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Only One Mic Podcast
Carl Jerard, Brooklyn Dre, and JRob welcome you to The Only One Mic Podcast. We are joined each week by authors, activists, advocates, community leaders, and professionals from several walks of life who would like to offer their experience, expertise, or commentary on the various topics you will be interested in learning.
Only One Mic Podcast
How to Gain New Perspectives Through Self-Reflection?
In this episode, we are honored to have Brian Isom, an Emmy award-winning producer, cinematographer, life coach, and motivational speaker, share his remarkable journey. From serving in the military in Iraq to conquering the challenges of Hollywood, Brian's story is a testament to the power of perseverance and the need for diverse representation behind the camera. He discusses his role as a life coach and mentor, the profound impact of military experience on his personal growth, and the mental health struggles he faced after returning from deployment. We delve into the complexities of Black culture and the unifying force of truth, illuminating the way forward towards empowerment and positive change for a brighter future.
Discover more about Brian Isom by clicking the link below.
https://www.brianisomconsulting.com/
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm4803623/
Brothers and sisters.
Speaker 2:Welcome to the Only One Mic Podcast called your Rob Brooklyn Trey.
Speaker 3:J-rob is off tonight, but listen y'all, we got a very, very special, special guest in the house. His brother. Here is an award winner, cinematographer, a life coach, a motivational speaker and so much more. Mr Brian, how you doing, brother yo? Thank you for having me.
Speaker 2:Thank you for having me. Much more, mr Brian. How you doing, brother, yo, thank you for having me. Thank you for having me. I'm doing great. I'm doing great.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we was talking behind the scenes, y'all you know he was talking about balance, man. Like you know, the energy just came off. The brother, like you know, got everything lined up the right way, man. So I just wanted to say, once again, thank you for coming on. Talk to La Chris. Big shout out to La Chris. Good people Love La Chris, yeah, man. And so when she reached out to me and said I got this brother here, real positive, might be good to be on the show, or whatever, I'm like, alright, absolutely. I looked at you by y'all. I said, yeah, get the brother on. We're going to slide them on here and let them talk to our people. You know what I mean. You know. Hopefully we learn something from one another. So, listen, you got so much on your plate, man, on your resume here with the cinematography award-winning cinematographer producer. Can you name some of the shows that you did? I know you did a lot of the courtroom shows.
Speaker 2:I started off in Hollywood when I left the military. I left Iraq and I manifested going to Hollywood. I was in Alabama I'm an Alabama native and some of the shows that I did the first show I did come home from Iraq was we, the People, with Gloria Allred. I was a bailiff, so to come home as a soldier and then it's like yo.
Speaker 2:I got a security job on TV, my first acting gig. It was a blessing. And then from there that was under the production of Byron Allen, and Byron is Allen Media Entertainment Studios is what it's called. And Byron, lovely brother, oh, I love Byron. Byron said he knew I had just came back from Iraq. He says, young man, he says what else can I do for you? I see you're doing good things, how else can I serve you? I said whoa. I said for me. I said, man, I want to do some more camera and more acting. He said consider it done. And it was done. And then from there he allowed me to be the only I was the only Black camera operator on sitcoms that he did. Oh, wow, wow. So I got to work with Vivica Fox, rick Fox, bill Bellamy, essence Atkins, john Witherspoon Ooh, wow, that was the homie.
Speaker 2:I've never met anybody so authentic. You know he's a comedian, but to be around an individual that was so himself, like I was at his house, it was just me and him and he was just the same way as he would be on TV. I'll tell you a quick story. He had a neck brace on and I said he had came to set. It was a sitcom. And I said, john, what happened to that? I said you had a neck brace on when you came to set. I said what was up with that? He said Ron. He said what was up with that? He said Ron. He said I was talking to my agent and I was trying to put my pants leg on and he said I didn't want to let the phone go and I almost fucked up. I was like yo and it was just me and him at the table just talking and he was just so authentic and it was just a breath of fresh air to just be around an authentic individual.
Speaker 3:Yeah, especially in that space of being in Hollywood, I reckon you know you don't meet too many authentic people. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:Plus, he's naturally funny, man. You know, he's naturally funny man, anything he does is just a regular conversation.
Speaker 2:It's just hilarious. You know, I was a student just watching him read the script and I was a camera just watching him read the script and I was a camera operator and I would be like watching him read and I'm like, hey, he's doing his lines wrong. No, he was doing the lines right, he was doing them his way. But I was trying to keep up. I was like, oh, I didn't know you could, you could say a line like that. And I was like, wow, you know, and so to see him at work in his mastery and Jackie Harry, you know, to see her and her, you know, just perform. I was like wow, I was watching and what I was doing?
Speaker 2:I was collecting data just to take back home to Alabama to do my own things. You've worked on like six of Byron Allen's court shows, stage managing judges, from Judge Ross, judge Karen, judge Christina Perez, judge Maybelline. I was behind the scenes stage managing. I never said no to anything that was asked of me because I knew I was learning and I wanted that knowledge to learn as much as I could. So I could, you know, take it back home to the South and build another empire, you know.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's good that he was influential in your career. Did you have like prior camera work experience, or he just put you out there and said yo go learn it oh.
Speaker 2:I was going to film school at the same time. It was a blessing, okay, at the same time. Getting on the job. He allowed me my first experience, my first camera job to be on a sitcom. He trusted me. I was the only Black and so some of the actors rarely see Black camera guys, I would think behind the camera, especially young like I was, and they would all come over to the camera and tease me. But I was in film school while I was working for Byron on those sitcoms Didn't have to start from the ground up as a camera boy, camera assistant, and it was like it was gifted to me and I took it as a gift and I said I'm going to run with this. It to me and I took it as a gift and I said I'm going to run with this.
Speaker 1:It's kind of awesome, you know. Do you think that the military had anything to do with, like you know, the opportunities that were presented to you? I mean, because you know I was in the service too, so I don't know if you've experienced it, but it's almost like some sort of a glow that you have off of you when you come out of the military. You know, I don't know if maybe I had it before I went to the military, but you know what I mean when people just seem like it just opens up a world of things for you.
Speaker 2:You know what the military it does. I think we already have something, but the military enhances who we already are. It heightens it and the leadership that when you're in the military and you're rising through the ranks you have to go to leadership school right. So in that leadership school, having to do public speaking, give courses and be in front of people and be heard, I think that prepped me for that moment when I worked with Byron Allen, because they saw leadership skills within me. I went from a camera position to like a stage manager overnight, because they saw, and I never said no, I was like it's a new role. I know I wanted to do camera because that's what I was going to film school for, for cinematography, and so I was like I will turn nothing down. I will graciously and gratefully accept everything.
Speaker 1:I will graciously and gratefully accept everything. So, yes, the military played a pivotal, pivotal role in my success working on television sets, because of the discipline and the leadership that the Army provided, plus, I think, the one thing they instilled in me too. I may have had it before I went there, but I think you know definitely after I got out of there, it's like the job is going to get done, no matter what happens. You know what I mean. I'm going to you know there ain't going to be no complaining, we're going to get it done Exactly.
Speaker 2:Exactly as the NCO. It's like we the backbone, so we do us. You know what I'm saying? It's like okay, I'm a problem solver, Right, Right, yeah, so you did 17 years and you also said you were 17? I want to clarify no, no, it was 17. But it was 17. I know people listening. They're probably, you know, other other Army service members. Was he active or was he part time? Because he was?
Speaker 3:part time.
Speaker 2:Ain't no such thing. You know what I'm saying? The weekend warrior. I was a weekend. Now I have no shame. I was a weekend warrior, right right, right. But I was still a gangster of the army. I was still a killer. You know what I'm saying. You know, I was still trained to kill at the end of the day. So what was the question about Iraq?
Speaker 3:Well, yeah, I was going to say 17,. You know 17 years and you clarified that, and you served in Iraq. Is that correct?
Speaker 2:2009,. 2010 was my time to go to Iraq. When I say it was my time, I volunteered, I could have not had, I could not have went, and I chose to go for my own ego purposes. There were soldiers who were younger than me who came back from Iraq with war stories and they were telling other soldiers, giving them, you know, in case they go. They would say, hey, this is how it is.
Speaker 2:And I felt, as an NCO and as part of the leadership, felt a little, you know, slight, handedhanded. I was like, wow. I was like, well, how come I even went? I don't have any stories, I can't even talk to younger soldiers and and tell them hey, be careful when you go over there, blah, blah, blah. Whatever the case, give them some good guidance and so and so I raised my hand and says you know what? I'll go. It was an opportunity to go. I would say I want to see what this war is about. Let me see firsthand instead of hearing it, uh, secondhand from other people. You know, and, um, you know, and, and then, when I went, you know, it was a life, life changing experience.
Speaker 3:What are the things that you saw, what are the things that you experienced that you can say like wow, this was just eyeopening to me this was just eye-opening to me.
Speaker 2:It was an interesting landscape. When you first get there it's almost like textbook, like donkey kid, dirty face and a baby on the back. It was like that. I was like whoa, this is like pictures I've seen in my history books. Right, that was that was. I was taken back at that lifestyle. They didn't have no infrastructure. Where we were. It was basically, it was barren, it was. There was no plumbing, there was no, so there was feces, smell in the air. So everybody got. All the soldiers got sick, we all. For two weeks we had, you know, running bowel movements, you know loose bowel movements, but it was, that was part of the infrastructure.
