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The Therapy for Black Girls podcast is your space to explore mental health, personal development, and all the small decisions we can make to become the best possible versions of ourselves.
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I m your host, Dr. Joy Harden-Bradford, a licensed psychologist in Atlanta, Georgia, and I can t wait for you to join the conversation every Wednesday.
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Listen to the Therapy for Black Girls podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
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Take good care, and we ll see you there.
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Tune in to the new podcast, Stories from the Village of Nothing Much.
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Like, easy listening, but for fiction.
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If you ve overdosed on bad news, we invite you into a world where the glimmers of goodness in everyday life are all around you.
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I m Catherine Nicholai, and I m an architect of cozy.
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Come spend some time where everyone is welcome and the default is kindness.
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Listen, relax, enjoy.
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Listen to stories from the village of nothing much on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
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Get emotional with me, Radhi Devlukia, in my new podcast, A Really Good Cry.
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We re going to be talking with some of my best friends.
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I didn t know we were going to go there.
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people that I admire.
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When we say listen to your body, really tune in to what s going on.
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Authors of books that have changed my life.
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Now you re talking about sympathy, which is different than empathy, right?
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Never forget, it s okay to cry as long as you make it a really good one.
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Listen to A Really Good Cry with Radhi Devlukia on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
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I want to wake up more happy than depressed.
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I want to enjoy life.
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I m not the final form of myself.
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I don t know what that s going to be.
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He s one of the most influential voices in morning radio.
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Yep, it s the world s most dangerous morning show, The Breakfast Club.
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Charlamagne s the guy.
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I had no idea who I was.
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There was this character that had been created named Charlamagne.
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I m like, I don t know who this person is.
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At some point, I remember saying to myself, well, what s wrong with me?
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I thought it was OK.
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Hey everyone, I ve got some huge news to share with you.
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In the last 90 days, 79.4% of our audience came from viewers and listeners that are not subscribed to this channel.
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There s research that shows that if you want to create a habit, make it easy to access.
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By hitting the subscribe button, you re creating a habit of learning how to be happier, healthier, and more healed.
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This would also mean the absolute world to me and help us make better, bigger, brighter content for you in the world.
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Subscribe right now.
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Hey everyone, welcome back to On Purpose, the place you come to become happier, healthier, and more healed.
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I m so grateful that you re lending me your eyes and your ears for this time, investing in your growth.
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And today s guest is someone who I m so grateful to because he came on the show back
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five years ago when we were just starting out, the platform was not established and I d reached out to him and I said, hey, I d love to interview you.
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He came on as one of our earliest guests, did me a massive favor.
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Over the last few years, I ve been on his incredible show, The Breakfast Club.
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so many times now some of my favorite conversations brings out a different side of me i get to have a honest vulnerable truthful reflective conversation and he s a new york times bestseller and his new book is out right now it s called get honest or die lying why small talk sucks i m talking about the one the only charlamagne the god charlamagne it is so great to have you back on on purpose and honestly man the friendship and the
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the genuine connection that we ve built over the last few years has been a real honor for me.
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And as I said, I m very grateful to you because you believed in me when I was just starting out and it really meant a lot to me and it still does today, man.
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Oh man, thank you for that.
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I received that.
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And to see you grow into, you know, your purpose, you know, and see you have this massive platform has been amazing to watch.
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So I m happy to be here.
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Happy to be here with one of my favorite people and on one of my favorite podcasts.
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Thank you, man.
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Thank you.
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Well, let s dive straight into it because you put this book out and I think it s really true to the times that we live in.
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I think we re living in times that are defined by quarrel, defined by hypocrisy, defined by lack of self-awareness, defined by
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gossip, and here s a book talking about all of that.
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And I wanted to start off simply by asking you, why have you built up such an animosity towards small talk?
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Where does that come from?
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Well, number one, I hate small talk, you know, just on the literal level, right?
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When somebody sees you and they try to, you know, make conversation and they re not really talking about anything.
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And it s just like, yo, you and this person are in this unique moment in time where y all get to share space and nobody is saying anything.
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That is annoying to me.
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And it s annoying to the point where I m like, I would rather just tell the person like, oh, we don t have to do this.
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We can be on our phones.
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We can be reading a book.
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We can sit here in silence.
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You don t have to try to make conversation.
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But then on a more macro level,
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I feel like we re having too much small talk, meaning we re having too many micro conversations.
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We re taking these micros and making them macros.
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Like, the things that people, you know, get online and discuss and debate about and argue about over and over and over and over, in the bigger scheme of things, mean nothing.
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And that s why things just come and go in this era.
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Every day you get online and, you know, it looks like there s a conversation that s the biggest thing in the world.
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Wait three hours.
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wait four hours, wait 12 hours, it ll be completely gone.
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And it ll be like, well, damn, I thought everybody was so concerned about this, you know, two days ago.
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So I just have a problem with
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everything being so macro that shouldn t be nowadays.
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And the things that we should be discussing, like the big macro conversations, we have a way of making those so micro.
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And that s the background noise.
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That s why even like, you know, on Breakfast Club or on my podcast, Brilliant Idiots, when we do discuss things, right, that might be rooted in pop culture, I m always trying to see like, what s the,
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bigger conversation that we can be having behind this.
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It can t just be that y all think this person is a terrible person or that was a bad tweet.
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What s the psychology or what s the thing that we can discuss that people are going to actually learn from?
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That s what I want to do.
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And how do you break that cycle?
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Let s say you bump into someone that you haven t seen for a bit.
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And I think a lot of people struggle with this.
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You see them at a party, an event, in the corridor, and you go, hey, how s it going?
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Oh, yeah, good.
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Yeah, cool.
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And you know you re not listening.
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You know there s no real thing.
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How do you break that if you can?
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So one example is you say, look, we don t have to do this.
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But how do you break it in a positive sense?
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Like how even people with their friends, with their family, you re at a family dinner,
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and everyone s talking about whatever, how do you actually break that and elevate that?
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What s a healthy way?
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Tell them.
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Be honest about what you re feeling in that moment.
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Be like, yo, we ain t talking about nothing right now.
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I ll be like, yo, well, who s going to start the conversation?
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Throw something on the table.
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Literally, that s what this book is.
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This book is literally just a series of topics that I feel like you could just throw in at a lunch, throw in at a dinner table.
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Throw in if you re just sitting around on a plane with somebody and you want to have a conversation, but you can t.
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We make this a lot more difficult than we need to.
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And all it takes is for somebody to break the ice.
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That s all you re literally waiting for when you re sitting around with somebody, you re just like,
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I want to talk, but I just don t know what to say.
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And you re thinking, should I bother this person?
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Should I not bother this person?
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Does this person want to be bothered?
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Does this person want to talk?
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Maybe they do.
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Maybe they don t.
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Maybe that s the question, right?
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You can ask them, like, you feel like having a conversation?
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If that person says no, respect that.
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Don t ask them that.
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hoping that they say yes, but if they say no, you re still going to force them to have the conversation.
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Sometimes you should just ask a person, like, yo, do you got time to talk?
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How often do you get that, Jay?
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Never.
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Exactly.
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People just run up to you and they just throw their stuff on you all the time instead of saying, yo, Jay, you got time to speak right now?
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And if you say not at the moment,
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They re offended.
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You may not want to offend them.
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So you take time to have this meaningless conversation, this small talk.
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You re just telling them, yeah, just because you don t want to offend them, but then you re not even really paying attention.
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You know them too well.
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So nobody s doing it.
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We re not doing each other any favors by doing that.
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So just be honest about what you re feeling in that moment.
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Yeah.
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And I feel like the reason you pointed out there, the reason why so many of us are struggling to be honest with people
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is because people are offended by honesty, even if it s genuine, and even if it s thoughtful.
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Like you just said, if I asked you, I was like, hey, Shaloman, can you talk about this?
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And you were like, gee, I don t have time right now.
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because of this, this and this or whatever, I m in between something.
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As a respectful person back, I m going to be like, I understand that.
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I actually had someone I messaged this morning.
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I had messaged someone inviting them to an event and they didn t get back to me.
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And they messaged me this morning and were just like, Jay, I m so sorry.
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I was like getting ready for the Met and my outfit went wrong.
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And then like, I had to figure this out and it s been crazy and it all worked out, but I wanted you to know, you know, I always respond to you.
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And I was like, yeah, I wasn t offended at all.
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I respect that.
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And thank you for explaining.
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And then it turned out, but a lot of the times I feel we re scared of being honest, because we re scared the other person s going to turn around and go, oh, you never get back to me.
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Oh, you think you re too important for me.
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We are scared of offending people.
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How can we all stop being so offended?
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Because I feel like anything offends anyone these days.
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That s a multi-layered answer, right?
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Because number one, I think we have to stop being people pleasers.
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And I think that, you know, if you grow up in a certain environment, you ve had certain things, you know, happen to you.
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Like my therapist always told me, like, I know exactly why I m a people pleaser, right?
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And I talk about it in the book.
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I m a people pleaser because
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you know, of abuse to ourself at the age of eight, right?
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So me not wanting that young lady to touch me anymore turned into her calling me ugly and saying I had a big nose.
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So in order for her to stop doing that, I would continue to let her, you know, touch on me.
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So it s like, you don t realize how that carries on into
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adulthood to where you just become this people pleaser.
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You don t want to let anybody down because if you feel like you let them down, then they re going to start speaking ill about you and doing things that hurt your feelings.
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So, you just continue to do what s best for them, sacrificing your own peace.
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And we can t do that.
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You just got to set boundaries for yourself and be like, yo, I m not going to be a people pleaser in any way, shape, or form.
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And man, honestly, if my boundaries
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you know, cause somebody to feel offended, then that s the whole point of having the boundary in the first place.
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I gotta have a boundary from this person to begin with.
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Because you re upset with me because I m placing a boundary for my peace of mind?
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Nah, I don t need you in my life to begin with.
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How early, well, when were you ready to revisit that eight-year-old self?
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Like, when did you feel comfortable to even reflect back on that in therapy?
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Because I imagine that, or you can tell me, when you were eight,
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Did you just block it out in the next few years?
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And then when did you go back to it and say, oh, actually, that s where a lot of it started?
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I was watching an episode of Oprah Winfrey and Tyler Perry was on there.
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And Tyler Perry was, you know, crying about the abuse that he experienced from a woman in his family.
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And I think I was in my 20s.
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And I remember saying to myself, like,
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What s wrong with him?
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Why is he upset about that?
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And then at some point, I remember saying to myself, well, what s wrong with me that I thought it was OK?
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But then you kind of suppress it again, because I wasn t going to therapy in my 20s.
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But when I started going to therapy in my mid-30s, that s when I started to unpack a whole lot of that stuff.
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Because you go to therapy for one thing.
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You go to therapy because you re dealing
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you think you re dealing with anxiety and depression, then you start peeling back all of these different layers and you start realizing all of this other trauma, you know, that you ve experienced.
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And, you know, that was one of those things, like, you know, being a people pleaser, not setting proper boundaries because of that moment that happened to me, you know, when I was eight years old and carried on
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throughout my whole, whole adult life until I finally realized like, oh, this is why I don t like letting people down.
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This is why I do things, you know, for people even when I don t want to.
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This is why even if I m not happy necessarily about doing something, I just go along to do it because I don t want to upset or offend that person or cause that person to be, you know, looking at me
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in a negative way.
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So I would say like mid-30s is when I really started unpacking it.
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So it s probably been like the last 10 years of really unpacking it.
