The Journey to Freedom Podcast
Journey to Freedom serves as an exclusive extension of the Living Boldly with Purpose podcast series—a platform that inspires powerful transformation and growth. Journey freedom is a podcast hosted by Brian E. Arnold. The Journey to Freedom is an our best life blueprint exclusively designed for black men where we create a foundational freedom plan. There are five pillars: Identity, Trust, Finances, Health and Faith.
The Journey to Freedom Podcast
Purpose and Politics: How Family Reshaped a Leader's Path
What makes someone walk away from their dream job? For Michael Butler, it was a simple question from his three-year-old daughter: "Daddy, are you leaving again?"
Michael's journey began on baseball fields in North St. Louis, where as a seven-year-old he witnessed opponents cheating to win a game. When his father told him "life isn't fair," young Michael made a profound decision – he would dedicate himself to creating more fairness in the world. This childhood moment sparked a passion for public service that would eventually lead him to make history as the first African-American elected Recorder of Deeds in Missouri.
The path wasn't straightforward. From earning a full scholarship to Alabama A&M University to an unfulfilling corporate career at Walmart, Michael's trajectory changed dramatically after a mentor advised him to "quit now" and pursue his true purpose. Within three years of that conversation, he'd been elected to the Missouri House of Representatives at just 26 years old. His meteoric rise continued when fellow legislators elected him Democratic Caucus Chair at 30.
Yet at the height of his political success, Michael faced a crucial realization – his dream job kept him away from his growing family. This prompted his decision to run for a local position that would allow him to serve his community while being present for his children. Today, he's transformed the Recorder's office into the highest-rated government office in Missouri through innovation, technology, and exceptional customer service.
Michael's philosophy that "the measure of a man is how he treats those he doesn't need" shapes his approach to leadership and service. His story challenges us to reconsider our definitions of success and impact. What sacrifices are we making for career advancement? How might our greatest purpose be found closer to home than we imagined?
Listen to this powerful conversation about purpose, priorities, and creating meaningful change right where you are. Michael Butler proves that sometimes the most significant leadership happens when we choose what truly matters. If you're searching for your own purpose or trying to understand how your past experiences might be shaping your future calling, this episode will inspire you to look at your pain through a new lens and consider how it might be guiding you toward your most meaningful work.
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All right, all right, all right, just here we are. This is Dr B, just so excited. We got another edition of the Journey Free Podcast. Oh my gosh, you guys are in for a treat today. You know, every time I get to do one of these podcasts and I get to talk to I guess I just have a bias. When I get to talk about energetic black men who are doing stuff, my heart just gets warm, I get excited. I can't wait to hear everything that's going on in your life and all the things you're being able to do. And I love my other show. So I have another show. It's called Living Boldly with Purpose and it is just that We'll talk about a lot of the aspects and the things and you know what does it mean to live in purpose and all that kind of stuff. But there's just something special about we're at about 200 and some episodes now of the Journey to Freedom podcast I have I said in 2024, you know I had gone to a.
Speaker 1:It was a trust leadership conference and it was in Minnesota. It was really good. A guy by the name of David Horsager led this event. I've had him on my podcast, my Living Boldly with Purpose podcast. It was probably one of the best. I'm 60 years old now. It was probably one of the best conferences that I had been to, and it was a three-day event. And he just, I mean, he pulls no stops and he understands trust and what it means to trust and all these things. And so there's 500 people in this room and, you know, I started looking around and there's about 30 folks that look like me that are in the room and I'm going okay, 500 people, some really good content, some things that our community really needs to. You know, just to know and to be exposed to.
Speaker 1:You know, if there's a community of people that have trouble with trust issues sometimes, you know, I think it's ours, and not just because I live within our community. You know it could be the same everywhere, but somehow I don't think so. And so I came back and I said this needs to change. And so in 2004, I said I'm going to do at least 100. I'm going to find Black men who are doing something and making a change on a community level, on a, you know, in the city level, in the rural area level, not just. You know what we see as entertainment or what we see as music or some of the things. You know, the people that we idolize because they're famous, but what about the everyday person who is going to schools and showing up at parks and, you know, making sure that people are taken care of, are there. And so that began that journey to freedom.
Speaker 1:And then I was able to take, you know, some men down to Alabama and do some stuff and just continues just to be this incredible place where I get to talk about some of the wonderful things that we're doing in every community.
Speaker 1:And then, you know, I get to, you know, get to talk to you, you know, and get introduced to you and go, wait a minute. Here's just another example of somebody who's out there doing stuff, and so, like all of our other shows, I've asked Michael to share his story, to talk about what it is that makes him, I guess, to tell us about his genius, what he's been able to do in the community that he's there, and I said, hey, like I told you, you can start anywhere you want, start at your mama's womb, or start somewhere in the middle, the middle, because I think for a lot of us, if we can understand who you are, then what you do becomes even that more special, and so you know again, thank you for being on today, thank you for taking your time in your evening time here in the middle of the week to be able to be on this podcast, and I just hope it just enlightens and helps the folks that are watching.
Speaker 2:So please go ahead, tell us your story and then we'll just chop it up after that yeah, thanks, dr b, I'm excited for the conversation, uh, and of course I'm mike butler and uh, yeah, I've never been called a genius before, so that's a, that's a new title. I I really, I really appreciate the, the and to look inside any kind of jeans that I may have. But my story really starts out in my hometown of St Louis, missouri. I played a baseball game when I was a kid and I played shortstop for a team here called the Herbert Hoover Boys and Girls Club. It's in North City, the low-income area of the city, and I grew up not rich at all, poor.
