July 23, 2024 • 48 mins
Dramos deep dives into a concept from his book he is writing discussing how the things that happen to us growing up, mindsets passed down from previous generations and the situations we currently find ourselves in do not have to define the quality of life we live. Citing stories of struggle to glory from musicians Nipsey Hussle and Jelly Roll.
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Speaker 1 (00:06):
Let me talk about talk.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
There we go, he said, you live in life as
a ringo, where you question where you fit in every
time you mingle, they.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
Say you do. This would not that my rapt this
life as a lingo.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
Yes, hello, and welcome to another episode of life as
a gringo.
Speaker 3 (00:25):
I am dramas of course, and today.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Today, man, I wanted to I want to talk about
where we come from, right, I think, I know I
should say.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
A lot of us, particularly in our culture.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
And then just as like a frame of reference before
I even kind of get into specifically that I've been
writing a new book, and this one's like a full
length book as opposed so kind of the other mini
series I had been doing called just b and the
chapter I had just finished working on was the idea
of your past not dictating your future. Right, your past
(01:14):
does not have to dictate your future. And I'm kind
of being a little bit general with some of the descriptors.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
Here, so I apologize because I just this.
Speaker 2 (01:24):
It's a part of a larger concept, this book, and
I don't want to give it away before I, you know,
put it out there and do the whole shopping thing.
When it comes to publishers and stuff like that.
Speaker 3 (01:34):
But I was really moved.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
By this chapter, not like you know, patting myself in
the back of my own writing, but in the research
process and then sort of just cultivating it conceptually. It
was a great reminder for me, right, and I think
particularly and we'll get into this deeper for Thursday Trends,
but you know, I can't help but have been really
(02:02):
moved by this particular moment that we're going through politically,
with Joe Biden stepping down in Kamala Harris being his
presumptive replacement as the Democratic nominee to go against Trump
for the presidential race, and.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
It just, you know, the optics of it moved me.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
Seeing a woman of color up there and all the
backlash that she unnecessarily gets, and when you think about
her career and all the hard work that she put
in to get there, and the idea that like by
(02:53):
all metrics of like our societal standards here in this country,
she's not supposed to be there. Quote, right, she wasn't
supposed to have risen to the prominence she did as
an attorney and then as a presidential candidate and then
vice president and now presumptively going to be the representative
(03:15):
of the Democratic Party for the twenty twenty four election.
It's really incredibly inspiring, Like, regardless of politics aside, I
think we should all be able to look at the
optics of that, particularly if you're somebody from a community
of color or a marginalized community. Something like that is
incredibly inspiring. And I kind of wanted to touch on
(03:40):
a bit of that concept because I think a lot
of us suffer from the idea of imposter syndrome.
Speaker 3 (03:46):
And I think I've touched on this a bunch of
the podcast.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
But you know, I've had people in my life, for
people that I work with and even myself. Recently, I
was having a conversation with a friend of mine like
last week, and you know, we were just kind of
catching up and we've known each other for a long time.
He's actually been a mentor of mine, one of the
people that got me into radio, you know, and kind
(04:09):
of helped me get on this this path that I've
been on, the trajectory I have been on, and I
was just sort of like, you know, we're venting to
one another about different frustrations we were having, and you know,
one of mine was talking about a particular opportunity that
fell through, you know, and it wasn't my fault, and
I was expressing to him, you know, just how devastating
(04:30):
it was, because I was saying, people like me, who
come from my background, we don't get opportunities like this,
and that's why I was particularly disappointing for it to
have fallen through for reasons beyond my control. And I've
heard this, you know, sort of similar sentiment even in
(04:53):
happy moments from people I know or people that I
work with, you know, shout out to to coach Brand,
who has been a really big help with the whole
Just Be movement, and and you know, for for the
better part of like two years, has really sort of
been my right hand and helping me organize a lot
of the things that I'm doing. But you know, she'd
(05:15):
recently been given an opportunity to speak at a conference
in Los Angeles, you know, her hometown actually, and it
was like, if I'm mistaken a conference you know, related
to community outreach and particularly with schools.
Speaker 1 (05:32):
And children and things like that.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
And I can remember her commentary of sort of saying, like,
I can't believe me a girl from the hood.
Speaker 1 (05:42):
Is going to be now speaking.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
In my home city and talking to a bunch of
like educated people and giving them pointers about community outreach
and mentorship and things of that nature, right, like, not
like in disbelief that she was somebody, you know, And
she's expressed those moments, and I hope she doesn't mind
me sharing this, but especially those moments of self doubt
(06:06):
and imposter syndrome, like I'm not a college graduate. I'm
from a particular area of Los Angeles that is notoriously
you know, rough.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
Who am I to be in this position? You know?
And I've heard that from.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
People I work with in the podcast side of things,
you know, people who are like have executive titles talking
about how they can't believe they're you know, they're speaking
on a panel amongst like Fortune. I think, like I'm
Fortune five hundred, the one below I camera with the
category it's the Fortune one hundred whatever panel I did
like last year, and them having this sort of reflective
(06:41):
moment like I can't believe I'm here. And I think
for many of us, whether you come from a rough background,
whether you just come from the immigrant background, right where
we're really just happy to be here and we just
want to sort of survive. Right, where you come from
a small town or whatever your circumstance might be, or
(07:03):
you made some mistakes in your younger years, right.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
I think a lot of us get caught.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
Up in the environments that we are around, the life
that we've sort of been dealt, you know, the hand
we've been dealt, and we give it a lot more power.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
Than it deserves.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
And I think we also don't give ourselves enough credit
and don't recognize our innate power that we have in
every particular situation. And not to discredit anybody's struggle, but
regardless of what your struggle is, you have the ability
(07:44):
to look at it from a productive mindset.
Speaker 1 (07:48):
Right.
Speaker 2 (07:50):
And there's a couple of things kind of coming up.
I think I touched on a few things. But there's
a book called I Think This Man Search for a
Meeting by Victor Frankel, who's a Holocaust survivor. I believe
I've mentioned this either in this podcast or The Street Stoke,
But you know, this man was going through one of
the most horrendous experiences of mankind's history, and still.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
He managed to sort of wain and survive.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
That situation because he recognized and practiced the idea that
you can do whatever you want to my body. You
can put me in whatever circumstance physically, but you have
no control over my mental unless I allow you to.
And he went somewhere else mentally during these atrocious moments
(08:37):
that he experienced. Mentally, he put himself in a different
place and it helped him survive this horrendous experience that
he was going through.