Speaker 2:But my job was basically to help rebuild the Iraqi infrastructure and so I didn't go over there to kill most people. When I tell I went direct, I just think, well, you're on the front line, was you killing? Did you have to? You know, shoot and duck? Was you on the front line? Was you killing? Did you have to shoot and then duck? And I have to remind people, everybody, no matter if you're a nurse, police officer, whether you're an engineer, whether you. They was like it's 150 degrees. I thought it was the heat from the plane because we had landed in Kuwait and got off the plane and on the tarmac I'm thinking to myself okay, we've been in the air for so long, it's the jet's heat that's putting out, that's making us feel this extreme temperature. So the further we walked away from the plane, it remained hot and the thermometer said 150.
Speaker 3:I thought it was broke.
Speaker 2:And I saw it and the NCO came over there and said what you're looking at at that thermometer is 150. It's not broke. And I was like whoa. And so by the time I got to Iraq it was like 120 every day. So to adjust to that extreme heat woke me up. You know, I thought in the biblical days. I said that's why they wear turbans the sun would dry them out, it would dehydrate them. Honestly. Oh, that's why they went, that's why they wear the clothing to keep from being dehydrated. So I was like, oh, it was making sense, you know.
Speaker 3:Until this day too, like you still see a lot of people you know in that region. They wear like long-sleeved shirts. Right, even when they're here, you know, they got to cover up.
Speaker 1:You think it, you know you think you shouldn't, but you got to cover up in that you know, keep your body from being burnt and stuff like that. So I guess that's what it is. But let me ask you this as a mentor would you suggest the military to a young person. I mean, I know you said it turned out good for you and the reason why I ask that question is because I have a thought process that you know when people ask me about it.
Speaker 2:So I wanted to know what your thought process is. I share my experience and let them make the decision for themselves, so that they don't say, man, you told me to go, and so I learned to take the responsibility off me and tell them. I'll share with them. If you know how to play your cards, you can utilize the military to get things that you want. If you know what you want out of life, you can get a job in the military, get a, you know, get a test score that will meet the requirements of the type of job that you want. And then from there, if you listen to somebody who's been in, they can guide you and teach you how to take advantage of the opportunities that the military can give you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the reason why I said that is because you know I've had friends over the years who had children and they said well, you know, I'm going to send them to the military to straighten them out. I'm like listen man, you know, if your kid got problems, you know the military, you know, straighten out your problems. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:But if you know, if it's minor, and he got a head on him. When I went in in 2003, they were sending a lot of the you know the youth who were, you know all the troublemaker youths. They'd be getting in front of the judge and the judge would say you got two choices, young man go to the military, join the army, or go to jail. So when I went in, they was coming in based off you know, man, I'm just here to avoid jail time, you know and so.
Speaker 2:But now today's army is more structured. You have to be intelligent, you have to be intellectual. Now you can't have, you have all these protocols, you can't have certain tattoos on your body and there's all these restrictions. And they want your you know, and they want the smartest nowadays. And, like you said, a lot of people just send their kids and thinking that the military is going to fix them. No, If your kid is not disciplined, the military is not going to give you a child disciplined who doesn't have discipline Right, Because if they hate discipline, they're really going to hit a a child disciplined who doesn't have discipline.
Speaker 2:Right, you know Right. Because if they hate discipline, they're really going to hit a drill sergeant in the face.
Speaker 1:You know, the funny thing about it is, when I was in the service, what I noticed is that you know the people that joined the army to go to jail guys. They actually turned out pretty good, but the borderline bad dudes. That wasn't really bad, but they were just stupid or whatever the case may be. The gangbangers did pretty good Right.
Speaker 2:They start getting that check every two weeks. You're like yo, this army check is good every two weeks. Yo, this is more. What do you make on the street? More than you make on the street? It was consistent. I got health benefits, dental benefits, what? Start switching up the language. After that you start. It was consistent I got health benefits, dental benefits.
Speaker 3:What yeah? Start switching up the language after that you start switching up.
Speaker 2:You're like this is sweet. Every two weeks, like clockwork First and 15th that chick dropping, and you be like I know where to drop that baby. It's like time to go to the mall and get some sneakers. Baby, time to go to the strip club, all right. So listen.
Speaker 3:I want to. I want to talk about you know your consultant company because, like I said, your life coach. And let me ask you a question, because a lot of people use that term life coach, life coach, their life coaches, um, for our audience, what does a life coach actually do?
Speaker 2:You know, like we, we, we, some of us know, but just for for those that don't know, you know, we, some of us know, but just for those that don't know, well, I think everybody needs the term. Life coach is subjective, it's based on what you want it to be and how I, how I, choose to look at it, is that I provide a service that helps add to your life, brings peace and comfort, and helps have tools to help you minimize your stress level forever. Right, if you practice, if you listen. So life coaching to me is providing a surface that adds to people's lives in a positive way.
Speaker 3:OK, and I'm glad that you said that, because a lot of people define it differently depending on who you're talking to, because anybody that's on social media is always a coach in something, but it's like you never know where the credentials come from. What makes you qualified to tell me this, this and this? So it was just something I just, you know, thought I'd throw out there to you.
Speaker 2:No, you should ask that question because I have no PhD. I don't have a doctor in front of my name. I didn't go to school. My school was life and my desire to want to take my negative experiences and turn them into positive. And when I reached out to the universe, I cursed God.
Speaker 2:When I was in Iraq, when I was on that bridge, when we got hit by a bomb, and I was like, if you're real, I said I need your presence, I need to know that you're real, because right now you don't look good. And so I changed based off. You know, I was going to be another statistic. Coming home from Iraq, I was going to commit suicide. I was going through it. I was Rambo when I was over there. Bullet through vest, I had a Ber it. I was Rambo. When I was over there, bulletproof vest, I had a Beretta. I had an M4. I had the machine gun that Rambo had, with the bullets feed out, and I felt invincible. And it was like going on the biggest rollercoaster ride and then say, okay, thank you for your service. Oh, why don't you go to school? Why don't you get a trade? And it was like I was still trying to process everything that just happened. I was like, wait a minute, I was programmed, I was.
Speaker 3:I was like no, you know, it was hard to come home to readjust, you know so, like you said, you were in that particular situation where your life was on the line. Yeah, spiritually, that put you in a different space, one space I was here until that boom that hit. And then it's like, all right, now I gotta change my perspective on things. You know what I mean is it?
Speaker 2:it forced me?
Speaker 3:it forced me, yeah, yeah so it's like you got lined up correctly exactly thoughts on track. You know what I mean exactly what I.
Speaker 2:What I learned was that sometimes, through trauma, the trauma can either break you or make you and I said I'm uh, I'm not gonna let it break me, so I'm going to turn this negative, this perceived negative, into a positive. And it was me wanting answers to the solutions. I wanted answers to the problems that I was having and I didn't have the solutions. So I just asked God, my higher self, whatever you want to call it, whatever you want to say, jesus, muhammad, whomever I called out, and that call was answered and I didn't deny it. And one thing that I want to point out to the listeners in what I did, I basically minimized my distractions. I stopped watching television and minimized my distractions so that I could hear from source or whatever type of voice that needed to come through, a positive, reinforcing voice, one that would guide me in the direction that I needed, because I was in a dark space, that dark and light energy. So I was coming from the light but had a dark experience and I was stuck there trying to get back to the light.
Speaker 3:Now you say that, but just to backtrack, you had a life-threatening experience. Can you walk the audience? What exactly? Happened, I know you mentioned the bomb, but what exactly happened?
Speaker 2:So 10 months. My tour was 10 months and the whole 10 months I was doing infrastructure rebuilding. That means creating projects which required my time in the community of like in Iraq in the, in the neighborhoods, creating projects and, um uh, basically rebuilding the infrastructure.
Speaker 2:So, after almost 10 months, the tour is almost over and every day we was missing bomb, we would miss, you know, a bombing or we would miss an attack, and I was like yo, I was like yo, if I could just make it. You know, you know this 10 months, you know, wow, you know, I'm going to do some, some, some like miraculous things. When I get out, so close to the end of the tour, the last mission, it was like ironic, why did it have to be the last mission? And I remember getting into my truck 30 seconds before somebody else got into my truck. It was the last seat. And then we did our briefings and meetings and it was about 125 degrees, everybody was hot, the AC wasn't working in the vehicles and it was in April 2010. And we were driving along, going to pick up some dignitaries and on our way there, I'm just balancing, going along with the ride and trying to keep cool and all of a sudden we hear a boom. The back truck gets hit by a bomb. We stopped the truck and in all 10 months, nothing has happened to us and we can't believe that this is actually happening on our last mission, and so we stopped. We all get out, we it? It threw us all off. It was three vehicles, so we get out running.
Speaker 2:Now I'm a paint a picture to the East and to the West, there's nothing but desert. To the to the horizon, there's nothing but desert. Now we horizon there's nothing but desert. Now we got hit on a bridge and there's this bumpy road In Iraq. They don't follow, they have no structure when it comes to driving, they just drive. And so to the east and west is desert, and on this one stretch road, cars are coming as we are stopping and trying to, you know, attack this enemy that just hit us with a bomb, and now we got to check to see if soldiers are alive. In training, they told us there was two bombs. The first bomb is to stop the convoy. The second bomb is to kill as many people, and that's what they kept drilling. We watch videos over and over.
