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 How to allow men to be emotionally vulnerable, especially when they're growing up It's not accepted when you're made fun of when you're picked on by Other boys when you're being sensitive or maybe a girl who's saying hey, what are you crying for?
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SPEAKER_01
That's not sexy to me That's not a turn-on.
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, then boys start to toughen up and say okay.
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SPEAKER_01
I can't show my emotions because my buddies are gonna make fun of me and
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SPEAKER_01
 I'm not gonna get the girl, and she's not gonna think I'm a real man.
1
SPEAKER_01
And so we kinda just put these masks on.
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SPEAKER_01
Tell me if I'm wrong here.
1
SPEAKER_00
No, no, I think you're right, and I think what it is is that the culture, even for young girls who eventually grow up to be women who want men to be mostly vulnerable,
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SPEAKER_00
 There are as much victims of it as we are because they're told that the toughness, the mass, the indifference, the bad boy imagery is what to turn on, right?
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SPEAKER_00
 And then as they go through their maturation process, they realize that there's something else that's needed and that vulnerability.
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SPEAKER_00
And then I think from a cultural standpoint, as men, what we fail to do is to say, hey, I actually love love.
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SPEAKER_00
I actually appreciate intimacy.
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SPEAKER_00
That as beautiful and as amazing as you are, what really is beautiful
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SPEAKER_00
 is that I can trust the conversation we're having is authentic, and I can be my true self, and I can say, you know, today this actually hurts.
1
SPEAKER_00
You know, one of the things I wrote about in a new book, I said, you know, as a boy, when I couldn't cry tears, I cried bullets.
1
SPEAKER_00
Like, that's our community right now, right?
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SPEAKER_00
These mass shootings are unexpressed sadness, they're unexpressed frustration, they're unexpressed insecurities,
1
SPEAKER_00
 And while it doesn't excuse the behavior, if we grow to understand it, then we can actually better prevent it, first of all.
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SPEAKER_00
Because everybody can do a Monday morning triage and we can all play Monday morning quarterback.
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SPEAKER_00
But prevention is what we have currently available to us.
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SPEAKER_00
 And that prevention starts with understanding.
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SPEAKER_00
If you don't understand, if you don't create space for men to actually say, here's how I really feel.
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SPEAKER_00
Let's take down the idea that you think about how I feel, but here's how I really feel.
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SPEAKER_00
And we have to do it with each other as men.
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SPEAKER_00
Absolutely.
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SPEAKER_00
 And what I found is that in my men's circle, I get so excited to talk about my friends.
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Because I can say to them, I love you, brother.
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SPEAKER_00
I care about you.
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SPEAKER_00
And how does your soul feel today?
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SPEAKER_00
Did you do anything that was joyful?
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SPEAKER_00
Are you fulfilled in your life and in your purpose?
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SPEAKER_00
And we don't have to talk about numbers and metrics.
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SPEAKER_00
 all these other things that have been defined as the way that we measure our manhood, but I can do it because I'm willing to share those things.
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SPEAKER_00
 And I didn't get there overnight.
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SPEAKER_00
Like this was a journey unlike anything imaginable.
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SPEAKER_00
And I would say that the tipping point from the emotional growth started with the third miracle.
1
SPEAKER_00
Remember I said that there was these three miracles, right?
1
SPEAKER_01
So Nancy was the second one.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah, and so that third miracle was getting a letter from my son while I was in solitary.
1
SPEAKER_00
So this is after the altercation with the officer.
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SPEAKER_00
 I'm about seven or eight years into my sentence.
1
SPEAKER_00
From your son?
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_00
When did you have your first son?
1
SPEAKER_00
So my first son was born six months after I was arrested.
1
SPEAKER_00
So his mom was three months pregnant.
1
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
1
SPEAKER_00
Oh, wow.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so, you know, probably about two years into that time in solitary, which began about my eighth year in prison.
1
SPEAKER_00
So I probably was coming up on 10 years when I get this letter.
1
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
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SPEAKER_00
 And my dad always would sit my son down and make sure he wrote me letters.
1
SPEAKER_00
And normally they were just these little kid letters, hey dad, Transformers is my jam right now.
1
SPEAKER_00
Or here's a drawing or whatever and I love you dad.
1
SPEAKER_01
He would send you those as a kid, a young two, five, seven year old.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, and I actually still have those letters.
1
SPEAKER_00
That's cool.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And so he would send me these throughout my journey.
1
SPEAKER_00
And then I get this one letter when he's about 10 years old.
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SPEAKER_00
I'm in solitary at the time.
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SPEAKER_00
I think I'm on about year two.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I open the letter expecting it to just be, hey, dad, here's what's happening in my world.
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SPEAKER_00
When I open it, my son writes to me, dad, my mom told me why you were in prison for murder.
1
SPEAKER_00
And he said, dad, don't kill again.
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SPEAKER_00
Jesus watches what you do.
1
SPEAKER_00
 That letter destroyed the facade of toughness.
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SPEAKER_00
Like the mask that I had worn up to that point in my life, I mean, it just disintegrated.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And I was like, I owe him a dad.
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SPEAKER_00
And if I don't know if I'm getting out of prison or not, but what I do know is that I have to live my life in a way that my son understands that no matter how far down you fall in life, if you are willing to do the work, you can get up and you can overcome.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And so I said to myself in that moment, I don't know how, I don't even know if I'm ever gonna get out of this place, but I need to prove to myself that I am committed to transforming my life.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I'm in the Spartan cell at the time, like there is nothing there that says, hey, here's how you can prove it.
1
SPEAKER_00
So I started with journaling, because I wanted to get to the truth of like, you know, how did I end up here?
1
SPEAKER_00
 Like there was a part of me that was like, I know I'm not a bad person.
1
SPEAKER_00
I know that I'm a good soul, but I've done horrible things that have hurt people.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so that was a conflict that was just like, this is a war right now, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
 And so I go into battle mode.
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SPEAKER_00
I'm like journaling and I'm writing.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I mean, it's raw and it's scary.
1
SPEAKER_00
And it's just like, sheesh, this is the things that I've done.
1
SPEAKER_00
These are the things that have been done to me.
1
SPEAKER_00
And while I was doing it, I realized that I hadn't completed anything other than the GED.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I was like, okay, if you're committed to transforming your life,
1
SPEAKER_00
 you have to finish something.
1
SPEAKER_00
And you have to do it for you.
1
SPEAKER_00
And you can't do it for the warden, you can't do it for the guards, you can't do it for your parents.
1
SPEAKER_00
I told them many times, oh, I'm turning my life around.
1
SPEAKER_00
So last time I've been in trouble, it was all the fluff, it was the mess, it was the lies that we tell ourselves in the moment when we're hurting and we're just like, okay, we don't want the, we want that immediate hurt to stop.
1
SPEAKER_00
But it wasn't about turning life around.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so I said,
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SPEAKER_00
 Here's what you do.
1
SPEAKER_00
You have to write a book in 30 days.
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SPEAKER_00
And if you write this book in 30 days, then that will be your proof that you're ready for a change.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And so I didn't have a laptop though.
1
SPEAKER_00
I didn't have a typewriter.
1
SPEAKER_00
You were handwriting.
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SPEAKER_00
It was old school.
1
SPEAKER_00
I didn't even have a real good pen.
1
SPEAKER_00
So imagine if you pulled the inside of that pen out.
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SPEAKER_00
You had that little thing.
1
SPEAKER_00
That little thing.
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SPEAKER_01
Oh my gosh, that's hard.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so I was like, okay.
1
SPEAKER_00
They wouldn't give you a pen?
1
SPEAKER_00
No, not in solitary.
1
SPEAKER_00
They're scared you're gonna like shank the guard or something, right?
1
SPEAKER_01
Oh my gosh.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And so immediately, I was like, it's no way possible I'm going to write a book in 30 days with this thing.
1
SPEAKER_00
And the first thing that popped in my mind was, here's excuse number one.
1
SPEAKER_00
Here's your victimhood.
1
SPEAKER_00
Here's your blaming everything other than being accountable.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I was like, OK, no, that's not going to happen.
1
SPEAKER_00
We're not going back down this path, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
 And so I took that pen, and I wrote it up in some paper.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I had- Ah, chill.
1
SPEAKER_00
Chill getting in there, making it hard.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I'm like, yo.