Speaker 2:As a kid we were playing a team that I knew was cheating and this team is a very well-recognized name in St Louis. I'm not going to say because I don't want to offend them, but I've told this story that this team was cheating. They were throwing dirt in the air going into second base if you played baseball. I played shortstop, so they kind of throw some stuff at you going to third or put their cleats in the air sliding in the base. To be honest, we lost that game to this team, the rival team that we have at Herbert Hoover. They loved hearing me say that we lost the game. I remember telling my dad in the game I was like dad um, it's not fair, it's like dad, you know. You told me cheaters never win. It's not, that's not fair. They were obviously cheating. They won the game. My dad told me something that he told me a lot when I was a kid.
Speaker 2:He said, son, life isn't fair and at that moment that I realized that I wanted to make life more fair for everyone, and as a seven-year-old, I didn't accept that concept, that life couldn't be fair. Even though, growing up in a poor area of St Louis Missouri, I wanted to make sure that other folks didn't experience the negative trauma that I had as a kid from time to time. So I had since dedicated my life to public service. Then I then attended college some years later at Alabama A&M University, where the theme of the school is services. Sovereignty is our motto and it's a's a a great public institution, hbcu in alabama, in huntsville, alabama, that asks uh folks to use what they learn here in service to the, to the community, in in some parts of the race. And I was blessed to be very successful at alabama in my. I was a student government president by my senior year. I graduated with honors, uh, and, be honest, I had a blast at alabama a&m university. I had a great time, and but if there are any young guys listening to this podcast, I like to tell them when you're thinking about college, go to the place that wants you, no matter what that place is. And I chose alabama a&m because I got a full ride. Academic scholarship uh, my tuition was full, fully paid, in my room and board uh, I filed the money and it was the best decision I ever made. I got accepted to many other colleges, some with bigger names, but they weren't giving. They wanted me to pay them to be there. In a sense, alabama A&M was paying me to be present and I felt like even at 17, that that was important, that somebody wanted me and that the organization wanted me, and that truly changed my college experience and it truly helped me to be more successful in college and to take risk and to expand in my leadership potential and I got to try a lot of different things and really practice the leadership I got to do later on in life.
Speaker 2:So after I left college, I was, I wanted to start a company. I'm much like you, dr B I'm an entrepreneur. I'm in a sense of some people can call me a serial entrepreneur. My father started a business when I was nine years old and since then I really have been hit with a bug like him to to leave my own company and do things my way, and I decided that I want to get into service, but in order to be a public servant, I wanted to get rich first. I wanted to have a company, wanted to have some money, and that way I could never be bought out as a politician.
Speaker 2:That was my goal at like 20. Like, okay, I'm dedicated to service, but it's better. I put this in my mind. It was better for me to get into service if I had a lot of money. And, um, some people could say that's, that could be, that was the devil's extra thing to put it in, you know. But uh, and so I decided after I graduated, after I graduated undergrad. So I got a business degree in undergrad, but I graduated in 2008. I originally wanted to start a company right at the college of 22. And if you remember the year 2008, it was a big economic downturn. Half, like quite a few people in my graduating class, didn't have a job offer upon graduation. It wasn't easy for people in my generation coming out of college for those few years, and I was lucky enough to get a job offer where I was actually. I actually started out in corporate America at a small company Might've heard of it called Walmart stores, incorporated.
Speaker 2:I started out in Benville with a really cool job as a 22 year old. I was a liquor buyer for Walmart at 20 years old. Pretty fun job. So I was the term was replenishment manager. I was responsible for purchasing and replenishing liquor stock for over 600 Sam's clubs across the country and I was really good at it. I was really good at good at my job. I made good money not great money, but decent money for a 22-year-old.
Speaker 2:I lived a very peaceful and cool life in Bentonville, arkansas, but I hated my job. I hated it. I hated corporate America. From probably the 31st day it was really cool. Until every day I walked into work at seven, eight o'clock in the morning and I'm just like, why am I here? I didn't feel any purpose in life and I have learned quickly. The reason I was there in Benville was to meet my wife. I met my wife in Benville, arkansas, the summer. I decided to leave and we are still married today. And we started dating in Benville and we are still married today. Um, and and we started dating then in benville and we were married today, but I at the time I could not tell you why I was in benville, arkansas, so I went to lunch with a, a mentor of mine and frat brother, uh, who was in the legal department at in at walmart stores incorporated, and he was asking me hey, what do you really want to do in life?
Speaker 2:What do you, what, what, what are your? What are your real goals like? Do you really want, do you want, to stay here in walmart forever? And I'll tell them no, I want to get into politics. I'm just here to make money and learn how, learn how to run a company. Man, I want to, or maybe make some quite a bit of money and then run for office.
Speaker 2:And this uh brother changed my life and was having saying he said, michael, you Quit now. He said get out of here. He said get out of here right now. He said you don't want to get stuck in Benville. He said you don't want to meet some lady you don't have, you're not married, don't have kids, don't get stuck. Do what you want to do right now, do your purpose. And that really resonated with me. And so when I got back to my desk that day, I decided I prayed about it in my desk that day. I decided, I prayed about it in my desk and I was. I was driven to, to, to, to pursue that and kind of the plan that came to me from this mentor was that, hey, if you got, if you just got, to go volunteer and be an intern in a campaign, go back home and do that. If you're going to be a staffer, go back home and do that. If you want to go to graduate school, just go to graduate school or something like that, go and do that. So I pursued research, all three of those avenues, and I kind of did all three. So I actually applied to graduate school, first at the University of Missouri, which is 30 minutes from the state Capitol and has a lot of connections to the state Capitol in Columbia, missouri, and I got accepted to graduate school for a master's in public administration and I got a full scholarship for graduate school. So I applied that day and I found out a few months later I got a full ride tuition and scholarship to graduate school.