Speaker 2:So I'm looking for the second bomb, and so I'm looking around, I'm exposed, I feel naked, I'm vulnerable, and I got my weapon ready to engage and ready to die. My soul is like OK, this is it, this is it, I'm not going back home, my soul is like OK, this is it, this is it, I'm not going back home In Iraq. And I remember looking in the back of the truck and there was lifeless bodies which really messed me up, you know, and I was supposed to been back there in that truck the interpreter you know, you know it was decapitated and the other soldier had a bomb. It went through his vest and just to see that and I couldn't react to it. And I had another guy up onto the bridge and they saw wires connecting and they just started cutting.
Speaker 2:Didn't know cutting them would detonate the second bomb. They didn't know if that was the first bomb or they didn't know. They just started cutting. Well, that whole incident had a huge effect on me because I did die in Iraq. My soul was there. Because I did die in Iraq, my soul was there and it haunted me when I came home from Iraq to go back into society and go back to work and start dating and and and I would be a minister, society, and I went back into society because I was so filled with anger, resentment. What could I have done to have maybe prevented this?
Speaker 3:So was it like a survivor's remorse that you was going.
Speaker 1:It was some a survivor's remorse is what I was dealing with yeah, you don't hear too many people talk about that you know, I had um kidney transplant in 2020 and I think you know, like those kind of uh, what you say, like near-death experiences and stuff like that, I think it affects people in different ways. For me, you know, it was a situation where it's like, you know, I could have lost my life. So I'm saying, well, when I woke up the next morning, it's like, oh, but even when I got the first bad news, I had kidney issues, where it was like now I'm looking at the world different. Like you know, I got to do more. You know I got to enjoy my life more. I got to enjoy my family more. I got to pray more.
Speaker 1:You know, and it's kind of funny that you should say that you know, like, you went to a dark place. Like you know, I think everybody deals with things like that differently. You know what I mean. It's kind of it's kind of it's kind of weird to me, cause we, like I said, when we get into those kind of situations, I think it makes people better people. You know, at the end of the day, even though you had to go through a dark place to get there, like I even see right now in you and talking to you from even from the beginning of the conversation, like you have that zest for life. I got to get it done. I got to do something, you know, to keep it going. And I think you know, I think that's something that pulls out of most people that come through those situations. Do you feel the same way? I?
Speaker 2:do.
Speaker 2:And again, trauma sometimes either makes you or break you, and I look at it now is that in order to get where I am now, I needed to go through that. People say do you have any regrets? I said no, no regrets, because they were lessons. All the experiences are lessons and if I didn't get the lesson out of that, then I would be still searching and going through a similar experience to wake me up, to push me towards the light, and the light is all there is. That means all things, goodness. I'm aware of the darkness that I have and I talk about this thing called the beast that lies within. The beast is like the dark energy. The beast is like brush my shoulder, I'm going to let the beast out, and when the adrenaline starts flowing, we Superman for about five to 10 minutes and it was like learning how to control that dark side of me, learning how to control the beast.
Speaker 2:I was a hothead when I came home from Iraq. I wanted blood, I wanted to fight. I moved to LA. I was in traffic, I was just spazzing out. I was like dude, chill out and trying to balance the dark and the light that is within me. I am all things. I look at myself. If I'm part of the creator and the creator is everything, then I'm all things as well, and so, therefore, I am darkness and I am light. I need to control my darkness and operate from the light, and you know, if somebody break into my house, I turn the darkness on. I match the energy.
Speaker 3:This is a part of you that's not completely gone yet It'll never leave.
Speaker 2:I just have to be a manager, a supervisor, I have to be an owner of that beast that sits in a cage that doesn't have a lock, that at any given moment, when it comes out, the adrenaline flows like Incredible Hulk. Incredible Hulk is basically the story of humans when they're angry, the adrenaline starts flowing and they can do superhuman things punch holes in a wall, you know, or just lift things that they normally couldn't lift when the adrenaline is not activated. And so when the Incredible Hulk is tearing up things and he's mad and he comes off the adrenaline, as David Banner, he feels so bad. And that's every human, every human when they react in that dark side, that beast that's ready to come out and say say something smart, say something smart. And it was like, you know, I had to learn how to control the dark side, because I felt like I had reached that dark side in Iraq and and just dealing with it and just being present you know, yeah, and even in that, I guess, when you came back from iraq and you have, you know, like you say, that that darkness seeing you, that it affects the people around you, you know I mean and yes people near you pushes them away, you know, I mean, because they don't understand what's going on with you and, and to be quite honest with you, some of us just don't want to take that negativity on from anybody, you know, I mean you want to incorporate in what you have.
Speaker 3:So what was the things that you did to kind of bring yourself out of that? You know what I mean. What was the goal moment on that one?
Speaker 2:Well, what I did? I listened to my inner self. I had to practice listening to myself, as long as my intuition and my thoughts wasn't telling me to go kill nobody. It's like go to Hollywood Now that you've left Iraq. Go to Hollywood, that's what you should do. You should go and be an actor, try that out. You almost died, you almost didn't make it, so why not? So it was that push really.
Speaker 2:But I was so torn because I'm from Alabama my mother just had I was the second of her sons that went to Iraq. So it was like I had one son that survived. Now another son came home, he survived, and now you're going to California. My mother had never really been out of the States. So it was like like California, what are you doing? And she was yelling at me and out of anger and out of frustration and out of confusion and out of her. Her youngest son is now, you know, almost lost him in Iraq and now he's going to California.
Speaker 2:But so I was like Pinocchio. I said I don't have strings on me. I had no children, not married. I was like what stopped me from going to LA and pursuing my passion? I was like nothing. And it took a lot of effort and I finally made that move and never looked back and making that Right. I was like nothing and it took a lot of effort and I finally made that move and never looked back and making that move. What drove me out there the carrot that drove me out there was acting and entertainment and going to film school. What I discovered was I was out there to do some self-development, to work on myself, to push me towards the light. I was like, oh, now, when I'm sitting in my apartment, november 2013, I got laid off from the entertainment job I was working at and November 2013, I'm landing floor of my apartment, no television, just listening to my inner thoughts, just really wanting higher knowledge and just really wanted solutions to my problems.
Speaker 2:And I said man I got six to nine months to just ride this unemployment out. I was like, wow, I could live off this, you know. I was like, ooh, this is sweet man, I'm about to hibernate, you know. And as I was laying in my apartment thinking about hibernating and just doing nothing for six to nine months, a voice came through. Now there was no TV on, there's no distraction. I minimized all distractions so that I could think clearly. And a voice came through and it said if you don't take this time out to do some self-development, shame on you. And it was loving, it was compassionate, it was caring, but it was almost like a stern teacher. And I opened my eyes. I was like I heard that and I didn't question it. It wasn't no negative stuff. It just said, if you don't take this time out, that you have to yourself to do some self-development, shame on you. And it almost chastised me. Why would you sleep when you could be doing the work?
Speaker 2:I put my foot on the gas at that moment and never took my foot off, and what I developed was a method to live life very simply, and that method is basically what people already know. I had to learn how to love myself unconditionally over again and realize that I was operating on conditional love. The polar opposite of unconditional is conditional. We put conditions on our love. Sometimes I learned that from my environment, whether family, social environment, at school, church, just being out in the public. I learned I watched how people conditionally love themselves, television and movies, and so I relearned how to unconditionally love myself over and over, through repetition, repetition, reposition, like a computer reprogramming my mind, redownloading new software to operate on.
Speaker 2:The second one was no judgment of any kind. I said, dude, stop judging yourself about Iraq, stop judging yourself about your past. You know, like childhood, unresolved issues. Stop judging yourself. You know, have no judgment of any kind. Third one was forgiveness. I had to practice forgiveness, repetition over and over. Forgive yourself, forgive yourself for the past, forgive your parents. They know not what they was doing. They did the best they could. You have expectations that they don't even know, they can't even meet them. The expectation, unspoken expectation, that I had of my parents they didn't know it, but I had this judgment, this anger towards them, and they had no clue of my expectation. I was doing it to myself. So the moment I start practicing unconditional love to myself, at every moment, no judgment of any kind to myself at every moment, and forgiveness and minimizing negative expectations that would cause me to have disappointments in life.
Speaker 3:Say that again, brother. Say that again brother.
Speaker 2:That's it right there, Say it again brother, minimizing negative expectations so that I don't experience extreme disappointments in life. So what I had to do was minimize expectations of myself that I should be. You know I would. I would ridicule myself. I would say, man, you be creating all these projects, but you don't never finish with me. I mean, you create a hundred projects and I would talk down to myself, man, you ain't nothing. And I stopped doing that. I stopped doing that because I was speaking life, I was casting a spell on myself and didn't know it. And I said if you love you, if you love yourself unconditionally, why would you treat yourself that way?
