Season 9 Episode #12 Choosing Yourself and Rebuilding with Purpose with Hakeem Bourne McFarlane

In this episode of The Cultural Curriculum Chat Podcast™, host Jebeh Edmunds interviews Hakeem Bourne McFarlane, founder of Choose Yourself Community.

Hakeem shares his journey of personal transformation after experiencing loss, injuries, and life challenges that pushed him to rebuild his life with intention.

This conversation explores resilience, identity, and how choosing yourself can lead to meaningful growth and purpose.

Listen now to this inspiring conversation about transformation, community, and empowerment.

#PersonalGrowth
#Resilience
#PodcastInterview
#CulturalCurriculumChat

Learn more about Hakeem Bourne McFarlane here: chooseyourselfcommunity@gmail.com

Socials: @bigdreamhakeem IG & TT

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:25

Hello, everyone, and welcome back to the Culture Curriculum Chat Podcast, the show where we explore culture, storytelling, and courageous conversations that help us better understand ourselves and one another. I'm your host, Jebba Edmonds, educator, author, and cultural consultant, and I'm so glad that you're here with us today. If you're new to the show, this podcast highlights voices and stories that help us think more deeply about identity, community, and experiences that shape our lives. Before we begin today's conversation, I want to share two quick resources for educators listening today. If you're looking to bring more cultural awareness into your classroom, be sure to check out my mini courses and multicultural lesson plans available on my website and on my Teacher Pay Teachers storefront. These resources are designed to help educators facilitate meaningful and courageous conversations with students about culture, identity, and belonging. Now let's get into this wonderful conversation. Today's guest is Hakeem Bourne-McFarlane, founder of Choose Yourself Community, a movement dedicated to helping individuals rebuild their lives with intention, purpose, and self-awareness. Hakeem's journey into this work is deeply personal. His path was shaped by lived experiences, including the loss of his younger brother at the age of 16, injuries, and moments of misalignment that forced him to take a deeper look at his life. Through those experiences, Hakeem began the process of rebuilding with intention, focusing on growth, mindset, and community. Today he shares that message through Choose Yourself, encouraging others to step into their power, take responsibility for their path, and create meaningful change in their lives. Hakeem uses his platform to inspire people to think differently about adversity and transformation, reminding us that sometimes the most powerful growth comes from the most difficult moments. Hakeem, welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_01 2:37

Hey, what an intro. Thank you so much for having me. Thank you for choosing yourself so you can overflow onto the people you love and know.

SPEAKER_00 2:45

Well, I love that. And thank you. You know I did my research, mommy. I am just so excited to have you with us today. And let's start from the beginning, Hakeem. What experiences shaped your journey toward the work that you're doing today?

SPEAKER_01 3:00

Well, there's a few of them. I call them trigger points. Some people call them dark days, some people say trauma, abuse, neglect, blah, blah. Okay, those are all for transformation. If God had a plan, then you got to go into your story and figure out what is fun. You run from it, you suppress it, it's just gonna hit you harder in the face at a moment that you least expect it. So when it comes to the parts that shape me, you could say my parents dealing with addiction, only child, not having much materialistic things in the home, being able to be athletic and talented and dedicated to sports helped shape me as well. Losing my little brother when I was 16, he was six, the relationship with my mom, and through that whole process of him dealing with cancer for six years and still trying to stay focused, then going into going from D1 to D2 to D3, getting into fights with anger and resentment that I buried from grief and then ended up getting locked up, caught a felony, went into a dark day, dark days, I say a few dark days, a couple deep dark days. If you read the book, Choose Yourself to Be Chosen, you will definitely be able to identify with parts of the story because we all go through it. Everybody worse is worse. If you get down to the root of it, everybody been through it. Grief, pain, shame, loss, neglect, guilt, abandonment, hesitancy, disbelief, we all go through it, but how long does it last? And that depends on the work you did up until the moment. So going through this adversity, eventually, when you lose the core four of health, time, relationships, money, sometimes you lose one, sometimes you lose two, sometimes you lose your kid, sometimes you lose your job, sometimes you lose your mind. But you got to lose something to figure out the pain because hell is the default for not choosing yourself. Hell is also created by our creator. It's the point to bring you closer to God. Okay? And so if we are too hard-headed, caught up in societal norms and the ego, eventually you're gonna end up all alone. And that's when you only got you, yourself, your inner child, your creator, and your subconscious. And y'all got to figure out what that relationship is. And for me, it was 2017 in solitude. And in that moment, I took the next 18 months to really dive into personal development, which opened the opportunity for me to partner with my uncle and start with sales. So I took my systems that I use for personal development to pull me out of my dark place, implement them into sales and business development, which then propelled my career enough to where I was able to move to New York City. Moved to New York City and made a shift in what I wanted those systems to represent, and it became the choose yourself process. And now that's what I implemented to workshops, the choose yourself community that retreats into my courses and my coach, and it's in the book. It's the choose-yourself process, the universal truth of all transitions. And so that is what the message is. Now, creating experiences is the most important part about this movement. Doing the in-person workshops, doing the in-person growth opportunities, doing the in-person interviews, doing the collaborations, because so many things online are fake. And there's so many creators be lying. That's why they call them online, because they be all lying. Not all of them, but there's there's some there's some real ones out there. And, you know, being in person is when you can really tell if somebody's about their life. And so I encourage all y'all to tap in to whoever you consider influential on your page, go to one of their events and feel that energy in real life.