Speaker 2:When I was in graduate school I started out in politics as an intern. I decided that I wanted to do graduate school differently than I did undergrad and undergrad. I was very involved on campus. I was some people could call me one. I wouldn't say I was, but it's one of the men on campus, one of the big guys on campus. But I said, this time I want to be just as involved off the campus as I was on campus and community relationships uh, like I as well as on-campus relationships. So I was able to do that, uh, by being an intern in the state legislature.
Speaker 2:So I started out as a grad student and an intern in Missouri State House. I worked for the state representative that represented the University of Missouri and had a blast I. I originally wanted to go back home and run for local politics as a city council person, but I fell in love with state politics at 23. And my state representative, who I was working with, she fell in love with me. So she actually, at the end of my internship her current staffer was leaving to pursue another job opportunity. She asked me to work for her to be her legislative assistant. Well, a little bit of that. She asked me at the time what do you want to do when you graduate?
Speaker 2:I said I want to run for office.
Speaker 1:I want to be a state representative. I said I want to go back home.
Speaker 2:Just go back home and be a city councilman. I want to be up here. She said, well, representative. I said I want to go back home. Just go back home and be a city councilman. I want to be up here. She said, well, I'm helping you do that. I want to hire you as my aid. So then I became stafford um, great job. I almost loved that. So I served uh elected official for two years uh in jefferson city and learned everything about the state capital and about, and everything about being a good uh state elected official.
Speaker 2:And, as God would have it, my home district in St Louis Missouri for state representative opened up in 2011 through redistricting through the whole state. There was nobody running for the place where I grew up in St Louis Missouri and, as fate would have it too, there were a couple state representatives who were looking for someone to run in that space, and they asked me if I was interested in running, and I was just heaven sent. So I said yes. I said let me look it up first and research see if I can win, and I did. And a month later, I said, yeah, I want to run in this.
Speaker 2:And the rest is history. And since, when it came to me winning that race, it was. I went from in Bentonville, arkansas, at the lunch with my friend, to becoming an actual elected official within a span of three years, and that was just truly a blessing, not something that I thought would occur when I was having that lunch. So yeah, ever since then, I was very successful as a young state legislator. I was 26 years old when I first got elected to the state house. I thought I knew a lot and.
Speaker 2:I didn't know a lot, but at the same time I do look back as a 39-year-old now. Lot I knew I was, but at the same time I do look back and, as a 39 year old now, like man, I was young and making some mistakes. I did a lot of things right, but I also did quite a few things that I wish I could, that I wish youth had, that the experience had of overcame my youth but at the same time I was very successful as a state legislator. The things I learned in corporate America and in college and the things that my father and my mother instilled in me as a child led to me becoming one of the youngest members of leadership in the state house. I was elected to be the caucus chair of the Democratic caucus at age 30. So other leaders chose me to lead them in the Democratic caucus and I was very successful to in a sense change the way some of the things in our caucus were run and lead leaders at a young age but at the same time to get to work through the position I'm in now. I got married and had those kids and my friend knew what happened and in that last term I'll never forget beginning of that last term. I'm in my dream job and I lived in St Louis.
Speaker 2:The state capitol is in Jefferson City and most politicians state level or congressional politicians have to travel away from home in order to do their job in their state capitol. It's a sacrifice that you make. My daughter was just turning three years old and she was old enough to talk at the time and I'll never forget on a Monday when I was leaving town to go to the state capitol that week to be gone for about five days, my daughter looks up at me and she says Daddy, are you leaving again? And that's when it hit me that I worked in a different city than I lived in, away from my family, and while I had a really good last two years in legislature, my family life was not good and my you know it really affected how I even felt about what was my dream job. It was harder and harder to drive those two hours to get to the state capitol every week. So I decided to run for a more local office to really stretch my master's degree in public administration, because I asked the legislative branch to be an executive branch office as well as allow myself to be closer to family, which became more important to me at the time and still is so.
Speaker 2:I ran for office in 2018 as a recorder of deeds for the city of St Louis and within six to nine months, I was elected as the first African-American person ever in the history of our state to be elected as a recorder of deeds in the state. There are over a hundred counties in our state and I'm the first elected African-American. There's been a couple appointed, but I'm the first one ever in all the counties in our state to be elected um, as well as, of course, the first one ever in my city to be an african. Mariner's position had never been held by an african-american in the past and since then, I've just transformed the office to uh, to be more forward-thinking, to be to come to the 21st century and I like to say, in some ways, the the 22nd century.
Speaker 2:We're utilizing online services and artificial intelligence and better customer service than any other office in our state and right now, we're the highest rated government office in the entire state and, quite frankly, we're still not satisfied and we want to keep pushing that a little further and save the city some money and give our citizens better services, and I found that service doesn't have to be, doesn't have equal fame or equal something that gets you in the news every day, but it's something that you, that dedication I had for service from when I was a kid, is something that just makes someone's life a little easier and reduces the amount of trauma they may have. And I've been blessed. I've been blessed. So my focus has went from just serving the entire public and trying to change the world to serving my family and serving my local community and changing the world on that level, until God calls me to serve at another level.
Speaker 1:Wow, thank you for sharing what an incredible story and as I think I got so many questions to figure out where to start. So initially, when I'm sitting here thinking I don't ever think I ever heard anybody like when they were kids and I want to grow up to be a reporter of deeds, it's just not one of those and, you know, think of it as a position that has impact, but it must have a lot of impact. So maybe just kind of share a little bit about what a recorder of deeds does and like, what is your impact as you move through the city?