Speaker 1:Yeah, my only thing I would add to that is get rid of negative people. Well, as much as you can, because you got some people that you know, like we got family members that we just you tell the family. You stuck to them, man, you got to ride with them. You know what I mean, and as much as well. Let me change that, because you know, the older I get now it's like wait a minute, I'm going to ride with you, but I'm going to put you here for a second.
Speaker 2:Exactly. There's nothing wrong with taking a break from family members who can be toxic, who are not willing to do the work on themselves, who are not willing to take responsibility for their actions. I grew up blaming the devil in the South. Blame the devil. Tell the truth, Blame the devil. Blame the devil. Devil made me do it. Devil made me do it. Devil keep making me do things. That takes the responsibility away from you. So it's like I had to reprogram myself. I says no, you can't blame no devil. You can't blame nobody else. Take responsibility. What are you doing to fix whatever is bothering you?
Speaker 3:It's just certain things that you it was in you to do it. You know what I?
Speaker 1:mean, we're a rare breed man Because there's a lot of people walking around this earth, man, and it's just like man. You just don't want to fix the situation that you're in, Like you're just going to, you're going to stay there, you know, and I don't understand that. You know what I mean and I don't think I've ever been like that. But even the older I get, I'm even more like you know't want the knowledge, you don't want to change.
Speaker 2:That's fine. I have family members that don't want to change and I try to help them. Put the crown on top of their head Like I. Just I feel good about myself. I have, I have answers to have solutions to problems that arise in my life and and I'm not stressed, because I understand what stress does.
Speaker 2:Stress turns into a physical sickness and that's not my objective to make myself sick, to get physically sick. The headache, the migraine, the thought, a thought of anger about something, holding an expectation and being extremely disappointed. Now I got a headache. The headache turns to a physical sickness and now you know you're calling out for it. Now your immune system is weak, now it leaves room for any type of attack, for viruses or anything to come into your life, and now you're just like woe is me. And so I know the causes and the effects of thinking negative. I just don't do it. So I say, hey, you know I discovered something. You know y'all got free will. I'm never going to force myself on you. You know if you listen, you listen, you don't. I'm going to keep pushing this message.
Speaker 1:As a life coach. When you see you know people come in, come into you for help, right? You ever look at somebody like I can't help him, man, it's nothing I can do for him man.
Speaker 2:It's nothing I could do for him. There are some people. I basically tell them the truth. I say basically, the intuition and the discernment tells me that they don't want to change. And I'll verbalize, I'll say, hey, you don't want to change, but when you're ready to change, they say when a student is ready, a teacher will come. So when you're ready, a teacher will come, whether it's me or somebody else. So I don't worry about people who are not ready, who say they want the help, because I could smell and I could tell if they really desire the help.
Speaker 1:It's a real like I said, it's a real group because I'll give you an example Like I work with some young people, right, I'll give you an example.
Speaker 1:Like I work with some young people, right, and you know, as an older person now I can say you know, listen, this is what I did financially to get myself on track stocks. You know, show them how to work the 401k or whatever like that, and you could be speaking to a group of all of them and it's one person that the light goes off on and you know she's like yo, listen, show me how to start this account, help me or whatever like that, and you can see the light on. So I wonder, like I said, that's why I asked that question in regards to a life coach, because when people come in, you can automatically look at a person and be like, oh, this person wants to get out of that situation, they want to be better. You know what I mean. So have you ever seen anybody that you thought were negative overcome? You know some of the some of the affairs and you know some of the things that they were continuously doing wrong.
Speaker 2:An example of my nephew. My nephew is 22 years old, one of my nephews I have like 13, 15 nieces and nephews and one of my nephews is 22. And I didn't think that he had the ability to listen. I thought he was too young to absorb because he was always on this video game and he would be heck listening. And he was one of my first clients that I worked on since he was 14.
Speaker 2:I wanted this young black king to have knowledge and I started with him very young and I was from Los Angeles, calling him to Alabama, making sure that I was feeding him knowledge. And I started with him very young and I was from Los Angeles, calling him to Alabama, making sure that I was feeding him knowledge but making sure that I was not infringing on his free will to choose. And so he was one that I thought that I wasn't, that, I couldn't, that I didn't think he would get it, I thought it was too advanced for him. I couldn't, I didn't think he would get it, I thought it was too advanced for him. But it was through the power of repetition. It's repeating things over and over. We said, oh, I said that. No, it's repeating it because when we first learned how to drive. We had to drive 100 times before it became unconscious.
Speaker 2:When we just get in the car, we just drive from point A to point B and forget how we got there. So I use a method of repetition. But he was an example that was just in the streets, you know, real young, you know, wanted to be part of the gang life, and he was just, you know, just running rampant and just didn't care. But I was able to instill, I knew that, the knowledge that I was sharing with him. His spirit knows truth, no matter how young he was. So I was speaking to his spirit, not his physical mind, and I knew that, through repetition, had I just keep talking to him, that he would go out into the world and subconsciously it would be sitting in the back of his brain. And then it and it happened one day. He called me one day. He says oh, you know the knowledge you was getting, he's like it actually worked. I was like, oh, he's like man, I want to thank you man, right, Right, you know. And um and I here's a quick story from that Um he called me one day when I was in Los Angeles and he says oh, he says, man, my ex-girlfriend just broke up with me and she left her coat over here and she coming over here with her new guy. He said, man, she come over here. I swear both of them going to get chopped down. He said I swear. I was like, oh. I said okay.
Speaker 2:I says, well, you know, take responsibility for your actions. He says, man, you ain't going to get mad if I go to prison, like if I go to jail? I said no, that sounds like a conscious choice for you to hurt somebody. And I said if you do do that, just make sure that you're open to the effects from your cause. I said you do not own her. She's not your property. I said you're young. There'll be many women that you come in contact with that you're going to be learning from. They don't belong to you.
Speaker 2:I said because we come from a society to where a man looks at a woman yeah, you, my woman, I own you. You know what I'm saying. Like if I spend time with you and you leave me, you taking my love, the love that I gave to you all the time and energy and money that I spent, now we're ready for violence. So I was teaching him how to love in a different way. That was unconditional. I says give her an opportunity to see what kind of guy she wants. You're just a stop along the way. You guys are young. She may have 17 different guys. She may have 17 different guys. She may have five. I said but give her an opportunity to be with a guy that she thinks is good for her and let her lawnmower pass. That's unconditional love. And he accepted it.
Speaker 2:And he called me two weeks later. I said, man, you got the wrong friends. I said your friend is going to lead you to prison. And he called me two weeks later. He said I got rid of those friends. Yeah, I was like you. You did. I was. I was shocked to hear him say hey, I got rid of those friends. I thank you for the advice, man. It saved me he got a.
Speaker 1:He got a blessing all the way around. He got rid of the friends and the girl man so you know, I told him, man, that's the best thing that ever happened to you, brother yes, that's the best thing, your best thing.
Speaker 2:You know, uncle, mentor life coach.
Speaker 3:Hey, listen, I mean I actually had another question in my head, but since you said this, we're going to pivot over to this one. How do we actually apply that to our kids out here? I know you do your mentoring thing and all you have your. You know people come to you but it's like, do you take that and you say, let me get these group of black kids right here, or these group of kids don't necessarily have to be black, because a lot of them, a lot of people, go through different things, but our people catch it the most. I'm gonna be honest.
Speaker 3:So what it is is like how do we get a lot of the youth out of that dark mind state that they're in? And when I say it's dark, it's because darkness is pushed upon them constantly, whether it be through, you know, music, movies, things that they see. Their so-called heroes these days have dark mentalities and it's like this is the stuff that they ingest in and this is the things that's probably more influential to them than you know. Unfortunately, their parents would be, or their uncles would be, or anything like that. So what, what would you do in that situation? If you're not doing it, do you have something tailored towards like gathering these guys up and just telling them the truth.
Speaker 2:Well, everybody needs entertainment, most people need entertainment, so I provide, I bring the light. It's the law of balance, the law of polarity. So if they're in darkness, I just add more light and understanding and education because, again, their spirit knows the truth when they hear it. If I'm speaking truth, all I have to do is consistently. It needs to be consistent, having these group meetings to where they see the consistency, the cycle I have to create a cycle to where they see that Tuesday at 7 o'clock I'll be talking about how to live a stress-free life, how to minimize stress in your life, and I think it's through consistency and through repetition and through entertainment. You take what they're entertaining, you find out what they're.
Speaker 2:I like the Jesus parable. Jesus used parables, right. Jesus used parables right. He took parables stories and incorporated the message into the story, and so that's the tech that I use.
Speaker 2:I like to entertain and while I entertain through my filmmaking, everybody want to be in front of the camera, right, everybody. Everybody want to be. You know, part of the entertainment movies and everybody's creative. They just don't know how to express it. So I help those young men by asking them what do they want to do? By not having no judgment, unconditional love and listening to them about what their problem was ailing them, right, because they can't really learn new information if they can't, if I don't give them the tools to solve the problems at home and say, hey, the problem that you're dealing with at home is on the temporary.