1
SPEAKER_00
I mean, I had tons of experience rolling things up, so it was just like, let me be intentional, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
Like, this is innovation.
1
SPEAKER_00
This is, you know, I learned that later on in my life, that, oh, that's what that is, like, innovation.
1
SPEAKER_00
But rolling it up in that paper made it firm enough for me to write.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I wrote for 30 days straight until I finished that book.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And when I finished that book, I felt this incredible weight lifted from my shoulder.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I felt empathy for myself.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I felt compassion.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I was like, you are a smart kid.
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SPEAKER_00
You are capable of doing good.
1
SPEAKER_00
You are worthy of doing good.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I was like, wow.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And then I was like, okay, that's cool.
1
SPEAKER_00
I wrote a book.
1
SPEAKER_00
But I was like, greatness is the ability to do something good over and over.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so I was like, write another book in 30 days.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I wrote that second book.
1
SPEAKER_00
And then I started a third book and I fell into the deepest bout of depression that I had ever experienced while incarcerated.
1
SPEAKER_00
 Writing the book?
1
SPEAKER_00
Writing that book.
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SPEAKER_00
Why?
1
SPEAKER_00
About halfway through, I realized I had all this talent and I was trapped in an environment where I couldn't give birth to it.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And all the disappointment of my life flooded back to me.
1
SPEAKER_00
This realization that I was this brilliant kid, I was a talented writer, I was an artist at heart, I was smart, but here it was, I was in the worst place imaginable, in solitary confinement, with the chaos of that environment playing out all around me.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And it was devastating to come face to face with that.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I just remember not even wanting to get off my bunk.
1
SPEAKER_00
Like everything felt heavy and weighted.
1
SPEAKER_00
Like just to go to that door and open that food slot and take in a slot one more time, like it felt like a million mile journey.
1
SPEAKER_00
 because it was like that heavy, that devastation of coming face to face with my authentic self in an environment that was created by this mass version of who I was.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I was just like, damn, I failed this kid.
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SPEAKER_00
I let this person down.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so I fall into this deep, deep depression.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And then one day, I was just like, you know, you can sit back and you can feel sorry for yourself.
1
SPEAKER_00
You can blame your parents.
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SPEAKER_00
You can blame your trauma.
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SPEAKER_00
You can blame the guards.
1
SPEAKER_00
You can blame everything that led to this moment.
1
SPEAKER_00
 But right now, you have a choice, whether to wallow in self-pity, in defeat, in brokenness, or you can find your inner light, and you can find your way out of here.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so at this time, I was reading all these brilliant books, you know, As a Man Think of the Secret, and it was talking about the power of manifestation.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And initially, I was like, this is some whack, quack science right here.
1
SPEAKER_00
It's all woo woo, garbage, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
How do you think into existence and things, right?
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SPEAKER_00
But here's where, what I learned about that.
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SPEAKER_00
I went back and I read my journal.
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SPEAKER_00
And I began, as I'm reading this journal, I'm charting how I was thinking.
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SPEAKER_00
 And I was like, my thinking produced the exact outcomes that it should have.
1
SPEAKER_00
Like by reading this journal, it was very clear that I was going to end up in prison.
1
SPEAKER_00
Like it was very clear that at some point I was going to pull the trigger that was going to cause someone's death.
1
SPEAKER_00
It's very clear that I was going to get into these altercations because I was thinking that that was the only thing I was worthy of.
1
SPEAKER_00
From the time I was seven or eight years old, I heard you're only going to end up dead or in jail.
1
SPEAKER_00
 You know, I had observed my friends go to prison.
1
SPEAKER_00
I observed my friends get shot.
1
SPEAKER_00
I had accepted that narrative.
1
SPEAKER_00
So it was my dominant thoughts were dead or jail.
1
SPEAKER_00
Like that was, those were my dominant thoughts.
1
SPEAKER_00
Like I wasn't shocked when I got shot.
1
SPEAKER_00
I was traumatized, but I wasn't, it wasn't like, oh my God, like this wasn't supposed to happen.
1
SPEAKER_00
It was like, oh, this is a narrative, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
And so my dilemma was,
1
SPEAKER_00
 if this is absolutely true that I had magnetized my thoughts in a negative, that if the laws of the universe are true, that I can magnetize them in a positive.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so I began to focus.
1
SPEAKER_01
You had this when you were in Solitary.
1
SPEAKER_00
Solitary, yeah.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so I started waking up with intentional thoughts of what I wanted my life to be.
1
SPEAKER_00
 That one day my life would be full of joy.
1
SPEAKER_00
One day it would be purposeful.
1
SPEAKER_00
One day I'll get out of solitary.
1
SPEAKER_00
One day I'll get out of prison.
1
SPEAKER_00
And while I was on that train of thought, I was like, OK, let's test this theory.
1
SPEAKER_00
If thoughts are things.
1
SPEAKER_00
 if what you think manifests, if how you believe dictates your outcome, let's test it.
1
SPEAKER_00
That's the empirical thing to do, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
It's the most scientific thing to do, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
And so I wrote The War in this letter.
1
SPEAKER_00
I had been getting deep into philosophy.
1
SPEAKER_00
So I write The War in this very philosophical letter.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And what I proposed to him was to understand what the truth is.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I said to him, I said, you know, Warden, when I entered prison, I pledged that I was never gonna follow the rules that I didn't wanna follow.
1
SPEAKER_00
And it got me into solitary.
1
SPEAKER_00
And it got me into solitary, and it got me into, I've accumulated over 36 misconducts.
1
SPEAKER_00
And while you may not like that,
1
SPEAKER_00
 what I would hope that you can acknowledge is that I'm a man of my word.
1
SPEAKER_00
And that was the truth, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
I said I was gonna get into all manner of trouble, and I did it.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I was like, if you believe that the truth is the only thing that matters in conversation, everything that I'm about to tell you is what my truth is today.
1
SPEAKER_00
If you give me this opportunity to get out of solitary, I will focus on developing my skill sets as a writer,
1
SPEAKER_00
 And I would focus on creating a pathway to build a career for myself using my talent as a writer.
1
SPEAKER_00
And The Warden actually wrote me back.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And he said to me, this is the most compelling argument for release I've received.
1
SPEAKER_00
And while it feels counterintuitive, I'm going to advocate for you to get out.
1
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
1
SPEAKER_01
How many more years did you have in solitary?
1
SPEAKER_00
I ended up being like two and a half more years because the sentence was indefinite.
1
SPEAKER_00
It was forever.
1
SPEAKER_00
It's whenever they feel you're ready.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_01
So you had two and a half more years.
1
SPEAKER_01
 after that letter.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, after that letter.
1
SPEAKER_00
But he advocated immediately and then it went to his higher ups and they shut it down.
1
SPEAKER_00
Took more time, yeah.
1
SPEAKER_00
So it took these three steps.
1
SPEAKER_00
And then I also wrote down what I wanted to happen in my life with my writing.
1
SPEAKER_00
I was like, okay, if I'm gonna be serious about writing, here's the goals.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I wrote down the most lofty goals you can think of as a writer.
1
SPEAKER_00
 I wanted Oprah to read one of my books.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I wanted to be a New York Times bestseller.
1
SPEAKER_00
Check, check.
1
SPEAKER_00
Check, check.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I want to build a career for myself using writing.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I want to write across multiple platforms.
1
SPEAKER_00
I want to write music.
1
SPEAKER_00
I want to write for the stage.
1
SPEAKER_00
I want to write for television.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so I was just super intentional and very clear.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And when I got out of solitary, man, I took all the books that I had hand-wrote and I typed them all up on a little word processor.
1
SPEAKER_00
And it was the most tedious thing I've done to date.
1
SPEAKER_01
It was like, oh my God, it was brutal.
1
SPEAKER_00
But that was the culmination of those three miracles.
1
SPEAKER_00
Coming together, kind of letting that mask down, and charting a new path for myself.
1
SPEAKER_01
What did the warden say after you hit New York Times Best Seller and had Oprah interview you and talk about you and all these things?
1
SPEAKER_00
 You know what, he ended up retiring so I haven't been able to track him down.
1
SPEAKER_00
Oh man, that'd be cool to get in touch.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, but there's so many people from that part of the world, that experience, that have reached out, that have followed my work.
1
SPEAKER_00
A guy I used to work for, he's one of my best friends now, I worked for him in the days when I was in a dark space.
