Woman Evolve with Sarah Jakes Roberts - A Father’s Affirmation w/ Bishop T.D. Jakes

Episode Date: October 26, 2022

Back like W.E. never left, here’s the convo you’ve all been waiting for! WTAL Grand Finale—the end of an era or the start of an evolution? Chile, let’s just say one man’s “don’t drop the mic” is another woman’s “turn me up in the microphone”! This week W.E. are thrilled & honored to be kickin’ it with the G.O.A.T. of women’s empowerment, Bishop T.D. Jakes! As a watchman on the wall, he affirms his children and the generation to come in their ability to steward legacy. Sooo, that whole anointing and passing the torch…What was Bishop Jakes’ reaction to how the moment was received? And what was restorative for the little girl inside of SJR? Delegation, TUNE IN & secure your lashes as an intimate father-daughter discussion unfolds! Sis, if you’ve been loosed to evolve with us, SUBSCRIBE to WomanEvolve.com/Podcast + REGISTER for conference at WomanEvolve.com/events + SIGN UP at WomanEvolve.com/connect to receive weekly devotionals. Listeners can access a FREE 60-day trial with ShipStation.com & a personal banker from FirstRepublic.com. Don’t miss these offers!

God can't bless you for ten to be or who you can care yourself to. He can only bless you and the lane that was created for you. I feel that for somebody like that. You don't need no itch, it's a tea you need boundaries. What? I don't need your lights, I don't need your elevation. All I need is a God party for me that's there for all things. All things, all things.

Child. Well, I thought it was time to get my dad in the hot seat to talk about all of the things that have been at Woman's Hour at Loose. So many of you have reached out talking about what the moment meant for you. That in many ways, my dad was a surrogate father and you were like me on the receiving end of those words.

Well, I wanted to get some behind the scenes perspective on what that moment meant to my dad, but also for me, I took some Q&A from those of you who are connected to our social media. And so this conversation is this unpacking hour, father, daughter, dynamic, and hopefully spreading some hope for those of you who are on the journey of healing,

whether it's parental healing, trying to walk into ministry or understanding the intergenerational gaps that exist between our cultures. I believe this conversation is going to be one that helps you. Well, well, well. I don't even know where to begin Well, well, well. I don't even know where to begin after what happened in Atlanta at Womendao Art

Loose. There's been a lot of feelings, a lot of emotions that I hope just stay underneath the surface today. I don't need them coming up. I feel like I've had them under control, but I've still been processing everything that happened. And so I thought to myself, how cool would it be if we had a chance to just talk and process it together? And so I just want to know, like, where are you after everything? How are you feeling?

Did that moment go the way that you thought that it would? But which, by the way, I had no idea that that was going to happen to me. I feel, I don't know, some kind of trust. I don't know about it, but yeah, I had no idea that that was going to happen, but is it what you wanted? One never knows what's going to happen

when God is involved. And I think it was, it came down the way I envisioned for it to happen, but the impact of it was beyond anything I ever imagined. The impact that it had on the peripheral audience and the global audience, and the audience that has seen it in perpetuity has been staggering because I think every woman and a lot of men sat in your seat and felt like they had never heard of father's affirmation before and then there was the generational component to it. And then my generation, some of them have said to me, you know, they were amazed that I would walk away from something

that was still so widely sought after. You know, but I thought, why should I wait till all the leaves are dried up, and the figs are dried up, and the branches are breaking, and then figs are dried up and the branches are broken and then hand you or anybody else anything after there was no more life in it. What did that moment mean to you though? Like the idea of me as your daughter being in a position where you felt like I could handle it. Oh girl.

I knew that before I announced it. One doesn't do something like that on stage without a lot of contemplation, not only because of the value of the brand or woman or lose, but the value of you. So I had to think about, would you, would you, would it crush you? Or would it propel you?

I didn't want to hand you something that crushed you. And then I had to see you do something on your own that proved, invalidated that you had the auction anointing vision leadership creativity and innovation that was that was worthy of of investing my life's work into not just something I did my body of my life for three decades of my life have been involved in women are loose. But when I watched you do what you did with woman evolved, completely on your own, without really asking me anything,

or asking me for anything. And I watched the anointing endorse and impact and impart that's the critical part through through you. The French benefit is that you're not doing it. And that's more than I could even hope for to be able to pass something that God trusted to me over to you and to someone else. And that someone else gets to be my baby girl. So everybody was standing on the stage. The stage was so crowded.

It was, my mother was standing up there. I was standing up there. My grandmother was standing up there. My ancestors, my father was standing up there. All of us were talking to you, every woman who'd ever written me a letter through abuse and trauma and tragedy and adversity and inequities on the job, the Me Too movement, the women's right to vote movement. They were all crowded up on the stage talking to you in that moment, not just me. And to get to witness that moment, it felt great, it felt exhilarating.

I have absolutely no regrets at all. I have a piece in my spirit about it because I think that when Solomon says for everything there is a time and a purpose for every season under heaven, you have to realize that it's one type of wisdom to know when to start a thing. And it's another type of wisdom to know when to walk away. And I want when to walk away.

And I wanted to walk away when my season for doing that was over. And I felt like I had said what I came to say over the past three decades, seven million books, translated into 12 different languages, movies, plays, music projects. I did with it what I was supposed to do with it. Now it's your job to take that vision further, higher, deeper, wider, and do things that you see that I didn't see. And it started for me when I went to Denver and I said on the

front row, and watch you do woman evolve and watch your creativity on display and I got to watch it. And when I watched gaze. It's like a baby being born and you look for your features on their face. And you say, oh, she has my nose or she has my chin or she has her grandmother's temples. I looked for not a repetition of my creativity, but your own version of creativity that still had some DNA to it, that I could relate to it. And I knew it was kin to me, and yet you'd make for me. So woman, that wasn't loose. No, I'm not for lunch.