Speaker 2:Here's what I'm going to share with you, because sometimes we as children, we become sometimes guidance for our parents. You know, sometimes we become, sometimes we become the healers to heal our parents. Yeah, definitely. And so I teach kids basically how to basically take a situation without infringing again upon their free will to choose. I just share knowledge. That's truth. That sounds like truth, right, and it is truth. That's truth to their spirit, because spirit knows truth. And I exemplify light. So great because greatness will get mimicked. Michael Jordan, everybody's, you know, shooting fadeaways, tongue out. You know Right, right, you know anybody. Michael Jackson, everybody's doing. If anything, I do great, we have to do it great and with intention. The kids will see that and they will want to mimic that greatness that's in front of them.
Speaker 3:Right, because I look at it and I see like a lot of the violence and things that you see that's in front of them. Right, because I look at it and I see like a lot of the violence and things that you see that's going on amongst the youth is because of lack of problem solving skills, lack of coping skills. You know things of that nature and it's like you would. You're not going to get it in school. You're not going to learn these tactics in school because a lot of your educators are not from where you are and can't meet you where you are. So that's what kind of sparked me to say that it's like you have this, you know your cousin salton farm, and it's like you know I'm quite sure you do things within the community to to help these guys. Because I was.
Speaker 3:I was listening to a radio show one time where one of the you know older, you know elders were saying the problem with us as we get older is that kids have become, have gotten to the point where the, the elders are afraid to talk to them, you know, or are kind of reluctant to talk to them, based upon the reactions that they will get from them. I mean, we live in a society where people are beating up elders just for saying hey, you know, pull your pants up, you know I mean. So it's like we're kind of getting to that point where it's like you're afraid to kind of show them something. Because of that, I mean, from now on you're withholding knowledge from them. You understand what I'm saying?
Speaker 1:Also too. I think the other issue is that we become I think these kids are becoming desensitized man. You know what I mean, because their entertainment diet is trash man. You know, like you was just talking about entertainment before and I was going to ask you about, you know, is there anything that you have planned in the works in the future? You know, working with or do you see going on in Hollywood now to make a change? Because when it comes to African Americans man, our entertainment diet is trash, from the music, from the movies. You know what I mean and it's sad to say because you know, I know there's a um, it's a tough time because for you guys, because our people like trash, you know, I hate to say it, you know a lot of our people like trash you know I mean so it's kind of hard to make money and get that balance.
Speaker 1:And you know I mean like and be and be cool everybody want to be cool, right, right.
Speaker 2:So I call myself a spiritual gangster, spiritual gang star. So it sounds cool, so it makes me look cool. It's cool to be in the light, it's cool to have the knowledge. Hey, I tell people, hey, you can go to the dark. And going back to the adults, the adults are afraid to talk to the kids because they themselves are not healed. I have no fear talking to a child that claim he a thug. You can't be on park time too, park time and live a long life If you live this long you ain't that bad, you ain't that hard.
Speaker 2:You ain't out there terrorizing the neighborhood For real. But that park energy you're, you gonna get dealt with really quick yeah.
Speaker 1:I think you know the nuts out the gate. Like you just said, your nephew, when he called you and made that call, that's really a call for help. It ain't really like I'm gonna do it Because people that are about that are gonna just do it he wants you to tell him don't do it Right.
Speaker 2:He wanted me to talk him off the ledge and I read through it, right, and I didn't. I was like, hey, if that's what you want to do, that's a decision you want to make, right. You ain't even get mad at me. I'm like, no, that's your decision. You want to go to prison? Hey, go ahead. I'm not going to stop you. If that's the decision, you got free will. I'm not going to talk you off the ledge. Right, go ahead and jump, go ahead and jump and you knew he didn't want to jump.
Speaker 1:You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:I knew he didn't want to jump, but it had to be okay if he did jump. That's a spiritual and some people may be like, wow, that's cold-blooded, that's a narcissist. Think only about yourself. No, well, I say I'm a walking contradiction, I'm everything, I'm all walking contradiction. I'm everything, I'm all things, I'm all things, I'm who, I, who I need to be at any given moment. But I knew at that moment in my intuition, my discernment, that he did not want to, uh, jump off the ledge. He wouldn't be on the phone talking to me about what he was going to do, he would have just done it yeah, and we're coming from.
Speaker 1:You know we come from the hood. So, um, we know, right off the back, you know if you really mean it or not. You know, know what I? Mean Go ahead and jump Give it a shot. See what?
Speaker 2:happens Exactly. But he was looking for sympathy. He went oh nephew, man, don't do that. Man, you're going to go to prison. I love you, man. That's what he wanted. He wanted the sympathy. I gave him tough love. I was like if that's what you want to do, but it saved his life. He called me and thanked me.
Speaker 1:I tell kids all the time and sometimes parents, some people you might need to go to jail you might need to go to jail. I've seen it work out for people.
Speaker 3:When you came out.
Speaker 1:You're like I don't want to go back there, no more. You might need to go.
Speaker 3:You can go one of two ways. You know what I mean. But yeah, that's how it works. Take your route, take your route.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Take your route. In this life, in this Infinite route, there's no limit to what type of route you can take to get to the light. Everybody got to get to the light, the light it's already said the light wins anyway. So why even entertain the darkness? I know the dark, I know I have darkness. I know I could tear up a room. I know my stature. You know when I walk into a room, you know, I know what I'm capable of. But I don't have that intention. I control the beast that is within me. I'm the owner of that beast that darks out of me. And I tell that beast hey, I'm your owner, you stay in the cage.
Speaker 2:Here's a quick story with my nephew. I love talking about my nephew because he's very dear, near and dear to my heart and he's probably one of the students that I have that's really honed in, like a changed young man, right Going from street to just like, really being just who he is today as a respectable young man that's looking for light. But also he has a balance of dark and light within him. So there was a moment in time to when I moved from Los Angeles back to Alabama during COVID, my nephew, I could tell, had not had the best experiences at home with family members and friends. I could tell that I could just discern that Me coming in all nice and loving and yes, nephew, what do you want? And feeding him knowledge in a very calm way. I wasn't yelling at him and he would ask me several questions. Sometimes he'd be redundant and I would just continue answering the questions from a place of love, knowing that the repetition he needs to hear it. So in order for it to click, Well, I was showing him something. I handed him a piece of paper and when he took that piece of paper he snatched it out of my hand and the beast said let me out, Grab him through the window, Break it, Draw blood. Oh yeah, it's showtime.
Speaker 2:And then, for a split second, and I said if I do that, if I exemplify a violent act, it's showing him he's looking up to me. He's going to say well, in order to solve problems, you got to use violence. My uncle did it to me and I look up to him. So for a split second I said to myself nope, we're not going to use violence, we're going to use intellect. Take the knowledge away from them. You've already been feeding him. He's around you because he knows it works. So just take it, take your presence away.
Speaker 2:And I was able to call down that beast that wanted to just say, hey, yeah, you want to go at it. And so what I did was in a nanosecond. It says nope, you teach him an intellect, solve problems intellectually. So I says nephew. I says you jerked that out of my hand. I said that was a form of disrespect for my book. I says now, I said I could be on high and by turn with you in this city. I says, and I won't feel no type of way, Trust me, you're the one need the knowledge and I drove off.
Speaker 2:Five minutes later he's calling back hey, I think I did it on purpose and I apologize, man. I said I want you to go in the city and see who's giving you the knowledge that I'm sharing with you. I'm putting a crown on top of your head. I got this knowledge at 30, in my 30s, and I said I'm giving it to you. You've been, I've been training you since 14. You're going to be a powerhouse, right? I didn't tell you that, but this is how I'm planning to see into the world.
Speaker 2:And he goes out into the world and he's shining quietly, you know, and so he's affecting other people. But when he called and apologized, I accepted his apology quick, but it was in that split second. So the moral of the story is that I was able to control the beast, that dark side within me, and use intellect, Because, as Black men, every time we, you know, solve problems most of the time it's with violence and that beast comes out, that beast don't have an owner, that adrenaline is flowing, the beast want to come out and the beast want to wreak havoc for about five, 10 minutes, and after that adrenaline flow calms down. We, like I did, what.
Speaker 2:I tore that up Like, wow, what is wrong with?
Speaker 3:me If you get the chance to even say that.
Speaker 2:If you get the chance. If you get the chance, if you live through it, if you live through it, you can say wow. You always have regrets. I didn't want to yell like that. I don't want to be that beast. That's an ugly beast that comes out Right, right, and so I was able to exemplify peace and order within me and bring balance and says no, don't do that, because then he's going to continue solving problems with violence.
Speaker 1:Well, you know, and also too, it's like it's funny to say that is that he saw your power when you didn't react that way. Because you know, growing up up you know violence is just a natural thing that we understand. But you know, even in the hood, you know, we knew that. You know, you know we saw power when somebody said yeah, listen, I'm gonna let you slide. You know, I mean, I'm gonna give you a pass right now. You know, I mean, and I could really hurt you. It's just like kind of like even watch moving the godfather that portion where he's in the room and all of the people are talking about killing his son and he says I'm just doing this because of my son right now, but if something happened to my son I'm going to blame some of the people in this room.
Speaker 1:And that's not what I'm going to forgive right now. So when he says that, it's like the coldest thing in the movie because he's like I could react and wild out right now. But right now, but right now I'm looking for peace and you know it's hard. You know, like you said, I think the most power that you can show is that when you hold back yourself. You know what I mean and, like you said, you didn't show any weakness to him because you're telling him also too, like listen, you know I can't remember exactly how you said it, but in your way of talking you said like listen, I could, I could flex on you right now, but I'm going to just leave you alone right now and also I'm just letting you know I love you because I give you this information, you know. But I don't have to do that.