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And when you were eight, how long did that abuse last?
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Like how recurring was it?
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I don t know, man.
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And I even mentioned it in the book.
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I suppressed so much abuse that I experienced when I was young that it wasn t even that one person.
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But you suppress it because in a lot of ways, it becomes the norm.
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I remember being
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young, like 9, 10, 11 years old, having conversations with other young men I grew up around.
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And we were all talking about older women we was dealing with.
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And we thought we was lying to each other.
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But now when you look back on it, it was just all a bunch of young kids getting abused.
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But when you re a young man, you don t look at it like that.
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When you re a young man, you re just like, oh, I m getting action early.
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You know, I m getting action early and I m getting action with older women early.
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So you don t look at it like that until you get older and realize how, man, how a lot of that impacts you
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you know, like mentally and emotionally.
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Yeah, what were some of the ways that you think that impacted you?
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And it s interesting, I love what you said there, like when you re young you actually see that as like ego, bravado, arrogance, like it s cool.
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What were the things that you started to extrapolate through therapy and the work you did where you were like, oh that s the kind of impact that it s had in my real life, in my real adult life?
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The biggest one for me is the people-pleasing aspect.
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That s literally the biggest one, like not having
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no boundaries.
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And when I did try to set boundaries with one of the women in particular, her, you know, getting in my head, psychologically calling me ugly and saying I got a big nose and all of this other stuff.
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So for me, the biggest, you know, issue was the fact that I just did not know how to set proper boundaries.
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And when I did set them, it was like a
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It wasn t the brick house.
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It was the straw house, you know?
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You could just blow it.
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You could just blow it away.
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So I never really set any proper boundaries.
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It wasn t until I started unpacking a lot of that stuff that I realized, like, no, I m going to set my boundary, and I m not going to be upset at, you know, any bad, big bad wolf that s mad that they can t blow my house down.
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Yeah, what I find interesting especially is I think we all developed a peacemaker, people pleaser personality type through different reasons.
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How have you found yourself not being a people pleaser with your therapist?
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Because I find a lot of people end up playing that role where they can t be honest with their therapist because we want our therapist to like us and say,
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Well done, good work.
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So how did you find yourself getting that ability?
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Because I think a lot of people listening and watching may be going to therapy, they may be trying to turn to help, but actually they find themselves playing that same role with their therapist.
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Man, I got a new therapist this past year and my first therapist, I might ve been lying to her probably,
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50, 60% of the time, just because there was so many things that...
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I thought I wanted to share, but I wasn t.
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And it wasn t until earlier this year, me and my wife went away on this nice little spiritual retreat for a weekend.
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And we was indulging in plant-based medicines, ayahuasca in particular.
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And one of the things that came forth for me was literally, stop lying to yourself and stop volunteering those lies to other people.
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And so much came up in that moment.
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So much, like I said, abuse that I experienced as a child, all of that type of stuff.
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And that s when I was like, oh, I ve been telling half-truths.
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I haven t been being completely honest.
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I ve been telling just enough of a story to get just enough back.
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But that s not how you, you know,
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properly heal anything.
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Like you got to deal with it all.
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You know, don t even, don t even, don t even try.
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And so for me, I feel like, you know, I probably was lying to like my first therapist for like, I would literally probably say half of the time.
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And do you think we do that because we re actually scared of having to address it?
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Is that the reason?
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A hundred percent.
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Like it s still fear, it s still insecurity that we re not willing to share with anyone.
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Like even that night that I was, you know, that first
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But that was the second night of the journey on Ayahuasca.
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Me and my wife been together 26 years, and I was sharing things with her that I never had shared with anybody.
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And that felt so, so, so, so freeing.
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And even in that moment, I m like, I don t think there s anybody else I trust to share these things with.
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Not even a...
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No matter how good the therapist is, no matter how great the therapist is, this individual that I ve shared majority of my life with is the only person I feel comfortable putting all that on the table for.
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Yeah, I think that s a really interesting point because I think the words honesty and vulnerability have somewhat been exploited in and of themselves in this idea that if you re honest,
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Everyone has to know everything.
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Like you have to just put it all out there.
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And what you just said is actually, even with my therapist, they re not going to get the 100% version of me because my wife, my partner, who s been with me for over 20 years now, it s like that person not only deserves it, but we ve built up enough trust and there s earned respect where we both can share that.
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What s been your take on the internet, like oversharing, undersharing, overtelling, undertelling?
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Because I feel like there was a point in time where it was like, well, if you re vulnerable, you better say everything to everyone, right?
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Like that s what vulnerability is.
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And I think there was like this false pressure that you had to share all your business with everyone.
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Yeah.
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I think on the internet, a lot of people crying out for help who probably, not probably, who need to be in
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therapy, actually talking to somebody.
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And there s a whole lot of people just lying.
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But that s what I mean when I say, you know, stop lying to yourself and stop volunteering those lies to other people.
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Every single day, people wake up and just volunteer lies for no reason.
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And I m not saying lies have to be negative.
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Like, they just lie about their life.
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They lie about who they are.
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They lie about what they do.
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And it s like, nobody asked you for that.
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Like nobody.
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SPEAKER_01
So, you re inviting all of this negative energy into your life.
2
SPEAKER_01
You re inviting all of this opinion and all of this critique that s literally going to have real-world consequences because that s the stuff that s going to give you anxiety.
2
SPEAKER_01
That s the stuff that s going, you know, cause you to have bouts of depression and you re going to be sitting there dealing with all of this stuff
2
SPEAKER_01
for a farce you created?
2
SPEAKER_01
Like, what is the point of that?
2
SPEAKER_01
So it s like, for me, man, we really all just have to stop volunteering, you know, the lies we tell ourselves to others.
2
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_02
What led you towards plant medicine as a method of healing, as a method of reflection?
2
SPEAKER_02
Like, what made you go down that route?
2
SPEAKER_02
Because you ve done therapy for years, you ve talked about it, you re a big ambassador for mental health.
2
SPEAKER_02
What was the opening there?
2
SPEAKER_01
I mean, it was just something I wanted to try.
2
SPEAKER_01
And then they always say, you know, you don t do it unless it s calling you.
2
SPEAKER_01
And so, you know, just reading about it and, you know, seeing, you know, what other people s take on it was like two things that really attracted me was everybody that did it was telling me like, yo, I saw God.
2
SPEAKER_01
Like I knew people who were atheists, like Neil Brennan was an atheist.
2
SPEAKER_01
And he did it, and now he s like a believer.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I was like, whoa.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I ve always had faith, and I ve always been a believer.
2
SPEAKER_01
So I just wanted to kind of see like, I want to see more of that.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I think people saying how it detaches you from your ego.
2
SPEAKER_01
Like, I thought that was very powerful, because that s something that we all try to do every day.
2
SPEAKER_01
But they was like, no, it feels like somebody literally takes your ego and just rips it away from you.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I wanted to know what that felt like.
2
SPEAKER_01
And man, I absolutely, absolutely, overstand what it felt like, especially that second night.
2
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_02
Where did you go for it?
2
SPEAKER_02
Where did you try it out?
2
SPEAKER_01
I was in California.
2
SPEAKER_02
Okay, so you didn t go too far.
2
SPEAKER_02
No, no.
2
SPEAKER_02
Because I ve heard of, I ve had friends go out to like Costa Rica and then Ibiza, you went local, so you made it easier.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, Shaman I talked to was like, why even, I think it was Peru or Costa Rica, it was somewhere, I forgot where it was, but he was just like, that s a jungle.
2
SPEAKER_01
He was like, you don t want to have that kind of experience.
2
SPEAKER_01
I mean, he wasn t knocking anybody who did.
2
SPEAKER_01
He just like, for you on your first time, I just don t, you know, recommend that.
2
SPEAKER_01
So it was just kind of like divine alignment.
2
SPEAKER_01
Like it was one of those things, like it had been calling me for the past, I would say five or six years.
2
SPEAKER_01
And then like the opportunity just presented itself, you know, with some people with some really great energy.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I was like,
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, why not?
2
SPEAKER_01
And it just all lined up.
2
SPEAKER_01
It was one of those things was like, oh, I m actually free this weekend.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_01
The wife wanted to do it.
2
SPEAKER_01
We went to do it.
2
SPEAKER_01
Oh, it s beautiful.
2
SPEAKER_00
The Therapy for Black Girls podcast is an NAACP and Webby Award winning podcast dedicated to all things mental health, personal development, and all of the small decisions we can make to become the best possible versions of ourselves.
2
SPEAKER_00
Here, we have the conversations that help Black women decipher how their paths inform who they are today and use that information to decide who they want to be moving forward.
2
SPEAKER_00
We chat about things like how to establish routines that center self-care, what burnout looks and feels like, and defining what aspects of our lives are making us happy and what parts are holding us back.
2
SPEAKER_00
I m your host, Dr. Joy Harden-Bradford, a licensed psychologist in Atlanta, Georgia.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I can t wait for you to join the conversation every Wednesday.
2
SPEAKER_00
Listen to the Therapy for Black Girls podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
2
SPEAKER_00
Take good care, and we ll see you there.
2
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When you find that bright spot to help you get through your day, it s powerful.
2
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That s where The Bright Side comes in.
2
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A new daily podcast from Hello Sunshine that s bringing you a daily dose of joy.
2
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I m Danielle Robay.
2
SPEAKER_05
And I m Simone Boyce.
2
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Listen, both Danielle and I are reporters.
2
SPEAKER_05
We ve covered the news and we know the world can feel heavy, but The Bright Side podcast is a space to have a little fun, to learn something new and get into some friendly debates.
2
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That s right.
2
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Join us five days a week to see how life can look from the bright side.
2
SPEAKER_05
We ll hear from celebrities, authors, experts and listeners like you, whether it s relationships, friend advice or figuring out how to navigate life s transitions.
2
SPEAKER_05
We ll talk through it all together.
2
SPEAKER_04
Listen to the bright side from Hello Sunshine every weekday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
2
SPEAKER_03
Something that makes me crazy is when people say, well, I had this career before, but it was a waste.
2
SPEAKER_03
And that s where the perspective shift comes.
2
SPEAKER_03
That it s not a waste, that everything you ve done has built you to where you are now.
2
SPEAKER_03
This is She Pivots.
2
SPEAKER_03
the podcast where we explore the inspiring pivots women have made and dig deeper into the personal reasons behind them.
2
SPEAKER_03
Join me, Emily Tish Sussman, every Wednesday on She Pivots, as I sit down with inspiring women like Misty Copeland, Brooke Shields, Vanessa Hudgens, and so many more.
2
SPEAKER_03
We dive into how these women made their pivot and their mindset shifts that happened as a result.
2
SPEAKER_03
It s a podcast about women, their stories, and how their pivot became their success.
2
SPEAKER_03
Listen to She Pivots on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
2
SPEAKER_02
What have you found has been the hardest thing for you to be honest with yourself about?
2
SPEAKER_01
Everything.
2
SPEAKER_02
Everything.
2
SPEAKER_01
Everything.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yo, it s so easy for us to get caught up in lying to ourselves, because we do it to protect ourselves in a lot of ways, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
like it might be a person that you genuinely have love for, like genuinely, just as a, on a human level, like you love this person and like, you know, this person might have a talent or a skillset that, you know, you want to help amplify, like provide an opportunity for, but you know, as well as I do that, you know, character, talent sometimes will take people where character can t sustain them.
2
SPEAKER_01
So even though you see this person s talent,
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, once they get in a certain position, you realize their character isn t going to be able, you know, to keep them there.