Speaker 1 (08:44):
Right, and.
Speaker 2 (08:48):
That is I think the thesis for what I'm talking
about of not allowing your past to dictate your future.
And in the book, I highlight two particular sort of
figures in entertainment as a means to relate this message,
and one of which being Nipsey Hustle, who I talk
about a lot, and the other being a country star
(09:11):
ironically not really a genre I dabble much in, but
a country star by the name of Jelly Roll who
some of you may have seen his viral speech that
he gave after winning Best New Artists of the Country
Music Awards, where he talks about the irony of a
thirty nine year old man winning Best New Artist and
his quote that I love paraphrasing. He says, there's a
(09:31):
reason why the windshield is bigger than the rear view mirror.
And I'll dabble into a few of those different things,
but I just wanted to share that because I think
this is something we all constantly struggle with, and myself included,
no matter how much work I do on myself, it's
something I have to remind myself of.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
Why not me?
Speaker 2 (09:53):
I am worthy of all of these great things in life, right,
regardless of my background, regardless of the you can, you know,
the perceptions the outside world may have of me, of
my people, of my community. It's me versus me, and
I'm capable of whatever I want as long as I
you know, stay the course, as long as I keep fighting.
(10:14):
And you know, in my gut from from some of
the commentary I'm hearing from people and again my own
interactions with those close to me, my own words, I
feel like we it's a good time to remind us
of this message. So today we're gonna be just diving
into all that. We'll have a long me hint that
segment basically, so without further ado, let's let's get into it.
(10:46):
So in the book, I I really focused on Nipsey
Hustle as kind of the main sort of launching point
for this concept of not allowing your patht to de
find you. And again, as with all of these examples,
you don't have to know who the artist is, and
I'm talking about you don't have to be a fan
of their music or whatever. Where it's merely a story, right,
It's like anything else. It's an example to correlate the idea,
(11:10):
to bring the idea home for people. But Nipsey Hustle,
you know, sadly is a man who lost his life
in twenty nineteen, if I'm not mistaken, March or twenty nineteen,
was senselessly murdered outside of his own business in Los Angeles.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
But he is somebody who has had.
Speaker 2 (11:29):
A profound impact on my life and I'm sure millions
of people around the world because of the thoughts and
the philosophy that he lived his life by.
Speaker 1 (11:41):
You know, he was a very positive person.
Speaker 2 (11:42):
He was an entrepreneurial person, a very spiritual person, and
somebody who literally was dealt or an incredibly difficult hand
in this life and still somehow figured out a way
to overcome all of the darkness to find happiness and success. Right,
Nipsey is the product of immigrant parents. His father is Ethiopian.
(12:05):
I can't from Eritrea, which I believe is near Ethiopia.
I apologize if I'm messing that up geographically. I know
there's I believe a.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
A war happening or happened between there.
Speaker 2 (12:19):
I'm not super educator well verse, so I apologize for
my ignorance there. But he's specifically from a country in
Africa called Ritria.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
His family I can't. I think his mom is from
somewhere else I can't remember off the top.
Speaker 2 (12:30):
Of my head, but you know, they grew up in
a particularly rough part of Los Angeles. I believe they
would identify as like the Crenshaw area, and Nipsey fell
into a trap that many people his age from a
certain area would, and he got involved in gangs and
(12:52):
the drug game very early on in his life, you know,
sort of seeing that as the only way of getting
out of that particular situation.
Speaker 1 (13:00):
But he's also somebody who.
Speaker 2 (13:04):
From a young age, I think had the mentality of
I'm not going to let this define me. I'm not
going to allow myself to just.
Speaker 1 (13:14):
Be another statistic.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
And obviously he had his mistakes, his ups and downs,
but there's a story that I.
Speaker 1 (13:21):
Love about him.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
Where you know, it's time for like back to school shopping,
and his mom, I think all she had was like
fifty dollars or something like that to give him right,
might have even been less, but basically fifty dollars to
buy all the clothes he would need for the entire
school year. So you know, he went to you know,
(13:43):
a discount place like Ross or Marshalls because that was all,
you know, the best shot he hadn't making that fifty
dollars stretch. And he realized, like, this isn't going to
get him to where he wants to be, right, and
he's a young kid, teenager, so of course he wants
to be dressed in like the freshest clothes at the time,
which was like Tommy Hill figure and Polo and things
(14:03):
like that. And instead of getting angry or frustrated or
complaining to his mom, he understood she was doing the
best she could and he took it upon himself to say,
I'm never going to go to school not dressed fresh essentially, right,
(14:25):
I'm going to take it upon myself to make this happen.
And as the story goes, he basically went all around
his neighborhood to all the businesses asking for a job
as like a young kid.
Speaker 1 (14:37):
I believe it was like twelve.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
Or thirteen or something like that, just like we're a
super young kid, and everybody turned down because he was young.
And eventually he gets to a shoe shining shop and
basically won't take no for an answer, and they give
him an opportunity and he gets paid X amount of
dollars per shue that he shines or whatever it might be.
And as the story goes, he basically was there like
(15:00):
every single day, working crazy hours, saving up all his money,
and after a particular time period, I don't know if
it was the entire summer or whatever, he then had
a few hundred dollars to his name and made good
on his promise to himself. He went to like the
outlets and bought you know, all the time in fresh time,
he'll figure in all these different things, right. And obviously
(15:20):
this is like fun and lighthearted and frivolous, if you will,
because we're talking about clothing. But what I want you
to focus on is the mindset. He refused to allow
himself to be a victim of circumstance. He said, this
(15:41):
is what I want, and even though my circumstances dictate
I can't in this case afford that, I refuse to
take that as an answer. I know I have the
power to make it happen, and he did so in
finding a job and hustling his ass off, right. And
really this is sort of the backbone of the Nipsey
(16:03):
Hustle story because what's interesting about his story. He's somebody
who it took a long period of time for him
to find success. I mean I've mentioned this before, but
like in the music industry, man, if you don't find
success by you know, your mid twenties to even your
late twenties, pushing it, it's kind of like the you know,
(16:25):
the end for you. And Nipsey didn't find success until
his the very late twenties, maybe even early thirties really
when people really started to know who he was, and
his road to getting there was filled with so many
trials and tribulations. Again, you know, he's born into an
area where really your survival is based upon your gang affiliation.