1
SPEAKER_00
 creating all type of chaos on the yard, and his name is Tom Scheidt.
1
SPEAKER_00
He was an inmate with you?
1
SPEAKER_00
No, no, he was my supervisor.
1
SPEAKER_00
He was a civilian coming into the prison.
1
SPEAKER_00
And teaching, or he was?
1
SPEAKER_00
He was running a recreation center.
1
SPEAKER_01
Gotcha.
1
SPEAKER_00
So he was running a recreation center at Michigan Reformatory, which was the gladiator school.
1
SPEAKER_00
This was like the most chaotic part of my incarceration, this 1,500 young guys with long sentences, anything from 15 years to life,
1
SPEAKER_00
 And I worked for Tom.
1
SPEAKER_00
In the prison?
1
SPEAKER_00
In the prison.
1
SPEAKER_00
For this program?
1
SPEAKER_00
Yes, I worked for the recreation center.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And back then, Tom was just like, you know, you can do anything you want to do in life, like positive or negative, you know?
1
SPEAKER_00
He was like, but I believe that your life is meant for a greater purpose and that one day you're going to get out of prison and young people will look up to you, but you got to make sure you don't end up with life in prison, because I can see you going down that path as well.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And so I looked Tom up when I got out of prison.
1
SPEAKER_00
I wrote him.
1
SPEAKER_00
I hadn't seen him since, like, 96.
1
SPEAKER_00
And at first, when he answered the phone, he was like, he was like, Shaka, like, I'm like, he like, how, like, how did you get out?
1
SPEAKER_00
Like, you know, it's like, like I escaped or something.
1
SPEAKER_00
I'm like, no, Tom, I've legitimately got paroled.
1
SPEAKER_00
 But he took me to my first football game, my first college football game, him and his wife.
1
SPEAKER_00
He was one of the first people to read some of my writing before I even thought of myself as a writer.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so over the years since I've been out, Tom has come and stayed at my place.
1
SPEAKER_00
I've stayed at his place in Lansing, Michigan, and we're really, really good friends now.
1
SPEAKER_00
But he saw something in me the way that my mentors did back then that I didn't see in myself.
1
SPEAKER_01
 So you had these thoughts that got you into jail, essentially, right?
1
SPEAKER_01
That had you...
1
SPEAKER_01
 doing the actions and the behaviors that got you into jail and then you continue those thoughts for the first nine to 10 years until you kind of learned that thoughts can become things and you can manifest what you want in your life and you started shifting and creating goals and then staying true to your goals by accountability, daily, consistent actions to help you accomplish those goals.
1
SPEAKER_01
And then backing it with the positive thoughts
1
SPEAKER_01
 The thoughts of gratitude or joy or possibility that one day something would be better as opposed to falling back into shame or upset or guilt How does someone?
1
SPEAKER_01
 just in their life, whether they're incarcerated or not, they might be incarcerated in their own minds, shift their negative thoughts to set themselves up to manifest more abundance.
1
SPEAKER_00
It's an incremental process and it's truly a journey.
1
SPEAKER_00
And you know, what I always tell people is that, you know, when you look at the end results of anybody who's accomplished anything,
1
SPEAKER_00
 Great or anything of you know Respect and you know, what would we consider success?
1
SPEAKER_00
It always looks easy after it's done.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah But it's a process, you know, it's a journey and it's a For me what work was bringing myself to the moment and checking the narrative what story am I telling myself?
1
SPEAKER_00
You know, am I telling myself the truth?
1
SPEAKER_00
 Am I recirculating the old outdated story that no longer exists?
1
SPEAKER_00
And like that mindfulness, that ability to bring myself true to the moment.
1
SPEAKER_00
 That was one of the most powerful things I learned.
1
SPEAKER_00
I learned it through meditation and really processing thoughts and energy and, okay, what am I bringing in?
1
SPEAKER_00
I always talk to young people about the importance of checking what you're consuming.
1
SPEAKER_00
Our consumption cycles mentally often go unchecked.
1
SPEAKER_01
 In terms of the thoughts and what you're watching and what you're reading.
1
SPEAKER_00
Information, reading, listening to... What your friends are saying, gossip or whatever.
1
SPEAKER_00
All the things like those, like we take in so much information.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And then it's that internal conversation, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
That internal conversation is a beast.
1
SPEAKER_00
You know, the best conversations I ever have are with myself and they're complex, you know?
1
SPEAKER_00
They're not always easy, you know?
1
SPEAKER_00
And so what I would say is that that journey from negative attraction, you know, manifestation, like, it's a process of like, okay, can I check it in a moment?
1
SPEAKER_00
 Can I really just take a beat and say, OK, is this real?
1
SPEAKER_00
Is this happening?
1
SPEAKER_00
Or is this me drawing from old, outdated information to create a story that's not even true?
1
SPEAKER_00
And so I'm constantly doing that.
1
SPEAKER_00
I'm constantly just checking the narrative, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
When things are happening in a world that can be so chaotic and feel like they're so in our face,
1
SPEAKER_00
 I like, I center myself and I just come back to like mindfulness, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
We talked about, you know, the horrific, you know, mass shooting that just happened yesterday.
1
SPEAKER_00
I learned about that about a half hour before I was going to pick my son up from school.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I just had to like recenter myself, be present.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I remember getting to the school and I felt just that
1
SPEAKER_00
 Anxiousness, you know?
1
SPEAKER_00
And then I heard the laughter of those kids.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I was just like, oh, this is what's really happening is these kids are in joy over here.
1
SPEAKER_00
And that shooting was horrendous and horrific.
1
SPEAKER_00
And as a dad, like my heart.
1
SPEAKER_00
 just went out to those parents, but I knew that there was a way that I can go down this negative, kinda taking my son out of school, he's not going, you know, like this whole chain of events, and bringing myself to the clarity of that moment.
1
SPEAKER_00
And knowing that collectively we can help those families heal, but we also can be present in the kids that are still here, that we love and wanna care about, and we can double down on that care.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And just that doubling down on the care and the love was like, okay, let's be present in that while we help these families heal.
1
SPEAKER_00
So it's a process.
1
SPEAKER_00
Writing it down really helps.
1
SPEAKER_00
I still write down my thoughts.
1
SPEAKER_00
I still in my notes on my phone, just kind of like, hey, I had a thought about this thing and journaling and processing and attracting good energy.
1
SPEAKER_00
 good intentions and that hyper-awareness of like, what am I consuming and what does it serve?
1
SPEAKER_00
Because everything we consume serves a part of us.
1
SPEAKER_00
Even when it's like, when I was in that negative loop, like that served, it served a part of me.
1
SPEAKER_00
It energized me.
1
SPEAKER_00
Anger energized me, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
It made me feel, because it was what I was taught I can only feel.
1
SPEAKER_01
It gives you some significance too.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah.
1
SPEAKER_01
 I'm curious, was there a moment in time in prison where you were able to fully let go of shame, guilt, the trauma that you were maybe holding onto and actually start to love yourself authentically and have peace?
1
SPEAKER_01
Was there a moment that happened in prison or did this not happen to laughter?
1
SPEAKER_00
 No, absolutely.
1
SPEAKER_00
So around that time that I was journaling and I really began to unpack that narrative, I began to grow my locks.
1
SPEAKER_00
And it was my hair.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, my hair.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_00
And it was my third attempt.
1
SPEAKER_00
So the first time that I attempted, they got it started.
1
SPEAKER_00
And when I looked in the mirror, all I heard was all the negative things I ever heard about my natural hair.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And, you know, I went and cut it off immediately.
1
SPEAKER_00
I started a second time and it got a little bit longer.
1
SPEAKER_00
And then I heard that negative narrative.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so I knew I was on a healing journey when I was able to see the beginnings of it and see beauty and see joy and see cultural connectivity.
1
SPEAKER_00
 And I began to apologize to myself.
1
SPEAKER_00
I began to apologize to myself for all the mean things that I had said internally, all the times I had doubted my capabilities, all the times that I had bought into the shame.
1
SPEAKER_00
I grew up, I have gap teeth, and I would get teased as a kid, and there was shame attached to that.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I learned to,
1
SPEAKER_00
 look into that little window between my teeth and say, oh wow, that's fascinating, that's beautiful.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so it was just a process of watching all of the narratives fall away.
1
SPEAKER_00
 and create new narratives and create new language of self-love.