SPEAKER_00 6:25

Oh, I love that. And and I love how you even shared, Hakeem. Thank you for being vulnerable with us today, that we don't go through life unscathed. We go through things, you know, and like you said, to get us closer to God and in making those choices and and your you know, 18-month solitude to really work on yourself and and then finding people in your life to get you to the next level of using those systems to get you, you know, and it just builds up to your elevation. I just love that. And, you know, when you talked about your journey, you know, you came more from your lived experience than inspiration. Can you talk about those moments that forced you to rebuild your life with intention? And you you touched on that with grief, loss, you know, from your sports career and all, but yeah, what what kept you going in intrinsically to, you know, with that choice to keep moving forward?

SPEAKER_01 7:25

I would say a promise I kept to myself to be the person that my mom wanted me to be. I think when it came down to it, it was not letting her hard work go to waste. And I didn't realize that, that that's what I was doing because I was still surface level with it, but I was like, I'm not giving up. I'm going to the NFL. I could be five knee surgeries deep with a felon, kicked out of two schools. I'm still going. Now I'm blacked out in the black market at age 19, suspended from school, living in my mom's crib. I'm still going to the NFL. Ended up going back D3. Got back on the field. I saw that light in my mom again in the stands. I said, ooh, look at that. She's happy. She loved watching me play sports. So giving her that feeling.

SPEAKER_00 8:09

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 8:10

But also, sports was a mask for me because when I pulled the plug on my brother, I went into a basketball, into my team van and went and played a basketball game the same day. So sports was a mask. No matter, and I didn't even grieve. I didn't cry after that. I cried once when I got the phone call. My uncle picked me up, my mom's brother. I went to the hospital, pulled the plug, said the last words, hopped in a van and played sports from then on. And I was, the good thing is I got really good because I never stopped playing. Anytime I was alone, I'm like, I'm going to the gym, I'm going to run sprints, I'm going outside, I'm going to run hills, because I never was alone, but it became a mask. And a lot of people do that with work. We do that with relationships, you do that with sex, you do that with drugs, substances, you do that with doom scrolling, blaming, complaining, depression, anxiety, those are all masks. And so no matter what your version is, we've all done it. But how long does it last? You can fake the interview, but it you can't stop from getting fired when it's time to put the work in. And when it was time for me to put the work in, I got fired from life. And that's what put me into solitude. And so as I reflect, I think about one, a couple things. One is like making my dad proud, who wasn't around. Yo, look at me, I'm doing good. Tell me I'm doing good. I didn't, I didn't intentionally think these things though. Upon reflection, I'm like, why? How did I how did I not give up? How the heck? I don't know. Because I hear other people's stuff like, oh, I just want to give up. I'm suicidal. Oh, nothing is worth it. I'm like, damn, I never said none of that. But like I said, everyone's worse is worse. So I'm figuring out how was my mentality so strong. And I think it was a deep desire to be the provider of happiness for my mom. And the way that I knew to do that was sports. And then once sports was gone, it was a double dip because I couldn't make Mama D happy, and my mask was gone at the same time.