(16:49):
Ther only means of making money really and getting out
of that situation potentially is selling drugs. And you know,
as a result, Nipsey was in and out of jail
and had a lot of really difficult moments of like
at the times where he even you know, there's a
time period where he said to himself, I'm gonna put
(17:10):
all my energy into music. Right, and him and his brother,
his brother had gotten out of prison and they script
some money together and like they bought at they went
and got a house kind of out of the way, out.
Speaker 1 (17:22):
Of their normal neighborhood, right.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
And during this time, Nipsey sold his car, he sold
a lot of his jewelry, and he was like broke.
He really was saying, I'm just going to be an artist.
He put all his money into putting up basically building
a recording studio in the house, and that's all he
did day and day out, recorded music, recorded music, recording music.
And one day the house got raided by the police
(17:48):
and and in it they found a gun that I
don't you know whoever it belonged to.
Speaker 1 (17:53):
And because.
Speaker 2 (18:00):
And I might be conflating different stories here, but basically
I think at the time he was on probation or
his brother was, whatever it might be. They end up
losing the house and you know, had to go to
jail and fight a case I believe his brother end
Up had to go to jail, they had to fight
a case, and in that they confiscated all of his
recording equipment. And I think for many people they would
have seen this as a sign from God, from the universe.
(18:23):
Like I, for the first time in my life went straight.
I'm not selling drugs, I'm not doing anything illegal, and
I'm just focusing on music and trying to make this happen.
And here I am sort of getting fucked by life essentially. Right,
(18:45):
But again, Nipsey refused to allow this to dictate his future.
Speaker 1 (18:50):
Right.
Speaker 2 (18:52):
He is a famous quote, you know, I'm paraphrasing where
he basically says like no, no one can stop me
from doing what I wanted to accept me or God basically.
And there's a lot of stories like this, when him
getting signed to a major record label and then like
you know, or even before that, doctor Dre was gonna
(19:13):
sign him, then he didn't happen this other person and
then the industry didn't want touch him because his gang affiliations.
And then he finally gets a major label deal, there's
all his buzz around him, and then all of a sudden.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
The label has a shake up.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
At the executive level, and they no longer believe in
the vision of Nipsey Hustle and they want to make
him like work with EDM produce and all. It's like,
so his debut album never gets released after it's already
recorded and done right, so many ups and downs that
he had to push through and believe in himself through, right,
And for me reading that story, it's a reminder of like,
(19:48):
this guy found success against all odds, right, But it's
a reminder that.
Speaker 3 (19:55):
The odds are bullshit. The odds have no meaning unless
you allow them to have meaning, right, I mean, and
we've seen this in sports where the underdog wins and
(20:15):
that's not a one off thing.
Speaker 2 (20:18):
And yeah, there's some truth to it, right where it's like, Okay,
the odds are being made this team, you know, matches
up better against that team, they have better talent, better record,
whatever it might be. But there's a reason why we
still have to play the game right. There's a reason
why the winner isn't determined based on the odds. It's
determined based on the outcome of said game. You still
(20:41):
have to fucking show up and win the game right
and play the game and on that court, it's anybody's
game who's playing better that night. And I think life
is is really very much like that. And I think
that often time past trauma, whether it's our own, whether
(21:04):
it's our own families, sort of beginst the cloud. That
message of like it can literally happen to anyone or
your past doesn't have to define you. Right, And I've
mentioned this a bunch, but like my parents, products of
(21:25):
their own environment, didn't believe.
Speaker 1 (21:31):
That people from our background.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
Could find success in the entertainment industry, let alone something
they truly love doing, right, I'm talking about myself here,
So for a long time there was a lot of
tug and pull about my capability of doing these things,
and as much as they wanted to support me, their
own past trauma didn't allow them to and made them
(21:55):
talk negatively about what I was doing.
Speaker 3 (22:02):
And a lot of people succumb to that messaging.
Speaker 2 (22:08):
Unfortunately a lot of us, and I have, at different
points in my life, allow the negative messaging to seep
through and convince us that what we feel in our
heart is wrong or make us doubt our own capabilities
at the end of the day. But I want to
(22:28):
point out and I don't try to. I don't minimize
how difficult this is. But with the awareness of hindsight here,
or just the awareness that we can have by having
a general conversation taking out the personal emotion or attachment
to a specific situation, that's the moment that caused us
(22:52):
to really fail, The moment that we started listening to
the negative chatter. Those are the moments that made us
not be capable of all we could be, and they're
(23:13):
the moments that allowed our past, or our circumstance to
define our future. Yes, life is hard, and for some
it's harder than others. And yes, some of us might
be going through an incredibly difficult fucking time right now.
Speaker 1 (23:29):
I don't take that away from anybody.
Speaker 2 (23:36):
But whether it's next week, next year, ten years from now,
with the right mindset, your life could be completely different
than it is right now or than it has been.
Speaker 1 (23:53):
I'm not going to blow smoke up your ass.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
And tell you that it's going to be easy or
that it's right around the corner. I can't give you
that guarantee. And that's particularly why I love somebody like
Nipsey Husse's story. You're talking about somebody who was dedicating
over a decade of their life at the highest possible
level of dedication towards a singular goal. And again it
(24:15):
took them over ten years to achieve what is you know,
recognizable success. So for some of us, myself included, our
path is going to be longer.
Speaker 1 (24:28):
For me. I was just thinking about this the other day.
Speaker 2 (24:30):
I was making fifteen dollars an hour up until I
was about thirty years old.
Speaker 1 (24:36):
Right.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
I didn't get a full time, like contracted job with
a higher salary bump.
Speaker 1 (24:45):
Until I was halfway through my thirtieth year of this
in this world. Right, So that was a lot of
belief that I had.
Speaker 2 (24:57):
To have in my vision, in myself and where I
think I could take this right, And the only reason
I achieved anything was because I had that innate belief
that regardless of the fact that I am, you know,
a Puerto Rican kid who is the product of you know,
(25:21):
two working class parents, you know, one of which and
my father broke up, debt and woke, you know, grew
up dead broke, and my mother being a teacher you know,
in the Bronx like the you know, I obviously could
(25:46):
have been born into much worse circumstances, but also I
wasn't born into a circumstance that would say, yeah, this
is going to be somebody who's going to like live
a life of purpose and make his dreams come true
and work for himself. There would have there's no clear
pathway to that based upon what I was born into.
My blind faith is what got me there, and even
(26:07):
now I have to have that same blind faith, right
because I have to find the belief in myself and say,
this wasn't a mistake, This wasn't luck that I found
myself in this position. This is the product of my
(26:29):
hard work, my vision, and my talent, and I can
continue to recreate that success and also elevate to a
higher level based upon all the factors that got me here.