2
SPEAKER_01
But you will constantly lie to yourself about this person s character over and over and over and over.
2
SPEAKER_01
And then you wonder why things aren t working out.
2
SPEAKER_01
And literally, it will affect everything that you re doing.
2
SPEAKER_01
Like, let s just say it s a team and you...
2
SPEAKER_01
put this person as part of the team, and this person is causing problems with the rest of the team, and you see it, but you re making excuses for it, you know?
2
SPEAKER_01
And it s like, even a friend that s, you might have been friends with a person for a long, long, long time, and you know, y all have very deep, intimate conversations, so you know this person differently than a lot of other people know them, so you get a soft spot, you know, in your heart for said individual.
2
SPEAKER_01
So when you re hearing everybody else talk about how terrible this person is,
2
SPEAKER_01
You re lying to yourself about it.
2
SPEAKER_01
You re like, no, y all just don t understand this person.
2
SPEAKER_01
Like, it s like, no, the reality is they are a terrible person and they need to do more work and they need to really, you know, figure themselves out.
2
SPEAKER_01
So, you know, the biggest thing.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, it s just.
2
SPEAKER_01
We constantly lie to ourselves about everything.
2
SPEAKER_01
You might look in the mirror and know you need to lose 20 pounds.
2
SPEAKER_01
Like, you might put a shirt on and know it don t quite fit right, but you ll pull on it and tug it and, you know, how does this look?
2
SPEAKER_01
And, you know, somebody s like, oh, it looks all right.
2
SPEAKER_01
It looks good.
2
SPEAKER_01
And you re like, hey, it does.
2
SPEAKER_01
And then you get on Instagram, and then you get humbled.
2
SPEAKER_01
There s a bunch of people that don t know you at all who are willing to tell you the truth about how you look.
2
SPEAKER_01
Then you lie to yourself again.
2
SPEAKER_01
And you say to yourself, oh, they just hatin .
2
SPEAKER_01
You knew that was whack when you put it on.
2
SPEAKER_01
You knew you had no right putting that shirt on before you put it on, but you decided to do it anyway.
2
SPEAKER_01
So I just feel like we, I think every single moment of our lives is an exercise in being honest with ourselves first and foremost, and then the rest of the world.
2
SPEAKER_01
And then choosing who to share that honesty with.
2
SPEAKER_01
Because sometimes people aren t lying.
2
SPEAKER_01
It s just none of your business.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I think that s something that people forget, too, especially in this world of oversharing.
2
SPEAKER_01
I have to constantly remind people that, especially in this era of the internet, I m like, when you re talking about celebrities, you don t know any of these people.
2
SPEAKER_01
I don t care what they post on social.
2
SPEAKER_01
I don t care what you hear in their music.
2
SPEAKER_01
You genuinely do not know any of these individuals.
2
SPEAKER_01
Stop lying to yourself like you do.
2
SPEAKER_02
In what sense?
2
SPEAKER_02
Because I m thinking of something, but in what sense do you mean like we don t know the more, how that applies to us?
2
SPEAKER_02
You think we re commentating on a life that we don t know about?
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SPEAKER_01
People pass these judgments, like you ll see whole psychoanalytical
3
SPEAKER_00
about people, right?
3
SPEAKER_00
And it s like, how did you come to that conclusion?
3
SPEAKER_00
Like, literally, you re breaking down a person s whole pattern.
3
SPEAKER_00
Oh, they re a narcissist, and they re egotistical, and they re out for this and that.
3
SPEAKER_00
I m like, how do you know based off a tweet?
3
SPEAKER_00
How do you know based off one conversation that they had?
3
SPEAKER_00
You don t know this person.
3
SPEAKER_00
This person has lived
3
SPEAKER_00
You know, 30-plus years, 40-plus years, whatever it is, you do not spend every waking moment with this individual.
3
SPEAKER_00
How do we come to these full-blown conclusions about people that we don t know?
3
SPEAKER_00
I had somebody get mad at me the other day because I told them I don t know this person personally.
3
SPEAKER_00
We were talking about an artist, and I was like, I don t know that...
3
SPEAKER_00
person personally.
3
SPEAKER_00
Now that the person I was talking to did.
3
SPEAKER_00
So I understand how they felt, but I don t have that same personal connection or feelings toward this individual because I don t have a personal connection with them.
3
SPEAKER_00
And when it comes to public figures, a lot of times it makes you more objective because you don t have
3
SPEAKER_00
any bias, because anybody that you actually have a connection with, you re going to have a natural bias toward them.
3
SPEAKER_00
That s another thing we lie to each other about.
3
SPEAKER_00
We lie to each other like we re so honest and so objective when we all have our biases for people, we all have our biases for places, we all have our biases for things, and that s okay.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
And if you can address that and say, yeah, I know I got a bias, then you could actually have an honest conversation about whatever it is you re talking about or look at things, you know, from an honest perspective.
3
SPEAKER_00
If you can t even be honest about your biases, then you starting off from a lie.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I often find it s this observer mindset that we re missing where it s like, okay, we re having a conversation right now, but can I actually allow myself to look at it from this perspective?
3
SPEAKER_01
If I can t do that, like if I can t see, oh, I m currently displaying ego and the other person is currently displaying defensiveness.
3
SPEAKER_01
If I can t see what I m displaying and what someone else is, and I m only seeing what they re displaying, then I m not really observing.
3
SPEAKER_01
I can t be objective.
3
SPEAKER_00
Absolutely.
3
SPEAKER_01
And I find that that s exactly what s missing where, and I can testify to what you just said, whether it s inaccurate guest lists at people s wedding that are printed in the papers, or whether it s inaccurate, oh, I know the news saying, oh, they re going to get a divorce, or their kids hate them,
3
SPEAKER_01
or whatever else it is.
3
SPEAKER_01
How do you know this?
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I can testify to knowing people going, none of that s true.
3
SPEAKER_01
And it goes back to the point you started with, which is this idea of we get so lost commentating on everything and everyone else that we know nothing about that we don t have time and energy to work on what s going on inside here.
3
SPEAKER_00
Absolutely.
3
SPEAKER_01
And I find it remarkable that we spend our lives trying to solve, psychoanalyze,
3
SPEAKER_01
entertain ourselves by someone else s problems rather than fixing our own.
3
SPEAKER_00
We do that on purpose.
3
SPEAKER_00
Because if we can talk about everybody else, then we can avoid that hard, painful, excruciating work it takes to deal with our own BS.
3
SPEAKER_00
If I can look at everyone else, I can avoid looking in that mirror all day long.
3
SPEAKER_00
I m too busy sightseeing other people and commentating on other people, so I never have to look in the mirror.
3
SPEAKER_00
at what it is that I need to fix.
3
SPEAKER_00
And you said something that s interesting too, man.
3
SPEAKER_00
And that s why this era we re in is so difficult.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I think even our positions as media personalities,
3
SPEAKER_00
I remember when I used to work for Wendy Williams, she used to always say to me, you re either going to be of the people or of the industry.
3
SPEAKER_00
But it s almost impossible when you re in the business because you re going to actually meet people and you re going to develop relationships.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I think a lot of times we have a different perspective of things because we re kind of in it.
3
SPEAKER_00
Like I ve literally been with individuals
3
SPEAKER_00
couples, watching them love on each other, watching them kiss on each other.
3
SPEAKER_00
And then it ll be like breaking news.
3
SPEAKER_00
They re getting a divorce.
3
SPEAKER_00
They hate each other.
3
SPEAKER_00
They re apart.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I m like, this is a mind fuck.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
Because I m like, whoa.
3
SPEAKER_00
And it puts so much in perspective.
3
SPEAKER_00
And not even just that.
3
SPEAKER_00
Us as individuals, you ll see things about yourself.
3
SPEAKER_00
And you re like, that s not remotely true.
3
SPEAKER_00
That s not even.
3
SPEAKER_00
accurate at all, and everybody around you will be mad, and everybody around you will be upset, and you ll be pissed off too, but then you got to really say to yourself, what are you going to do?
3
SPEAKER_00
I refuse to go on the defensive and start explaining to myself to a bunch of people who never even took the time to learn the truth anyway.
3
SPEAKER_00
You never took the time to learn the truth, so you would rather just put this out there, print this, say these things, not care if you re accurate,
3
SPEAKER_00
you know, not care if there s any falsehoods, you just, whatever.
3
SPEAKER_00
So why would I take the time to explain the truth to you?
3
SPEAKER_00
Now not only am I validating what you said to a certain extent, or not what you said, but validating you and your platform.
3
SPEAKER_00
Now I m actually giving you more content.
3
SPEAKER_00
I m not doing that at all.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, for sure, for sure.
3
SPEAKER_01
I was going to go back to the personal again with you because I feel like a big turning point in your book that you talk about that I can t wait for people to dive into is this moment where you realize that your father was cheating on your mom.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
3
SPEAKER_01
And like that is like a really big moment for you at that point because you re like I think 17 years old and you re learning about this and naturally you
3
SPEAKER_00
feel like tell me how you felt like in that moment because it almost feels like the first time you discovered that something s a lie like in a big way i mean yeah that was a very macro conversation you know because i had made up my mind in that moment that me and my pops couldn t have no small talk about this situation because you know we live in a small town so you re hearing it constantly right and you re
3
SPEAKER_00
You re driving by this house and you re seeing his truck out there and you re fully aware of all of the different lies that he s told my mom.
3
SPEAKER_00
Like, oh, I m over there doing work.
3
SPEAKER_00
Or, oh, that s my secretary.
3
SPEAKER_00
All this other stuff, right?
3
SPEAKER_00
So finally, just deciding to have the macro conversation and say, yo, you out here cheating on mom.
3
SPEAKER_00
What you doing is foul.
3
SPEAKER_00
And my dad was like, yo.
3
SPEAKER_00
You only got one girlfriend?
3
SPEAKER_00
You know, one day you gonna understand. 
3
SPEAKER_00
Like, that was his reply to me.
3
SPEAKER_00
And that messed me up for a while, because that s my hero.
3
SPEAKER_00
Like, still to this day, I love my dad.
3
SPEAKER_00
Like, my dad, I fully understand, you know, the totality of my father as a man.
3
SPEAKER_00
And as I ve become a man myself at 45 years old, I overstand, you know, everything that, you know, he went through.
3
SPEAKER_00
And so when he said that to me, I felt like I had to, um...
3
SPEAKER_00
live up to his expectations.
3
SPEAKER_00
So that s when it became a thing of, oh, let me show him that I can get a roster.
3
SPEAKER_00
I don t have to be committed to one person.
3
SPEAKER_00
And yo, that lasted
3
SPEAKER_00
for a while, not a while, but too long for my liking, right?
3
SPEAKER_00
And so I remember later on, years down the line, my dad saying to me, you know, the worst thing that he ever did was called my mother to leave him and telling me that I always had it right.
3
SPEAKER_00
Cause he, you know, I m with the same woman, right, for 26 years.
3
SPEAKER_00
So he was like telling me I always had it right.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I m like,
3
SPEAKER_00
Damn, that s why you shouldn t always listen to adults, bro.
3
SPEAKER_00
Like, just because you love a person and they re older than you and they got more experiences than you don t mean that they re always right.
3
SPEAKER_00
But I give my father so much grace because, you know, one of the first breakthrough, the first breakthrough I ever had in therapy, I mean, the thing that led me to tears was just realizing that my father used to discipline me for things that he never taught me.