I'm not, I won't do it. We're not messing up. I'm not for lunch. I'm not. I won't do it. I'm not for lunch today. I love you deeply, but I'm not for lunch today. Okay, I'm really good. So, women though are at least is historical. What it has done, literally, not just nationally, but internationally, I think has forever changed the landscape of what's possible for women and ministry. Given the often discussed misogyny within church, the idea of where women are allowed or

not allowed to be positioned, you came as a voice liberating women, not just liberating them from the seats, but also creating platform for women on the stage. And I do think that part of what many women in church have felt, I think especially for the generation that has connected with women evolve is that they could not be connected to a church that they support at 10, but weren't allowed to have position in. And yet, you created a lane by what you've done with one of the art loosened, even endorsing my ministry,

that I believe encourages other men to not just look for a succession within a man, but to see what God may be doing through women as well. What are your thoughts about is there an evolution in the church as it look at? How great. There an evolution in the church, as it look at. Oh girl. Is there an evolution in the churches that relates to the role that women can play?

Oh, that's a big question. That's an absolutely huge question, not because the question does not go deep enough. The deeper issue is, what is the impact of culture on religion and what is the impact of religion on culture, because the reality is misogyny pre-existed the New Testament. Okay. Okay, Massage and He has been in bread in the culture of all the antiquities of history. So as history evolves, the question emerges, how does history's evolution impact our theology?

Well we are raised to believe that theology can impact culture, but culture doesn't impact theology. But the reality is that theology is the study of God, but it's through the eyes of men. And those men's eyes are behold God through the prism of their own past experiences. Consequently, for example, all the way back to the daughters of Zalafa had saying to Moses, saying as our father is dead and we have no one to inherit, can't why should we not be able to inherit like the men do. So that's Old Testament. And so, what we call misogyny today existed all the way back then. Moses was going to say absolutely no. He prayed about it and God said the woman, all right. So this debate about the

woman's role pre-exist your generation and mine. I mean, if you think your generation had our generation, it was just unthinkable and still is in some sectors for a woman to even stand in the pulpit as an usher. You would go to the bottom of the pulpit and offer the minister's water, but you can go as change. So that's a kind of religious experience that we came from. So the women who spoke often spoke from the floor, depending on the denomination. Until Bishop Bastard McKinsey came along, she was the first woman in

the A and E church to be ordained a bishop, and it was headlines in the New York Times. It went everywhere. Everybody was talking about it. So this transition really goes back to how society's views impact theological understandings and vice versa. When the or shorn for man is the infusion of the societal ideas on the theology of the letter. And so when you look at all of that, I said all of that to say that we're constantly evolving in our understanding, the new testament informs the Old Testament and liberates the Old Testament from legalism to grace. That information continues to transition from the days of Christ

who was born up under the Old Testament, died up under the Old Testament, and then the testator dies, and the New Testament might be enforced and now the apostles have to walk out the New Testament without their teacher leading them. And so they're trying to figure out should we abstain from meat? So should we eat meat? How much Judaism? Because see these debates are a part of the pursuit of God. It speaks to the fact that we have a perfect God, but we behold Him through imperfect eyes,

and it affects the way that we see Him. I think the way forward for women in the church is bright and powerful, but will probably be controversial for many decades to come. We're a lot of things are controversial in church because the church has the freedom to declare and believe whatever it wants to. So there's going to always be diversity. There is no supreme court for the church. And there is no D church. We have to say D church church like it's like one institution. Yeah, so there is no D church.

And so how we interpret our faith and express our faith will be unique. I wanted to be compliciting and recognizing an appreciating the fact that Aquila and Priscilla impacted the New Testament church, that your sons and daughters and daughters show prophesied, that we are neither male nor female, we know you bond or free,

but we're all one in Christ Jesus. But whatever you do, you always have to know that there's always gonna be naysayers who have opposing scriptures to debate the issue. And that debate is not bad. We don't have to run from that debate. We can disagree without disintegrating. And if you know that God call you to do something,

you do it irrespective to whether people believe it or not. And that goes regardless of gender. And so women have to do the same things. But they also have to prepare themselves in such a way that you are respected for giving the best of yourself to your craft, rather than giving the least of yourself and blaming it on your gender for not being accepted. I think that's the argument with equal opportunity, right?

It's like, are you only in the position because you're black, or are you in the position because you're qualified and just happen to be black? Absolutely. Do you think that men have a responsibility to balance the scales that have tipped so heavily when it relates to whatever role women are playing, whether in corporations or religion because I see your work as a man in part

and I said this at conference was you really opening the doors for women to experience freedom for women to pastor and minister you open that door and I think that a women's movement is powerful when women come together but I think it's even more powerful when a man says and I agree that a women's movement is powerful when women come together, but I think it's even more powerful when a man says, and I agree with her, because I think it shifts. It's why we need white allies when we talk about what's happening in justice.

Yes, and I think there are many men out there who embrace that idea and the notion that philosophy. There will be something that do not. But let's go before we get to church to the home. I think that many men walked away from that weekend saying to me, you inspired me to be a better father. It doesn't start with the preachers. It starts with daddy.

Wow. Okay, yeah, I'm packed that. Yeah. You cannot relegate the raising of your daughters completely over to their mothers. Because there are elements of her self-esteem that needs your affirmation in order to completely flourish. We had in that room women who were in their 50s and 60s passing out in the floor saying that they were starving to hear their father say they were enough.