SPEAKER_00 9:58

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:59

I had to sit with it and I couldn't do nothing. So when I was helpless and making the people I cared about proud, making the people I cared about happy, then it became okay, ain't nobody here no more. The touchdowns are gone, the girls are gone, the money's gone, the drugs is gone, your mom and dad can't get you out of here. What are you gonna do? And I started getting push-ups. So the intrins the intrinsic motivator was always a desire to be my best for the ones that I love. Now it becomes selfish when you don't. That's what happens when you don't choose yourself. You don't love your people enough. That's all it is. I don't want to hear nothing else about it. Yeah, I do. I would go, I would do anything for them. But would you be healthy for? Exactly. Would you control your emotions for them? Would you create something for them? Would you practice your faith and stop saying please when you pray, say thank you and find gratitude in the growth?

unknown 10:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:58

Where's that? Do that.

SPEAKER_00 11:00

Where's that? Yes. Oh, I love that. And just how you said, you are trying to make so many people happy, but you weren't happy for yourself. You weren't choosing yourself. And I love how you have that name, choose yourself. It is so powerful because you're right. If you're not right within yourself, what else is there? What else is there? You know, and and why did you choose that as the foundation of your work?

SPEAKER_01 12:14

Yeah, no, that came out. So I do poetry. And I've always been a writer. My Mama D actually brought up some Valentine's Day. Mama D was my Valentine every year. We did Valentine's projects growing up. You know, I was an only child until my brother was born. So for 10 years, it was me and her, every holiday, everything. And I went back, I think it was Thanksgiving this past year, and she had this box of Valentine's. And I was writing poetry since a young book. I don't even remember. Oh, yeah. I don't remember, but my whole family was like. That's what mama boys do.

SPEAKER_00 12:48

Yeah, I have boys too. I get it. I keep everything. I was like, ooh, it was nice even back then. Yeah, I love it.

SPEAKER_01 12:57

My whole family is musicians. I got my whole family, and I don't play instruments. I play sports, but I got creativity with the tongue. And that's where my creativity comes. It's the rhythm, it's the flow, and it's being able to create emotion through words. They create emotion experience through music, similar things. Some people do it through art, some people do it through movies, some people do it through books, whatever.

SPEAKER_00 13:21

You're still a lyricist with your words. I love that. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 13:25

When I started to, when I went to New York City, and there's this flow I get into. And if you don't know what flow state is, it's not you. But for the listeners, if you don't know what flow state is, it's a combination between purpose, passion, and curiosity. I feel like it's either something when you're in this flow where either time goes super fast or it goes super slow. But the time didn't seem real. And athletes experience this all the time before you hit the ball, before you shoot the ball, before you catch the ball. Right before you don't think about anything. Everything's quiet. And I experienced that same flow when I'm on stages speaking. But that same flow I create every morning because when I would have to walk in New York City with these dang rats all the dang time, 3-4 a.m. on the way to the on the way to the GYM, and that's grow your mind, I'd be creating poetry that I write all day. I always have these bars coming up and analogies and metaphors, and I got a whole long three notepads in my iPhone to where if I scroll too much, it starts freezing. And I'll wake up in the morning and I'll take some, I'll create something, and it'll be a message that is in alignment with what I'm going through or what I've experienced, what I've been inspired by. Then I'll walk in the streets and I'll record it. And then over time I've had little sayings and things that just come out of my come out while I'm flowing. I don't even write them down. Choose yourself. I did not ever write that down. I thought I was the first one to ever say it, to be honest. I never even heard it, but now I see it everywhere. Obviously, that's confirmation, but confirmation bias. And I said it once, I said it twice, and then I started seeing a lot more feedback about choose yourself. Like, oh, that's awesome. I'm like, oh yeah, choose yourself, dang. I said I've said that a few times now. That's dope. So then that became the tagline. And so the the taglines, the intros, the call to actions, they've changed over the years. But once I figured, okay, what is choose yourself? And I and I felt the controversy and how people were, even my dad was like, he's so Christian. You got to choose Jesus, you got to choose God. I'm like, it's the same thing. And so that passion that I had before to make him proud, I wanted to him to see that choose yourself is the same as choosing God because Jesus chose himself because he chose his faith over non-believers. That's why he left his hometown. It's not about self, it's about choosing your belief, your purpose, and what you intend to do before the emotions came. That's the self we're talking about. Not choose yourself and eat snacks. Not choose yourself and get lit. Not choose yourself and shoot and rob and steal. No, choose the self that was created when you came out the womb to the nibble before society. Try to make it someone you're not.