Speaker 2:Yeah, the recorder of deeds. There's a recorder or a register or a clerk in every county in this in the country. My office is responsible for providing and overseeing all the land deeds of the city all the birth records, all the death records and all the archives and the marriage licenses of the city. So any important document that you need, we are there to provide that for you when you need it, as well as keep it safe for safekeeping to protect those actual physical documents. In the meantime, the first recorder of deeds in the country Black recorder of deeds in the country is actually Frederick Douglass. The first black recorder of deeds in the country was actually Frederick Douglass. He recognized how important it was to in the 1800s, how important it was for African Americans to oversee land records for folks in our community. That was his first and only political office throughout his life.
Speaker 1:That's so cool, just because you brought that up. When I think of being able to create relationships, and be around people.
Speaker 1:I don't know if there's, you know, I guess they say, like with Kevin Bacon there's seven levels of separation and that kind of stuff and can you find commonality in people? And sure, as a politician you've been able to find and create relationships through commonality. But when I think about like so I have a stepson and his lineage goes to Frederick Douglass, so he's like a great, great, great grandson of Frederick Douglass. And here now Frederick Douglass is the county reporter. He was one of our. I took him with us when we went to Alabama.
Speaker 1:We learned all about, you know, not just what the history books say, but a whole bunch of other stuff so cool that there's always something in common. So I guess, when I think about identity and I don't know if there's term limits as the recorder of deeds and you can only do it so many years and then you have to do something else, but maybe kind of talk to me, because you said you grew up in St Louis and it wasn't, you know, not wealthy. In fact, you said you guys were poor, not wealthy. In fact, you said you guys were poor and then you get a scholarship academically. So there had to be something that's going on in this community that you're in, that allowed you to excel academically and for you to believe that you belonged going to Huntsville to be on a scholarship and that you could thrive there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, when it comes to education, I don't. I don't have this, I don't have the sob story that some people have, but like I'm not a first generation college student, I'm not, I didn't have to. Of course it was expected of me to excel academically, but not for the reasons, not for a normal, I would say, a movie, stereotypical way of African-American. My great grandmother has a college degree. My grandmother has a college, a master's degree. My mother is an attorney. She has a JD. On my mother's side, um, education attainment was an expectation. Even even though we didn't have financial uh advantages, we always had uh, in a sense of we were instilled us to have educational advances in that in a
Speaker 2:sense. In a sense, I grew up in a family that education and intelligence was more important than money, and yeah. So going to Alabama A&M was more of extension of what my grandparents had. My grandparents attended HBCU and met at HBCU, at Kentucky State University. I grew up in a household where the Crisis magazine was on the table every day and I didn't even know what that was until I went to HBCU. I was like, oh, this is the NAACP's magazine. I've been reading this my whole life, I don't know. I mean Ebony Magazine was on the table every day, I mean next to the Bible. So we were very and.
Speaker 2:I got to that my grandparents are educators, so they were both teachers in the St Louis public school system. So the education attainment was not even a question for us and I but I but. But getting a scholarship was a choice that I made. That and attending HBCU was not forced on us. So my mother went to University of Missouri Columbia. She didn't go attend HBCU. It wasn't a requirement to go to HBCU.
Speaker 2:But when I was 17 years old, this little move I can't say little this little movie came out called Drumline. That was started. I really wanted to go to Florida State University and by the time I watched Drumline I was like I want to go to Florida A&M and I decided that I wanted to go to HBCU, which in a sense was in most cases our small schools and our state schools, and it opened up a world to me that allowed me to be able to get more money scholarship money as well, be able to get more money, scholarship money as well. So now I guess what I saw was successful parents and grandparents who showed that getting an education could give you more options. It wasn't a requirement, but it gives you more options to success, and that's one thing I try to instill in younger folks as well that I mean if you want to go do trucking or do anything else, that's perfectly fine, but sometimes you might be limiting your options career wise at the beginning.
Speaker 2:Now let me add this to I've noticed the older I get is that the more money you can make at 18, 19, you save that money. Cash expands your options as well. So there's a way to, if you're not going to go to college, make sure you're saving your money and invest your money until when you turn 25 or 26 or 30 or 35. You have cash. Cash gives you options as well. But if you want those career options, you can go to college and you can go from one place another. You can um, it does allow you to move careers a lot better if you have a college degree rather than if you stayed in one position and didn't have a degree. But sometimes a lot of college graduates don't have that cash that a lot of the non-college graduates have early on in life.
Speaker 1:Talk to me a little bit about. We think of. You know associations and people that have been in our lives and you talked a little bit about a mentor that you had that just told you to quit. You know I've never heard it called Walmart Incorporated. It kind of has a ring of you know some of the, you know some of the, some of the. I love it, but you know, and sometimes you know say you are who you hang around with, you are the people that you're around. I like to say sometimes you are who you compare yourself with, that you hang around with. But maybe kind of talk about that. What are some of the people in your life, the people that made a difference, that kind of channeled your trajectory into where you are now and the abilities that you have with folks now? Maybe kind of just talk about how important that is.
Speaker 2:That is very important when I think about a lot of my mentors have mostly been from my fraternity. I'm a member of Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity Incorporated and I became a member in college at Alabama A&M University and, quite frankly, I came from a very large chapter. When I crossed, we were actually the largest chapter in the country. I have to say that I had a lot of attachments and a lot of associations with really smart and successful guys, because we're about achievement. In Kappa Alpha Psi, upon graduating, I had 120 brothers who were in the same fraternity as me and then you know, about 30 or so pledge every year. So we have a large network of folks who are connected and I have some. And what was interesting about my our chapter is that we have quite a few successful politicians coming from directly from that school chapter. Two of them were in the state legislature.