And that is extremely powerful. Some of these were corporate women, business women, executive women, pastors and churches. Affirmation is very, very important regardless of gender. And I think we have to strive to be better fathers. I had a moment with your brother. And we talked very, very candidly. And I told him how much I loved him and how much he meant to me and everything like that. And he responded, we're both crying,

we're appreciating the moment. But when I told him I was proud of him, he collapsed. And immediately I knew I hit the button that meant the most to him. I think you search your way into fatherhood, groping blindly at it. Because fatherhood isn't just based on what you want to say. Fatherhood is also based on what that child needs to hear. And you don't always get to know what that need is until you hit it. And when you hit it, everybody in the room knows it. Because what's amazing to me is we haven't even yet had the first woman evolve since the murder has happened, but I can see something happened to you

that you are always bold, you are always preaching, you are always knowing, you are always getting to, but there's a difference now. There's a, there's a, an assurance and a bonus that I didn't even know that you needed to hear that public affirmation. Okay, here we go. And I can tell by the pace you're moving that you needed to hear that. And what I think people need to know is that just because your father doesn't mean you have a God book,

you don't know how to do this. You're grouping after it, you're feeling after it. And so you don't know what spots to hit. And I was amazed to see the impact of what happened on you still reverberates in the way you enter a room and the way you walk and the way you grab a mic and the way you handle things, there's a boldness that said to me that really mattered to her as a girl, not just as a preacher, but as a girl. And a lot of people are saying, I didn't get that from my father.

And my, I suggest to you, some fathers know how to make babies, but they don't know how to raise children. And there are no books that prepare you for what one child needs versus what another child needs, and they don't tell you. So you have to feel after it, and you have to grow after it, and sometimes just lock up and stumble on it, because I didn't know that you needed that from me. I thought I had given you that. I thought the things we'd said around the dinner table were enough.

I did not know that saying those things publicly would affirm you in a way that they cost you the button, blast them right in front of my face. And that's, that's who, that's an amazing thing to get to see. That's an amazing thing to get to see in my life. That's, That's incredible. That's better than the pan-transfer sentimental and stuff to have hit a spot for your soul was hurting and watch your bruise disappear that I didn't even know was there is beyond wonderful. Um, I'm sitting here and I'm processing. Like, um, what it was that I think that you hit in that moment and I'm glad we're having this conversation

because I haven't processed this. Right. And I think more than the mantle, I even think more than you telling me that you were proud of me and that I'm enough. I think that you trust me. I think that that is probably what really was restorative.

I think that that was what the little girl and me wanted more than anything was to be trusted. Not for nothing, I took y'all through. Hail. Yes you did. I took y'all through. Hail, I was telling the kids of the days, he's locked my face off and he's stealing anything that was around.

But God, yes. Oh, God. He's worthy. She worth does over y'all. I mean, I jacked them up real good. You looking a miracle But I think that when I lost trust in myself That I assumed because of the many things that I did that were worthy of losing trust that you know I don't know that I felt like you would ever I didn't even know that I felt this way But that you would trust me. I know you first first of all, you're not giving anything away. Like it's not giving anything.

What the hell is that? You've said it before. You have said that you've got all your money before you go, so we don't have no inheritance in life. You outlawed me for payday, count somewhere else. But you've said, I mean, I know, I know how much you have sacrificed to build and grow. And I know that you wouldn't hand me your life's work unless you trusted me with it.

And I think that as you were talking that I realized that the little girl, you know, maybe being proud of me could be the same thing. But I think I didn't translate that into trust until we're standing in that moment. And like you're handing me literally blood, sweat, and tears, you're handing me back, breaking pain, you're handing me, you're handing it to me

because you trust me with it. And that, yeah, go ahead. Well, first of all, I handed you so much that when I walked off stage and went in the back, I felt like 40 pounds that lifted up off me, that I didn't even know was on me. Secondly, when I said that, that don't be waiting for me to die, that I was with my inheritance. I don't want to raise entitled children. I know.

I want to, I don't want to raise children who are waiting on me to die or feel like I owe them something beyond life, health, the three square miles in a roof over your head until you become an adult. I live to leave something behind. And I fully intend I'm working to leave something behind. I'd rather you leave, you leave your behind. That's what you could do, leave your behind. That's funny. They're at a place that as long as I can. But I

want to stay here as long as I can to watch y'all. That's the reason to live for. To watch you become and get to see it. Every milestone is a privilege. When you're a real parent, you cross this threshold where it ceases to be about you. If I haven't killed my giants by now, they're not going to die. To see the next generation, my children, and my spiritual children and then their entire generation grabbed the helm of what my parents bled in the streets on the bridges, bit by dogs and water hoses for. My generation is the children of the Civil Rights Movement. I just got a gift from Bernie's King and it's a picture of her mother and father walking down the street who are the same ages. My mother and father and her mother went to school with my mother and below it is the next

generation, the next generation of their children going down the street. Every generation pays the toll on the bridge. The Norman Pettis bridge that the next generation goes across. Some pay in blood, some pay in tuition, some pay in wisdom, some some paying advice, but every generation pays a price to be a parent, or they're not really a parent, just because she had a baby doesn't make you a parent. And so to pay the tuition and then get to see the return on it, it's what it's all about. Because if you reach my age and you're still selfish, shame on you. It's the nicest thing I can pick myself. This is what I'm thinking about. You say a little bit more than you can say.

Yeah, shame on you. It's nice to talk about that. If you're still greedy at 60, if you're still self-consumed at 50, if you're still narcissistic and have gray hair shame on you, you are my crown. You are my crown. You are You are my crown, my children are my crown. Your generation is our crown.

And if you don't shine, our heads are empty. I can't even tell you how much I mean that. So I'm in the corner where palm palms, so are needles, they'd kill something, bring something, be something, do something, go after something. Because part of that is you validate what we went through to get to where we got and you're going to want that from your children all the getting up in the morning and getting in the school and driving them to traffic is not for nothing. You want them to be all that they can be even if they don't duplicate what you did that's okay you didn't have to grow up and do that.