SPEAKER_00 16:14

That's exactly that self. I love that.

SPEAKER_01 16:18

Yeah. That passion for aligning the truth of choose yourself to religion, politics, nature, stars, balance, energy. That became my creative flow. So choose yourself is the root, the process. I can literally integrate, implement, implement, and exemplify through all facets of life, from an oak tree to the smallest atom, from a dinosaur to the president, and the last president, and the next president. It's all the same thing if we want to evolve.

SPEAKER_00 16:49

I love that. Oh my gosh. And this, I could talk to you all day. I just love this. So I love it. For listeners who may be going through challenging seasons right now, what message would you want them to hear today?

SPEAKER_01 17:03

Ain't nobody coming to save you, not even your savior, until you align your behavior with the things you pray for.

SPEAKER_00 17:09

That part. Yeah. That part.

SPEAKER_01 17:12

Stop saying please when you pray, because you're speaking from a place of lack. Put some gratitude in your attitude. Say thank you for what you got, because it's on the way. And the timing may not be in the time or the form that you want, but the timing is to see if you really believe in your beliefs. You say you do. But it's not your timing.

SPEAKER_00 17:33

Yes, it's his timing.

SPEAKER_01 17:35

It's the struggle to make you worthy of the life that you are destined to activate in time. But you have to prepare, and the preparation comes from the third pillar of the choose yourself process.

SPEAKER_00 17:51

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 17:52

It's the time it's what you do for yourself when you buy yourself that changes your self-concept so that when the environment triggers you to feel an emotion, your self-esteem activates awareness instead of reaction.

SPEAKER_00 18:08

Yes. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 18:09

So your self-esteem is how you feel about your self-concept. And your self-concept comes from the things you do most frequently when you by yourself, when nobody's watching. You can't talk confidently if you know you be hitting a snooze, eating BS, staying up late, doom scrolling, beating your meat, and spending all your money. You don't even believe in you.

SPEAKER_00 18:28

You don't even believe in you. Yes. Now here's one thing I was gonna ask you to. You talked about your three pill your pillars in your book. Can you share more about your three pillars in the choose yourself concept?

SPEAKER_01 18:41

Yeah, yeah, it's five pillars.

SPEAKER_00 18:43

Well, five, sorry.

SPEAKER_01 18:44

Yep, yep, it's all good. It's T-E-F-I-C, the Tethic. Triggers environment, foundation, investment, contribution. The triggers, there's four types of triggers. One is when you get triggered by others, that means you're unhealed. That's the most common trigger. The next one is when you trigger yourself and you get done dealing with your own BS and you say, okay, like my solitude, like my dark place, that's the trigger point. That's the good trigger point. That's the that's the important one. That's the one where you're like, okay, I'm in control. I have to do what I believe. And the third one is you triggering others by showing them what choosing yourself looks like. Your energy, your gut health, your skin, your physique, your finances, height, your manners, your eye contact, your posture. That's that's triggering others. And now they're gonna probably have a problem with you or they're gonna be inspired by you. Just like you were triggered by the other person who was a self-choer when you had a problem with them and they triggered you or they inspired you. Now it's flipped. Just by doing the work on yourself. You ain't gotta change nobody. If you can't change the people around you, you need to change the people around you. Now, once you make that shift, you trigger, you get done triggering yourself, and then you start to trigger other people just by setting boundaries and standards and taking action in solitude. You align differently with your environment. Your perception and paradigm changes when you actually change what's going on inside. That's the second pillar, environment. And it's not just what you eat, what you drink, what you smoke, it's what you're watching, what you're listening to, who you follow on, you feed. It's how you it's how your crib smells, how your car smells, how your body smells. It's the thoughts in your mind, it's what you're saying to yourself, it's what you're saying to others, it's who you're entertaining. It's a little smirking comments online. You just put negativity under people's posts. It's those. That's showing violence.

SPEAKER_00 20:40

Yes, yes.