3
SPEAKER_00
And now I even take it a step further and say my father used to discipline me for things that he never taught me, but also for things that he never learned himself.
3
SPEAKER_00
So a lot of his raising of me, he was raising me through fear and not love, right?
3
SPEAKER_00
Because he just didn t want me to make the same mistakes that he made.
3
SPEAKER_00
He was terrified
3
SPEAKER_00
of me going down, you know, the same path that he went down.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I ended up going down that path anyway, like even down to, you know, the mental health journey.
3
SPEAKER_00
Like when I wrote my second book, you know, Shook When Anxiety Playing Tricks On Me, when I wrote that, I was...
3
SPEAKER_00
all the way discombobulated.
3
SPEAKER_00
I had no idea whether I was coming or going, because I had just started going to therapy, and I had just started peeling back a lot of those layers.
3
SPEAKER_00
So I was just raw.
3
SPEAKER_00
Like, I had no idea who I was.
3
SPEAKER_00
There was this character that had been created named Charlemagne.
3
SPEAKER_00
I m like, I don t know who this person is.
3
SPEAKER_00
Then I m dealing with Lenard, myself.
3
SPEAKER_00
I don t know who this person is.
3
SPEAKER_00
So I was just all over the place.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I literally just put it all in that book.
3
SPEAKER_00
and had Dr. Ish Major do clinical correlations to the things that I was talking about.
3
SPEAKER_00
But he, my father had read that book, and I talk about this story in the book, but he had read that book, and then that same week I had a cousin who had completed suicide, and he had attempted to complete suicide like four other times, and the fourth time he completed it, I think he was like 25 years old.
3
SPEAKER_00
So my dad was triggered by a lot of that stuff.
3
SPEAKER_00
He was triggered by a lot of the stuff I wrote in my book.
4
SPEAKER_00
And he was definitely triggered by my cousin completing suicide.
4
SPEAKER_00
So my father calls me and he tells me,
4
SPEAKER_00
You know, he read the book, talking about my cousin a little bit.
4
SPEAKER_00
And he goes, man, you know, I tried to commit suicide 30 plus years ago, but I didn t because of, you know, your older sister and you.
4
SPEAKER_00
And he was like, you know, I was on two to three medications.
4
SPEAKER_00
No, he was actually on 10 to 12 medications.
4
SPEAKER_00
And he was going to therapy two and three times a week dealing with his own mental health issues.
4
SPEAKER_00
And so much so that the state of South Carolina just started giving him a check.
4
SPEAKER_00
And that s what they used to call it, a crazy check.
4
SPEAKER_00
So, I remember asking my mom, like, yo, you know, you know, dad was going through all of this and she was like, I just thought he was playing crazy to get a check.
4
SPEAKER_00
So, just think about that.
4
SPEAKER_00
Like, think about if he was able to just express himself and have those conversations with us as a family back then, how that would have saved me, you know, so much grief when I was dealing with panic attacks and stuff as a child and thinking something was, you know, you know, wrong with me.
4
SPEAKER_00
All of that makes me give my father a whole lot of grace.
4
SPEAKER_00
He s just a man who was just trying to...
4
SPEAKER_00
do his best with what he had and the knowledge he had at the time.
4
SPEAKER_00
So I held a lot of that against him for a long, long, long, long time.
4
SPEAKER_00
But it was in that moment in 2018 when he told me everything he was dealing with, I don t know why, it just clicked like, my dad just a man.
4
SPEAKER_00
He just a man, just like I m a man.
4
SPEAKER_00
Who am I to not give him the same grace I want?
4
SPEAKER_01
Totally.
4
SPEAKER_01
What s allowed you to have that, Shalomay, to be able to zoom out and have that context and that grace?
4
SPEAKER_01
Because I think when we re analyzing these things and you kind of connect the dots, you re like, oh yeah, my dad treated me like that, that s why I became like that, that s why I made that mistake.
4
SPEAKER_01
And you can spend so much time in this very linear back and forth journey of that was the past, that s how it connects to the present, that s how it impacted my life.
4
SPEAKER_01
But you re almost looking at it from a bird s eye view, looking down going,
4
SPEAKER_01
that makes sense and my dad went through and then you can like give grace you can have what was the key in therapy and in your personal work that shifted it from being this linear thing to being a bird s eye view of this situation?
4
SPEAKER_00
I honestly think I ve always had that as a child like always like I ve always had a bird s eye view of things like I ve always felt in tune to something to something else like there was always like
4
SPEAKER_00
this voice in my head or this spirit that was, you know, moving me in certain directions or causing me to see certain things.
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Sometimes I would see things I wasn t supposed to see, you know, literally and figuratively, right?
4
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And I ve always had these visions.
4
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And I just, I remember my dad always telling me when I was a child, if you don t change your ways, you end up in jail, dead or broke under the tree.
4
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And a lot of people hear that, but don t actually learn that and apply that.
4
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For some reason, I was able at a young age to actually start seeing people that I love go to jail, like for prison sentences.
4
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And I was going to jail, and I saw people around me that were actually getting killed.
4
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And I saw older cousins who I used to look up to.
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they are sitting under the tree kind of like not doing much with they selves and I m like, oh, that s not going to be me.
4
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And I literally could see, all right, everything I do today directly is going to impact what happens to me tomorrow.
4
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So I need to start doing what I need to do today.
4
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It s like, yo, if I, you know, continue to eat like this, I m going to be fat in the future, right?
4
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Like if I don t read this book, you know, my knowledge is going to be limited in the future.
4
SPEAKER_00
So I ve always,
4
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you know, by the grace of God, just tended to have, like, a bird s-eye view of things.
4
SPEAKER_00
Like, my third eye has been open for...
4
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quite a long time, to the point even when I think about me and my wife had a non-profit back in the day.
4
SPEAKER_00
Well, we thought it was a non-profit.
4
SPEAKER_00
When we set it up, it was a non-profit.
4
SPEAKER_00
We set it up as a non-profit, but we never went through the proper channels to make it a non-profit.
4
SPEAKER_00
It just sounded like, oh, we gonna set it up.
4
SPEAKER_00
It was one of those things.
4
SPEAKER_00
And so we had a, it was called third eye awareness.
4
SPEAKER_00
Literally, that s what it was called.
4
SPEAKER_00
Even when the first tattoo I ever got,
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was Wolverine from the X-Men, because I love Wolverine, right?
4
SPEAKER_00
Like, I love the X-Men.
4
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I m a big comic book guy.
4
SPEAKER_00
But back then, I got the tattoo when I was like 17 years old.
4
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This is when tattoos were illegal in South Carolina.
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I got the tattoo because the thing that attracted me towards Wolverine was his healing powers.
4
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And so the tattoo I got on my arm is Wolverine holding a microphone in his hand, because I thought rap was going to be what changed my life.
4
SPEAKER_00
But lo and behold, it was these
4
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type of microphones that changed my life.
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And, you know, now I feel like my purpose in life is to not only continue to heal myself, but to continue to help as many other people, you know, get on their healing journey.
4
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So I was 16, 17 years old thinking about stuff like this.
4
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And at 16, 17, you get a tattoo like that.
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And in your mind, you re explaining it perfectly.
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I m like, yo, I m attracted to Wolverine because of his healing powers.
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And then he grabbed the microphone.
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But now I m 45, about to be 46.
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I m looking at it like,
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Oh, I understand what that was now.
4
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And that was another revelation that came to me, you know, when I went on my ayahuasca journey was like, yo, nothing had been wasted.
4
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Literally nothing.
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There is absolutely nothing that has happened to me in my life, whether you want to label it good, bad, you know.
4
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ugly, pretty, whatever it was, nothing has gone to waste in my life.
4
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Every single thing has a purpose and had a purpose and has gotten me to this point.
4
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And I think, man, when you look at things through that lens,
4
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it just kind of like shapes, it shapes your understanding of trauma and, you know, why so-called bad things happen in a different way.
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I don t look at it as good or bad.
4
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It was just like one process of life that gets you to this point.
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I think you just nailed something so powerful there and I want to emphasize it for people because I think we go through this loop where we say, oh, now I get it.
4
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Everything else, I was wrong.
4
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I wasted time.
4
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Now I get it.
4
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And then a few years later we go, oh no, no, no, no.
4
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I just wasted the last few years.
4
SPEAKER_01
Now I get it.
4
SPEAKER_01
And we constantly have this belief that we have to neglect and reject our past
4
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in order to establish our present.
4
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We feel like we have to constantly say our past was a waste of time in order to establish that our present is now us doing the right thing.
4
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And I actually fully agree with you and completely disagree with that, because what you re doing is you re negating all of the lessons, all of the wisdom, all of the learning, all of the growth that actually got you to that point.
4
SPEAKER_01
And then you re also negating the fact that all the skills you learned during that time, all the habits, they could still be useful,
4
SPEAKER_01
But because you re writing off that time, you re writing off all of that growth.
4
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And I ve been saying that to so many people lately, even when people are like, Jay, I think I m wasting my time.
4
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I m trying to find a new job.
4
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I want to do something I m passionate about.
4
SPEAKER_01
Or, Jay, like the last few years, I just wasted them being anxious.
4
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Now I m confident.
4
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It s like, no, no, no, no, no.
4
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You need to remember that because that s how you got here.
4
SPEAKER_01
And by the way, life is going to give you those scenarios again.
4
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And you re going to need to remember this because next time it will be a familiar.
4
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Right?
4
SPEAKER_01
It ll be like a familiar feeling of, oh, I ve been there.
4
SPEAKER_01
I know how to deal with this.
4
SPEAKER_00
That s why when you, even when you re talking to, you know, young people in the field and they ll say things to you like, well, what if I, you know, leave New York and go to Atlanta and things don t work in Atlanta?
4
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I m like, okay.
4
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Like, and?
4
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Like, what do you mean if things don t work?
4
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Because what you re going to realize later on in life is regardless of what happened when you was there, it worked.
4
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I don t care if you went down there and you worked there for six months and got fired.
4
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There s going to be something you pick up in those six months.
4
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There s going to be somebody you meet in those six months.
4
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It might just be a time in your life that you actually enjoy and you need that.
4
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You might just need to be in a different environment, you know, for a little while, but there s going to be something you pick up within those six months that s going to make you realize, like,
4
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It worked.
4
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I think, you know, we have these extremes when it comes to work.
4
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I could easily look back at my radio career and be like, I got fired four times.
4
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So those were four times things didn t work.
4
SPEAKER_00
That is a complete lie.
4
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Every single one of those situations I got fired from, I had the time of my life.
4
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And I learned so much from.
4
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And I met people that are still, you know, my friends to this day.
4
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So I wouldn t trade any of that for the world.
4
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For all I know, how do we know what we re doing now is working?
4
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We don t.
4
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This is just what we re doing in the moment.
4
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I know it s working for now, but who s to say this is what we re going to be doing when we re 50 years old?
4
SPEAKER_00
Who s to say this is what we re going to be doing when we re 60?
4
SPEAKER_00
We might be still trying to hold on to Breakfast Club and On Purpose, and God is like,
4
SPEAKER_00
I need you to move.
4
SPEAKER_00
And he might even still let you keep it, but you ll be sitting here unhappy, depressed, angry, like, oh, why isn t things moving the way I want them to move?
4
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It s because God asked you to move a long time ago, but you didn t want to because you re still trying to make this work, and it s not working no more.
4
SPEAKER_00
Just because something is successful doesn t mean that it s working.
5
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Totally, totally.
5
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That s such a good point.
5
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That s such a good point.