I never required of any of my children to assume anything that I had in ministry. I just wanted you to be something, something amazing, the best you could be at something if it was sweeping the floor. And to get to see that and get to help with that and get to to block and tackle and guard and and and and participate in that because I know from my own life that the amount of years that you get to block and tackle for

your grown children are counted. And one day you look around like I did when I turned 40 and my mother and all her sisters and everybody was gone and you have to walk the rest of the way home by yourself. So as long as you can to give you somebody to talk to, that you can trust and somebody who can say, duck, wow, I wouldn't trust that person right there or get a contract while we can, it's better than money, it's better than life insurance, it's better than getting the house or the car to get my head. That's the best I have to give you. Oh God, we can't do this. This is not going to work.

This is not going to work. What we're going to do by now. No, this is not going to work. You know, we can't do this. Okay. To leave you my scars and my stars and what I learned and what I endured and to leave you what is normal. The hardest thing to figure out is not what you want, but what all comes

with what you want to find out. I want to have a baby, but to find out you're going to gain weight. You know, your ankles are going to swell. It's normal for you to throw up every morning. You have cravings in the middle of the night to figure out what goes along with your dream. It's so important so that you can come to me and say, is this a complication with the pregnancy? Yeah. Or is this part of having the baby to be able to talk to me or anybody that says, oh yeah, those are the things I said nothing about. Because the things that I said nothing about are the biggest parts of the story. And as long as I'm alive and your mother is alive

to tell you, yeah, that goes along with that. Then there's a certain calmness that comes in your heart because you begin to understand, I'm not wrong, I'm not crazy, I'm not doing it wrong. I didn't bring this on myself. I'm not stupid. This is just a part of you. You're going to be hated. Absolutely. That's how you know you're effective. If nobody hates you, nobody noticed you. That's part of the credentials that validate the fact. If nobody's talking about you like a dog or writing pieces about you or trying to dissuade people from lacking you,

that means nobody noticed you. They goes along with it. You're gonna be up all night making sure and finding out that you can't just walk across, you have to have insurance and you have to have contracts and you have to have home They goes along with it. You're gonna be up all night making sure and finding out that you can't just throw crowds, you have to have insurance and you have to have contracts and you have to have hotels and you have to have transportation, you have to have so many things

that the people don't see, that the biggest part of your work is spent in preparing for the unexpected, that you need ambulances outside, because if you have that many people, somebody's gonna have a stroke or a heart attack for the unexpected that you need ambulances outside because if you have that many people, somebody's gonna have a stroke or a heart attack and so you have to be proactive and not reactive.

That goes along with that. That there may be somebody in the room who's not praising God and not clapping for you, but looking for an opportunity to attack you, shoot you, stalk you, uh, uh, stalk you. That goes along with that. That's normal. Whether you're Beyonce or Jackie McCullough, that's normal. To understand what's normal helps you to say, oh, okay. So I'm not crazy and I'm not bad. That's just a part of the process.

That's what we give to you with our gray hairs. It's what goes along with that. What goes along with your children accepting that you're on the stage and what goes along with them, innery, and you have some of that because you grew up in that. So you're kind of, you've got to advantage over a lot of people,

because you grew up in the shadow of my movement. And you know a lot already, but as generations change, what you want to do is prepare your children for what is not in the books. The books will tell you what happened on the stage, but they won't tell you what happened off the stage. Yeah. If being an entrepreneur has taught me anything, it's taught me that winging it without a strategy is very expensive.

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Start today and get set up before the biggest season of the year. That's two months free. Get the same rate that Fortune 500 companies receive regardless of the size of the order you're shipping. Visit SHIPstation.com, click the microphone at the top and type in code, evolve. So if you had to go back and do it over again, and don't give me that I wouldn't change anything because everything worked out. Like if you could go back and change anything from the strategy, strategy structure

and implementation of women that are loose or on the personal side, like what are two things that you would do differently? That's very hard because I'm really proud of what I did given what I had to work with. One thing I would do differently is take you with me. I always remember walking out the door with you and Cor core grabbing at my legs Thinking I was leaving you when I was going to provide for you

and and to live out my life's calling Is how I fed you and paid for the schools you went to and and did all of that. I wish there were a way We we think everything is education, but there's something to be said for the other e-experience, springing you in the room where it happened. So by the time it became your turn, you would be comfortable in that room and you would own that room and you would learn the language of what's next. because I'm not sure you get that from universities or schools.

What's next? What questions to ask? What to watch out for? How to tell when somebody's lying and what to do about it, when the whole thing blows up in your face, and you have a disaster and you've got to manage it, and walk out on the stage and say, good morning, Potter's house. Woman, now I've loosed. And the whole back of your body is burning from the cinch of Somality, Tragedy, adversity, hatefulness and you can't go out on the stage bleeding and heal people. You have to be able to suck it up and

prioritize what you're called to do. That type of sacrificial service, the biggest hint God gave us to ministry is Christ on the cross. Still preaching. While he's died, that goes all with that. And that's not just preaching, that's entrepreneurship, that's running a company, that's being a leader in any way somewhere in your life you're going to be bleeding either with your children or your marriage or your

personal life or your man or your emotions or your cash flow or something is going to be bleeding while you're producing. You don't get to just produce without done and digging and stench, fertilizing the soil from which success emanates from regardless of the genre, whether you're enacting or hip hop or whatever it is, but it's worse when it's a church because it's spiritual warfare too. Okay. But just to be able to tell you what's normal so that you can go to bed and get some sleep.

You might not get eight hours. But if I can get you from two to three, if I can get you from two to five hours of sleep because daddy said that's normal. Yeah. This is not as bad as I think it is. That goes along with that. Oh, this won't kill me.