SPEAKER_01 20:41

So when you start to treat yourself differently, your standards change and your boundaries change. And boundaries aren't meant to keep people out unless they weren't meant to be there in the first place. They're meant to show people how to work with you. And that's how you find out. You don't get you don't get discouraged because you're like, oh, I can't go out with them anymore. Oh, I can't go gamble, I can't go shopping with them anymore. Oh, I can't, what? They gotta go. Sure. They gotta go. What you saying? What you trying to do? You'll find more people that are in more alignment and better for you.

unknown 21:10

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 21:10

So that your awareness changes. Now you set your boundaries. Now the foundation. That's the this is the pillar. This is the very first thing you can do today. And it will allow you to identify triggers, it will allow you to change your environment. It's the time before and after your sleep without people, screens, or toxins. It's probably one of the toughest things to do. Nighttime routine, sleep, morning routine. No people, not even your kids. No screens, no phone, no TV, no toxins, no vape, no nicotine, no coffee, no nothing. Caffeine is a toxin too. It's a stimulant. Don't try to play yourself because it's legal. Okay? So we're talking about pure natural state around your sleep. This is how you reprogram the conscious mind. The choices you make around your sleep are the most imperative to your software update when you're asleep. State of brainwave. So put your phone down, plug your phone in, get a read-in-bedtime. In between your digital sunset and your reading bedtime, get you a routine. In between you hitting the alarm or turning the alarm off and not hitting the snooze, your first activation of constant control, and your first obligation, your kids, your email, your phone, get you a routine. These are the foundations that we talk about in the CYC. These are the courses. This is what we you learn at the workshop. These are all things I do in one-on-one coaching, is getting your routines down, and then we evaluate your consumption, implement the systems to break free of the victimhood and the vices.

SPEAKER_00 22:34

Well, I love that.

SPEAKER_01 22:35

The fourth pillar, the fourth pillar is invest in yourself. Now you've identified with the triggers. Triggered yourself, start choosing yourself. You evaluated your environment, mindful consumption. You started seeing what parts of my environment were causing these triggers, eliminate. What parts of my environment am I triggering others? Perfect. Keep those around. What parts of my environment are a catalyst to my growth? Cool. You just become aware by identifying the triggers. There's intercises we do for that. Environment. Now you set the foundation because you're starting to become aware of stuff. You're like, I don't even want that. Why am I watching this? Why am I on my phone in my bed? Why am I eating snacks in my bed? Why is my dog in my bed? That's controversial. I know a lot of people are like, my dog gotta be in my bed. Alright, I don't know what to say. My dog ain't in my bed, I can't pay very much. But so then what you and then you start to invest in yourself. Yes. New experiences, new food, new education, new content, new podcasts, new music, new environments, new supplements. You start to really get curious about okay, this is hold up. Why what what else can I how can I boost my health some more? What else can I read? Who else can I call? Who else can I help? And then the fifth one is creation and contribution. That's the overflow. When I say fill up your cup and then pull from an overflow, and you ain't even gotta, you ain't even gotta create nothing. All you gotta do is be yourself. Keep choosing yourself, keep investing in yourself, keep finding the balance in your consumption. Because it's not about being straight and narrow, it's about finding the balance. You can indulge in sugar liquor weed, nicotine screens, caffeine. You can indulge, you can dabble, don't depend. Because you don't want to be an addict. You got a lot of screen agers out here nowadays, dopamine fiends. It ain't a crackhead no more. It's a screen crackhead, what it is nowadays. Okay. Don't let it get fooled you because it's legal.

SPEAKER_00 24:28

It's still like that. Oh, that is so true.

SPEAKER_01 24:31

So that's the overflow and that's the pendulum swing. And then once you get to creation and contribution, guess what? You're gonna be triggered by people in that realm. And then you go through it again, all the way to the whole thing.

SPEAKER_00 24:42

Yes, the whole cycle. Oh, thank you for breaking that down. So looking ahead, Hakeem, what is your vision for the choose yourself community and the impact you hope it will have?