5
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And it reminds me, there s this beautiful story that the Buddha used to tell about a person who s on a journey.
5
SPEAKER_01
And they re on this journey and they come across an obstacle.
5
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And the first obstacle is this fast flowing river.
5
SPEAKER_01
So they realize, I need to build a raft.
5
SPEAKER_01
So they get the bamboo, they get the rope, they tie it up, they build themselves an oar, and then they paddle with all their strength and they get to the other side.
5
SPEAKER_01
And then they think this raft saved my life.
5
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I m going to take it wherever I go.
5
SPEAKER_01
So they strap it to their back and they carry on walking.
5
SPEAKER_01
And then the Buddha says that just like us, this person gets to another challenge.
5
SPEAKER_01
And the challenge is not a fast flowing river this time.
5
SPEAKER_01
It s a tall wooded forest with trees dotted at every other step.
5
SPEAKER_01
So now the person is trying to walk through and the raft keep getting stuck.
5
SPEAKER_01
And they re trying to maneuver, and they re trying to get through, and the raft is getting chipped.
5
SPEAKER_01
The raft is blocking them from walking through.
5
SPEAKER_01
And the Buddha says the person has two choices.
5
SPEAKER_01
They either hold on to the raft, and they struggle to get through, or they put it down, and they walk on freely.
5
SPEAKER_01
And it s the same point that you re making right now, this idea of like, what are you holding on to?
5
SPEAKER_01
that you believe made you successful but is actually stopping you from breaking through the next challenge and if you keep holding on to it is gonna hurt your hands gonna hurt your back you never gonna walk through and i agree successes probably the greatest prison.
5
SPEAKER_01
because the feeling of success is so intoxicating that you think i m just going to keep doing this like a drug because it makes me feel good but actually i may not be actually feeling healthy well feeling like i m moving in my best self and i ve seen that even in my
5
SPEAKER_01
In my career, I remember when I first started my work, we grew based on videos I made on Facebook.
5
SPEAKER_01
And today, eight years on, I don t make those videos anymore.
5
SPEAKER_01
Facebook is not our core platform anymore.
5
SPEAKER_01
We had to move on and evolve.
5
SPEAKER_01
And I ve seen that time and time again, whether it s been a YouTube platform or whatever it is.
5
SPEAKER_01
And I think we get tied to platforms, we get tied to
5
SPEAKER_01
algorithms, we get tied to patterns, we get tied to all these things, and then eventually we become a prisoner of the pattern and get to become a prisoner of the algorithm.
5
SPEAKER_01
And letting it go is hard.
5
SPEAKER_01
And what you re saying right now, like, recognizing that what you re doing right now may be something you have to let go of is a healthy thought.
5
SPEAKER_00
Tune in to the new podcast, Stories from the Village of Nothing Much.
5
SPEAKER_00
Like easy listening, but for fiction.
5
SPEAKER_00
If you ve overdosed on bad news,
5
SPEAKER_00
We invite you into a world where the glimmers of goodness in everyday life are all around you.
5
SPEAKER_00
I m Katherine Nicolai, and you might know me from the Bedtime Story podcast, Nothing Much Happens.
5
SPEAKER_00
I m an architect of cozy, and I invite you to come spend some time where everyone is welcome and kindness is the default.
5
SPEAKER_00
When you tune in, you ll hear stories about bakeries and walks in the woods, a favorite booth at the diner on a blustery autumn day, cats and dogs, unrescued goats and donkeys, old houses, bookshops, beaches where kites fly, and pretty stones are found.
5
SPEAKER_00
I have so many stories to tell you, and they are all designed to help you feel good and feel connected to what is good in the world.
5
SPEAKER_00
Listen, relax, enjoy.
5
SPEAKER_00
Listen to stories from the Village of Nothing Much on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
5
SPEAKER_04
Get emotional with me, Radhi Devlukia, in my new podcast, A Really Good Cry.
5
SPEAKER_04
We re going to talk about and go through all the things that are sometimes difficult to process alone.
5
SPEAKER_04
We re going to go over how to regulate your emotions, diving deep into holistic personal development, and just building your mindset to have a happier, healthier life.
5
SPEAKER_04
We re going to be talking with some of my best friends.
5
SPEAKER_03
I didn t know we were going to go there.
5
SPEAKER_04
People that I admire.
5
SPEAKER_04
When we say listen to your body, really tune in to what s going on.
5
SPEAKER_04
Authors of books that have changed my life.
5
SPEAKER_04
Now you re talking about sympathy, which is different than empathy, right?
5
SPEAKER_04
And basically have conversations that can help us get through this crazy thing we call life.
5
SPEAKER_04
I already believe in myself.
5
SPEAKER_04
I already see myself.
5
SPEAKER_04
And so when people give me an opportunity, I m just like, oh, great, you see me too.
5
SPEAKER_04
We ll laugh together, we ll cry together and find a way through all of our emotions.
5
SPEAKER_04
Never forget, it s OK to cry as long as you make it a really good one.
5
SPEAKER_04
Listen to A Really Good Cry with Radhi Devlukia on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
5
SPEAKER_03
Hey, it s me Blippi and this is my best friend, Mika.
5
SPEAKER_03
Hi, I m Mika and this is our brand new podcast.
5
SPEAKER_03
Blippi and Mika s Road Trip.
5
SPEAKER_03
The Blippi Mobile will take us to amazing places.
5
SPEAKER_03
Click, click, put your seatbelts on.
5
SPEAKER_03
Get ready for a ride, we re gonna have some fun.
5
SPEAKER_03
We ll explore and listen to the sounds of awesome places like farms.
5
SPEAKER_03
racetrack, and even construction sites!
5
SPEAKER_03
Follow your ears, what do you hear?
5
SPEAKER_03
And we ll meet new friends along the way!
5
SPEAKER_03
They ll teach us awesome new things about the places and things we see and hear!
5
SPEAKER_03
What did we learn today?
5
SPEAKER_03
It s so cool!
5
SPEAKER_03
Listen to Blippi and Mika s Road Trip Podcasts on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
5
SPEAKER_02
Man, I m living proof.
5
SPEAKER_02
I talk about that in the book, you know, Get Honest or Die Lying.
5
SPEAKER_02
Why small talk sucks.
5
SPEAKER_02
Shameless plug.
5
SPEAKER_02
But I talk about that in the book because 2016, that s where I was at with it.
5
SPEAKER_02
You know, I m six years in on The Breakfast Club.
5
SPEAKER_02
I m having more success than I ever imagined.
5
SPEAKER_02
I m making more money than I ever imagined.
5
SPEAKER_02
Like, you know,
5
SPEAKER_02
I put out my first book, Black Privilege.
5
SPEAKER_02
It s an instant New York Times bestseller.
5
SPEAKER_02
We moving.
5
SPEAKER_02
Things are great.
5
SPEAKER_02
Things are fantastic, but I m not happy.
5
SPEAKER_02
And the reason I m not happy is because I m still dealing with this anxiety.
5
SPEAKER_02
I m still dealing with, you know, this depression.
5
SPEAKER_02
And I m starting to feel like, you know, I m becoming a caricature of myself to a certain extent.
5
SPEAKER_02
And it was like, when I made the decision to start going to therapy, number one, but then you start going to therapy and you start saying to yourself, like, all right, this has gotten me to this point.
5
SPEAKER_02
What is going to get me to that next level of life?
5
SPEAKER_02
I wasn t thinking about career or anything like that.
5
SPEAKER_02
I said, what s going to get me to that next level of life?
5
SPEAKER_02
Because I want to enjoy life.
5
SPEAKER_02
I want to wake up more happy than depressed.
5
SPEAKER_02
I want to wake up feeling more secure about myself than imposter syndrome.
5
SPEAKER_02
What s going to get me to that?
5
SPEAKER_02
What got me to that was letting go of just what I felt like people wanted from me.
5
SPEAKER_02
And that s another reason the comments and stuff was so dangerous, because you can put things out there and immediately get
5
SPEAKER_02
real-time feedback.
5
SPEAKER_02
And, you know, this is 2018, right?
5
SPEAKER_02
Or 2016, 2017, you know, or prior to that, it was 2010, 2016, things weren t as, weren t that toxic on social media.
5
SPEAKER_02
So you could kind of get, like, some real-world criticism, and you would see these things that, you know, I guess people like about you, so you would constantly feed them more of that.
5
SPEAKER_02
Or you got publications saying, oh, Charlamagne is the hip-hop Howard Stern.
5
SPEAKER_02
You re like, well, what does that mean?
5
SPEAKER_02
So you start giving them more of the wild,
5
SPEAKER_02
you know, crazy antics.
5
SPEAKER_02
But for all I know, they could have meant that because of, you know, the introspective interviews that get done on Breakfast Club as well.
5
SPEAKER_02
But I wasn t seeing that aspect of it.
5
SPEAKER_02
I was just seeing the rah-rah, the wildness.
5
SPEAKER_02
And so for me, just personally and professionally, I just was not happy and I had to, you know, let that go.
5
SPEAKER_02
So that was the most freeing thing for me because when I did that, I experienced
5
SPEAKER_02
way more.
5
SPEAKER_02
I wouldn t be here sitting with you, you know, having the success that I ve had if I hadn t let that raft go.
5
SPEAKER_02
And there was also a period where, you know, because of this cancel culture era you live in, you be
5
SPEAKER_02
definitely ashamed to see some of the stuff that you, you know, used to do.
5
SPEAKER_02
You re not necessarily ashamed of it.
5
SPEAKER_02
You re more so afraid of, oh, they re going to use this against me, whatever, whatever.
5
SPEAKER_02
But guess what?
5
SPEAKER_02
You can t care about that.
5
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_02
And the reason you can t care about that, because if you really have faith in a higher power, if you really trust, you know, God to God, you have to know that every single moment that you were in, you were the person you needed to be for that
5
SPEAKER_02
moment.
5
SPEAKER_02
Because it s just a journey and it s a process and eventually you become who you re supposed to be.
5
SPEAKER_02
And even the version you re looking at me right now, I m not the final form of myself.
5
SPEAKER_02
I don t know what that s going to be.
5
SPEAKER_02
Nobody does.
5
SPEAKER_02
But I know that I m on the journey and I m going to keep walking.
5
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, one thing I wanted to pick your brain about was this idea, you kind of alluded to it there, it s this
5
SPEAKER_01
We have this rhetoric on social media, which is like, we want people to be more empathetic and compassionate and kind.
5
SPEAKER_01
We want people to, when they share their vulnerable mental health journey, that we all got to listen and be attentive.
5
SPEAKER_01
But then when sometimes we see someone with a mental health challenge, make them act different, we re the
6
SPEAKER_02
first ones to point out that they re an idiot, they re a loser, there s something wrong with them.
6
SPEAKER_02
I ll give an example of what I mean by this.
6
SPEAKER_02
Tom Holland talked about this when he came on the show.
6
SPEAKER_02
He was talking about how he s always been seen as Spider-Man and this cool kid and all the rest of it.
6
SPEAKER_02
And then when he started talking about his mental health, or actually no, when he just announced that he d given up alcohol and he was sober,
6
SPEAKER_02
All the news was like, he was saying this, he was saying all the news was like, oh, Tom Holland, the happy-go-lucky kid wasn t actually, he was depressed and it was like, and they made it a whole thing.
6
SPEAKER_02
And he was like, no, I just gave up alcohol.
6
SPEAKER_02
I wasn t like an alcoholic.