1
SPEAKER_00
And that's still a thing that's like a journey, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
There's not these one-offs.
1
SPEAKER_00
I know people want it to be like a magical thing, but it's like, no, it's a journey.
1
SPEAKER_00
I have to wake up and just be like, hey,
1
SPEAKER_00
 You're okay.
1
SPEAKER_00
You're doing fine.
1
SPEAKER_00
There's things that you still have to navigate and you have to overcome and face and confront, but it's actually okay.
1
SPEAKER_00
Because if you can label it in the right way and you can just say, oh, I'm just triggered right now.
1
SPEAKER_00
Or this is kind of a moment where I'm kind of having a self-defeating moment.
1
SPEAKER_00
Get it together.
1
SPEAKER_00
Self-talk.
1
SPEAKER_01
On a scale of one to 10, the first 10 years you were in jail,
1
SPEAKER_01
 on a scale of self-love, 10 being like you loved yourself the most in an authentic, conscious way, you know, had peace in your heart, all these things, one being you hated yourself, you know, shamed yourself, all these things, where were you in those first 10 years?
1
SPEAKER_00
And I like minus, like it was like, probably minus five, you know, it was like now.
1
SPEAKER_00
And where were you after you got, when you got out, or the last, you know,
1
SPEAKER_00
 You know, the day I walked out of prison, I would say I was at about a strong eight.
1
SPEAKER_00
So there's strong eight.
1
SPEAKER_00
Self-love.
1
SPEAKER_00
Self-love, yeah.
1
SPEAKER_01
 Yeah, I was at a strong eight.
1
SPEAKER_01
Was it because you were getting out or was it because you had gotten there maybe in the previous year?
1
SPEAKER_00
No, yeah, it was probably like that last few years where it just started hitting on all cylinders, you know, and it was just kind of this space in my life where I was like, you know,
1
SPEAKER_00
 I'm in prison.
1
SPEAKER_00
One day I won't be.
1
SPEAKER_00
I went up for parole like two times, three times before I got released.
1
SPEAKER_00
So it was kind of like the moments would knock me back down a few notches.
1
SPEAKER_01
Hoping maybe this is the time.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_00
So that was the challenge.
1
SPEAKER_00
That was the thing that I had to combat was the negative.
1
SPEAKER_00
Talk attached to that, OK, they're never going to let me out.
2
SPEAKER_01
 And then I just had to start countering it.
2
SPEAKER_01
So every day I would walk the yard with one of my best friends named Calvin Evans.
2
SPEAKER_01
And Calvin is an incredible light in my life.
2
SPEAKER_01
He served 24 years for a crime he didn't commit.
2
SPEAKER_01
And one of the most joyful people I know.
2
SPEAKER_01
And so I would walk the yard with Calvin.
2
SPEAKER_01
We would just walk.
2
SPEAKER_01
 And I would say, one day, man, I'm going to get out of here.
2
SPEAKER_01
And this is what I'm going to do.
2
SPEAKER_01
And this is how I'm going to do it.
2
SPEAKER_01
I'm going to hustle these books out of the trunk.
2
SPEAKER_01
And one day, one of these books is going to reach Oprah.
2
SPEAKER_01
I don't know how, but I'm just going to hustle, hustle, hustle.
2
SPEAKER_01
I'm going to mentor the kids when I get home.
2
SPEAKER_01
And so this talk was like, it was verbalizing my intentions.
2
SPEAKER_01
But it was also countering that narrative that was attached to like,
2
SPEAKER_01
 Denying parole.
2
SPEAKER_01
You're not going to be allowed to do anything.
2
SPEAKER_00
You're going to be in here forever.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, so it was just that constant refrain, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
And so yeah, it was at about an eight by the time I walked out of prison.
2
SPEAKER_01
That's pretty powerful.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_01
That's really powerful.
2
SPEAKER_00
Where would you say you're at today?
2
SPEAKER_01
 Today I'm at a 10.
2
SPEAKER_01
Life is great.
2
SPEAKER_01
It's complex.
2
SPEAKER_01
The things that happen, I just acknowledge them for what they are.
2
SPEAKER_01
I had a tough year last year.
2
SPEAKER_01
It was probably one of the toughest years that I've had in a very, very long time.
2
SPEAKER_00
Why is that?
2
SPEAKER_01
 My younger brother was murdered.
2
SPEAKER_01
My dog was, our puppy, we had like a one-year-old beautiful puppy.
2
SPEAKER_01
Left him with a trainer.
2
SPEAKER_01
The trainer calls me the next day.
2
SPEAKER_01
Puppy had got ran over.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, I got, you know, dealt with like illness and just, it was just brutal.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, it was a brutal, brutal year.
2
SPEAKER_01
And, you know, what I found to be the most healing
2
SPEAKER_01
 was that I was actually able to sit up and say, you know, I'm sad.
2
SPEAKER_01
 Express it.
2
SPEAKER_01
I was able to literally articulate those words.
2
SPEAKER_01
I was, you know, I went through the anger phase with my brother.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I remember, like, I flew home to Detroit and it was just like all the autopilot of like, OK, we got to get my brother buried.
2
SPEAKER_01
Let me make sure my parents are good.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, let me navigate all the things, the kind of thinginess of reaction to
2
SPEAKER_01
 you know, negative experiences, right, where it's just like autopilot is fix, fix, fix, correct, you know, all those things.
2
SPEAKER_01
And not pause and feel.
2
SPEAKER_01
Not pause and feel.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I remember we were sitting, you know, in a hotel room right outside of Detroit, and it was my girlfriend, my partner, we like to call each other's partners, like, I think we're a little too old to be boyfriend and girlfriend.
2
SPEAKER_01
 My partner Liz and I and my friend Calvin and we were sitting there and we were talking and I just like the tears just came.
2
SPEAKER_01
 And I was like, I'm sad.
2
SPEAKER_01
Like I'm sad that my brother's in here.
2
SPEAKER_01
I'm sad that he didn't get a chance to experience all the great things that we had planned together.
2
SPEAKER_01
And then when the puppy, you know, got ran over, it was the same thing.
2
SPEAKER_01
It was just being able to say like, hey, this was my companion.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, one of the things that I experienced with my puppy that I didn't know was like, you know, I got shot when I was walking.
2
SPEAKER_01
 And so there's negative emotions attached to that experience.
2
SPEAKER_01
And when I got the puppy, I had to take him out and walk.
2
SPEAKER_01
 And I was like, wow, this is the first time that I've walked freely in almost 30 years.
2
SPEAKER_00
That kind of allowed you to heal.
2
SPEAKER_01
It allowed me to heal.
2
SPEAKER_01
So to lose that was devastating.
2
SPEAKER_01
But it was really sad, because he was so joyful.
2
SPEAKER_01
And my son was sad.
2
SPEAKER_01
And to be able to cry with him and just hold him and experience his sadness, but also our love.
2
SPEAKER_01
 and for my partner to be able to hold space for that, and for us to be able to experience sadness together and love and vulnerability.
2
SPEAKER_01
And so it just made a tough year fulfilling and enlightening in this way that I've just recently started coming out on the other side of, and I'm excited about that.
2
SPEAKER_01
But I'm also excited that I experienced the sadness and I was able to express that.
2
SPEAKER_01
 and to still feel a line with just like joy and fulfillment, you know, and to know that that's part of it is, you know, sadness is gonna happen, but...
2
SPEAKER_01
 Joy comes in being able to fully express all of your emotions.
2
SPEAKER_01
And like as a dad, I don't think there's a greater gift I can give my son than full access to his emotions by modeling that for him.
2
SPEAKER_00
Absolutely.
2
SPEAKER_00
When I did my book, The Mask of Masculinity, back in almost five years ago now, I did a little tour for the book.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I would sit in rooms of,
2
SPEAKER_00
 a few hundred people, and usually 50-50 men and women.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I would, at one point in every speech, I would say, for all the ladies in the room, raise your hands if once a week you get together with a girlfriend or girlfriends or your mom, and you talk about your insecurities, your feelings, your emotions around relationship or body image or work.
2
SPEAKER_00
 And pretty much all the women would raise their hand.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I'd say, okay, for the guys in the room, how many of you get together once a month and talk about your feelings with another guy or guy friends?
2
SPEAKER_00
You talk about your relationship issues, you talk about your self-doubt, your body image issues, these different vulnerabilities.