Because I'm defining what I'm capable of, I'm not allowing
anybody else to and truthfully and even beyond that, right like,
(26:54):
there are a lot of people who didn't believe that
I could be doing these things, didn't see in me
what I saw on myself.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
I could have listened to them.
Speaker 2 (27:04):
I could have allowed them to define my future for me,
but I didn't, And I struggle now, but I still
fight to not allow that to continue to be the case, right,
And I think that's what's so inspiring about these stories
when you think about it, why I love them so
(27:24):
much and why I like to harp on it. Because
anything is truly possible, And as long as you're trying
to be better tomorrow, I don't believe anything you've done
(27:46):
in the past can really fuck up your entire life,
with the exception of.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
Maybe some really extreme things.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
And yeah, I do believe, you know, karma is real
and things you do can catch up to you. But
I believe that only happens when you don't learn the
lesson from them, and when you continue to sort of
play in the mud, if you will. Right, Like, on
the flip side of what we're talking about, somebody like Diddy,
his like world is crumbling right now in his past
has caught up to him because he continued to play
(28:18):
in that mud for years. Right He didn't, you know,
sort of have a negative experience like a nipsey hustle,
going to prison or whatever it might be, and then
turning his life around. Did He kept living in that mud.
And that's the difference right there, where your past can
catch up to you for sure, if you don't stop
the bullshit and try to course correct, right. And if
(28:41):
you course correct, I do believe good things will follow
as long as you keep staying faithful to the idea
that your life can be different than what it is
or what it has been.
Speaker 1 (28:50):
You know.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
I'm gonna pause here real quick, and then I want
to touch on Jelly roll story a little bit, because
I think it's also really inspiring, particularly for me, but
I think anybody listening as well. So we'll talk about
that in a second, but we'll take a quick break first,
and then we'll.
Speaker 1 (29:05):
Be right back.
Speaker 2 (29:10):
All right, We are back, and I want to touch
on the story of Jelly Roll, who, again you don't
have to know who this is to get something from it,
but he's a country musician who's now like one of
the new faces of modern country.
Speaker 1 (29:23):
And if you don't know who that.
Speaker 2 (29:24):
Would google it what he looks like, because he's not
what you'd expect as the face of country music. He
is a large dude with face tattoos where's Jordan's And
he himself comes from a background of addiction and prison time.
(29:53):
And his story is particularly interesting because he was a
drug dealer and I believe he was surrounded by addicts.
Speaker 1 (29:57):
I don't remember I specifically he was an.
Speaker 2 (29:58):
Addict, but definitely addiction being a part of his life,
being a part of the life of those around him,
those closest. And he spent some time in prison. I
believe his first child was born while he was actually
in prison. And he gets out of jail in his
mid twenties and begins to really start taking music far
(30:20):
more seriously than he had in the past. And for him,
his first big break didn't come again almost ten years later,
similar to Nipsey a decade later of doing this, and
his first big break was literally like a regional song.
And what I also love about his story again, your
(30:41):
past doesn't have to define your future. He started out
as a hip hop artist and then would include singing
in some of his songs, and people gravitated towards that,
and he sort of began to pivot more into making
songs where he was singing andevitably became countries from Tennessee
and then again ten years plus of trying to do
(31:04):
something has some regional success on a whim.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
He is inspired and I.
Speaker 2 (31:15):
Think he had a dream, if I'm not mistaken, woke
up and was inspired by the dream and writes this
song called save Me, And the next day he's has
to be in the studio anyway, they're like wrapping up
final production on an album that he was making, and
they record this song, and they finished writing it and
recording it all in the span of like forty eight hours.
(31:38):
And I believe they even shot like a video for
an acoustic video for it in the studio and just
randomly drop it and that video goes viral, like crazy viral,
and all of a sudden, Jelly Roll is now this
big name in country music. Right, But again, this is
(32:00):
ten years of this dude plugging away. This is a
dude who started out making a completely different genre of music,
a dude who his life was trailer parks and drugs
in jail time.
Speaker 1 (32:12):
And I alluded to this at the beginning of the show.
Speaker 2 (32:15):
But he then is nominated for like Grammys and nominated
in the Country Music Awards CMAS and wins Best New
Artists there, and he stands up there and gives us
really fucking inspiring speech. I employ to go find the
whole speech. It's not super long, it's Copdan. It's long,
(32:37):
but again talks about the irony of a thirty nine
year old man winning Best New Artist Dude thirty nine
years old by music industry standards is ancient, particularly if
you are a new artist like most record labels wouldn't
(32:59):
look to Why sit you at that age.
Speaker 1 (33:01):
You're too old to be a star.
Speaker 2 (33:04):
To be relatable at that point unless you had previous success.
But there he is, thirty nine years old winning Best
New Artists, defying the odds and the standards and the
norms of his industry, and that, right, there is a
lesson in the past doesn't have to define you, right,
(33:25):
or the way things have previously been done or normally
done doesn't have to define your success, because we get
tripped up on that a lot as well, where it's like, oh,
I don't see anybody who looks like me doing this thing,
or who sounds like me, or who is in my
style doing this thing. That must mean it's not wanted
(33:45):
or needed. There's not an opportunity for me. And you're
dead wrong there, right. If you're doing something and you
don't see people doing it in the way that you're
doing it, that should fucking be an alarm belt in
your head that you're onto something. But again, we've been
trained by previous generations and societal norms of like what's
(34:11):
normal and the idea of our circumstances dictating our lives
at any given moment, no matter what we're going through,
we have the ability to take charge of our life
(34:31):
and not allow those circumstances to dictate the rest of
our life. And that quote that I alluded to what
he said, he said, there's a reason why the windshield
on our car is bigger than the rear view mirror. Right,
rear view mirror, the little mirror on the top of
your windshield. It's important because you do need to see
what's behind you, but the higher priority is what's in
(34:55):
front of you.
Speaker 1 (34:56):
Right.
Speaker 2 (34:56):
From a technical standpoint of driving a car, you're going
to crack if you're just staring.
Speaker 1 (35:00):
Into the rear view mirror.
Speaker 2 (35:03):
Now, it's important to know what's going on in back you. Right,
So the analogy would be, it's great to learn the
lessons from the past to be aware of those things.