Yeah. I didn't know what was a five star, five bill fire, and what was a barbecue. I just knew when I smelled smoke, I thought it was my handy and burning. Okay. And the only issue left was how much is gonna burn. Okay. And I didn't know and I didn't have anybody to talk to. I think I would have brought you in the room sooner. I would have brought corn in the room sooner. I would have brought all my kids in the room sooner. Not so have brought all my kids in the room sooner, not so

that they can preach but so that they could understand their greatness has side effects, any kind of greatness on any platform always has side effects. Whether you're talking about Jimmy Hendrix, whether you're talking about Michael Jackson, I don't care what what genre you want to go into. Greatness always has side effects. And I wish I would have brought you in the room beyond the segregation that is so pervasive in our world, not just black to white, that's an American conversation, but globally from country to country in Africa to London, to Iraq and Iran, to Afghanistan, to understand that there are people who dress differently and wear veils who are listening at us too. And unlike our predecessors who only spoke to the people in the room, we had the technology that brings us to the world. And you have to have a language

that embraces a concern of the Iraqi women right now, that embraces what's going on in Ukraine right now. That when you speak on Sunday, there are Ukrainians listening at you. And Russians listening at you. And Chinese people listening at you and Russians listening at you and Chinese people listening at you and you cannot think in a vacuum when you are speaking to a planet. Okay, that's the possibility that technology affords you today that you don't have the luxury to think from the perspective. How many towns does a dollar go around in our community before these are community? What is a community today? It is not a zip code today.

Am I excommunicated from the community because I moved into a neighborhood that you marched for me to move into? Does that burn my black heart? And what about the human race? And how do I show up in the world amongst people who look different from me? Am I responsible for their well-being too, even when they don't act responsible for mine? Those kinds of questions go with a platform like ours that translates into 90 different languages. I can't have a community conversation

and have a global platform. a community conversation and have a global platform. There are people who are listening at you, the woman evolve, who can't get a visa to get out the country to hear you, who will do pure content, not because they're evil, but because they will never get to go. And there are people who will get to go, but they've been saving all year to get a plane ticket to be a woman involved. And it means absolutely everything to them in a way that you don't know if you don't go

and see what they had to go through to get there. There are people who got beat up to go, who snuck out to go, who are afraid to go back home because they went. There are people who will never get to go, but they will stream on and struggle to understand your language to get a fragment of what you have to say. That's the era that we live in today. You cannot go to Soweto and say Beyonce and do not know who you're talking about. You can go to Birmingham in the UK and say, beyond saying them not know who you're talking about, you cannot go to Australia and say, I'll read the Franklin and them not know our community.

Our audience has become so global that our sensibility when we walk out on the stage, cannot be focused on who's not smiling on the second row. When you're speaking to nations, you're speaking to people in Ukraine, whose husbands will never come home. And they're sitting there with babies in their lab in a tent, hoping that the power stays on long enough

to hear the last of what you have to say. And yes, we as black people have had horrible atrocities, hung and beat and ostracized and murdered and killed. I'm blatantly aware of that. My father's from Mississippi. My grandfather was murdered by white racists. My mother's from Alabama. I get that we have a horrible story, but so do the Jews. As so do the Native Americans and so do so many other people around the world. And we can't become so consumed with our own pain that we don't address theirs as well. I didn't know that when I started.

I didn't have nobody to tell me that. I discovered that when I showed up in South Africa seven years after the apartheid and rented my own outdoor coliseum because they couldn't come see me in Johannesburg and preached out there in the two thousands of people who stood in the rain for a chance to hear me talk. I didn't even know they knew who I was because I was oblivious to how far my voice echoed. Take this seriously. There are people who will hear you and people who are listening at this podcast, who will read your book or listen at your music or or see your artwork or watch you dance on TikTok. Tec will never touch you. So don't just be stupid and say silly stuff.

Say something that matters because you are the generation that lives in the world of the metaverse, and technology, and innovation, which gives you a platform that requires responsibility. It's more to it than that you cute and you find and you sexy and all that immaterial stuff Do you have anything to say to the world? Other than that you've been working out Because they got gyms in Africa They have gyms in Soweto do

The microphone that I passed you is bigger than a microphone. It's an opportunity for your generation to stop global warming and become more conscious of green spaces and to come up with innovation that stops the stripping of the earth, that protects the rainforest in Brazil, that does all kinds of things that are necessary for your children to breathe. And all you want to do is be sexy. That's all you got. That's what you came to the world to show me you cute. We come from

people who bled and died to learn how to read and making you exposing you to that sooner helps you to take life more seriously and gives you a reason to be educated whether it's in a university or whether it's on Google or whether it's through LinkedIn or whether it's through a course or whether you're self-made. I'm telling you you matter. That's how I was telling you. You're important. Not because your last name is Jake's Roberts, you're important because it's your turn. And nobody writes books about people who fit in. Go in the library, all the books are about people who fit in. Going to library, all the books are about people who stand out. And my question is, in what way are you going to stand out?

Or are you going to give up your chance to stand out? Just so you fit in with people who don't even know where they're going. Mm. I feel like I just got caught into the room when you're looking at me over the glass. I'm still young. No, I think what you said that really adds so much value is I do think we have a generation that wants to be seen, but they don't always have something to say. And so they think the prize is visibility, but it's actually credibility.

Well said, well said, and credibility is hard one. Yeah. It's bloody. John Lewis left your respected, but God was at bloody. Not because he was educated, he was not, not because he was articulant, he was, but he, it was bloody. Credibility is bloody. It's bloody.

People respect you by the things you survive, not the things you suggest. So you can get a quickly say from listening and somebody say, and get on there and put some music behind it and say something really smart. But if you haven't earned it, it won't give you any credibility because you don't have the scars behind the stars. People give you credibility by what you survived.

That you made it out of the plain record alive, that you came back from the war in a wheelchair, that you have bullet holes in your chest up under your suit, that you survived divorce and trauma and rape and molestation and abuse and some kind of way you crawled out of your mental conundrum and put yourself back together even if it's with glue and putty and paper clips and you walk out on that stage and you get the Nobel Peace Prize and you get the applause and the accolades' respect is expensive. It's expensive, not with money, but with pain. And anybody can Google something cute to say and get on TikTok and say it. But do you know it? Did you earn it? Did you survive it? Would your kids attest to it?