2
SPEAKER_00
And it'd only be like one or two hands would go up out of like 100 something, right?
2
SPEAKER_00
 I'd say, how many of you guys are in a church group where this is kind of mandatory every month to get together and do this?
2
SPEAKER_00
And they're kind of laughing, yes.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I said, ladies, how many of you guys do this every day?
2
SPEAKER_00
You talk about your feelings.
2
SPEAKER_00
Maybe it's 30 minutes over lunch.
2
SPEAKER_00
You express yourself.
2
SPEAKER_00
And most of them kept their hand up.
2
SPEAKER_00
 And I go, guys, how many of you in the room never do this?
2
SPEAKER_00
And most of the guys put their hand up maybe once a year or something.
2
SPEAKER_00
They have a moment where they're vulnerable.
2
SPEAKER_00
 And I go, ladies, imagine what it would feel like to never be able to express your emotions, to never be able to say how you feel.
2
SPEAKER_00
What would that do to you?
2
SPEAKER_00
And most of them are like, it'd drive me crazy.
2
SPEAKER_00
I'd go nuts, I'd explode, right?
2
SPEAKER_00
And I go, well, look what's happening with the men in the world.
2
SPEAKER_00
They're exploding on others, whether it be verbally, whether it be online, whether it be domestic violence, whether it be any other type of violence out there.
2
SPEAKER_00
 And I'm curious, what do you think will happen if human beings, men and women, all human beings, never express their feelings and emotions and don't learn to heal their trauma?
2
SPEAKER_00
What do you think will happen?
2
SPEAKER_01
I think if we continue to create these personal prisons around people, these emotional, spiritual prisons around people,
2
SPEAKER_01
 You know, we'll continue to see these massive upticks in violence.
2
SPEAKER_01
We'll continue to see this just kind of disdain for each other that shows up in social media.
2
SPEAKER_01
We'll never get to a space where there's like clear conversations and healthy dialogue and
2
SPEAKER_01
 you know, all the things and, you know, it's so interesting, you know, when I think about being here on this podcast and I think about just the many brilliant minds you talked through over the course of, you know, you building out this great platform and how much of it is about, you know, just like greatness and success and, you know, sometimes even about wealth building.
2
SPEAKER_01
 And I think all those things are drivers for me.
2
SPEAKER_01
I love the grind, I love the hustle.
2
SPEAKER_01
I come from the streets so that mindset of entrepreneurship and building something and doing the thing, I love it.
2
SPEAKER_01
It's super exciting to be here to talk about it.
2
SPEAKER_01
But I think the greatest untapped resource we have in the world right now is the emotions of men.
2
SPEAKER_01
 Like when we are able to fully be ourselves, to authentically be connected emotionally, to be able to be vulnerable and intimate, you know, with each other, with our significant others, with our children, like everything around us just gets better.
2
SPEAKER_01
Like it just gets better and it's like such a great untapped resource.
2
SPEAKER_00
 and feel accepted for our emotions.
2
SPEAKER_00
Not feel shamed, made wrong, made less than because we have vulnerability or express sadness every now and then or share tears every now and then.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I can just say this, we talk about privilege in the world.
2
SPEAKER_01
We talk about white privilege, we talk about gender specific privilege.
2
SPEAKER_01
I know I sit in the space of privilege
2
SPEAKER_01
 when I'm talking about emotional vulnerability.
2
SPEAKER_01
Because I've dealt with the toughest things you can deal with in life, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
So there's not a guy that's going to come and question toughness, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
So I have a cheat code, so to speak.
2
SPEAKER_01
I can talk to these things and
2
SPEAKER_01
 I don't have to worry about the shaming that comes with like, oh, he's soft because he's talking about feelings now or whatever the things are.
2
SPEAKER_01
So I'm fortunate in that regard, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
And I don't take that for granted.
2
SPEAKER_00
You lived a tough life.
2
SPEAKER_00
I lived a tough life, yeah.
2
SPEAKER_00
And you got the results of what that looks like.
2
SPEAKER_01
Absolutely, absolutely.
2
SPEAKER_00
And you continue to have more and more pain and restriction based on living that lifestyle, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
Absolutely, absolutely.
2
SPEAKER_01
And that's why the subtitle,
2
SPEAKER_01
 of the book is an invitation.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I know that I'm a great ambassador to invite people to join this party of emotional vulnerability and love because I've overcome the most adverse conditions imaginable.
2
SPEAKER_01
The hardest things, the things that I wasn't supposed to survive.
2
SPEAKER_01
Like nobody's supposed to get out of solitary confinement.
2
SPEAKER_01
 and to operate in love.
2
SPEAKER_01
Nobody's supposed to get out of solitary confinement and be a successful writer, successful tech entrepreneur, successful investor.
2
SPEAKER_01
Nobody's supposed to be able to get out of solitary confinement and dream or imagine a life that is beyond what people who've never been in solitary confinement imagine for themselves.
2
SPEAKER_01
So I have the cheat code, which comes with responsibility.
2
SPEAKER_01
 And it's one of the reasons that I chose to write and I choose to talk from these vulnerable spaces because it's a blessing.
2
SPEAKER_01
The cheat code is a blessing.
2
SPEAKER_01
The hack is a blessing, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
It's this ability to understand that
2
SPEAKER_01
 I know this is what men crave.
2
SPEAKER_01
Somebody just has to open up the pathway for it.
2
SPEAKER_01
Somebody has to invite them into, like life gets so much better when you're at peace with yourself.
2
SPEAKER_01
When you're not in turmoil, when you're not aching, when you're not waking up with worry and fear and dread and all the things that stand in the way of achieving great outcomes.
2
SPEAKER_01
Life is beautiful.
2
SPEAKER_01
 You know, when you're not beating up on yourself internally, life is magic.
2
SPEAKER_01
Like, it's the most magical thing is when you're just like, hey, I love life.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, I love joy, I love fulfillment.
2
SPEAKER_01
And it doesn't have to be hard and it doesn't have to be complex.
2
SPEAKER_01
And like, those things don't make me a man.
2
SPEAKER_01
Like, I was the least manly the night I pulled that trigger.
2
SPEAKER_01
I was a boy having a grown up tantrum.
2
SPEAKER_01
 you know, because my emotions weren't processed in a healthy way.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, I'm the most masculine and the most man that I can ever be is when I'm actually loving my son.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, when I'm taking care of him, like, you know, I talk a little bit about,
2
SPEAKER_01
 like the details of care, like I think love is in the details, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
Like when I'm able to, like literally just two nights ago, my son is, he had a loose tooth, you know?
2
SPEAKER_01
And he's like, dad, I just really want to get the tooth out, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
 And I'm just like, you know, I'm not screaming, it's by any stretch of the imagination, but I also don't want to hurt him.
2
SPEAKER_01
I don't want it to be a traumatic event, like old school, let me tell you, just rip it on out, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
And so, you know, we go into the bathroom and, you know, we're trying to figure out how to loop the string around.
2
SPEAKER_01
It's like a weird sound in his mouth.
2
SPEAKER_01
And then there was this moment where I was just like gently like rocking it.
2
SPEAKER_01
And then the tooth like comes out.
2
SPEAKER_01
 And it was like the most gentle extraction possible.
2
SPEAKER_01
I didn't need the pliers.
2
SPEAKER_01
And there's like this moment where he's just, it's joy, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
It's pure joy, you know?
2
SPEAKER_01
And so like those moments of fatherhood, like that feels great.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, preparing a meal for him when he specifically wants something that I'll prepare for him in a way that he likes.
2
SPEAKER_01
 you know, folding up his laundry, like all the details, teaching him a new skill set, you know, that isn't athletic, that isn't combative.
2
SPEAKER_01
It's not about, you know, the sports and just letting him be, you know?
2
SPEAKER_01
Like I'm a big sports guy, you know, and the complex thing like now in the world of political correctness, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
It's like you can't say you like to see people's face pummeled on UFC and that you're also a kind, loving, and gentle partner.
2
SPEAKER_01
 but that's the truth of who I am.
2
SPEAKER_01
I love boxing, I love combat sports, I love basketball, I love football, and I get all the things associated with it, but I love it.
2
SPEAKER_01
I love the crash them up, bang, bang reality of, I love cars with big engines and that guzzle way too much gas, but I also love sitting present with my son and hugging him.
2
SPEAKER_01
I also love sitting in deep, beautiful conversations with my partner.