But once you've done that, you know, once you've glanced
into your rear view mirror, it's eyes back on the
road in front of you. Right, the windshield is where
(35:23):
you're going, That's what's important. That's far more important than
what's behind you. What's in front of you is far
more important, which is why the windshield.
Speaker 1 (35:33):
Is bigger than the rear view mirror. And I think
what I was called something I was called.
Speaker 3 (35:39):
To today.
Speaker 2 (35:46):
In this podcast. You know, I have somebody on my
heart that I'm thinking of. You know, I'm not going
to call him out by name, but one of one
of somebody who I've met as a listener of the
show and we've stayed in contact with social media, and
he reached out to me just letting me know that
he's going through a really difficult moment for him and
his family right now.
Speaker 3 (36:03):
And I hope that a message like this gets through
to you.
Speaker 2 (36:18):
And I know you're going through difficult moment and I
speak to anybody who is. But this doesn't have to
define you or where your life is going to go
after this. Yeah it might slow you down. Yeah you
have some shit to figure out and work through, but
(36:40):
you can and will work through it. And as long
as you have the right mindset, this won't define you.
And in fact, one day it's just going to be
something that you look back on and reflect on and
use it as a teachable moment or a lesson or
a moment to say, I'm just so grateful that we
(37:00):
moved through that and that I had the presence of
mind to not get lost in a negative headspace that
would make that moment my permanent reality, or make that
that sadness, that anger, that frustration I was feeling in
that moment a permanent way of being, because.
Speaker 1 (37:17):
That's what it also ends up happening. A lot of times.
Speaker 2 (37:21):
We get caught in frustration, anger, disappointment, or that that
sort of like that just feeling of being trapped by
your circumstances, and we allow it to become a way
of life for us. And I think that's that's the
trap so many people fall into. It's like a it's
(37:44):
like an elephant. I could fuck up this analogy of
the story, but like they're talking about how elephant keepers
they have elephants on like these leashes or whatever, and
they have them trained to think that these leashes can
contain them.
Speaker 1 (37:59):
Really, leashes are like connected to a small stake in
the ground.
Speaker 2 (38:04):
An elephant, which is incredibly powerful and you know, just
gigantic animal could easily rip this thing out of the
ground if it wanted to. But it's been trained to
think that it's stuck in that place, so it never
actually tries to. And I think that's what oftentimes happens
to so many of us, particularly marginalized communities, who have
(38:27):
known nothing but pain and suffering for the most part,
or have gone through intense traumatic experiences, or haven't seen
themselves represented in places of prestige or success. Right, we
become the elephant, the elephant who doesn't know its own strength,
who doesn't realize that we literally could just rip off
(38:49):
the leash that's holding us back, the chains that are
holding us back from living the life that we want
to live, the freedom that we're longing for. And I
think that's what's important to sort of realize we have
so much power in our mentality, you know, the way
that we think we could have so much power, I
(39:11):
should say, but oftentimes we relinquish that by giving into
the negativity around us, the naysayers, the dire circumstances we've
been dealt. We allow them to make us think we
are weaker than we actually are, we are more powerless
(39:31):
than we actually are, that we don't deserve to be
in the places that we know we are capable of
being somewhere deep inside of us or the places we
belong to be. And I think that is what is
trapping and historically has trapped so many of our previous
generations of our community.
Speaker 1 (39:48):
But so many of us still.
Speaker 3 (39:50):
Fall into that trap, or even when we're in.
Speaker 2 (39:53):
Spaces, we don't give ourselves the credit or minimize ourselves
because we still feel like we don't belong here.
Speaker 1 (40:04):
And that's sort of what I'm getting at, And that's.
Speaker 2 (40:05):
Why this chapter was so powerful for me, a powerful
reminder for me, because I recognize so much of what
holds me back is me personally. Now we'll tie everything
we talked about today in a neat little boat in
a segment called conclusion STU. But first we'll take one
more quick break and then we'll be right back time
(40:27):
for company soon, all right. So I hope that that
was just maybe a reminder that some of us needed,
you know, to keep pushing, to have patience, to recognize
that all of our journeys are different. Some of us
(40:48):
are blessed to find what we've been looking for at
a younger age. Others have to wait longer to find
said life that they're driving for.
Speaker 1 (40:58):
But in either circumstance.
Speaker 2 (41:00):
And even if you haven't gotten there yet, regardless of
of what age you are in this life, or where
you are, or whatever it might be, you have the
capability of getting there. It's just maintaining the mindset that
keeps you energized and working towards it. Right, Like, the
thing I keep fucking harping on is it's you versus you, Right,
(41:23):
it's you versus you. The only defeat can come at
the hands of yourself, essentially you giving up, you, relinquishing
your power to external circumstances. Outside of that, inevitably you
can win. Inevitably, you can get to a place that
(41:46):
you're happy about in your life. But you have to
just keep fucking going. You have to maintain the faith. Right,
talk about Nipsey Hustle. Dude went through so many circumstances.
I didn't even get a chance to mention here, like,
so many ups and downs, so many moments where he
was about to make it, and then something happened and
it set him back to square one, and he just
(42:07):
kept fucking going, kept chipping at it like a cycle, right, Like,
like just this determined psychoticness, and eventually he got there,
you know, jelly roll, same fucking thing. Like man, dude
is not supposed to be the face of country music,
yet here he is the new face of country music.
Speaker 1 (42:30):
Right here he is.
Speaker 2 (42:31):
Though it's just beautiful. I'm not supposed to be here
talking to you. Here I am, and I've so many
other things I want to do, and I remind myself, Dude,
you've got this, and everybody listening doesn't matter what your
past says, what the norms are.
Speaker 1 (42:46):
You got this.
Speaker 2 (42:47):
You have the ability to prove everybody wrong. Underdog stories
happen all the fucking time. Why can't you be one
of those stories? The only answer to that, as to
why you can't be.
Speaker 1 (43:00):
Is because you give up on yourself.
Speaker 2 (43:02):
If you don't, you too can be bigger and better
than the circumstances you were born into. The circumstances that
you find yourself in right now. You just have to
keep going. And yeah, I know it's easier said than done.
It's fucking tough, it's demoralizing, it's heartbreaking when these setbacks happen.
But again, it's what do you allow your mind to
(43:24):
do in those moments? Do you allow your mind to
just give up and to essentially say all right, life,
all right, job, all right, this blah blah blah, this person,
I'm gonna allow you to now be my ruler and
you dictate what my quality of life is gonna be,
because that's what you're doing. When you give up, you're
just saying, hey, all right, fuck it. Let somebody else
(43:46):
or something else decide what my life is gonna look like.
