calhoun. It's produced

1185
01:11:35,240 --> 01:11:39,120
Speaker 1: by La st Clair and Medves. Jeff Coke. The editing

1186
01:11:39,160 --> 01:11:42,680
Speaker 1: and sound design for this episode We're Done by Christina Larenger.

1187
01:11:46,680 --> 01:11:50,120
Speaker 1: J dot Ill is a production of I heart Radio.

1188
01:11:50,520 --> 01:11:53,800
Speaker 1: For more podcast from I heart Radio, visit the I

1189
01:11:54,000 --> 01:11:58,320
Speaker 1: heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to

1190
01:11:58,439 --> 01:11:59,519
Speaker 1: your favorite shows.