Speaker 1:You know what I mean and I stepped off, you know. So in his mind he thinking dang, you know I could have went left with me just now. You know what I mean and you know he chose strength. You know what I mean and that's something that even in my life has stuck with me over years, that I saw older gentlemen in my family doing that because I recognize, you know I could be objective. You know what I mean. I could fall back and not show weakness and you know stuff. You know what I mean, so I think you did a good thing with that.
Speaker 2:You know what I mean it's exemplifying the light. If I'm going to talk about the light, I need to practice what I preach.
Speaker 1:And he's going to do that to somebody Exactly.
Speaker 2:And then somebody is going to do it to you know, and it's going to get passed on. I knew I was planting a seed Right. I was planting a seed that would be inside of him, that he would remember that action that I gave him, that I solved it, learned, teaching her how to use. He saw it in action, because most black people we like to see it.
Speaker 3:Don't tell me about it.
Speaker 2:Show me. They say actions speak louder than words. I showed him my actions of what it looked like and what it felt like to have nobody yell at you and to give you the same energy snatching something out of it. If you snatch anything out of somebody's hand, especially black, a black male, oh, bloodshed is about to come.
Speaker 2:That's the causes and the effect, going straight to zero, right. And so I teach young black men how to be more intellectual. It's expected that we go zero to 100 with violence, that's a given. Grandmama can pull the trigger, but the most powerful thing is to use your words, use your mind, use light, use love and see the pain within him and see the game that he was playing. Because I looked at that moment, he was my teacher and my student all in the same breath. I was like, oh, he's my teacher showing me. Am I practicing the knowledge that I'm sharing with him?
Speaker 3:Am I practicing peace, all right. So listen, man, in our final moments together, I want to just ask you what do you have on the horizon in terms of you? Still, you know, cinematographer, award winning producer, and it's just like my brother was saying like with all of the negativity and things that you see our people is being forced upon within Hollywood? You know what I mean, what, what, what projects are you working on and is there a way that you're using, you know, know, that voice of yours in that area to kind of combat, you know, showing us in a negative light?
Speaker 2:yes, um, yeah, I, I look to do some sitcoms and in in those sitcoms I am placed in the food, uh, the nourishment of unconditional love into each message and no judgment and forgiveness, so eat. So implanting the message into my art is now my life's calling and everything that I do, uh, I'm gonna, I'm doing more speaking engagements so that I, that I interact with a larger audience, so that, especially our young black men, that we wake up and to and that that we, like I'm going to show people I want to share my, my kingship with young black men. So if you're around somebody's energy, that is energized, you too get energized. So I've been, so I'm working on building my YouTube channel and as a filmmaker, like, like going to film school, I get, I get into my perfectionist state. You know it's gotta be this way. How, why would they do? This hit home to me and I was like now is the time to really get out there and really, uh, make the audience a lot bigger within the uh, except for the um, with the exception of the small audience that I've been dealing with. Uh, but I'm, I'm putting myself out there more. I'm a publicist, but chris is helping me with those plans of really you know groundbreaking events that I'm going to be doing in the future conferences, basically teaching people how to love themselves in a fun way that really puts the power back into their hands. And my objective is to really get our Black males really to be empowered and take this knowledge and use it for themselves and see for and just use it.
Speaker 2:You know, unconditional love to yourself, practice over and over no judgment of any kind, over and over Forgiveness, over and over and over, until it becomes repetitious. Do it a hundred times. It becomes innate. Do it back to back, do it back to back, do it back to back, do it back to back and do it back to back. You speed up the process of your learning and just continue doing it forever until you become on autopilot. So a lot of projects that I'm working on. I've got puppets. I got a puppet show that I'm going to be doing for kids, incorporating the message of unconditional love, no judgment and forgiveness into the puppet that I have. It looks like a Sesame Street character. I spent a lot of money from London and I was like I'm going to put seeds into the children. I'm going to plant seeds into the children so when they get older and become adults, they will remember this unconditional love.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's what I was going to say, man, because it's funny to say that just the puppet thing, I mean that's definitely a good way of going. But as a kid, even in our world, coming up in Brooklyn, we had so much entertainment that was positive and it kept these certain messages in your head, don't, you know, like watching Good Times and Fat Albert and you know stuff like that? These are things you know. I think they stuck in my head. You know you can't hurt old people, you can't. You know certain things that was just, you know, just stuck in our head constantly or pushing our head constantly. I mean, you got something good out of it, george Jefferson. What's happening All of this?
Speaker 3:stuff. Knowing it's half the battle.
Speaker 2:We ain't home Break dancing.
Speaker 1:I don't see that in our entertainment, no more. I think that's the thing that we're missing. People talk bad about these children now. But's the thing that we're missing? You know what I mean, and you know. People talk bad about these children now, you know. But the problem is is that we're not giving them anything.
Speaker 2:Exactly. And not only that are we influenced by the society, but we're also influenced by movie making, watching movies, right, right, we watch. How to? I didn't know anything about turning the gun 45 degree um, at a 45 degree angle, right? I think that was from boys in the hood, right? Yeah, yeah?
Speaker 3:that's about every movie in the 90s actually exactly, you can pick it up, yeah, right so so that movie making seeps into the brains, unconsciously into our environments?
Speaker 3:it's funny you mentioned that, bro, because I was telling my daughter this I mean you know we all from that era man, and so you know these kids are rediscovering. You know these movies that we used to watch and you know she was telling me I think she was watching like Don't Be a Menace or whatever, something of that nature. And I said, did you ever notice in all of movies in the 90s that anytime some black man was making it out the hood or going to college, they ended up dying violently? And it was like what was the message?
Speaker 2:You know what I mean. Psychologically it would make black people go. You know, hey, I ain't gonna make it. I may become successful, but I ain't gonna be out of here. So it's basically taking the black male out of the home quickly. Sometimes you could be doing subliminal psychology.
Speaker 2:When I was in film school I coined this phrase. I said man. I said I'm a movieologist. I got the ability to make somebody cry in an instant, make somebody laugh at this cue and if it's good enough, they're going to laugh. I can make somebody think I was like oh, I can manipulate people's emotions and I could make them think I said I'm a movieologist. I said, and then, when I became conscious, I says you can no longer make violent movies. You can, but the causes and the facts are huge. Are you contributing to the downfall of your community and so the people that's watching your content, or are you going to be a conscious creator and create with love and light and incorporate beautiful messages? Now, make it. Make the content cool and entertaining. But yeah, you can make loving yourself be cool. Brain balance to the uncool and to the cool. Yeah, like that law of polarity.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you can. You can yourself be cool. Brain balance to the uncool and to the cool. Let them all play. Yeah, and you can. I think a lot of our filmmakers now probably need to look within themselves and say, you know, I could change this world. I could change, especially for our people. I could change this world, and I use Bill Cosby as an example. I mean, nobody wants to talk about Bill Cosby or nothing like that now, but the reality of it all is, the first time I saw a different world, I was like man, that's how black college is like. You know what I mean, everybody wanted to go to black college. Then you know what I mean. I think even I think there was a statistic that says, like, right after a different world has showed, like you know the, what is it the enrollment for?
Speaker 2:you know, enrollment went up crazy for people going to At HBCUs. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Right, right. So I mean, I think, a lot of the people that just don't do what the status quo tells you to do, man, Step it to the next level and try to do something that empower people. Man, empower people. And I ain't got no racist bone in my body, man. I like black, hispanic, white, whatever the case may be, but for our people, man, we just so. Yes, I don't know, man.
Speaker 2:We're behind, but that's okay, we don't get caught up, because my mission is to really catch us up mentally, because we have that mental blockage. We're stuck in the past and we're stuck in trying to catch up with white people, with money, and it's like we don't want to see. I want to see what having a nice house feels like. I want to see what having a million dollars feels like. I want to see what owning a business and being able to travel when you want to travel feels like right. So until we get that out of our system not saying that we'll ever get it out of our system, but what I'm saying is bringing balance to everything and really, like Michael Jackson said, we got to start with the man in the mirror. Are you loving yourself the way that you need to be loving yourself? That's positive. And you know how you treat yourself is how you treat others. It's the golden rule Treat others how you. You treat yourself is how you treat others. It's the golden rule Treat others how you would treat yourself.
Speaker 2:But the question is how are you, as an individual, treating yourself? Because if you're treating yourself with conditional love, guess what I'm going to treat you with conditional love If I'm treating you with judgment. Guess what If I treat myself with judgment? Guess how I'm going to treat you. I'm going to judge you. I'm going to judge you. I'm going to judge you. I'm going to invalidate everything that you do. I'm always having an argument. I'm always being a headache. Every time you see me, I'll hit this guy. Go right, it's all in the method. Forgiveness, it's all in the method.
Speaker 3:You put it all into your work. Let me ask you, brother, are you still in contact with Byron Allen?
Speaker 2:Yes, I am Indirectly. Yeah, I am, but I have the reason why I'm back in the South, because I'm a king. I feel like I want to do it myself. Now I'm not. I am in contact with him and he's still a person that I can reach out uh to uh to help, um, uh, bring this vision into fruition. Uh, but it's taken.