Would your woman attest to it? Would your husband attest to it? Have you earned that? to it is have you earned that? You know, with these, these hands are not just preaching hands. These are ditched, digging, bloody, calloused hands, which dug ditches to buy diapers to cover my sons. I'm not who I am because of what you see on stage. I am who I am because of the bloody hands that couldn't let my children not have diapers. Who came home bloody and tired to earn $100 to buy groceries. Long before you talk about tailored sucess. You came in at the end of the

movie. Go away. You can't come in at the end of the movie and have an opinion about the movie. This is a story, a lifetime story. And you do what you have to do. And then if you're lucky, if you're lucky and blessed by God, somebody you do it for will appreciate it. And that's absolutely everything because you are not promised appreciation at the end of sacrifice. Yeah, peace.

There are no guarantees that when you have given your life that somebody will appreciate it, but when they do it's It makes you want to go do it again That it matter and and that you produce somebody Who's got fight in them. See, they talk about the way you preach it. I love it. And the way you lead, and I love it. She know what I love, the best the way you fight. The way you fight. When I see that growl come out on you out in you on stage or in the house or anywhere, I see my mother's growl, my father's growl, my ancestors growl, that growl is how we survived. Injustice. You can't get here and let whatever you're going to kill you.

You made out of better stuff than that. You can hurt you, you can cry, you can be sad for a minute, but you got to get on with wiping your face and making it happen, because if you don't come get you, nobody else is coming. Ain't nobody coming to get you. And if you don't love you, you ain't gonna let nobody else

love you. So sometimes you got to kiss yourself. Okay, can I ask you a question about you? You don't wanna ask me. You don't wanna ask me. It's your part, can I ask you a question about you? Can you feel when your filter's gone? Like, can you feel or not?

No. I'm old, I earn the right to say what I wanna say. The one of the great joys of being old is you get to say what you want to say. Is that like in fine print? Who told you that? I don't know. It's no Bible verse or anything.

It's just heredity, you know? Because there's some time when you start me, I'm like, that is only my father speaking. That's not the best of it all. Oh no, that is only my father. And you know what, that's great about that. Fathers are almost extinct, especially in our community.

They are absent in many parts of our community, distracted in other communities. There's no difference between the pain of a white boy who grows up in a house with a father who never paid him any attention, and a black boy who grew up in a house that was a poor house, not knowing who his father was. It's just different shades of pain.

It's basking Robbins, pick the flavor that you want. But fathers, real, the voice of a father, is so rare. And the more rare it is, the more precious it becomes. And I want to say to the men that are listening, if you, any kind of daddy, if you, if you don't make enough money, if you don't, if you're not tall enough, if your belly is to be, if she don't like you, some kind of presence in that town's life, some

attempt to let them know they matter. Really makes a big difference. Don't run away because you're not perfect because a hungry child will eat from the table of an imperfect father. Because if you're hungry enough, if you're hungry enough and I set food in front of you, you don't care who I am. You care that I am. And I think what we modeled to them was people sell them, get to hear Father Donor talk.

And they put themselves in your place before I ever even turned to them because either the men are there in their silence, they don't say anything, or they're there and they're not there, or we're still they're not there at all. Or finally, you don't even know who your father is. And you should do wish he was there to say anything, filter and no filter, if he was there to say anything. And what I learned that I didn't know, I understood that from a male perspective,

boy pain to father, what I learned raising my children was girl paying. I didn't realize that girls bleed too when fathers are derelict. And I don't think many people listening understand that I'm talking about more than sending a monthly check. I'm talking about sending a note, a kiss, a voice, smell, an email or you did that good or you ought to do that better or I expect it more you or you were absolutely amazing and and and I'm not supposed to say it this way but whether you are

flawed, perfect, got-cooked, credit, bad credit, been in prison, had an affair, lost your marriage, still show up. If nobody else takes you to kid wheel, that's how hungry they are for you. Show up. Don't let anybody call you so many names that you run from the kids and the mama. Show up. That's what we modeled. And you had no idea in the moment that's what was happening. I didn't know that I thought I had given that I didn't know that there was still some place that my words didn't see

into some cranny that I didn't see. I had been very intentional about like in your post telling you you beautiful and then you were amazing how proud I am of what you're doing and looking to you on the cover of the magazine and your first book in celebrating and I'm talking about it and all that kind of stuff. But there are crevices in a cave. And just because you threw water in the cave doesn't mean that it had all the crevices. And what I realized when I said that to you, it said there was new you as a result of that moment. I can see it confident, but there's a different level. You know one of the funniest things is most people don't watch.

I watch closely. My children, spiritual and natural, I watched him lose me. Because sometimes the only way to understand a person is to watch him, because not all people are gifted with the ability to articulate feelings. And you can be muted emotionally. There was a story that Jim Baker told when he got out of prison. I never will forget it. He said that this man who worked all the time and wanted to have a pet but wasn't going to be home enough to feed him decided to have an aquarium. And he named all the fish in the aquarium and the fish didn't require as much care. And so he was able to have the fish.

And one day he woke up in the morning, and the fish were floating on the top of the tank. And he said to himself, I wonder if some time during the night, the fresh cream, and I couldn't hear them. The silent screams of a human soul may be sitting at the desk across from you or laying in the same bed with you or eating at the same table with you. It's the silent screams you have to listen for. And if you listen closely and learn quickly, you can stop a bullet in a chamber before it goes down the throat of a child. That you got me on your guard. Because that stuff happens quick.

You're good stuff. I'm your daddy. You're good stuff. Thank you. We are dying for it. It's that. Thank you. Waman Evolve is supported by First Republic Bank. You've worked hard and now it's paying off.