Speaker 2:When I interned there, you guys were a part of the group that asked me to run for office. So when I showed up in the state house as an intern, I mean, what amazing is to me that I have two. And these guys were both young too. They were 20-something-year-olds just elected in 2008, young politicians who really gave me an advantage over other folks. I had a long-standing relationship. I knew two actual young, popular state representatives who were like oh hey, michael, how are you? Yo, come have a drink with us here. That was a big deal for something that people usually get. Maybe they go to Harvard or they go to Yale. I got that by going to Alabama A&M University. Those guys directed me in the right way, of course. They directed me to run in a district that was meant in a sense was meant for me.
Speaker 2:But after that, one person that has and I gotta shout out their name. Those guys are State Representative Chris Carter, whose family is a legend in St Louis, and at the time, state Representative Don Callaway, who is a legend in St Louis, and at the time State Representative Don Calloway, who is a media powerhouse nationally here now and is one of my really good friends. But they also I would say, the one since I've been elected, another fraternity brother of mine. His name is Starsky Wilson. Reverend Starsky Wilson, who is now the director of the Children's Defense Fund. Name is Starsky Wilson. Reverend Starsky Wilson, who is now the director of the Children's Defense Fund, has been a tremendous person to be associated with and to learn from and to instance. Compare in a sense, when I met Starsky, he was a street preacher for a church in my state representative district and, in a sense, a civil rights leader here in St Louis.
Speaker 2:He led a lot of the protests around the Trayvon Martin murder here in St Louis and was a dynamic community figure and just a smart guy in a sense. I really respect him and Don and Chris, because Kappa is not the first thing people think when they see us. Kappa is what connects us, it's not what we promote ourselves. So to be able to see him and others lead past just the association with such a bold organization was important. But since then he's really directed me in ways that makes me a better leader. He's a he's a reverend.
Speaker 2:he's a non-profit leader and it's something that's connected to community, something I was interested in at one point in life as well, and yeah so those I like your point about you are who you compare yourself to, in a sense, like you are, who your role models are, like you are who you who's your. You are who your role models are and, uh, I, I like that, I agree, I, I, I, um, and, and that has, and I've been blessed to have great role models and have those, not even my family or with my fraternity, and not while I have sought out other role models and mentors and been successful in that, and sometimes unsuccessful in getting those getting some good mentors.
Speaker 2:I've been blessed to have some natural good role models. I don't want to add some to them. Some people say you know the old term, the measure of a man, and he wrote a book about the measure of man and he has a a, a historic quote the measure of man is not where he stands in times of peace, but in times of controversy. Uh, I have a different stand by measurement than martha king. I say the measure he stands in times of peace, in times of controversy. I have a different stand on measurement than Martin Luther King. I say the measure of a man is how he treats those he doesn't need. And when I think about mentorship and some of those guys who took me under their wing, they didn't need me. These guys were always successful. Quite a few of them are 10 years or older than me or you know they were heading ahead in life and me more. All three that I just named more talented than I am. But the way they treated me as someone that I didn't need was changed my life and was very important to how I treat others too, because somewhere along in my career I decided that I need to treat everyone like they're the governor of the state of Missouri and I found myself my first couple of years as a young elected official being kind of important and soaking in the newfound importance and I had a lot of.
Speaker 2:You know, when you're a politician you have a lot of people coming at you or asking you questions or calling you, your phone's ringing a lot and I was answering my phone.
Speaker 2:I was answering my phone a lot but I was prioritizing who I was answering the phone for, who I would interact with, because that's what you do as a professional you have to prioritize things.
Speaker 2:But I realized that if the governor or the governor's office called me, I'd pick up on the first ring. Oh, I got it. And then it got to where I was like, oh, they didn't call me as much as I wanted to that year. Maybe they called you once or twice that year, which is kind of be a big deal if you're 20 something years old. But I realized that all those people that are calling me that, that that in a sense I don't need I'm the governor to them and it's very important that I read that if I'm important to those folks, I need to make sure that they're important to me, and that really changed my, my life in a sense, is measure myself as a person as how how I'm in service to folks, and not how I can use my relationships to just improve myself or improve their well-being, but how I'm in service to them in every day. And that simple thing is picking up the phone.
Speaker 1:Man, that's powerful. I was just thinking, as you were saying that, about the people that I interacted with in the last two weeks, and did I treat them? Because I don't know if there's any. Obviously there's several people that I do need that I interact with. But then I think about the folks that are coming to me for advice or coming to me for help or coming to me because of whatever the reason is, and then how did I treat them? And I love it. I mean, I wrote it down so you know it's gonna be something incorporating the things that I do. Oh my gosh, and I love the fact that, uh, you were able to find, uh, your preference.
Speaker 1:I have, uh, I have a cousin in in texas. His name is chris arnold, which is like an original hall of fame and he's like this famous on a daily show stuff and he's kappa, and he told me that you know, if there's anything you do, brian, you got to play staff of you. I unfortunately did go to a university or a college that even had a remote of fraternities and stuff, but had I been to one, I would have. I would have got lynched if I didn't go, so I would have, and he's been on my show and I'm just so I'm thinking of all the people he's introduced me to with the same thing where the fraternity of brothers that make sure that they take care of me. We're really happy in the Omegas here in Colorado and you know when I get to see and interact with a lot of, with a lot of them and how they treat each other.
Speaker 1:I want to shift focus a little bit because it's something that you mentioned that I don't want to pass over because I think it's so important, especially when we talk about the persona of what Black men are. You said you changed a pretty heavy, intense job that was in Jefferson City because of your family. It was that important to you, and so when I think about being a dad and what that means to be a dad and we often talk about how our kids we know all of our kids absolutely need their dad and every child should not grow up without a dad. If it's at all possible, how big of an influence that is. But sometimes we don't talk enough about what it means to be a dad and who you are and what you've done as a result of the importance of that. Please share with us what you believe it means to be a dad.