And guess what, they're not going to probably give a
fuck much about it, right or by you being negative
or down or not giving a fuck about yourself, that's
how your interactions world are going to go. People are
gonna pick up on that, and you're going to get
the bottom of the barrel in every aspect of your
(44:06):
life because you have.
Speaker 1 (44:07):
Not made the distinction that you deserve more.
Speaker 2 (44:12):
And it's a tough pill to swallow, right to reflect
back on our life and all that we've seen and
all the fucking mistakes and us not being where we
want to be. It's a tough pill to swallow and
say I have nobody to blame or place responsibility on
but myself. And I can either be angry at that statement,
(44:37):
or I could use it as a moment of awakening
to say no more. Right, And I say this to myself, Yeah,
I can.
Speaker 3 (44:46):
I can, fucking I can blame circumstance.
Speaker 2 (44:49):
Right. I even started this by saying an opportunity fell
through that was out of my hands, and yet to
a degree it was. But there are two things there.
In reflection. I could have been a bigger pain in
the ass to those people who are dragging their feet
and made them make this a priority just to get
(45:09):
me off their back, or be like I am now
picking up the pieces and saying, all right, I'm gonna
be quarterback on this.
Speaker 1 (45:20):
I'm gonna figure this out. I'm not going to allow
that to be a loss. I'm gonna allow it to
be a setback.
Speaker 2 (45:28):
And now I'm going to figure out how to pick
up the pieces and rebuild this thing that I worked
so hard on.
Speaker 1 (45:36):
And now, knowing what I know.
Speaker 2 (45:42):
And that I'm gonna care about this more than anybody else,
is going to moving forward, I'm gonna be a fucking
shark and a hawk and making sure everybody's doing their
job and doing things on time.
Speaker 1 (45:56):
Right.
Speaker 2 (45:57):
I could have allowed that moment to break me, but
instead of making a fucking learning lesson, and I'm moving
forward with my life and That's what I want for
all of you going through something. Develop that mindset, like
that's the only way we're going to survive this thing
called life.
Speaker 1 (46:14):
That's the only we're going to make the best of it.
Speaker 2 (46:15):
We have to have this mindset and don't beat yourself
up in the moments that you give in or you
cave in.
Speaker 3 (46:20):
Like it's awareness. It all starts with awareness, awareness to.
Speaker 1 (46:23):
The power you have.
Speaker 2 (46:25):
Then in those moments, you might fall short of what
you wanted to say or do, but it's a lesson
and it keeps building up that awareness. So in the
moment you catch yourself when you're going down that negative mindset,
you flip it and you say, nope, I'm in control.
Where's the opportunity, where's the lesson. That's what it is,
catch yourself in that moment. So I feel like maybe
I've been a bit redundant with some of these talking points,
(46:46):
but legitimately it's been so obvious to me how important
it is to develop this mindset and how so many
of us unfortunately haven't been taught that mindset or don't
believe in ourselves in the way that we should. And
I want to keep rid of reading that. So hope
this helps somebody out there. If you're going through something tough,
I get it. I empathize for you. But it's up
(47:10):
to you to get yourself out of that situation, and
you can do it. You just have to keep believing
in yourself. With that said, thank you so much for
tuning in. I will catch you on Thursday for an
exciting Thursday Trends episode.
Speaker 1 (47:23):
A lot going on until then at DJ Dramas. You
want to be a part of.
Speaker 2 (47:27):
The new Mastermind just be social club again. It's free
group membership thing we're doing now. We're building out a
real community. I'm really excited and it just takes all
of us showing up. So more messages like this one,
private stuff that you won't be able to find anywhere else.
So just DM me at DJ Dramas you want a
link to that, and I'll send you the link so
you could join our new community over there. With that said,
(47:48):
I'll catch you on Thursday, so then stay safe, we'll
talk soon. Life as a Good INNGO is a production
of the micro Thura podcast Network and iHeartRadio
Let me talk about talk.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
There we go, he said, you live in life as
a ringo, where you question where you fit in every
time you mingle, they.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
Say you do. This would not that my rapt this
life as a lingo.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
Yes, hello, and welcome to another episode of life as
a gringo.
Speaker 3 (00:25):
I am dramas of course, and today.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Today, man, I wanted to I want to talk about
where we come from, right, I think, I know I
should say.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
A lot of us, particularly in our culture.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
And then just as like a frame of reference before
I even kind of get into specifically that I've been
writing a new book, and this one's like a full
length book as opposed so kind of the other mini
series I had been doing called just b and the
chapter I had just finished working on was the idea
of your past not dictating your future. Right, your past
(01:14):
does not have to dictate your future. And I'm kind
of being a little bit general with some of the descriptors.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
Here, so I apologize because I just this.
Speaker 2 (01:24):
It's a part of a larger concept, this book, and
I don't want to give it away before I, you know,
put it out there and do the whole shopping thing.
When it comes to publishers and stuff like that.
Speaker 3 (01:34):
But I was really moved.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
By this chapter, not like you know, patting myself in
the back of my own writing, but in the research
process and then sort of just cultivating it conceptually. It
was a great reminder for me, right, and I think
particularly and we'll get into this deeper for Thursday Trends,
but you know, I can't help but have been really
(02:02):
moved by this particular moment that we're going through politically,
with Joe Biden stepping down in Kamala Harris being his
presumptive replacement as the Democratic nominee to go against Trump
for the presidential race, and.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
It just, you know, the optics of it moved me.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
Seeing a woman of color up there and all the
backlash that she unnecessarily gets, and when you think about
her career and all the hard work that she put
in to get there, and the idea that like by
(02:53):
all metrics of like our societal standards here in this country,
she's not supposed to be there. Quote, right, she wasn't
supposed to have risen to the prominence she did as
an attorney and then as a presidential candidate and then
vice president and now presumptively going to be the representative
(03:15):
of the Democratic Party for the twenty twenty four election.
It's really incredibly inspiring, Like, regardless of politics aside, I
think we should all be able to look at the
optics of that, particularly if you're somebody from a community
of color or a marginalized community. Something like that is
incredibly inspiring. And I kind of wanted to touch on
(03:40):
a bit of that concept because I think a lot
of us suffer from the idea of imposter syndrome.
Speaker 3 (03:46):
And I think I've touched on this a bunch of
the podcast.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
But you know, I've had people in my life, for
people that I work with and even myself. Recently, I
was having a conversation with a friend of mine like
last week, and you know, we were just kind of
catching up and we've known each other for a long time.