That's why it's time to start working with a financial partner who will always have your back. With First Republic Bank, you get a personal banker who's ready to sit down, listen, and provide the answers you need no matter how complex your questions are. Whether you're interested in residential lending or curious about other banking products, you can reach out to your personal banker by phone or email or visit in person. It's all part of First Republic's commitment to delivering extraordinary service every

time. To learn more about their extraordinary service, visit FirstRepublic.com. That's FirstRepublic.com. Remember FDIC equal housing rendering. I have a few Q&A questions. I don't know if we need them, but because I posted on Instagram and I can't fight no more. Um, Um, Yes, you did. I got it.

Okay, Okay, so first question, how do you rebuild trust in yourself and your faith and ultimately with God? If you've had troubled past and you thought you worked past it, but every time something happens, you go back to a mindset of nothing ever goes right in my life. You think God's promises don't apply to me. You answered your own question with the mindset that you have to stop letting that be your default setting. And the way you stop that from being your default setting is stop the way you talk to you about you. If you only talk to you about you from the perspective of what

you did wrong, then you're abusing yourself because you never talked to you about what you did right. And the way to build trust with anybody, God, man, or yourself, is consistency. You acknowledge the pain you caused and the death to which you hurt somebody, even when it wasn't pain you felt. Because pain you caused is different from pain you felt. Because pain you caused is different from pain you felt. And so when you tell people that you hurt to get over it, it's because you caused it, but didn't feel it. When you validate their pain with saying, I know that crushed you. I have learned

the depth of that pain. See, we just won't be heard. Well, it should be perfect. We want to be heard that that really hurt. And then to consistently act in a way that builds up trust, I sat down on this couch. I didn't check to see if it had legs on it. I trusted that it had legs. There are certain things that people will assume if you are consistent. And so it takes time to build a trust even with oneself. And when that trust is rebuilt, make sure that you don't tear it down with your own language

the way you talk to yourself. I learned, Sarah, it is not what people say about you. That is the most destructive. It is the things you say to yourself. And if you can get your language right and how you talk to you, you will attract people who reflect that language about you. If you don't do that, you will attract people who reinforce their typical ideas that you already had before you met them.

That's why every man you meet is abusive, because you attract what you validated your own conversation about self. If you wanna attract better company, be better company to yourself. Amen. What are some practical things you do to continue to cultivate your relationship with your daughter's father?

Oh, Lord, it's hard now because they're busy and they're gone. I think you get one shot at a great foundation. And if you get the foundation right, that's half the battle. Because once you have grown children, you don't have center stage anymore. And you may not ever have center stage again because they have husbands and wives and kids and jobs and responsibilities and you get them on the weekend or the holidays or a quick pick on the neck. And so I say to young parents, lay good roots, strong foundations, give them something that's more

important than gadgets, give them memories. The best thing you can leave a child with is memories, the smell of baking bread, the feel of you getting them ready for school and making eggs in the morning, the feel of tucking them in the bed at night. The little things that cost nothing, you don't have to be rich, you don't have to be famous. The things I miss most about my parents didn't cost to die. I miss most about my parents didn't cause to die. And I think if you establish that foundation early, they're going to depart from it. They're going to get in your face. They're going to get on your nerves and they may even cuss you out. But eventually they will come back to what the foundation that you established.

Who cussed you out? Oh no. That's what I was doing. That's what I was doing. That's what I was doing. That's what I was doing. Tell me talking to the world. I was scared.

He's talking to the world. Tell my okay, make cuss you out. You don't know what you're not us. No, baby. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, we appreciate that. But, but, but, there are many parents who get cast out. There are parents who get beat up. There are parents who have not strong on them. And I, and my heart goes out to the end of the conversation. First of all, well, I won't do first off.

Thank you. Let me go to second. I cannot imagine how bad that would hurt. Jesus. Forget what I did back. That's what you talked about. What I'm talking about is whatever I did back would only be an attempt to make you know

how bad that hurt me, that you think little enough for me to say that to me. When I've changed your diapers, when I fought off your enemies, that you would talk to me like that. When I took care of you and you were sick and chained and bed when you threw up in it. When I didn't let the other little kids know that you were the bed when I covered you and didn't say nothing and now you slapped me.

I can't even imagine what that would feel like. Whatever I did back would never be expressive of what you did because you were the reason I went to work every day. That's, and I say that to the person who's been there not to make you feel bad, but to make you understand There are certain lines you don't cross with people There are certain times you walk away. I don't say that they was right. Your mom is not always right. There's not always right There are certain lines you don't cross out of respect for yourself and out of respect for yourself. And if the person who asks the question, respect is built over and trust is built over time.

Change your language. Change the way you treat yourself. Change the way you're handed to yourself. And if you want it in your children, you got to get it while they're growing because once they get grown you don't get to lay roots on a grown tree. You only get them up. The Bible was right. Train up a child in a way that he should go. Fast forward when he is old he will not depart from it. It is say nothing about the middle. He will not depart from it. It is saying nothing about the middle.

And middle is going to be terrible. But you're counting on what you deposited early because you cannot make a withdrawal, daddy or mama, where you've never made a deposit. And one day in some hospital, somewhere, your kids are going to be who the doctors talk to about whether you live or die or are unplugged. Raise them in such a way that you can trust their decision. I just, if I can add to that, on the other side, what I do to try and cultivate a relationship with you as an adult child, I think that I try to be reciprocal for the things that you

did growing up, those things like changing the diaper and making the meals, thinking of ways that I can add value to your life. And I think that adult children have a gift to give their parents in just returning the care, thinking about what life is like for them and adding value to them in whatever way. Whether it's driving them to the doctor's appointment or leaving dinner at the table, just calling and connecting to see how they're doing when they are no longer center stage. So I think relationship as an adult child

is really predicated on how much you can see your parents in the fullness of their humanity and find ways to serve them back. I agree with you. And I think that it is not the things you do that are the most meaningful. It is the fact that you want to. Oh, gosh.