2
SPEAKER_01
 Receive in love.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, you know and those things don't have to be dissimilar It's beautiful man.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah now that you're you know a father What are the three things you wish you had as a child growing up I
2
SPEAKER_00
 that you are giving to your kids and you want more parents to give?
2
SPEAKER_00
What are those three things that if you would have received, you think would have changed the course of your life in a different way?
2
SPEAKER_01
I think the three things that I think about most is complete and full access to healthy emotions as expressed by my parents.
2
SPEAKER_01
 Like witnessing them have healthy emotions, modeling it.
2
SPEAKER_01
Witnessing them modeling it and then being able to do it myself.
2
SPEAKER_01
Safety, like the safety of emotional vulnerability from my parents.
2
SPEAKER_01
I wish the second thing would be the freedom to fully express
2
SPEAKER_01
 all of my curiosity, all of my artistry, all of my emotions.
2
SPEAKER_01
And when I think about that, I just think about my son.
2
SPEAKER_01
 and how he's able to fully express himself.
2
SPEAKER_01
He can wear mismatched shoes, he can draw on his clothes, he can do pretty much whatever he wants to, he just has this freedom.
2
SPEAKER_01
I wish I had that freedom of expression.
2
SPEAKER_01
I think that's so important.
2
SPEAKER_01
 And I would just say emotional and psychological safety.
2
SPEAKER_01
So one is like emotional modeling of vulnerability, but emotional and psychological safety to me for a child.
2
SPEAKER_01
 I just think it's the greatest gift that parents can give.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, it creates deep, deep trust.
2
SPEAKER_01
It creates confidence.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, it creates space for just like children to imagine all the things possible.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I see it with my son, like he's so confident.
2
SPEAKER_01
And in a way that's not like arrogant and cocky, which comes out of insecurities,
2
SPEAKER_01
 Like he's confident because he's been able to just be free, you know?
2
SPEAKER_00
Challenges a lot of parents have kids and they haven't healed their wounds.
2
SPEAKER_00
Absolutely.
2
SPEAKER_00
And so how do we teach or educate or empower new parents to do the work themselves, the inner healing work, the trauma work, the inner child, you know?
2
SPEAKER_01
 It's tough, you know, it's tough because a lot of us become our parents in different ways, for bad or for good.
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SPEAKER_00
And if you're traumatized and you weren't allowed to share emotions, then maybe you do the same, you repeat the pattern.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, you repeat the pattern.
2
SPEAKER_01
And then there's cultural realities, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
Like I grew up in, you know, you don't know I'm like black, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
Oh, you are?
2
SPEAKER_01
 So I grew up in an environment where, you know, corporal punishment is like a normal part of the conversation.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, if you watch black comedians, they talk about, you know, getting whooped when they were young, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
And we poke fun at it because that's what we kind of tend to laugh at our pain.
2
SPEAKER_01
Some of the most difficult conversations I've ever had as a mentor
2
SPEAKER_01
 is when I'm talking to parents about physical violence.
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SPEAKER_01
It's physically a violent thing to hit your child out of anger and frustration and your own insecurities and all the things, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
So what I try to do is create space for role reversal and empathy.
2
SPEAKER_01
And sometimes it can be a little gnarly and hard to unpack those conversations, but
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SPEAKER_01
 You know, I always just think about, you know, if we can get to a space of thinking, like, what did you need most as a child?
2
SPEAKER_01
What did you desire the most as a child?
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SPEAKER_01
 and then put yourself in your child's shoes, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
And parenting is tough.
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SPEAKER_01
It's complex.
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SPEAKER_01
There are so many things we're thinking about all the time as parents, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
Are they safe?
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SPEAKER_01
Are they fed?
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SPEAKER_01
Did they do their homework?
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SPEAKER_01
Did they go to this thing?
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SPEAKER_01
Do they got good friends?
2
SPEAKER_01
 you know, avoiding trouble and a lot of times it's rooted in our own experiences.
2
SPEAKER_01
So just helping parents bring themselves to presence and just saying, hey, you know, detach your ego, you know, detach yourself from your trauma and really give them space to just be, you know, who they're intended to be.
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SPEAKER_00
If someone feels, talking about detaching from your ego or your past or your trauma, if someone feels like
2
SPEAKER_00
 Something's off inside, you know, they've been driven by anger or to prove or because they were picked on or didn't have the right support from their parents or the love that they wish they were received or for whatever reason they feel like Inside I don't feel inner peace and
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SPEAKER_00
 Maybe they don't even know that they haven't, they don't need to let go of the past, right?
2
SPEAKER_00
Because I didn't know this until I realized like my life is not working at a level and I'm still in pain and I'm sick and tired of feeling this inner pain.
2
SPEAKER_00
So instead of chasing things, I'm gonna like look within and start healing.
2
SPEAKER_00
 What would you say would be the first three steps to take if someone wants to let go and detach of their past and their traumas and start moving into peace?
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SPEAKER_01
I would say acknowledgement is the first thing.
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SPEAKER_01
You have to acknowledge it.
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You cannot fix what you're not willing to acknowledge is broken.
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SPEAKER_01
So acknowledgement is a big thing.
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SPEAKER_01
 Apology is a big thing.
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SPEAKER_01
Apology to who?
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To self.
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SPEAKER_01
Like once you can acknowledge the ways that you've hurt yourself, and the ways you've been hurt, and the way that you've hurt others, like apologizing to self is powerful.
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SPEAKER_01
And then it's kind of atoning with yourself.
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SPEAKER_01
Like how do you become...
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SPEAKER_01
 at one and how do you heal and get back to that space?
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SPEAKER_01
And for me, what it looked like was like meditating was like one of the greatest gifts I've ever given myself, this ability to just kind of process and breathe and really exhale all this negative energy, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, releasing it.
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SPEAKER_01
And then it was the journaling, you know, which I consider meditation on paper.
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SPEAKER_01
 freeing up and liberating myself from old narratives and old hurtful and harmful things.
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SPEAKER_01
And then, you know, that mindfulness practice, just bringing myself back to the moment, you know, and, you know, in the moment, you know, really being present with, like, here's what's actually happened versus the story I'm telling myself.
2
SPEAKER_01
And, you know, and I talk about it in Letters to the Sons of Society, there's this moment where
2
SPEAKER_01
 I'm talking about the dread that comes with living in a racialized culture, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
And I've talked about police brutality.
2
SPEAKER_01
I've talked about all the things going on in the world.
2
SPEAKER_01
And what I realize is that a lot of times when we're having these conversations, we're having them from a source of pain.
2
SPEAKER_01
And it makes it hard for the other person to receive it because
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SPEAKER_01
 Our pain, when we're filtering through pain, it comes across as angry and people just put up a wall, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
And sometimes we are angry and rightfully so.
2
SPEAKER_01
But there was a moment where I was up at about two or three in the morning and my puppy had got sick.
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SPEAKER_01
He had pooped in a crate.
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SPEAKER_01
And I'm out in the middle of the night.
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SPEAKER_01
I'm in the new neighborhood.
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SPEAKER_01
I hadn't been there long.
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You know, it's a pretty nice neighborhood in West LA.
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SPEAKER_01
 And it's three in the morning, so I got a hoodie on, I got jogging pants on, it's dark.
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SPEAKER_01
And I'm out making all this noise, because I'm cleaning up the crate.
2
SPEAKER_01
And you got to imagine at three in the morning, you just got woke up with dog poop.
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SPEAKER_01
It's not the most gentle thing.
2
SPEAKER_01
You're banging things around.
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SPEAKER_01
And I had this moment that was paralyzing.
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 And I froze, and I was like, what if my neighbors call the police?
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SPEAKER_00
Think you're doing something not supposed to be doing?
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Think I'm doing something I'm not supposed to.
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SPEAKER_01
When the police arrive, are they going to see a homeowner who's upset because he's cleaning puppy poop at three in the morning?
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SPEAKER_01
Or are they gonna see a black guy in a hoodie that looks to fit all the prototypes of what we see on TV?
2
SPEAKER_01
 And that moment was so jarring, and it wasn't until I was able to bring myself to mindfulness and say, you know, this isn't happening.
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SPEAKER_01
I'm actually a homeowner in my backyard cleaning poop up.
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SPEAKER_01
Everybody does it.