He's actually been a mentor of mine, one of the
people that got me into radio, you know, and kind
(04:09):
of helped me get on this this path that I've
been on, the trajectory I have been on, and I
was just sort of like, you know, we're venting to
one another about different frustrations we were having, and you know,
one of mine was talking about a particular opportunity that
fell through, you know, and it wasn't my fault, and
I was expressing to him, you know, just how devastating
(04:30):
it was, because I was saying, people like me, who
come from my background, we don't get opportunities like this,
and that's why I was particularly disappointing for it to
have fallen through for reasons beyond my control. And I've
heard this, you know, sort of similar sentiment even in
(04:53):
happy moments from people I know or people that I
work with, you know, shout out to to coach Brand,
who has been a really big help with the whole
Just Be movement, and and you know, for for the
better part of like two years, has really sort of
been my right hand and helping me organize a lot
of the things that I'm doing. But you know, she'd
(05:15):
recently been given an opportunity to speak at a conference
in Los Angeles, you know, her hometown actually, and it
was like, if I'm mistaken a conference you know, related
to community outreach and particularly with schools.
Speaker 1 (05:32):
And children and things like that.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
And I can remember her commentary of sort of saying, like,
I can't believe me a girl from the hood.
Speaker 1 (05:42):
Is going to be now speaking.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
In my home city and talking to a bunch of
like educated people and giving them pointers about community outreach
and mentorship and things of that nature, right, like, not
like in disbelief that she was somebody, you know, And
she's expressed those moments, and I hope she doesn't mind
me sharing this, but especially those moments of self doubt
(06:06):
and imposter syndrome, like I'm not a college graduate. I'm
from a particular area of Los Angeles that is notoriously
you know, rough.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
Who am I to be in this position? You know?
And I've heard that from.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
People I work with in the podcast side of things,
you know, people who are like have executive titles talking
about how they can't believe they're you know, they're speaking
on a panel amongst like Fortune. I think, like I'm
Fortune five hundred, the one below I camera with the
category it's the Fortune one hundred whatever panel I did
like last year, and them having this sort of reflective
(06:41):
moment like I can't believe I'm here. And I think
for many of us, whether you come from a rough background,
whether you just come from the immigrant background, right where
we're really just happy to be here and we just
want to sort of survive. Right, where you come from
a small town or whatever your circumstance might be, or
(07:03):
you made some mistakes in your younger years, right.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
I think a lot of us get caught.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
Up in the environments that we are around, the life
that we've sort of been dealt, you know, the hand
we've been dealt, and we give it a lot more power.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
Than it deserves.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
And I think we also don't give ourselves enough credit
and don't recognize our innate power that we have in
every particular situation. And not to discredit anybody's struggle, but
regardless of what your struggle is, you have the ability
(07:44):
to look at it from a productive mindset.
Speaker 1 (07:48):
Right.
Speaker 2 (07:50):
And there's a couple of things kind of coming up.
I think I touched on a few things. But there's
a book called I Think This Man Search for a
Meeting by Victor Frankel, who's a Holocaust survivor. I believe
I've mentioned this either in this podcast or The Street Stoke,
But you know, this man was going through one of
the most horrendous experiences of mankind's history, and still.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
He managed to sort of wain and survive.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
That situation because he recognized and practiced the idea that
you can do whatever you want to my body. You
can put me in whatever circumstance physically, but you have
no control over my mental unless I allow you to.
And he went somewhere else mentally during these atrocious moments
(08:37):
that he experienced. Mentally, he put himself in a different
place and it helped him survive this horrendous experience that
he was going through.
Speaker 1 (08:44):
Right, and.
Speaker 2 (08:48):
That is I think the thesis for what I'm talking
about of not allowing your past to dictate your future.
And in the book, I highlight two particular sort of
figures in entertainment as a means to relate this message,
and one of which being Nipsey Hustle, who I talk
about a lot, and the other being a country star
(09:11):
ironically not really a genre I dabble much in, but
a country star by the name of Jelly Roll who
some of you may have seen his viral speech that
he gave after winning Best New Artists of the Country
Music Awards, where he talks about the irony of a
thirty nine year old man winning Best New Artist and
his quote that I love paraphrasing. He says, there's a
(09:31):
reason why the windshield is bigger than the rear view mirror.
And I'll dabble into a few of those different things,
but I just wanted to share that because I think
this is something we all constantly struggle with, and myself included,
no matter how much work I do on myself, it's
something I have to remind myself of.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
Why not me?
Speaker 2 (09:53):
I am worthy of all of these great things in life, right,
regardless of my background, regardless of the you can, you know,
the perceptions the outside world may have of me, of
my people, of my community. It's me versus me, and
I'm capable of whatever I want as long as I
you know, stay the course, as long as I keep fighting.
(10:14):
And you know, in my gut from from some of
the commentary I'm hearing from people and again my own
interactions with those close to me, my own words, I
feel like we it's a good time to remind us
of this message. So today we're gonna be just diving
into all that. We'll have a long me hint that
segment basically, so without further ado, let's let's get into it.
(10:46):
So in the book, I I really focused on Nipsey
Hustle as kind of the main sort of launching point
for this concept of not allowing your patht to de
find you. And again, as with all of these examples,
you don't have to know who the artist is, and
I'm talking about you don't have to be a fan
of their music or whatever. Where it's merely a story, right,
It's like anything else. It's an example to correlate the idea,
(11:10):
to bring the idea home for people. But Nipsey Hustle,
you know, sadly is a man who lost his life
in twenty nineteen, if I'm not mistaken, March or twenty nineteen,
was senselessly murdered outside of his own business in Los Angeles.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
But he is somebody who has had.
Speaker 2 (11:29):
A profound impact on my life and I'm sure millions
of people around the world because of the thoughts and
the philosophy that he lived his life by.
Speaker 1 (11:41):
You know, he was a very positive person.
Speaker 2 (11:42):
He was an entrepreneurial person, a very spiritual person, and
somebody who literally was dealt or an incredibly difficult hand
in this life and still somehow figured out a way
to overcome all of the darkness to find happiness and success. Right,
Nipsey is the product of immigrant parents. His father is Ethiopian.
(12:05):
I can't from Eritrea, which I believe is near Ethiopia.
I apologize if I'm messing that up geographically. I know
there's I believe a.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
A war happening or happened between there.