The fact that you want to. Oh, gosh. The fact that you want to, that, that, oh, I can't hardly tell about that. We are at that part of quick. The fact that that, that your face lights up at chances to show us appreciation. Just rexus. It don't matter what it is, it could be hot baloney and wonderbree. But the fact that you're happy to do it. Oh, I can't even describe to you what that means, that you run around and work on it and get through preaching and do it. And Betty daddy do you want something else to drink daddy? Do you need it? Oh Oh best respect and honor and and and and the most vulnerable stage of your life is when you ate hmm

See the rolls reverse See the rolls reverse. If you plan, if I plan into you when you were weakest and couldn't hold your head up without my hand up under your neck, then later on you will hold my head up when I'm weakest. And I am the most vulnerable. And both of us need each other to be trusted through that vulnerability. So yes, it's everything you said and I'm glad you said it from the other perspective because I didn't even think of that part of it but I can relate to it because my highest achievement in all of my life to this day above every award, trophy,

Grammy, New York Times, whatever stuff to have gotten to show my mother that I would take care of her till she died. It's my highest achievement because I got to show her that if she was on the other foot, I would do everything for her. She and I do mean everything for her that she did for me gladly. Not just do it, but gladly and to make her comfortable as she slipped away, that she could be vulnerable and be okay. And I will clean her up and the bed to make sure she was okay and provide for her. And I don't want people to feel bad because not everybody can do that. You can't

always lift your pants. You can't always turn them. Sometimes that's not the best choice for them. But in some way to be involved that they matter as they are fading away is a reward for having a child. So it's priceless. So I agree with you on both points. And thank you for giving us a 360 view from both sides of it. We still got parts we don't need.

We still got more dishes than we need. We still got these huge pots. We got huge pots. You would think our kids would look like a high school restaurant, and there's nobody to cook for. And I'm losing my ability to do it because I don't get to do it very much. But at least I got to do it when it mattered most. And my greatest joy is for them to come in the house and eat going to warmer and eat up food and your baby coming by house and going my warmer and eat

up my food. You know why I'm so happy about that is because one day that's all he'll have of me. But he'll have that. And you'd be surprised what great memories do with great grief. Say everything. Give a memory to somebody. Give a memory to the people you love. Do something wonderful.

Don't have to be expensive. It don't even have to be good. You can cook and mess up the dinner. But the fact that you cooked it is still wonderful. It's still romantic. We may have to order pizza, but it's still romantic. It's so funny. You mentioned that about grief because the last question I said, like to say, how do I navigate through grief?

I've lost both of my siblings, and now I'm a caregiver to my mom who was on hospice. I just feel lost. Of course you feel lost. It's the worst nauseating feeling in the world. It's frightening. It's horrifying because as long as your parents are alive, you're never in orphan. The first day they're gone, you realize that you are alone in the world.

And that's a terrible feeling. But I'm a living witness, you can survive it. And there are no three steps to handling that. Five steps to get out of that. I will not insult your question with some canned answer that fails to compensate for the magnitude of what you're dealing with, because I have dealt with it too.

But I will tell you this, you can survive it, and you must survive it, and you owe it to your parents to survive it, because we raised you to survive it. And we expect you to survive it. Because this is your turn to live. Don't die with us. Don't die with us if you got to crawl out.

Don't die with us. Because then our living was in vain. Dance for us. When all is said and done travel for us, go stick your feet in the salty waters of the Atlantic for us. Climb to the highest peak of a mountain and take a picture for us, drive to the Grand Canyon and make an echo for us, and let the world know that who we raised lived. And I'm sorry you had to endure such pain, and I'm sorry you had to endure such grief, but your face was not on the cover of the obituary. You are a survivor, so survive.

There are no answers for your questions. I cannot explain why it happened to you. But don't focus on the questions, focus on surviving. Breathe in and out until the breath becomes a day, until the day becomes a week, until the week becomes a month, until the month becomes a year, until the pain recedes and little by little, the laughter gradually returns and you start to have life again. It's gonna take time. It's gonna be painful. You're gonna be schizophrenic. You're gonna be moody.

You may not always be holy. You may not always be spiritual. You may vacillate back and forth, trying to find some way to push and turn like somebody who's got pain in their land in the bed and can't find a soft space to lay in, but eventually the pain will begin to receive, and you may not even know what day it did,

but we meant for you to survive. So do that for your sisters. Do that for your mother. Survive. Well, Daddy, I think the only way we can close this podcast is if you promise to come back after woman evolved 2023 and we can recap exactly what happened there. Well, I cannot wait.

I cannot wait. I cannot wait. Lord, I cannot wait. People are calling me from all over the world saying they want to be at this first woman evolve or woman Are lose collabs with woman evolve? They're calling it. It's not just young women. It's old women It's middle-aged women. It's grandma's is me mom. It's my dear

It's auntie it's sororities. It's even men It's auntie, it's sororities, it's even men who are so touched and so revived and so new than the renewed and so want to be in touch with their daughters better and their sisters better and their wives better that they are coming to watch the women evolve. Like I said on the sidelines and watch you, I modeled that a man can sit on the side and watch you and not lose his manhood. Because when it comes time for me to shine, I know how to handle the light. That's why I can share the light not because I'm less man, but because I'm more. Oh, all right. Mike dropped.

Absolutely. You had a few of those though. You had a few. Thanks for having me. I don't know how y'all going to edit this, or whether this is going to be a series or to be continued for 30 days because those were some long answers, but they were some true answers

and some life lessons. And I hope that they make it to the ears of somebody who needs them. Thank you for having me. Thank you for coming. Oh, it's my pleasure. you