Speaker 2:What it means to be a dad is a given purpose. People look for purpose in their life and when you make children, then you have a, a purpose that you don't have to question. And, man, as long as we're both professional guys, I've read your bio. You've had a great career and you've done a lot of different things and sometimes, when you're going through your career, you're questioning, like, is this what I'm supposed to be doing now? Like, yeah, I just set out to do that five years ago, but I'm supposed to be doing this and I do it already. Being a dad, there's no question. Like, being a dad is this is what you're supposed to be doing. This is this is supposed to be the most important thing in your life. Um and I. I'm very blessed to have two wonderful kids and and someone to share um parenting with, with my wife and I. My wife is the best mother. She makes being a dad much easier, um and but being a parent is more about purpose. So a few things led me to um become what I will, and it says, become more of a family man than a career driven person.
Speaker 2:One was I grew up with uh half of my life, yet childhood was with. I had a dad. My dad was in the household. My parents got divorced when I was nine years old, so halfway through my childhood, and the other, in a sense, I was raised halfway by a single mother. My father was, of course, my father had visitation and we still know. My father is one of my biggest fans and friends, but during that time that was very difficult for me and my siblings. The divorce was debilitating for some of my siblings. They did not. They still have not gotten past the trauma of that divorce. But, more importantly, not having our dad in the household had a tremendous impact on my child and a tremendous impact on me, and I vow like really, as a young person, I would never want my kids to not have their father in the house. And then I always reached back to.
Speaker 2:There was a movie I saw. I don't know when this movie came out, either I was in high school or college and I watched this movie almost every year now and after I became a father, I was reminded. This is where this, this feeling, came from. For me it's a movie called family man that stars Nicolas Cage movie where because, uh, as a young kid you know growing up either middle class. Some parts, michael, later on, like we did become my parents, got educated, became middle class. But either middle class or poor, you want to make money, you're ambitious, you're like, hey, I just want to get on my predicament.
Speaker 2:And in this movie, nicolas Cage is a very successful Wall Street broker and rich single guy who lives in Manhattan in a penthouse and drives a Ferrari. Through half of the movie and this is the guy you want to be. In a sense, he has a Scrooge moment where he is confronted by an angel who gives him his life in New Jersey where he would have if he had to marry his in a sense, his college sweetheart. And at the end of the movie he chooses the college sweetheart over his success for obvious reasons, mostly kind of the kid thing. Those kid scenes if you've seen the movie, they're just amazing.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, I think at a young let's say I was 17 or 18 or 22 when I saw the movie I was like, oh, that's what purpose is about. Uh, nicolas Cage had all the success in the world, but he, he felt way more purpose after the three weeks of being with a family and, um, yeah, I think that that's what being a parent is about. It's about the natural purposes you get, the moments that you have as a parent that money can never buy. Money can never get you. The time to parenting is important because my kids are only going to get me in a daily way for most likely 18 years and I'm only going to get them. My kids are six years apart for 24 years. So from the day my daughter was born to the day my youngest, my oldest daughter was born the day my youngest daughter is going to most likely go off to college, I'm only really guaranteed 24 years. It if me and my wife are don't uh, lord lord, will this not happen?
Speaker 2:But my dad didn't get 24 years. Let's say it's my parents, but my dad only got 14 in the house with his children. Well, no, not his children, my oldest brother's team. He only got 10 years to be in the house with his children every day. So these are I look at these just precious times and my daughters are just growing. You can see. You see the results in in being parenting differently than you see in a career, because you're watching something every day grow, and physically. It's like a tree is day. Grow. It's like a tree, it's physically grow. They tell the best jokes and the best stories. Parenting is just a joy and an amazing part of purpose in your life.
Speaker 1:It's only because you said they tell the best jokes. They're not even funny unless they're coming from your kid. Yeah, and they're not even funny unless they're coming from your kid. Yeah, it's so cool. When some other person's kid tells that joke, you're like that's dumb. And then you hear your kid say it it's the funniest thing ever and it's so cool. It's that feeling you get.
Speaker 1:I can remember, like when my first son was born.
Speaker 1:I had eight children when my first son was born and literally, like you know, I I have watched Roots or whatever, and holding them up and going, you know, behold, the only thing greater than yourself and what it meant to me is changing who I am and then to see them grow up.
Speaker 1:And so, you know, I'm fortunate enough to have seen all my kids graduate high school, most of them graduate college and have careers and have 16 grandkids now, and so I get to see that. Can you know? Now, the greatest thing ever is those grandkids, and so, so much that you have to look forward to. But one of the things that I would love for you to even go beyond, because one of the things they say is the greatest thing you can do for a child, right or for you know a son or a daughter if you're in the household as a mother or mom right to be able to have them see that and maybe talk about that relationship that you have with your spouse that they get to see as an example, that those are the you know people that they're comparing right, the association.
Speaker 2:Whatever people ask me this, I'd say that I'm sure my wife would have a much different answer than I would.
Speaker 2:I'm sure my wife would have a much different answer than I would, but I have heard my wife say that you know I'm a different person. I'm much. I definitely feel like I'm a better husband than I was every year hopefully every year, but definitely five or six years ago. I think your question was well, your question was just the relationship. How important is the relationship with a spouse? Barack Obama says the most important relationship you'll ever have, the most important choice you'll ever make in life and there's no doubt about that from any successful person will tell you who you choose to be your partner and share your life with is very important.