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SPEAKER_01
But that's what, one, living up under the cloak of an oppressive kind of idea,
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SPEAKER_01
 But two, that's what mindfulness does.
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SPEAKER_01
It can get you dislodged from that paralyzing moment.
2
SPEAKER_01
And so that's why it's such an integral part of my own journey.
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SPEAKER_01
And it's really kind of gave me a competitive edge when I'm in a world of, whether it's in the world of business, whether it's selling books, whether it's manifesting all the things that I believe that the universe has in abundance for me.
2
SPEAKER_01
 that ability to shift out of self-defeating thoughts, out of negative narratives, out of ideas that don't serve me on the journey that I'm on and where I want to go in life, being able to bring myself to that moment and say, I'm actually sitting across from Lewis, having a great conversation, as opposed to the 10 other things that can potentially be running in the background.
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SPEAKER_01
Like, that's powerful.
2
SPEAKER_00
I'm curious, Shaka, would you say that's the same process, these three steps, to
2
SPEAKER_00
 you know, the process of letting go of shame and guilt and the feeling that I'm a bad person for things I've done.
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SPEAKER_00
Is that the same steps or how do you let go of shame and the feeling like I'm a bad person as opposed to I did something bad versus I'm a bad person?
2
SPEAKER_01
 Yeah, that's a great question.
2
SPEAKER_01
And the way that I think about it is the accumulative effect of living life, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
Like we live through so many moments in our lives, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
And as a person who navigates a world where data is always being processed and numbers are being crunched, you think about the moments that we hold on to that are negative.
2
SPEAKER_01
They're usually minor by comparison to all the great and good moments we have.
2
SPEAKER_00
 We fixate on those one couple moments.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, it's kind of like you have on a beautiful pristine white suit and it gets a little splash of mud on the hill and you're obsessed over the cuff where the little splash at instead of the amazing suit that you have on, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
And for me, it's just like understanding that once a moment has happened, it no longer exists other than in your mind.
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SPEAKER_01
 Like the moments that I've lived through, those moments no longer exist.
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SPEAKER_01
Those aren't moments I'm living in.
2
SPEAKER_01
I'm living in the right now, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
So it's really like liberating yourself from old moments, you know, that have already happened.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I think sometimes we live in spaces that we don't control.
2
SPEAKER_01
Like you can't control the past.
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SPEAKER_01
The past has already happened.
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SPEAKER_01
Like you can reflect on it.
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SPEAKER_01
 go back and attach some energy to the emotions or whatever the case may be, but you can't recreate the moment that's already passed.
2
SPEAKER_01
And then the future hasn't arrived yet.
2
SPEAKER_01
You could plan for it and think about what it'll look like and do everything in your power to manifest it, but you can't control it because it hasn't arrived yet.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I think all too often we're living in those two worlds as opposed to like,
2
SPEAKER_01
 being centered in the right now and so the way that I've helped free myself from those things is being present in the right now and erasing that videotape of the past or at least putting it in the closet unless it's necessary to bring out and express it in a way that's going to add value.
2
SPEAKER_00
 This is powerful stuff, man.
2
SPEAKER_00
I feel like we could talk for hours on this, but I want to be respectful of your time.
2
SPEAKER_00
You've got a couple of amazing books.
2
SPEAKER_00
This one we have in front of me is Letters to the Sons of Society, a father's invitation to love, honesty, and freedom.
2
SPEAKER_00
Were any of these letters that you wrote, or any of this that you wrote, in prison, in this book?
2
SPEAKER_01
No, these are all letters I wrote during the imprisonment of the pandemic.
2
SPEAKER_01
 During our COVID, I call that my COVID baby.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, there was a lot going on in the world, you know, and a lot is going on since my first mater release.
3
SPEAKER_00
 six years ago, Writing My Wrongs.
3
SPEAKER_00
I released that six years ago and I've grown tremendously, you know, as a man, as a dad, you know, I took my time writing another book because I wanted, I only like to write when I have something to say.
3
SPEAKER_01
So that was six years ago, right?
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
And this came out
3
SPEAKER_01
 in January, so this one came out in January.
3
SPEAKER_01
My next book is five and a half years after my last book, because I wanted to, but I was like, I don't feel ready to, I don't feel like I have the right thing to say yet.
3
SPEAKER_01
Absolutely.
3
SPEAKER_01
You don't wanna just put it out just to put something out, so that's good.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, and that's what it was with this book.
3
SPEAKER_00
So much was happening in the world as a dad, as a black man, as someone who navigates the world of,
3
SPEAKER_00
 you know, Hollywood and tech and then the neighborhoods, right?
3
SPEAKER_00
I have this very complex, you know, network of friends from every walk of life.
3
SPEAKER_00
You can imagine different races and genders and I just have tons of great friends, right?
3
SPEAKER_00
 and great people who inspire me.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I was really just thinking, what do I want to talk about?
3
SPEAKER_00
And then the world just started going berserk.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I was like, I got to memorialize some of these moments.
3
SPEAKER_00
I got to talk to my sons of society.
3
SPEAKER_00
I was really thinking broadly about kids I mentor, people I work with in the world of hip hop.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I started writing down these ideas.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I was like, I'm just going to write these letters to my two sons.
3
SPEAKER_00
 And because between my 30-year-old son, Jay, who grew up while I was in prison and my 10-year-old son, who I'm raising now... Sekou?
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, Sekou are all of my sons of society.
3
SPEAKER_00
And so I started writing these letters, man, and they cover things that...
3
SPEAKER_00
 we don't talk about as dads.
3
SPEAKER_00
You talked earlier about the freedom that came later on when you were able to talk about sexual abuse.
3
SPEAKER_00
I write about my experiences growing up and being over-sexualized as a teenager and how that impacted relationships.
3
SPEAKER_00
I talk about what it's like to bear witness to George Floyd's demise in this public spectacle.
3
SPEAKER_00
 And what I want my sons to learn from that.
3
SPEAKER_00
I talk about love, like how rich life is when you're able to fully access love and share love.
3
SPEAKER_00
I talk about the affirmations that I do with my son and that I hope other dads adopt.
3
SPEAKER_00
Emotional vulnerability, accessibility.
3
SPEAKER_00
 success, living your dream, building your dream, writing and expressing your dream.
3
SPEAKER_00
So I get a chance to talk about all the things that excite me today as a dad and as a man.
3
SPEAKER_00
And what's interesting with this book is
3
SPEAKER_00
 Oftentimes, you know, people try to lump us into these categories, right?
3
SPEAKER_00
They're like, okay, this is a book for black dads or this is a book for dads.
3
SPEAKER_00
It's like, it's a human story.
3
SPEAKER_00
I just happened to be a black dad living in America.
3
SPEAKER_00
But what I have to say in this book,
3
SPEAKER_00
 is rooted in the human tapestry.
3
SPEAKER_00
It's love.
3
SPEAKER_00
There's no colors to that.
3
SPEAKER_00
It's vulnerability.
3
SPEAKER_00
There's no gender identity to that.
3
SPEAKER_00
It's healing.
3
SPEAKER_00
There's no class identity to that.
3
SPEAKER_00
It's success.
3
SPEAKER_00
We all have the potential to dream as wide and as big as possible and to decide if we want to pursue those dreams.
3
SPEAKER_00
 So it's so universal in the messaging.
3
SPEAKER_00
It just happened to be expressed through the lens of me being a dad and raising a 10-year-old son in the current realities and dreaming up what I hope this wisdom does for his life.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, man.
3
SPEAKER_00
It's inspiring stuff, man.
3
SPEAKER_01
Really inspire what you're creating.
3
SPEAKER_01
I want people to get the book.
3
SPEAKER_01
I want them to follow you.
3
SPEAKER_01
You're on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, all the places.
3
SPEAKER_01
 What's the place you hang out the most?
3
SPEAKER_00
In the social world, I kind of like my throwback Facebook feeds, because I can write a little bit longer on there.
3
SPEAKER_00
I like to write notes.
3
SPEAKER_00
But I'm on IG.
3
SPEAKER_00
I'm on Twitter, Clubhouse.
3
SPEAKER_00
You're still on there, huh?
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_01
I got off there.
3
SPEAKER_00
 You're selective in there.
3
SPEAKER_01
People are in there a lot?
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
There's great conversations happening there.
3
SPEAKER_00
So I'll pop in and have a great conversation.
3
SPEAKER_00
So love that crew.