Speaker 2:I'm using my intuition and you know, and um when I'll reach out to him. I had an intuition to reach out to him today. I don't know why, but I'm gonna follow on. I'm gonna follow up on that um, intuitive, intuitive thoughts, um, but I'm good at networking and I've been offered $2 million to build a studio here in Alabama, but I'm not depending on that money. The money hasn't come in yet, but I'm still working on developing the money, raising the funds myself. So when I have this studio, I know how to build it, I know what I'm looking for, I know how I want it to look. So I'm going to have an empire to where I'm putting out television shows that incorporate messages of love, learning how to love yourself, you know, like the show Rock.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Ice and Love it all. Sucks, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I love it all shucks. Yeah, yeah, I love watching rock. He was a man. Men we want to see women. They want to see strong, dominant men that really take care of the house and we like that.
Speaker 2:And I'm with you, uh, dre, about you know, bill cosby, how, um, I'm not gonna look at the dark side, I'm gonna look at the positive. It I'm going to look at the positive. It's dark and light to everybody. I have no judgment. His choices in life does not affect me. Now, if I, if I, if I don't allow them to Right, so I could only look at the positive if I want to. That's free will. I can look at his line of work, his portfolio of television shows and seeing what he's done of television shows and seeing what he's done, and I can use it as a template to incorporate my own shows and the cartoons, from the Fat Alberts to the it's a Different World, to the Cosby show, and showing that family life and showing that stability and balance. You know.
Speaker 1:It's kind of sad that, you know, I guess we put the flag on him. You know what society puts a flag on him? Because Bill Cosby man, I believe single-handedly changed the perception of Black America through television.
Speaker 2:He's too powerful. He's too powerful for them to see.
Speaker 1:I mean just to see doctors and lawyers on TV. That was us, the house.
Speaker 3:That was definitely one thing. But then when you're looking at him back in the 70s doing black history, stolen, telling you Picasso took this picture from black people, you know what I mean. Things like that, Putting out information like that, and even in his latter years and I'll be honest with you when he was having his speeches and whatnot, and everybody's like, oh, Bill Trippin, Back in the day, you know when he's telling you you know, your kid's got $300 sneakers but don't have a computer or don't have books, and things like that.
Speaker 3:And it's like people would say ah, Bill tripping, you know he always getting crazy, but no, he was actually right, because now you're seeing this today, that's right. You know what I mean. You're seeing it today.
Speaker 1:When I was younger, I disagreed with him.
Speaker 3:You know was it was on to something. You know, I mean, it was on to something and that's the thing is. Like, when you talk about bill cosby the reason why I mentioned byron allen and all this because, like, when you see, you know these guys, at one point, you know bill cosby trying to buy nbc, you know what type of programming was going on. There was gonna be something positive. You know, I'm quite sure byron allen's thinking the same way and even when he has his issues where they're trying to like block him from buying certain networks and things like that, you know, I mean, I always look at it in a sense of like there's a reason why these things are happening, because it's something that they're bringing to the table, that you know what we see now. You know the people that the so-called powers that be don't want that. You know they're trying to prevent that. I should should say you know from business.
Speaker 2:Because they know the power of filmmaking. They know the power of television. People are glued to the television. People are glued to their phones. I can create a movie right now and if it's good enough, people are going to be watching it right. And there is a cause and there's an effect of everything that we do in life. Everything that we do, I can cause something to happen. Well, guess what that cause? It comes with an effect. If I have a positive cause, it's going to come with a positive effect. So the powers that be know the power of television. They know how powerful it is. It's hard to get away from it.
Speaker 2:It's entertaining this God mind that we're operating the God mind. Everybody has a God mind, but nobody knows how to use the God mind until it's full of potential. We're learning how to use the God mind until it's full of potential. The brain balance everything that we do. If you don't watch TV, understand that you're overwatching. Understand that we're on our phones too much. Understand. But the people on television, they don't care about that, they just want your money. It's all about the money, money, money, money, money and money, money. And to control you so that you don't wake up. So if I keep you busy on your phone. You're not talking about, you know, revolution. That's what happens to the black panthers right right, it's a different type of drug how do we stop the movement of the black panthers?
Speaker 2:We incorporate drugs That'll slow them down. They'll be more lethargic, they won't move as fast, they won't even think about you know, they'll just be chilling.
Speaker 1:Even now, in our own society, right now. I think that's another thing that's over-marketed to us, man, you know, we come, like I said, come from New York and New York, man, it's so much weed that's being sold in New York right now, Like you know, it's crazy, like you know, on every block and everything like that, but to me personally I feel like it's personally pushed towards. You know black and black and brown people like crazy.
Speaker 2:Oh, I'm glad you mentioned that because on my journey to just higher enlightenment, I use, I utilize. I didn't start, didn't start experimenting with weed until I was like mid-30s, 35, because I was in the military I used to get drug tested. I didn't want to lose my benefits. I was like, no, I'm not doing that. What I discovered? I was already on my spiritual journey, I was already at a certain level, but I discovered that the THC I did my study to educate yourself the THC awakens who you are. It heightens your senses of who you are at that moment in time that you're taking the THC. So when a THC reacts, it's basically so. When I first took a gummy in LA and.
Speaker 2:I was like yo. I said I'm going to go to the, you know, to the weed store and I'm going to try these edibles. And what it did. I went home I made sure I wasn't going to be crazy. I was like I did my research because I didn't know a lot of people my family, a lot of friends that I knew who were messed up in the head based off, you know, bad weed or whatever. Yeah right. And so I wanted to do my research and make sure that I was, you know, going at it with education. So what I discovered was the TAT just enhances where you already are. So if you're nervous, you're fearful and you're violent, it's just going to make you more violent.
Speaker 1:More fearful. You know the funny thing? I mean, we haven't taken this conversation forever, man, but what happens is-.
Speaker 1:Yeah, good man, you got the time. What I'm noticing now you know what I mean from dealing with these children. I mean going in the drive-thru. Wherever you see these kids at man, they is so wasted. You're looking at them. You're like bro, you ain't even right for work. Man Like you know what I mean. The drive-thru was going slow because he can't get it right. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:Like we living in a and I'll say this, and I'm not promoting no drug or whatever the case may be I can say honestly, during my era with the guys I grew up, I never was a drug person. I did alcohol. Everybody got something. God please forgive me for doing that. But the people that I grew up with, they were at least able to operate. Like you said, I think promoting that to us is making a generation of lethargic people. I kind of get what you're saying, because it's kind of almost like saying if you're lethargic, it's only going to make you more lethargic. If you're sharp, then maybe it might enhance you. Is that what you're, lethargic? It's only gonna make you more lethargic if you, you know, um, if you're sharp, then you know, maybe it might enhance. Is that what you're saying?
Speaker 2:yeah, exactly what I'm saying. That's exactly so. When I took the gummy I was already enlightened with like knowledge, and so when I took the gummy I was like whoa, it brought clarity to the knowledge. I was like whoa and it made more sense and it just came like that and I was like, oh, because I had did it at an intention.
Speaker 2:Most people, when they do THC and they're smoking it, ingesting it, eating it gummies, brownies, cookies, whatever the case may be they do it. They don't have an intention of why they're doing it. I made an intention that when I take this gummy I practice spirituality my stuff every day. So I had no choice. When I take the gummy, my thoughts are now getting amplified, based off the knowledge that I'm learning, that I'm pulling in Now I'm not advocating doing what I do, I'm just sharing knowledge. This is what I did and this is what I discovered.
Speaker 2:But I also did my research when I went and took these THC supplements. I understood that with the right knowledge and the right intention. It should, because when I took the gummy I was paranoid a little bit, but the paranoia went away because I was aware of it. But most people that take THC or all the drugs, these hallucinogens, are not expecting to be paranoid, they're not expecting the paranoia to come from it, and then they lose their mind because they can't make sense of the reality now that they're in that. The THC has now opened them up to a new reality, another reality that they're not ready to deal with consciously and make sense of it.
Speaker 1:I think that's another issue that we have too, man, is that again, we're at no waveform. Am I promoting doing no drugs at all? But on the same token, it's like when I look at it now from what it was. You know, again, I wasn't a drug person in the street, I never liked it or anything like that, but I have friends that did it and I think what these kids are doing now is is a is a high, high THC level. That's. You know, out of this roof man, and they're doing something different. You know, like you know, when I came up, you know, out of this roof man, and they're doing something different. You know, like you know, when I came up, you know the dreads and you know the people in New York. They made sure that every they was about the earth, they wanted it straight out the earth. You know what I mean. It's like now they're wrapping it in hash. You know what I mean they dipping it in this and they, you know they're doing all that. You know what.
Speaker 2:I mean they're running from themselves because they can't make sense of the reality that they're currently in, and the person that drinks is just running from problems that they can't make sense of. You're right about that.
Speaker 2:So I have compassion for these young men and women who are just lost. I was once lost, but now I'm found. Isn't that amazing Grace? I once was lost, but now I'm found. Is that amazing Grace? I once was lost, but now I. I don't want to do nothing, I don't want to be lazy, I want to drink Sunday. You got to do it all over again. So when is there time to really do the self-development work? Otherwise, now you're just in a world filled with entertainment and distractions and now your mind can't think because everything's in your face constantly and you never have peace, right, you know?