Speaker 2:I was fortunate enough to know that as a young, younger person. My grandmother and my mother instilled that in me as a young person. Like who you choose who you spend your time with, as who your girlfriend is, that's very important. Like don't, don't be going after these bad girls, in a sense, because they're going to waste your time. And I was a very ambitious even as a young person and, of course, I decided I want to be in public service at nine years old. I decided I want to be a NFL player and then own a business and do all these things in life at a very young age and I was lucky that I had parents who said, well, if you're going to do that, then you probably need to be very picky when it comes to partners and our marriage, my marriage with my wife Erin has transformed over time because when I first got married I was a very ambitious and in a sense I didn't think I was but a very selfish person with my time and I always had a vision of being, of being a political animal, where you know the marriage was about me and that my wife would support that.
Speaker 2:That and she did. Quite frankly, she did do it. But there is no person who can do that for next four years and not have some pain or some trauma and over time. And there's no person who can have that arrangement as a man or a woman and and be the the leader or the politician and not become selfish or take advantage of of that partner and no that that was important because in a sense, it grounded me and I had to make a choice at one point where it wasn't ultimatum or anything, but I noticed that my family was suffering through my political animalness and that my wanting to be, share my time with the public and my family was not a good enough balance. I had to balance that a lot better and my wife really helped me, help me through that time. It was and was it. It didn't look like it, I didn't think it was the time, but she was very supportive through those times and I'm very grateful for that.
Speaker 1:So I guess you'd have to say that some of the greatest women in the world come from Arkansas.
Speaker 2:All right, my wife actually from St Louis Missouri. We met.
Speaker 1:That's a love story.
Speaker 2:We actually went to. We both grew up in the city of St louis, uh, literally less than a mile from each other. We moved to different suburban parts of the city and we went to high school in suburban parts of the city which, and our high schools, are less than two miles away from each other. We didn't know each other then. Um, my wife went to southern university in baton rouge, louisiana. I went to she's went to hbcu in the south. I went to school in the south in Huntsville, alabama, which is not a mile apart, but one state is over. We both had that experience. We didn't meet until we were in Bentonville, arkansas.
Speaker 2:We were in an apartment complex at a Walmart. Of all places. We didn't meet online. I had to put some game on a young lady in Walmart to attract this, the beautiful lady I have. But um, no, she's not from arkansas.
Speaker 1:There are some people, but the most beautiful woman I know comes from st louis, missouri I want to just give a little bit to to faith and where faith has played a part in your life, uh, throughout the years, and how it's impacted you in whatever way it has. Maybe you can just talk a little bit about what that means to you.
Speaker 2:Faith without works is dead. That's number one. I think faith is a part of success and it's shaped me. My dad is a pastor, so I grew up in the church yeah, my dad is, and my dad's a good preacher. He's a very good preacher and he instilled in me some very important scriptures from a young person. And then my dad, also in my childhood, was not a great example of faith. At the same time Was not a very good example of being a pastor from time to time, and now he is a great example. And so faith has taught me that sin is not something me, that sin is not something that's forever, and that forgiveness is important on both sides. And forgiveness is a part of faith that we don't take advantage. In other words, that we don't utilize as much, that we expect quite a bit but we don't put out as much as Christians. Most importantly, faith is a belief in God that most folks don't dive deep into. When I see my dad as a pastor, my dad is a Pentecostal pastor. The only thing about denominations Pentecostal is one of the, let's say, hard belief believe in miracles, kind of denomination and when there were times where my faith was tested and everyone doubts whether God is hearing them or whether God has their best interest at heart.
Speaker 2:I had enough experiences as a child and as a young adult to where I don't have to question it for more than two seconds. When I was a kid, I would lose things a lot. I lost things a lot. I was an ambitious kid trying to run around. I was that like kind of an athlete, so I would run around, do things I never forget. One time I was probably 11 years old, I lost my wallet and had a little money in that wallet and you know living I was really into projects at the time so $2.25 in that wallet, I needed that $2.25. And one time I don't know if my mom told me this or not, but I prayed about it and I prayed. I was like God, just please let me find my wallet. I need this money. And I found the wallet within like 30 seconds. I've been looking for it and throughout my childhood I did that quite a bit. After that it worked. Of course, I would do it again and every time I would lose something, I would lose things, probably fairly importantly. Maybe once every three months I'd be looking for it all over and then I'd pray about it and I'd find it, and so that's an example for me where, even as a young kid, my faith was shaped that God is real and I have experience with God that some of my other siblings don't.
Speaker 2:I may also say my father was a. As a Pentecostal, he was a, in a sense a healer. There have been times where I was sick that my dad prayed over me and I almost immediately felt better and healed, and my dad had that kind of faith and he still does. My dad has a physical kind of faith in Pentecostals, a physical belief that God is with us. We believe what Jesus said at the last supper, that what God had given Jesus he was giving all the apostles Some people believe it stops at the apostles. Pentecostals don't believe that. We believe that that same that Jesus was saying, that that same power is within us and every one of us, every single one of us who believe in Jesus and I continue that kind of faith generationally from my father to myself and hopefully to my children- Thank you for sharing that, one of the things I'd love to know this is a question I don't get to ask very many people because many people aren't public service.
Speaker 1:If you were to give advice to somebody who is wanting to run for office or somebody who wants to live a life in public service, what are some of the things that you would say is great about it that you should actually run into, and maybe some things they should caution themselves if this is the life that they would love to have?