6
SPEAKER_02
I just didn t want to drink anymore.
6
SPEAKER_02
And so all of a sudden it was like twisted the other way.
6
SPEAKER_02
where it was like, oh, the kid that you think is happy isn t, he s depressed.
6
SPEAKER_02
Or the kid, he s got mental health or whatever it may be.
6
SPEAKER_02
And it wasn t in the kind of compassionate way.
6
SPEAKER_02
It was more like a, well, look, you didn t see this.
6
SPEAKER_02
So I find it like the way we react to certain things, it s almost like we re being hypocrites in and of ourself.
6
SPEAKER_02
Because at one point we re saying we should care for people who have this, but then we re willing to point it out.
6
SPEAKER_02
How have you kind of seen that navigate when you see the worst forms of what mental health can do to people
6
SPEAKER_02
versus someone maybe not displaying the worst mental illness externally, but is just talking about it.
6
SPEAKER_02
Does that make sense?
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I don t know how anybody can diagnose someone just by watching them through the media.
6
SPEAKER_01
Like, you know, if that s the case, we re all dealing with mental health issues.
6
100%.
6
SPEAKER_01
Some people are just shitty people.
6
SPEAKER_01
And that s the other thing.
6
SPEAKER_01
And by the way, we say two things can be true?
6
SPEAKER_01
No.
6
SPEAKER_01
Multiple things can be true at one time.
6
SPEAKER_01
Like you used the example of Tom Holland.
6
SPEAKER_01
Why can t he be the happy-go-lucky kid?
6
SPEAKER_01
Who said he s not?
6
SPEAKER_01
But that s the only version of him you had in your mind.
6
SPEAKER_01
So now when you see another version that doesn t fit your expectation, you re upset with him?
6
SPEAKER_01
The happy-go-lucky kid is not so happy anymore.
6
SPEAKER_01
That s life.
6
SPEAKER_01
You show me a human that s one emotion all the time.
6
SPEAKER_01
It s just that when you re a public figure, we get these, it s like these freeze frames.
6
SPEAKER_01
So Tom Holland, happy.
6
SPEAKER_01
You know?
6
SPEAKER_01
This person crazy, like it s just free, like literally freeze frame.
6
SPEAKER_01
This person always mad, angry.
6
SPEAKER_01
It s just freeze frames of people.
6
SPEAKER_01
That s not the whole totality of a person.
6
SPEAKER_01
Like that s actually kind of insane for us to even think about it like that.
6
SPEAKER_01
Like, like, like, like even if you watch Jay Shetty on purpose, you have a thought, a perception of Jay Shetty in your head.
6
SPEAKER_01
Or you got a perception of Charlamagne in your head based off something you may have seen.
6
SPEAKER_01
That s your fault.
6
SPEAKER_01
If that s the one thing you saw and you came to a whole diagnosis about an individual.
6
SPEAKER_01
So, you know, even when you talk about people having empathy, that goes into what I m saying now.
6
SPEAKER_01
We might want to.
6
SPEAKER_01
Everybody, all of these humans might wake up every day saying to themselves, we re going to be empathetic today, and we re going to be caring, and all of that stuff, until something happens to somebody that you don t like.
6
SPEAKER_01
And then all that goes out the window.
6
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I tend to see that people have more empathy and sympathy, and they re more caring towards people they actually like.
6
SPEAKER_01
It s really a popularity contest, but nobody wants to admit that.
6
SPEAKER_01
We re not being consistent about any of these things and we re not being consistent with how we deal with people.
6
SPEAKER_01
There can be two people that come out in the news today with the same situation and based off if we like the individual or not, we ll give that person a whole lot of grace and come to that person s defense.
6
SPEAKER_01
But if it s somebody that we don t like or somebody s social media tells us we shouldn t like, oh, we re going to bury them.
6
SPEAKER_01
We want them out of here.
6
SPEAKER_01
We want them gone.
6
SPEAKER_01
That s not consistent.
6
SPEAKER_01
And that means you re lying to yourself.
6
SPEAKER_01
And that means that you re not the person you say that you are because you should be giving both those individuals the same amount of grace, but you re not because we re all hypocrites.
6
SPEAKER_01
And that s fine.
6
SPEAKER_01
We re everything.
6
SPEAKER_01
Like everything that we pin on other people, we are all those things and more.
6
SPEAKER_01
We just got to make sure that we re not projecting.
6
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
6
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Facts.
6
SPEAKER_02
Wow.
6
SPEAKER_02
That s powerful, man.
6
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_02
And it s true.
6
SPEAKER_02
All of us are, right?
6
SPEAKER_02
We all have bias.
6
SPEAKER_02
Absolutely.
6
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We all have the natural human tendency to be empathetic to people we like, and we re all that way.
6
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But we ve got to be able to see that.
6
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Because if we can see that,
6
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then it s something that we can, like you said, we don t project.
6
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Otherwise we live in our tiny, we were talking about this earlier, we live in this righteous mind as Jonathan Haidt calls it, this idea of my way is righteous and I believe the way I live and the way I think is the only way and the right way.
6
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And that s where it goes wrong because
6
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The truth is, if everyone thinks like that, now you ve just got eight billion righteous ways.
6
SPEAKER_01
We even have to watch how we express that language, right?
6
SPEAKER_01
Because we all do it.
6
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We ll say things like, man, the way you re seeing that is strange.
6
SPEAKER_01
I can t believe you re seeing things that way.
6
SPEAKER_01
Why?
6
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Because they re not seeing it the way you are?
6
SPEAKER_01
Like, there s probably nothing wrong with the way that individual is seeing it.
6
SPEAKER_01
But because you think they should see it the way you are seeing it, you re upset with that person.
6
SPEAKER_01
Or you might have had the expectation, I know I can call this person because we love confirmation bias, right?
6
SPEAKER_01
So, I know that I can call this person because this person is going to agree with me.
6
SPEAKER_01
And then when you pick up the phone and call that person or text that person and realize that person has a different opinion,
6
SPEAKER_01
Now you arguing back and forth with that person, trying to get them to see things the way you see things.
6
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It s like, no, let them see it the way they want to see it.
6
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Like, one of the hardest things to do is to step into somebody else s shoes.
6
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One of the hardest things to do is to see things from the perspective of other people.
6
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I literally fight myself
6
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to do that.
6
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And some people might say, oh, he s being a contrarian.
6
SPEAKER_01
No, I m just literally, I ve literally taken the time to step out of myself, step into that person s shoes, see how they see it, and I can understand where they re coming from.
6
SPEAKER_00
What s wrong with that?
6
SPEAKER_01
I don t see anything wrong with that.
6
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I m not saying that person is right or that person s wrong.
6
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I m just simply saying I can see where that person s coming from.
6
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Like I said, multiple things can be true at once.
6
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I can think a person s wrong and still see where they re coming from.
6
SPEAKER_01
I can think a person s right, but still see where they re wrong at in their argument as well.
6
SPEAKER_01
I think that s very hard for humans to do, and I don t know why.
6
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, yeah.
6
SPEAKER_02
I mean, talking about calls, you talk about in the book the call that you get from Kanye.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
6
SPEAKER_02
And that call, like, walk us through how that applies to what you re saying here, where you re trying to see things through his perspective, but then you re also like, but I know Pete and we re friends.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, his perspective was, I m black, he s black.
6
SPEAKER_01
We both from hip hop culture, he s from hip hop culture.
6
SPEAKER_01
Pete Davidson is this white kid from Staten Island who does comedy.
6
SPEAKER_01
He s younger than us because we re in our 40s.
6
SPEAKER_01
He s younger than us.
6
SPEAKER_01
His ex-wife is now out here dating Pete.
6
SPEAKER_01
I m going to call Charlamagne because I need Charlamagne to start siding with me against Pete Davidson, and he should because he s black and of the culture,  as Kanye says.
6
SPEAKER_01
And it s like, no, Pete Davidson is my friend.
6
SPEAKER_01
I can care if he s black, I can care if he s white, I can care what.
6
SPEAKER_01
I don t care what age he is.
6
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That s somebody that I met when he was 16 years old, and we was all doing, you know, guy code together, and we developed a real friendship and a real bond.
6
SPEAKER_01
I know his mother.
6
SPEAKER_01
Like, me and his mom talk.
6
SPEAKER_01
We check on each other.
6
SPEAKER_01
I ve been to his mom s house.
6
SPEAKER_01
You don t sit in somebody s mom s house and eat food with them and call that person a friend and then turn around and do snake shit like that.
6
SPEAKER_01
Pete s been to my house.
6
SPEAKER_01
He s been around my kids.
6
SPEAKER_01
He s been around my wife.
6
SPEAKER_01
I know him.
6
SPEAKER_01
You re not going to call me
6
SPEAKER_01
and get me to turn on my friend and try to, you know, say, because we re Black and we re of the culture.
6
SPEAKER_01
It s like, no, right is right, wrong is wrong.
6
SPEAKER_01
And as I told him, you know...
6
SPEAKER_01
and I had to quote Snoop Dogg from the 1990s, don t be mad at the player, hate the game, because your girl chose him.
6
SPEAKER_01
I didn t say girl, I used some other language.
6
SPEAKER_01
I used the language Snoop used, but your girl chose him and she s a grown woman making her own decisions.
6
SPEAKER_01
Y all not together no more.
6
SPEAKER_01
So for me, it s like, you re not going to call me and try to guilt trip me.
6
SPEAKER_01
you know, using blackness in hip hop to go against somebody I consider a friend.
6
SPEAKER_01
Because if I considered you a friend like that, Kanye, nobody could make me do that to you as well.
6
SPEAKER_01
You know?
6
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So it s really that simple with me.
6
SPEAKER_01
I don t have, you know,
6
SPEAKER_01
I don t have flexible morals and values when it comes to people that I love and when it comes to people that I consider actual friends and consider actual family.
6
SPEAKER_01
That s why betrayal hurts so much.
6
SPEAKER_01
That s why when you realize that certain people s character gets revealed when they don t get what they want from you.
6
SPEAKER_01
That s another realization that I ve been having a lot lately.
6
SPEAKER_01
I don t know, that person wasn t necessarily my friend like I thought they were.
6
SPEAKER_01
They were my friend based on what opportunity was being provided at the time, right?
6
SPEAKER_01
And so it s like, it s sad, but you do realize some of that stuff is transactional.
6
SPEAKER_01
That s why I say I m not mad at being used, just don t
7
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Just don t misuse me.
7
SPEAKER_01
And when things don t go your way, don t all of a sudden start, you know, kicking my back in just because things don t go your way.
7
SPEAKER_01
Because I m not going to do that to you other than, you know, I m lying.
7
SPEAKER_01
I wouldn t do that to you.
7
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Meaning that when I m around my people, I m definitely going to be like, that person is so fucked up.
7
SPEAKER_01
That person is such a, like, I cannot believe that that individual did such and such.
7
SPEAKER_01
But guess what?
7
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I can believe it because I understand
7
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humans.
7
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So I give all of those type of humans grace, but it s very disappointing when you re more solid to a person than they would be with you.
7
SPEAKER_01
Because if I embrace you, and I say you my friend, if I say I rock with you, we re going to ride to the wheels for a lot.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah, totally.
7
SPEAKER_00
And I find it s an interesting one because it s like,
7
SPEAKER_00
It s almost like, also, it s only the people, the only people that attacked you are the people who, you know, wanted to do something with you, but it didn t happen.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yes.
7
SPEAKER_00
Right?