Speaker 1:That's why I said, that's why I can't promote Spiritually. I couldn't promote it because I never believe in doing anything that's going to take over control of your body. Again, I'm not talking like no high and mighty holy roller. We did things coming up too.
Speaker 2:It's your experience. It's your experience, it's your perspective. Everybody either can respect your perspective or not respect, and you know everybody either could respect your perspective or not respected. I had to learn how to be OK with nobody respecting my perspective. I had to stand in my truth and my perspective and what I've been learning you know and respect everybody else's perspective.
Speaker 1:You see, I think the thing that bothers me is just, I just see the destruction of our people. Man, like I'm looking at, you know, you know it's sad to say I mean cause I could, you know I have to have hope, but on the other side I'm like yo, like these kids, is not operating right, man, you know what I mean. Like, I just see, like it's just like the, the entertainment, the drugs, the, you know, so on and so forth. Man, it's hard to even raise a child. I sympathize with anybody got to raise a child in this, this day and age. You got to send them to school, your morals and religious principles of being, you know, forced out. You know, I mean it's just a lot of stuff that's going on and I mean we could talk about that forever. But you know, again, it's just like I couldn't promote anything that's going to that I think is going to hurt our people. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:Or any people, for that matter. You know what?
Speaker 2:I mean but again.
Speaker 1:It's a tough time we live in now, you know, because I'm just. I'm just seeing the things that I'm seeing in life, walking around, driving and stuff like that. My passion now is like come on, man, I can't do this. I remember rap music. I love rap music growing up. You know what I mean. Now I listen to it Dropbox. I love it. I love it. I love it. I still have it in my system. You know what?
Speaker 1:I mean I still have that love for it in my system. But on the same token, now I can look back conversation. I remember years ago, man, listening to MOP, and I was with a bunch of guys and I'm telling you, mop I don't know if you know from your area MOP is like real hardcore hip hop music. And I was thinking to myself like you know, when you get in the car and you got that kind of energy behind you, that negative, hardcore energy behind you, you can't tell me it doesn't put you in the mental state of doing something the wrong way. You know what I mean and it does, man, you know what I mean. So then I had to come as an adult. Now, when I deal with talking to children and the sexy reds and these different kind of artists in the music, I'm like yo man, y'all we're driving these kids the wrong way.
Speaker 1:And I think what you said earlier the Trap Call Quest and whatever in some ways there was a balance in it. You know what I mean, because Trap Call Quest made you want to read something. You know Lauryn Hill and them made you want to go pick up a book and you know I heard Miseducation of Sonny Carson. It makes you go want to investigate things. This stuff right now is so stupid and Candy Apple is ridiculous. Man, this is my soapbox man, I don't want to go too crazy man.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, no, no. Speak from your heart. I hear you and I sympathize with you, but I just know we just have to keep on pushing through repetition and consistency Right, right, right, right, and. But I just know we just have to keep on pushing through repetition and consistency Right, right, right, right, and be in the light. I know I'm a light worker and I know I got a lot of work to do. I'm dedicating my life to this. I will be doing this until I have no more breath, until I choose to leave or a tragic accident takes me out, or whatever the case. But this is my calling, and so I know that I'm going to do great. I'm going to do great. I'm going to do great in what I do, because I'm not giving myself room for failure in this process. So I see the light.
Speaker 2:At one point in time I didn't see the light in hope for humanity, and our culture is Black men and Black women. But I do see it and I'm happy. That's why I keep smiling, because the pendulum must swing to the dark for a little bit and it must go to the right. So now it's time for the light to take over, and we're in the year of Aquarius. I don't know if you believe in astrology, but I'm an Aquarius and so I feel a great service.
Speaker 2:And we are humanitarians and so I feel a great service. And we are humanitarians and so I feel a great service. And there are other lightworkers like you, like yourselves, who are helping put out the message. And in having guests like myself, we have a positive message to reach not just our culture, but the entire world, because you know one thing that it is the black culture that's going to take this whole entire world to new heights, because everything that we do here in America, the world is watching. Everything, from our music, how we dance, whatever we talk about reality TV, we set the bar majority for the world. Everybody wants to be like this black male.
Speaker 1:The one positive thing I want to say about our children. Now, man, is one thing that you can't say about them they're about getting to the bag, they're about getting to that money. The only problem I have is sometimes is that they don't care how to get to the money, but they're about getting to the money. And as far as the information man, they will Google something in a minute and you can't bull crap them. You know what I mean. They can get in history and they could come back at you and fire back at you immediately with certain things. So I wanted to give a positive in the sense that they got some good things going on.
Speaker 1:I'm not saying that it's all bad or anything like that, but I'm just giving what I see so far, man, maybe I'm an old man, maybe I'm looking at things differently. No, no, no.
Speaker 2:It's your perspective. You're living in New York and you're looking at the society of where you live. I can talk about the society where I'm at right now, currently in Alabama. I could talk about the society where I was in Los Angeles. So, and what I see in the landscape, and you know, in thinking, and you know, so you're just speaking. Your perspective is neither right nor wrong. It's right for you, it's your lens that you're seeing the world out of, right, and I respect it, and I respect it 100%, definitely.
Speaker 3:Definitely. Well, brother, we thank you for being on and, before you know, we let you go for real because we can carry this conversation on. You know, save some of it for when we have you back. How about that? We have you back on. You know what?
Speaker 1:I mean, it's like sitting on a stoop. Yeah, it's like this is stoop talk. Sitting on a stoop.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we're in Brooklyn, we just chilling, you know what I'm saying, b-boy style. You know what I'm saying Just Spike Lee joint. You know what I'm saying. That's what it is Like, this camera action.
Speaker 3:We just sitting there chilling your handles, like where they can reach you, at how they can support this work that you're doing and all Go ahead and speak to the audience At this moment in time.
Speaker 2:You could reach me at my website. It's brianisomconsultingcom and that's spelled B-R-I-A-N. Brian Isom, i-s-o-m, as in Mary consultingcom, and there is where I have my TV projects. You can book a session with me, and my IG handle is Black Buddha. Now I only have one picture Buddha. Now I only have one picture. I'm getting back into the swing of things because I had to reinvent myself and be more methodic about how I present myself to the world, because obviously, people want to check out your social and they will judge you based on what your social. They'll validate you or invalidate you based off what you put on there. I have to be mindful and so, as I'm building my Instagram page, it's Black Buddha B-L-A-K. Buddha. B-u-d-d-h-a the number nine.
Speaker 3:Okay, and I wanted to mention this too, because I know you was talking about your projects and I hear you working on the photography photography for uh shoes Russell yes, good brother yes, yes yes, yes, yes.
Speaker 2:La Chris um brought us together. La Chris is a is a. She's you know, he's the glue that's bringing a lot of things together, and I want to wish her nothing but love, because without her, I wouldn't be sitting here talking to you guys If it wasn't for her putting this together. So Chris Jordan is a powerhouse and a wonderful person in my life, so that's how me and Russell Andrews became connected a powerhouse and a wonderful person in my life. So that's how me and Russell Andrews became connected.
Speaker 3:I would like to have you and Russell on here together, man. I don't even want to cut you off straight, but I would like to have you and Russell on here together, man. You know what I mean. We sit down and chop it up.
Speaker 1:That's a good brother, I can see how you guys get along, man, because you look you seem like a younger version of him, man. And then the conversation the conversation, too, is very similar. You know what I mean, so yeah.
Speaker 3:And he's a good brother man, Very good brother, Very good brother man.
Speaker 2:Thank you for that compliment. Yeah, I appreciate it. Yeah, definitely.
Speaker 3:So again, don't be a stranger, you know what I mean. You definitely, definitely, have a spot on the show man. I'm going to come back and you know, just chop it up like this man. Just chop it up like this.
Speaker 1:All right.
Speaker 3:So listen, I'm going to give our handles too. You know what I mean. So we really appreciate your time, Brian. So just hang on for a minute as you can. All right, y'all.
Speaker 1:The Only One Mike Podcast is available on all platforms.
Speaker 3:You stream your podcasts on Also, check out our Only One Mike podcast YouTube channel to catch up on the past and current episodes. Please don't forget to rate the show and subscribe. You can check us out on Instagram and X slash, twitter at TheOnlyOneMikeP1, facebook and LinkedIn at TheOnlyOneMikePodcast. You can contact us via email at TheOnlyOneMike00 at gmailcom, or call us at 302-367-7219 to have your one Mike zero zero at gmailcom, or call us at three zero two.
Speaker 3:Three, six, seven, seven, two one nine to have your comments and questions played on the show. We thank you all once again for your time, the audience. Thank you for making space, brian, thank you for making space, and we encourage you, please, to speak the truth quietly and clearly and listen to others, even the dull and the ignorant, because they too have their story to tell. So until next time, please keep in mind that if you each one teach one, and if you can't find one, you talk to the little ones and you'll see that they'll feel the missing piece to rise and shine. Thank you, brothers and sisters, for tuning in. Brian, thank you once again. That's right, and to that we say peace.
Speaker 1:Peace.