SPEAKER_01 24:54

Yeah, we're going worldwide, man. We're going worldwide. It's an ecosystem. It's an ecosystem to provide connectivity, community, and creation to everybody on this planet. If you implement the systems in this community, in the choose yourself community, we have hundreds of people doing it. We have several people. I just had, I think, my third self-chooser on the Choose Yourself channel podcast. Season two is going to be about testimonials and bringing people from the community on. Season one is about people who have built brands already, but there's an ecosystem. The content is intentional. I don't just speak online. I'm trying to get you to see something inside. I don't care if you like me or hate me, but you're going to feel me. You might block me and delete, probably because it's true. Okay. I'm not speaking on nothing. I'm not speaking on nothing I ain't been through, and I ain't speaking on nothing that I don't know about. I don't speak about parenting. I don't speak about building a billion-dollar business. And I don't speak about marriage. You know why? Because I ain't been in those. But when I am, please believe. It will be in the choose yourself ecosystem. It will be, yeah. Love that. You got the content, the podcast, the interviews. That's free. That's to get people to draw people in. You got the book that has my story, which is your credibility. Your story is your credibility. You better write your book. You ain't got to give it to nobody. Give it to your kids when you die. Write your book. It is healing. Because then you got to write it from a perspective that you want other people to see power and positivity in your story. So when you write that out, you got to flip your mindset while you write it instead of, oh, my brother, my felony, my injury. Wow. You gotta be like, oh, well, flip it so that when somebody reads it, they don't think I'm a frickin' soft ass. So you gotta do that exercise. And then we get the community, which we meet every Tuesday, Tuesday at 10 a.m. Eastern time. We also have another branch, CYC Kids, who is led by a parent, teacher, and coach once a month for families. We have people's parents and kids all join on the Zoom. We talk about the choose yourself process in the household. And then we also do workshops multiple times a year, which will help embrace your story, build your brand. We do retreats that are three to four days every year. Next one is in Sedona, October 1st. And once we once you start to tap into all these resources, your purpose will surface and we'll help you with that. And once you're ready to present that, the Dream Big Wellness Event, next one's in LA, June 7th, is where we bring all the brand creators together, set up tables, and share our story. And then you collaborate and connect, and then we help with the business development of it if you want to. But your brand doesn't have to be a business. It's just how you make people feel when you leave their presence.

SPEAKER_00 27:36

I love it. And now I thank you for sharing all of the events you have coming up and your ecosystem. Where can my listeners find your work, your ecosystem online? And how can they learn more about it?

SPEAKER_01 27:51

Yeah, just submit your submit your info on chooseyourself.info. There's a info submission link there. Otherwise, Big Dream High Keem, Instagram and TikTok. Also got Choose Yourself channel, Instagram and YouTube. That's the podcast. The book is Choose Yourself to Be Chosen, not lose yourself to be frozen. The second part is the title is the first part. Choose yourself in Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or email, choose yourself community at Gmail. Any of that, man. We we meet. If you want to tap in with the choose yourself community, we're through the school app, Dollar A Day, keep the haters away. No, keep the self-neglect away. Because people are gonna hate. And Bergner won't rob an empty mansion. So if they hating, just get greater.

SPEAKER_00 28:34

Yes. Oh, I love it. I just love talking to you. You are so inspiring, motivating, and and also you're helping me, just like kind of going through my own checklist of like, yep, yep, I can switch that. I can invest in myself. Yep, morning routines. I still need to work on that. Nice. But thank you, you know. And and it just, this is just so just open of a breath of fresh air, another Minneapolis, you know, buddy of mine now. And yeah, just I'm so I'm jealous that you're, you know, in a good way living the best life and flow Rita, you know. And we're still cold up here in Minnesota. But this was wonderful, Hakeem. I will have all of your information in the show notes so our listeners can follow along and help them choose themselves as well and be a part of your community. So thank you, thank you, Hakeem. Any last, any last advice before I close our interview today?

SPEAKER_01 29:39

Well, something I like to really bring to awareness, and I practice this awareness every single day, anytime negativity surfaces, is there's a balance in the universe, the good, the bad, the light, the dark, life, death, up, down, in, out is a balance. God and the devil. They both the God and the devil both reside inside as long as we're alive. And you get two choices when it comes to your relationship with both. You can be a deal maker or a deal breaker, and which one you gonna choose. And that's what we get to choose in every single moment of the day. So don't forget, it's not external, it's all inside. That's why you got a GYM and that's grow your mind.

SPEAKER_00 30:24

I love it. I love this. Oh, Hakeem. You just bring life. This is so fun. Oh my goodness. Thank you so much for joining us. It's just an honor to have you here and can't wait to get into the choose yourself community as well. So thank you, thank you, thank you all for listening to the Culture Curriculum Chat podcast. If you enjoy this conversation, which I know you did, please consider sharing this episode with a friend, colleague, or someone who you know needs to hear this message. And again, if you're an educator looking for more ways to bring culture awareness and courageous conversations into your classroom, be sure to check out my mini courses and lesson plans at jebbetmonds.com. Until next time, continue having these courageous conversations that move our communities forward. Thanks again.