3
SPEAKER_00
And LinkedIn, I'm on there as well, figuring out that space.
3
SPEAKER_00
 Yeah, I'm just, I'm there, you know, and everything is up under my name and website, all that stuff is all the same.
3
SPEAKER_01
It's Shakasankhor.com for your website where you can get all the books and content and information.
3
SPEAKER_01
What's the thing you're most excited about for the future?
3
SPEAKER_00
 Man, I am super excited about my current role as the head of sales and success for our company, TripActions.
3
SPEAKER_00
It brings together all the things that I love, right?
3
SPEAKER_00
I love working with talented people.
3
SPEAKER_00
I love working with people who...
3
SPEAKER_00
 just dream big and massive and just like, you know, we're going to collaborate and we're just going to work together to build this new world and this new way of being in the world.
3
SPEAKER_00
And then I get a chance to tell stories and help my team become just the best storytellers that they're capable of and like to be entrusted with that responsibility.
3
SPEAKER_00
 It's really affirming.
3
SPEAKER_00
Quickly, I'll tell you this story I had in this conversation I had with our CEO, who's a friend of mine.
3
SPEAKER_00
He was my friend of mine before I joined the company.
3
SPEAKER_00
And he always said to me, he was like, I want to see you just navigate the world based on your talent, not based on your past.
3
SPEAKER_00
 And he was like, you have so much to contribute to the world that has absolutely nothing to do with the time you serve.
3
SPEAKER_00
It's because of who you are as a person.
3
SPEAKER_00
And for us to partner years later and him ask me to join the company because he believes I'm one of the best storytellers that he's ever met.
3
SPEAKER_00
 And he's entrusted me with the sales team.
3
SPEAKER_00
I'm super excited about that, man.
3
SPEAKER_00
And it's a new role and we're having fun with it.
3
SPEAKER_00
We're building it in real time.
3
SPEAKER_00
I did the first sales training a couple of weeks ago and it was a big hit with our leadership team.
3
SPEAKER_00
And so I'm excited, man.
3
SPEAKER_00
I get a chance to utilize my skill sets in different ways.
3
SPEAKER_00
You know, I don't have to talk about
3
SPEAKER_00
 my work in criminal justice, which is really important to me and work that I'll always do, but it's not all of who I am.
3
SPEAKER_00
So as a writer, as a storyteller, to be able to use those skill sets to help build out the vision of our company, it's nothing more exciting right now.
3
SPEAKER_01
 Living the dream, man.
3
SPEAKER_01
Living the dream.
3
SPEAKER_01
I love this, man.
3
SPEAKER_01
I want people to get the book, Letters to the Sons of Society.
3
SPEAKER_01
Make sure you guys get a couple copies.
3
SPEAKER_01
Really inspiring letters in here.
3
SPEAKER_01
Make sure you guys check this out.
3
SPEAKER_01
I got a question I ask everyone at the end called the three truths.
3
SPEAKER_01
So imagine...
3
SPEAKER_01
 It's your last day on earth many years away.
3
SPEAKER_01
You get to live as long as you want, you get to accomplish and achieve and do everything you wanna do, but eventually you gotta call it quits in this world, in this life.
3
SPEAKER_01
And for whatever reason, you gotta take all your work with you.
3
SPEAKER_01
All your book, your message, this interview, anything you put out in the world, it's gotta go with you, all your content.
3
SPEAKER_01
But you get to leave behind three things you know to be true with the world.
3
SPEAKER_01
This is all we would have to
3
SPEAKER_01
 Remember of your information three lessons you would share with the world.
3
SPEAKER_01
What would you say are those three truths?
3
SPEAKER_00
The three truths that I would share is love wins that would be my number one love wins The second truth would be The universe is abundant in every resource we will ever need to live the kind of life that we desire and
3
SPEAKER_00
 And the third thing would be to never settle for mediocrity when greatness is available.
3
SPEAKER_01
 I wanna acknowledge you, Shaka, for your transformation.
3
SPEAKER_01
I think it's really easy for human beings to stay stuck in a past that they're used to.
3
SPEAKER_01
It's easy to stay in blame mode, in anger mode, in frustration, in lack of accountability, responsibility, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
It's easy to hold onto pain and shame.
3
SPEAKER_01
It's hard to shift into love, accountability, responsibility.
3
SPEAKER_01
 apologizing, forgiveness, all these different things.
3
SPEAKER_01
It's hard to express your emotions in a vulnerable way.
3
SPEAKER_01
It's hard to do good consistently when you've been stuck in an environment, a past that didn't foster that.
3
SPEAKER_01
So I really acknowledge you for shifting.
3
SPEAKER_01
 while you're in prison and continuing to add value to yourself, to your family, and to the world by teaching, by inspiring, by creating all the work that you do, man, it's really inspiring.
3
SPEAKER_01
And more people need to hear your message and be connected to your message because a lot of people are suffering and in pain.
3
SPEAKER_01
 And I think, you know, I was telling you, my brother was in prison for four and a half years, and there's a lot of suffering in prison, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
A lot of pain, a lot of suffering, a lot of stuff that goes down.
3
SPEAKER_01
And I witnessed part of this, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
I wasn't in jail, but I witnessed the pain that it's caused to a family when someone is in jail.
3
SPEAKER_01
I heard about all the crazy traumas and, you know,
3
SPEAKER_01
 Madness that happens in prison, right the the stuff that creates you more scared You know living in prison more in fear with the different stuff going on in jail So I really knowledge you for Learning how to shift out of that learning how to heal
3
SPEAKER_01
 And there's a lot of people in the world who aren't in physical prison, but they're an emotional mental prison spiritual prison and they're trapped so I'm so grateful that you're teaching how to get out of that from the physical and the spiritual side point as well and Excited for what you're creating man.
3
SPEAKER_01
It's really really beautiful stuff.
3
SPEAKER_00
Thank you so much for that.
3
SPEAKER_00
I truly receive that and
3
SPEAKER_00
 that really touched me, you know, and to be seen, you know.
3
SPEAKER_00
Oprah and I, we had a conversation one day and she said one of the greatest desires for human beings is to truly be seen.
3
SPEAKER_00
And so thank you for that.
3
SPEAKER_00
That means a lot.
3
SPEAKER_00
And thank you for this incredible platform.
3
SPEAKER_00
Like, you know, I reached out to you and you just was like, hey, let's do it.
3
SPEAKER_00
So I'm truly honored to be here.
3
SPEAKER_00
You know, I think that the work you're doing is so purposeful and so transformative.
3
SPEAKER_00
 And to be a part of that journey with you now means a lot to me.
3
SPEAKER_00
Thanks, bro.
3
SPEAKER_00
Appreciate it.
3
SPEAKER_00
Thank you so much for having me like this, man.
3
SPEAKER_01
Of course, man.
3
SPEAKER_01
Final question for you.
3
SPEAKER_01
What's your definition of greatness?
3
SPEAKER_00
My definition of greatness is the ability to do something good over and over.
3
SPEAKER_00
Whatever that specific field of focus is, right?
3
SPEAKER_00
 You know, when I think about Michael Jordan, I think about Kobe and LeBron and, you know, one of my favorite, Tom Brady, is like, that's what separates the great from the good.
3
SPEAKER_00
You know, anybody that's playing pro sports, we know they're good, they're pros, right?
3
SPEAKER_00
But the greats have the ability to execute over and over and whatever that is.
3
SPEAKER_00
Execute kindness, execute...
3
SPEAKER_00
 you know, whatever success metrics you're using, but the ability to just show up over and over again, to me that's like greatness.
3
SPEAKER_00
You know, when I think about being a great dad, it's because I know every day, consistently, I'm gonna show up in the best way possible as a dad.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I'm gonna do it over and over.
3
SPEAKER_00
It's not gonna be a one-off.
3
SPEAKER_00
So, when I think of greatness, I think of repeated goodness.
3
SPEAKER_01
 Thank you so much for listening.
3
SPEAKER_01
I hope you enjoyed today's episode and inspired you on your journey towards greatness.
3
SPEAKER_01
Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today's show with all the important links.
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And also make sure to share this with a friend and subscribe over on Apple podcasts as well.
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SPEAKER_01
 I really love hearing feedback from you guys, so share a review over on Apple and let me know what part of this episode resonated with you the most.
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And if no one's told you lately, I want to remind you that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter.
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And now it's time to go out there and do something great.