7
SPEAKER_00
What you re saying about changing morals, like, I find, like, people attack you, and they re like, oh, I want to do a podcast with you, but you didn t want to make it happen, so now I m going to find a way to attack you.
7
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It didn t work out.
7
SPEAKER_00
And it s interesting, because you go, oh, well, then it wasn t ever a collaboration, and it wasn t of high character.
7
SPEAKER_00
It was an opportunity.
7
SPEAKER_00
Now that the opportunity s lost, now you have a different view of the situation.
7
SPEAKER_00
And i love that point you made about how that s why i think opportunities going well or not going well shows how someone responds to it absolutely like when there s a yes or no someone who actually responds well to a no.
7
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And a healthy no, again, obviously in a way that is communicated effectively.
7
SPEAKER_00
Someone who responds in a positive way to a rejection or a no or a closed door, that person, you should keep them around forever.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yo, man, Jay, you hitting it on the head so crazy, pause.
7
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It s like, do you remember, like, you know, you ever met somebody who s so talented and you say to yourself,
7
SPEAKER_01
Why isn t this person here?
7
SPEAKER_01
Why isn t this person doing X, Y, and Z?
7
SPEAKER_01
Because they re so talented.
7
SPEAKER_01
And then when you start to get in business with them, and you go down the path with them, and you start to be around them, you realize exactly
7
SPEAKER_01
Why they haven t gotten to where they need to be?
7
SPEAKER_01
Because once again, my good friend Marbet Brito always says this, talent will take you what character can t sustain you.
7
SPEAKER_01
So you start to see like this person is not really a hard worker or this person really is a gossip.
7
SPEAKER_01
Like this person just likes to talk about everybody else instead of focusing on what they should be focusing on.
7
SPEAKER_01
They re so worried about what everybody else is doing and trying to shoot down what everybody else is doing.
7
SPEAKER_01
And you re trying to tell them like, don t worry about that.
7
SPEAKER_01
Because, you know, listen, sometimes jealousy and envy, it s natural, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
But don t focus on what s going right for everybody else because you don t know what s going on in their lives.
7
SPEAKER_01
They might be looking like on the surface like they re winning and things are great, but they might be going home crying every night.
7
SPEAKER_01
Like, don t worry about that.
7
SPEAKER_01
You focus on you.
7
SPEAKER_01
But you see that they can t do that.
7
SPEAKER_01
And when things don t go their way, oh, they become the worst people.
7
SPEAKER_01
Everybody s the enemy.
7
SPEAKER_01
Everybody s a terrible person.
7
SPEAKER_01
All of these people are out to get me.
7
SPEAKER_01
Nobody s looking out for me.
7
SPEAKER_01
And you realize, like, that s exactly why you re not where you re supposed to be.
7
SPEAKER_01
I ve had so many doors closed on me.
7
SPEAKER_01
I ve gotten way more no s.
7
SPEAKER_01
you know, than yeses in my life.
7
SPEAKER_01
I never was bitter about any of those no s, because I truly believe in God.
7
SPEAKER_01
And so whatever God has for me will absolutely positively be for me.
7
SPEAKER_01
We love saying that, but we don t mean it.
7
SPEAKER_01
You don t mean it.
7
SPEAKER_01
Because when things don t go right for you, guess what you say?
7
SPEAKER_01
Why God?
7
SPEAKER_01
Why is this thing not happening for me?
7
SPEAKER_01
Because I don t want it to at the moment.
7
SPEAKER_01
Do you trust me or not?
7
SPEAKER_01
If you don t trust me, I ll be sitting here waiting until you do.
7
SPEAKER_01
And guess what?
7
SPEAKER_01
If you never do, God bless.
7
SPEAKER_01
Literally.
7
SPEAKER_01
Straight up.
7
SPEAKER_01
God will be sitting right there.
7
SPEAKER_01
I can bless you at any moment, but not until you re ready.
7
SPEAKER_01
You don t trust me anyway.
7
SPEAKER_01
So until you find that trust in me,
7
SPEAKER_01
Good luck.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_00
I respect you for that in this.
7
SPEAKER_00
I mean, you always like this off, uh, online and offline, but in the book, I really feel like you get honest with us, but you re about your own pain and trauma, but you also get honest with us about just, you know, you re just right now, you re just spitting facts.
7
SPEAKER_00
Like it s just reality.
7
SPEAKER_00
It s just the way it is.
7
SPEAKER_00
And I think one of the things you talk about is this desire to like, you want to also make a joke when you can, like, you want to make it funny.
7
SPEAKER_00
You want to be able to let it, you know, let it kind of live in that world.
7
SPEAKER_00
When have you found it?
7
SPEAKER_00
that it works and when have you found that that doesn t work?
7
SPEAKER_00
Like when you re trying to make something into being funny or silly or kind of lightening the mood, when have you seen that be effective and ineffective?
7
SPEAKER_01
Probably quite often.
7
SPEAKER_00
Which way?
7
SPEAKER_00
Ineffective or effective?
7
SPEAKER_01
I mean, I think it works both ways both times, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
Because like say you re in a room full of people, somebody s going to laugh,
7
SPEAKER_01
But then the person you might be trying to make laugh does not want to laugh in that moment.
7
SPEAKER_01
So they re the one that s upset.
7
SPEAKER_01
Now you re really in your head like, I was just trying to make this person laugh.
7
SPEAKER_01
I was just trying to do something good.
7
SPEAKER_01
So now you really like trying to get this person to just have, you know, you re trying to put better energy on this person.
7
SPEAKER_01
Reality is you just leave that person alone in that moment.
7
SPEAKER_01
Everything does not require a joke.
7
SPEAKER_01
I have not learned that.
7
SPEAKER_01
I may not ever, I may not ever, you know, learn that.
7
SPEAKER_01
I really may not.
7
SPEAKER_01
Like, I just feel like I like to be around people who don t take things too serious, even when things are serious.
7
SPEAKER_01
Cause I don t feel like you can, you know, make really good sound decisions when things are too serious because emotions are too high.
7
SPEAKER_01
Like sometimes you gotta like, let s laugh about it.
7
SPEAKER_01
Let s joke about it.
7
SPEAKER_01
Let s really, really, really lighten the room.
7
SPEAKER_01
And then let s like sit down and try to like,
7
SPEAKER_01
figure it out.
7
SPEAKER_01
Like if you are sitting around a whole bunch of people and everybody s angry and everybody s upset, everybody s mad, you just got a team that s about to make a poor decision.
7
SPEAKER_01
Somebody on the team got to just be like, whoa, yo, everybody relax here.
7
SPEAKER_01
Somebody got to be the rational one in the room.
7
SPEAKER_01
And most of the time the rational one in the room is the person that s
7
SPEAKER_01
not, they re taking it serious, but they re just not taking it serious in the way that you wanna take it serious.
7
SPEAKER_01
Because I m the type of person, I m like, what can I do?
7
SPEAKER_01
Like there s certain situations that you hear about, certain situations you are confronted with in the moment, and you realize like there s really nothing we can do about this except for let it play out.
7
SPEAKER_01
So while we letting it play out, let s laugh.
7
SPEAKER_01
You know what I m saying?
7
SPEAKER_01
Let s crack some jokes.
7
SPEAKER_01
You ever seen that movie,
7
SPEAKER_01
Uh, don t look up?
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, of course.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly.
7
SPEAKER_01
You see how they handled the end of the world?
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
7
SPEAKER_01
That s how, like, I m talking about the Leonardo DiCaprio character when they were all at dinner and they were still pouring drinks and they were eating.
7
SPEAKER_01
They knew the inevitable was happening.
7
SPEAKER_01
They knew there was nothing they could do to stop it.
7
SPEAKER_01
They spent the whole beginning of the movie trying to stop it.
7
SPEAKER_01
And they accepted fate in that moment.
7
SPEAKER_01
And they decided, I m going out.
7
SPEAKER_01
like this, because they knew there was nothing they could do about it.
7
SPEAKER_01
And I know that that s a movie and it s probably easier said than done, but that s what I, that s what I strive for.
7
SPEAKER_01
Like, even in the face of adversity, even when it seems like, you know, Chicken Little, the sky is falling, everything s burning down around you.
7
SPEAKER_01
You re like exhibiting that video where he s just walking and everything s burning down and all this bad stuff is happening behind him, but he s just rapping and moving, rapping and moving.
7
SPEAKER_01
It s just like, yo, that s how I feel.
7
SPEAKER_01
Like, I want to,
7
SPEAKER_01
you know, constantly live my life.
7
SPEAKER_01
And that s the kind of people I want to, you know, be around.
7
SPEAKER_01
People that keep me in that space.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, for sure.
7
SPEAKER_00
Last question I want to ask you, Sholem, before we wrap up is, and it s interesting because it relates to what you just said of you want to be around those people.
7
SPEAKER_00
How do we find belonging in a world we don t agree with, but stop ourselves from only being friends with people we agree with?
7
SPEAKER_00
Right?
7
SPEAKER_00
It s like, because right now we look at belonging as like, if we agree, then I find belonging.
7
SPEAKER_00
But we both know from what you re saying in the book, from what you re saying right now, from what you say on your podcast, from what you say on your show, is like, but you are very comfortable sitting down having uncomfortable, awkward conversations with people who people wouldn t place you with.
7
SPEAKER_00
from completely different backgrounds, different walks of life, different schools of thought, and you find that to be a very important thing to do.
7
SPEAKER_00
Absolutely.
7
SPEAKER_00
So how do we find belonging in a way that we re not just creating little echo chambers and little confirmation bias schools where we just all just say what we think and we all double click on and go, yeah, yeah, yeah, that thing, that thing.
7
SPEAKER_00
How do we create a culture where, which you re doing through your work, through your book, how do you actually do that in your life?
7
SPEAKER_00
Because I think we all like to be around people who agree with us.
7
SPEAKER_01
I don t even know if you realize it, but as you was talking, you referred to that stuff as little.
7
SPEAKER_01
And that s exactly what it is.
7
SPEAKER_01
It s small.
7
SPEAKER_01
That s why it s literally called why small talk sucks.
7
SPEAKER_01
Macro conversations are big conversations that you can have with anybody.
7
SPEAKER_01
Like when you put yourself in those small boxes, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
When you confine yourself to just speaking with the people that you agree with, when you confine yourself
8
SPEAKER_00
just being in those echo chambers.
8
SPEAKER_00
Those rooms are so small.
8
SPEAKER_00
They just seem big because of social media, but that s not how the world works.
8
SPEAKER_00
Yo, there s really not too many people that are going to see the world exactly the way you see it.
8
SPEAKER_00
So that can t be true.
8
SPEAKER_00
All y all are lying to each other because y all just love the community of each other.
8
SPEAKER_00
Y all are really a bunch of people who need, you know, support.
8
SPEAKER_00
from each other and y all wanna have a friend group just like all humans do.
8
SPEAKER_00
So y all are all just going along to get along with each other.
8
SPEAKER_00
So y all make this imaginary rule book, this imaginary playbook, and y all have this imaginary rhetoric that everybody has to say.
8
SPEAKER_00
And if you don t see things like this, if you don t say things like this, then you can t be in this club no more.
8
SPEAKER_00
This club is this big.
8
SPEAKER_00
That club is so, so, so, so small.
8
SPEAKER_00
So in order to just like,
8
SPEAKER_00
understand that you live in a world that you are going to disagree with people.
8
SPEAKER_00
Like I said earlier, I can think you re right, but still not necessarily agree with you.
8
SPEAKER_00
I can understand where you re coming from, but still think you re wrong.