Speaker 2:Great, great, great question. The things that are great about public service are that you, depending on what position you're in or any leadership position, you're really at the forefront of every issue for folks. So what attracted me to politics and to be in public service was that the things that were plaguing my city and the things that give me trauma as a young, poor person, that I could affect all of them, not just if I was a teacher, my place is just education. If I was a preacher, my place is really in the pulpit. As an elected official. If I was a lawyer, I wouldn't want to be a lawyer like my mom, just the judicial branch. But as a politician, you're trying to change laws and change what tax dollars are spent. That can each day be a different topic, but I will also caution people. That I learned later in life is that that could be a burden as well.
Speaker 2:And me and my wife first got married. Our pastor and marriage counselor said that one thing he likes to tell new married couples is that the thing that attracts you to the person is going to be the thing that annoys you about them later on in the marriage. It happened in our marriage. What attracted me to my wife. She said in marriage counseling was that I was a very ambitious and, in a sense, entrepreneurial person, and three years into the marriage, that ambition meant that I had a lot of time away from the household and was putting my career over her Same thing about politics.
Speaker 2:So having the responsibility of being responsible for everyone's issues and being able to fix people's issues can become difficult, and then you become responsible for other people's issues when sometimes you have some personal issues of your own. So I would ask folks not to be. I hear a lot from folks that they're worried about their past and negative attention. The real thing to be considered when getting into public office is that the issues of others not just others of everyone become your issues and people expect you to solve not just your problems but their problems, and that could be a big burden.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it'd be hard to do, because you can't solve everybody's problems. You can't do that. Some people just really don't want their problem solved, they just want to be able to complain about it.
Speaker 2:A political mentor called me being a city council member at St Louis. He told me doing the impossible for the ungrateful.
Speaker 1:Ooh, wow.
Speaker 2:They asked me why I never ran for city council. I tell them that quote like that and there are different levels where public service is not as people are. There are times when people are very grateful, but some of the lower levels direct people, political offices are doing the impossible for the ungrateful. And, yeah, it could be a big burden, it could be difficult. Wow, that's so cool man.
Speaker 1:This has been a great conversation, man. I've enjoyed it so much. I've been super selfish in trying to get to know you and learn you and ask the questions that I wanted to know, and I hope everybody else that is watching gets to learn from that. But maybe just tell me a little bit about you. Know what you want to talk about If there's something we missed, something we didn't get to talk about. You know how can people get a hold of you if you want to.
Speaker 2:I don't know if you want to or not, but maybe you know, just you know from your heart. What would you love to share in the last few minutes? Yeah, I want to add that I know you take a trip to Alabama every year, but I would say, either mix it up or add in the state of Mississippi. As someone who went to college in Alabama, I've taken the same trip. You have the civil rights trip. I've been to Selma, montgomery, birmingham, a lot of the rural towns in the Blackville, alabama. Some of my best friends are from Mobile, alabama, and there's a lot of history in the Blackville and in Birmingham. But my family is actually from Mississippi and we're from 30 Minutes. My grandfather was born 30 Min minutes north of Jackson and Vaughan, mississippi. There's just as much history in the state of Mississippi as well and I've taken both civil rights trips there are. But I will say, choose Alabama as a good state, because Alabama, in a sense, is where Georgia is, where in where I sense a lot of success is portrayed.
Speaker 2:Alabama, middle Road, mississippi, in some ways is about the losses of the Civil Rights Movement, about the sacrifice of folks in Civil Rights and some of the extending circumstances from those sacrifices that just resonate with me so much because my family's from there and some of that spirit is still in me, from the black men that sacrificed their life in Mississippi.
Speaker 2:And it comes to politics, mississippi was the most powerful black state during Reconstruction, right after slavery. The first black United States Senator, hiram Nevels, was from Mississippi and the first, one of the first US Congressmen Black US Congressmen from Mississippi. And there were, and during Reconstruction hundreds of Black men like myself ran for the state legislature, ran for the city council. Black people immediately in Mississippi started to take power and built beautiful cities, amazing structures, um amazing structure, political structure. But they were murdered for it. They were live meet myself, at a 26 year old I would have been murdered in vaughan, mississippi, 80 years ago, 100 years ago, trying to live out my purpose in life. And I think about those stories of the most well-known civil rights leader from Mississippi is Medgar Evers.
Speaker 1:In.
Speaker 2:Georgia it's Martin Luther King. In Alabama it's Shuttlesworth Reverend Shuttlesworth. In Mississippi it was a man who was murdered, mcgregor Evers. So I would just say I would love to go on a trip with you, but I would say let's add Mississippi in there, and then there's so much richness in the soil of Mississippi for us. So people can find me as Michael Butler on most of social media sites or St Louis City Recorder Vids or STL Mike Butler.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much. Thank you for spending your time with us today. What a wealth of information. I hope you look him up. I hope you check out everything you can I am going to, for those of you thinking are thinking about going on a trip with us, I'm getting Mr Butler with us because I know he knows the history way better than even I could pretend to or ever know to, and so if this is your first time that you've watched an episode with us, please be happy to turn on and hit the notifications and subscribe buttons and all the things that folks do in order to see the content that we're putting out.
Speaker 1:So many good guests, so many great folks, that we just get to understand their lives and what they do and how they do it, and so I'd love for you to do that. You see on the bottom of the screen where it says becomingthepersoncom. We are launching a community about helping you become that person that you were meant to be, what God put you on the search to be in ways that you can't even believe, and so I'd love for you to be a part of that as well, and so I can't wait to talk to you on the next one. Don't forget your God's greatest gift he loves you. If you allow him to, mr Michael Butler, do you have any one last word that you'd love to share with everybody?
Speaker 2:I'm very blessed to be on the podcast with you, dr B, looking forward to continuing the relationship.
Speaker 1:Absolutely Thank you. You guys have an amazing, awesome, incredible day today. We'll talk to you soon, you.