8
SPEAKER_00
Like, I don t understand why we just can t sit down and have more conversations with people and realize the surface
8
SPEAKER_00
that I saw this individual or this perception of this individual that I had in my head, if you sit down and actually have a conversation with them and like listen to the whole totality of everything that they may be saying or experience, you ll never be able to experience the whole totality of a person, but you ll get closer to what you thought if you just sit down and have a conversation with them, you ll realize like, oh,
8
SPEAKER_00
what they re saying isn t necessarily that bad, or, oh, I understand why they see things that way.
8
SPEAKER_00
I disagree with them, but I understand it, and I respect their right to think that.
8
SPEAKER_00
We spend so much time trying to change people s minds because we re trying to make ourselves comfortable.
8
SPEAKER_01
So true.
8
SPEAKER_00
We talk about all of this growth that we want to have as humans, and we talk about how, you know, and we like being uncomfortable because when we re uncomfortable, it s making us grow.
8
SPEAKER_00
We know that we re evolving.
8
SPEAKER_00
We really don t like growing, and we really don t like being uncomfortable.
8
SPEAKER_00
We get to a certain point, and we all need to admit this, we get to a certain point where we re very comfortable.
8
SPEAKER_00
And we don t want anything disrupting this comfort.
8
SPEAKER_00
So to have new conversations and to talk to people that we may not necessarily agree with, oh, man, that scares us to death.
8
SPEAKER_00
That scares us to death.
8
SPEAKER_00
But I would say you should be more afraid of not growing.
8
SPEAKER_00
You should be more afraid of thinking that I ve gotten to a certain point.
8
SPEAKER_00
and I m fine and cool here.
8
SPEAKER_00
The world is a beautiful place, Jay.
8
SPEAKER_00
Humans are beautiful people.
8
SPEAKER_00
Like, why would you not want to experience everything that God created?
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Because a lot of these things that we ve learned, that s not necessarily of God.
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It s just things that we ve picked up in this world.
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Some people have picked up things that are different.
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from us.
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But sometimes when you sit down and you listen to that person and that person shares their experiences or that person, you know, tells you what they ve been through that s gotten them to that, you know, point in life, it can be eye-opening.
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And it s been very eye-opening for me throughout my life.
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Like, my best relationships in life have come through me having conversations with people that I didn t have anything
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in common with.
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One of the greatest gifts my mother ever gave me, she was an English teacher growing up in South Carolina.
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When I was growing up in South Carolina, she told me, read things that don t pertain to you.
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So I m in the library, I m reading everything from UFOs, Sasquatch, to Judy Blume in Beverly Clearly, to the point where I m like, this woman Judy Blume is a phenomenal
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So I love Judy Blume the same way I love Scarface, the same way I love Jay-Z, the same way I love Ghostface.
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She s that level of storyteller to me.
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And now, because of that love of somebody like Judy Blume and me expressing that, she s somebody I actually call a friend.
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She s actually somebody that I have gone down to Florida and kicked it with her and her husband George, me and my wife.
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I ve been to her bookstore and her movie theater.
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We was just together in New York a couple weeks ago.
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That comes from being open to other people, other experiences, and just listening to each other.
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And that s really what, you know, Get Honest or Die Lying, Why Small Talk Sucks is really all about.
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It s really about us, you know, getting to listen to each other.
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That s why I end every chapter by saying, let s discuss.
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Because I want us to have
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conversations.
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I m opening up conversation.
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I don t want you just to talk to the people that you agree with every day.
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Tear down the walls of that echo chamber and realize how big the world is.
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The world is infinite.
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That s what I want people to get from this book.
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Yeah, and just the way you reacted to that, I could tell how deep the topic is for you.
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It took me a second, but when you said, oh, the way I said it was little, and then you were like, oh, it s actually small talk, like it applies.
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That showed me just how deep this is running through your veins.
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Absolutely.
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Because you picked up on that.
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It s like, yeah, I was saying, yeah, these little groups and these little echo chambers and these little kind of like, you know, text threads or message threads, whatever we have.
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Language is important, Jason.
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It just gets smaller and smaller and smaller.
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Last question, what s the hardest, hardest conversation you ve had to have with your kids so far?
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So far, or the most honest conversation I d say, not hardest, the most honest conversation.
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Oh man, that s... Listen, I got a 15 year old, an 8 year old, a 5 year old, and a 2 year old.
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All girls.
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So I haven t had it yet.
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They re all hard.
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They re all difficult.
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Every single one, especially my 15-year-old, because she s a sophomore in high school now.
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And they re dealing with things that we never even thought of dealing with, literally.
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And we re dealing with adults that we never thought of dealing with.
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And these kids are smart.
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I remember during COVID,
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My daughter came to me and she came to me and my wife and she was like, she was in tears and she was like, yo, I m overwhelmed.
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Like, I m overwhelmed.
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Like, this is driving me crazy.
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You know, my grades are slipping.
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I m like, I gave her a hug.
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I m like, we are in an unprecedented time right now.
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Like, we re literally at home.
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I m at home doing work.
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You re doing pottery class on the kitchen floor.
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Do you think I give a damn if your grades slip at a moment like this?
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Like, I don t care about any of that.
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But what made me proud in that moment was she had the language.
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Because you know she s been to therapy not because anything s necessarily wrong.
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I m just realizing that we re in an unprecedented time.
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Like, these kids deal with things that we don t have to deal with.
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So, I want them, I want her to have the tools and the language early.
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Because I m just a person still going through it myself.
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Her mom is a person still going through it herself.
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So, I want her to sit down and you know talk to experts.
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So, but just the fact she had the language.
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So, when you say difficult conversations, honestly the difficult conversations come from
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me having to check my ego as a parent, because I m 45, and I believe this little 15-year-old doesn t know anything yet, she knows a whole lot.
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And she can, she s teaching me, you know, a whole lot, right?
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There s some things that change, there s some things that stay the same in this world, but there s a whole lot that has changed.
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And I think that, you know, we sometimes are too stubborn to realize that.
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And so,
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Yeah.
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I guess to answer your question, every day is a difficult conversation.
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I got four girls.
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Every day is a difficult conversation.
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Like I m dealing with a different set of emotions every single day.
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The biggest thing for me is to stay centered.
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Insane and you know not let my emotions get the best of me like that s one of the biggest conversations me and my wife Constantly have like we get together in our little prayer circles and huddle together like we are doing the best we can I literally touch so funny.
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I told her this yesterday.
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I was like yo
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You know, we ve been together 26 years, and we ve experienced so many different levels of life together.
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And so what I said to her, I was like, we ve also realized 26 years go by fast.
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So regardless of how stressed out we get,
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because of these children, let s enjoy the moment.
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Like literally, let s just enjoy the moment.
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We are doing the best we can.
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There is no manual that comes with this.
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You don t want to take everything you learn from your parents because you realize they didn t have all of the proper tools and they didn t necessarily, you know, instill the right things in us, at least from a man s perspective.
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My mom, I felt was phenomenal, but at least from a man s perspective, you know, I didn t have that.
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So we re just all doing
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the best we can.
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So let s just give each other some grace, man, and enjoy this ride called adulthood.
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Absolutely.
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Everyone, the book is called Get Honest or Die Lying.
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You can get it right now.
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Why Small Talk Sucks.
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Shalom and the God.
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This is the book that I want you to get.
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Discuss it with your friends, dissect it, allow it to infuse into reality.
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I ve been really, really happy that this book s out because I spent last Christmas in London, which is what I usually do, and I started to find that even friends I ve had for a couple of decades, I found that we were becoming less and less honest with each other.
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And I was feeling really disconnected when I was back at Christmas, and I was trying to figure out what it was.
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I was like, wait a minute, is it because I left eight years ago and I ve been living in the States?
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Is it because of this?
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Is it this?
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And I realized it was honesty.
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And so I started to create conversations in my friends group that were uncomfortable.
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And when I saw that you d written this book, I was so moved by it because I was like, that was the exact issue that I felt I was moving further away from the people I was closest to because we were all now just playing a role and everyone was playing their part, but there was no longer a get honest conversation.
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It was all small talk.
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And so I really hope that this conversation inspires people to get closer to the people you already think you re close to and understand the people that you re far away from.
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And so the book is called Get Honest or Die Lying, Why Small Talk Sucks.
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You can grab it right now.
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We ll put it in the comments and the link in the caption.
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Charlamagne, thank you so much again, man.
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As always, I appreciate these conversations.
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I appreciate you.
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Anytime, man.
9
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We always have macro conversations on air, off air, and I mean, just what you built with this platform on purpose, it is so necessary, man.
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Like, you know, everybody s having these conversations about mindfulness and, you know, wellness, and we re all just trying to be the best versions of ourselves.
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Something like this didn t exist
9
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five years ago, just like those conversations that people are having now weren t necessarily as loud as they were, you know, as loud five years ago as they are now.
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And your platform On Purpose is a big, big, big, huge part of that.
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So thank you for your service, brother.
9
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Thank you.
9
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I appreciate it.
9
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Thank you.
9
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If this is the year that you re trying to get creative, you re trying to build more, I need you to listen to this episode with Rick Rubin on how to break into your most creative self, how to use unconventional methods that lead to success, and the secret to genuinely loving what you do.
9
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If you re trying to find your passion and your lane, Rick Rubin s episode is the one for you.
9
SPEAKER_01
Just because I like it, that doesn t give it any value.
9
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Like, as an artist, if you like it, that s all of the value.
9
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That s the success comes when you say, I like this enough for other people to see it.
9
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For Mental Health Awareness Month, I m partnering up with the National Alliance of Mental Illness, NAMI.
9
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If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health, there is help.
9
SPEAKER_07
Call NAMI helpline at 800-950-NAMI or go to www.nami.org forward slash help or text helpline to 62640.
9
SPEAKER_07
For immediate 24-7 crisis support, call or text 988 or visit www.988.org.
9
SPEAKER_07
Lifeline.org
9
SPEAKER_04
Something that makes me crazy is when people say, well, I had this career before, but it was a waste.
9
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And that s where the perspective shift comes, that it s not a waste, that everything you ve done has built you to where you are now.
9
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This is She Pivots, the podcast where we explore the inspiring pivots women have made and dig deeper into the personal reasons behind them.
9
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Join me, Emily Tish Sussman, every Wednesday on She Pivots.
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Listen to She Pivots on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
9
SPEAKER_02
Bring a little optimism into your life with The Bright Side, a new kind of daily podcast from Hello Sunshine, hosted by me, Danielle Robay.
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And me, Simone Boyce.
9
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Every weekday, we re bringing you conversations about culture, the latest trends, inspiration, and so much more.
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I am so excited about this podcast, The Bright Side.
9
SPEAKER_00
You guys are giving people a chance to shine a light on their lives, shine a light on a little advice that they want to share.
9
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Listen to The Bright Side on America s number one podcast network, iHeart.
9
SPEAKER_03
Open your free iHeart app and search The Bright Side.
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Tune in to the new podcast, Stories from the Village of Nothing Much.
9
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Like, easy listening, but for fiction.
9
SPEAKER_06
If you ve overdosed on bad news, we invite you into a world where the glimmers of goodness in everyday life are all around you.
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I m Katharine Nicolai, and I m an architect of cozy.
9
SPEAKER_06
Come spend some time where everyone is welcome and the default is kindness.
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SPEAKER_06
Listen, relax, enjoy.
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SPEAKER_06
Listen to stories from the Village of Nothing Much on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.