Speaker 2 (12:19):
I'm not super educator well verse, so I apologize for
my ignorance there. But he's specifically from a country in
Africa called Ritria.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
His family I can't. I think his mom is from
somewhere else I can't remember off the top.
Speaker 2 (12:30):
Of my head, but you know, they grew up in
a particularly rough part of Los Angeles. I believe they
would identify as like the Crenshaw area, and Nipsey fell
into a trap that many people his age from a
certain area would, and he got involved in gangs and
(12:52):
the drug game very early on in his life, you know,
sort of seeing that as the only way of getting
out of that particular situation.
Speaker 1 (13:00):
But he's also somebody who.
Speaker 2 (13:04):
From a young age, I think had the mentality of
I'm not going to let this define me. I'm not
going to allow myself to just.
Speaker 1 (13:14):
Be another statistic.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
And obviously he had his mistakes, his ups and downs,
but there's a story that I.
Speaker 1 (13:21):
Love about him.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
Where you know, it's time for like back to school shopping,
and his mom, I think all she had was like
fifty dollars or something like that to give him right,
might have even been less, but basically fifty dollars to
buy all the clothes he would need for the entire
school year. So you know, he went to you know,
(13:43):
a discount place like Ross or Marshalls because that was all,
you know, the best shot he hadn't making that fifty
dollars stretch. And he realized, like, this isn't going to
get him to where he wants to be, right, and
he's a young kid, teenager, so of course he wants
to be dressed in like the freshest clothes at the time,
which was like Tommy Hill figure and Polo and things
(14:03):
like that. And instead of getting angry or frustrated or
complaining to his mom, he understood she was doing the
best she could and he took it upon himself to say,
I'm never going to go to school not dressed fresh essentially, right,
(14:25):
I'm going to take it upon myself to make this happen.
And as the story goes, he basically went all around
his neighborhood to all the businesses asking for a job
as like a young kid.
Speaker 1 (14:37):
I believe it was like twelve.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
Or thirteen or something like that, just like we're a
super young kid, and everybody turned down because he was young.
And eventually he gets to a shoe shining shop and
basically won't take no for an answer, and they give
him an opportunity and he gets paid X amount of
dollars per shue that he shines or whatever it might be.
And as the story goes, he basically was there like
(15:00):
every single day, working crazy hours, saving up all his money,
and after a particular time period, I don't know if
it was the entire summer or whatever, he then had
a few hundred dollars to his name and made good
on his promise to himself. He went to like the
outlets and bought you know, all the time in fresh time,
he'll figure in all these different things, right. And obviously
(15:20):
this is like fun and lighthearted and frivolous, if you will,
because we're talking about clothing. But what I want you
to focus on is the mindset. He refused to allow
himself to be a victim of circumstance. He said, this
(15:41):
is what I want, and even though my circumstances dictate
I can't in this case afford that, I refuse to
take that as an answer. I know I have the
power to make it happen, and he did so in
finding a job and hustling his ass off, right. And
really this is sort of the backbone of the Nipsey
(16:03):
Hustle story because what's interesting about his story. He's somebody
who it took a long period of time for him
to find success. I mean I've mentioned this before, but
like in the music industry, man, if you don't find
success by you know, your mid twenties to even your
late twenties, pushing it, it's kind of like the you know,
(16:25):
the end for you. And Nipsey didn't find success until
his the very late twenties, maybe even early thirties really
when people really started to know who he was, and
his road to getting there was filled with so many
trials and tribulations. Again, you know, he's born into an
area where really your survival is based upon your gang affiliation.
(16:49):
Ther only means of making money really and getting out
of that situation potentially is selling drugs. And you know,
as a result, Nipsey was in and out of jail
and had a lot of really difficult moments of like
at the times where he even you know, there's a
time period where he said to himself, I'm gonna put
(17:10):
all my energy into music. Right, and him and his brother,
his brother had gotten out of prison and they script
some money together and like they bought at they went
and got a house kind of out of the way, out.
Speaker 1 (17:22):
Of their normal neighborhood, right.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
And during this time, Nipsey sold his car, he sold
a lot of his jewelry, and he was like broke.
He really was saying, I'm just going to be an artist.
He put all his money into putting up basically building
a recording studio in the house, and that's all he
did day and day out, recorded music, recorded music, recording music.
And one day the house got raided by the police
(17:48):
and and in it they found a gun that I
don't you know whoever it belonged to.
Speaker 1 (17:53):
And because.
Speaker 2 (18:00):
And I might be conflating different stories here, but basically
I think at the time he was on probation or
his brother was, whatever it might be. They end up
losing the house and you know, had to go to
jail and fight a case I believe his brother end
Up had to go to jail, they had to fight
a case, and in that they confiscated all of his
recording equipment. And I think for many people they would
have seen this as a sign from God, from the universe.
(18:23):
Like I, for the first time in my life went straight.
I'm not selling drugs, I'm not doing anything illegal, and
I'm just focusing on music and trying to make this happen.
And here I am sort of getting fucked by life essentially. Right,
(18:45):
But again, Nipsey refused to allow this to dictate his future.
Speaker 1 (18:50):
Right.
Speaker 2 (18:52):
He is a famous quote, you know, I'm paraphrasing where
he basically says like no, no one can stop me
from doing what I wanted to accept me or God basically.
And there's a lot of stories like this, when him
getting signed to a major record label and then like
you know, or even before that, doctor Dre was gonna
(19:13):
sign him, then he didn't happen this other person and
then the industry didn't want touch him because his gang affiliations.
And then he finally gets a major label deal, there's
all his buzz around him, and then all of a sudden.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
The label has a shake up.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
At the executive level, and they no longer believe in
the vision of Nipsey Hustle and they want to make
him like work with EDM produce and all. It's like,
so his debut album never gets released after it's already
recorded and done right, so many ups and downs that
he had to push through and believe in himself through, right,
And for me reading that story, it's a reminder of like,
(19:48):
this guy found success against all odds, right, But it's
a reminder that.
Speaker 3 (19:55):
The odds are bullshit. The odds have no meaning unless
you allow them to have meaning, right, I mean, and
we've seen this in sports where the underdog wins and
(20:15):
that's not a one off thing.
Speaker 2 (20:18):
And yeah, there's some truth to it, right where it's like, Okay,
the odds are being made this team, you know, matches
up better against that team, they have better talent, better record,
whatever it might be. But there's a reason why we
still have to play the game right. There's a reason
why the winner isn't determined based on the odds. It's
determined based on the outcome of said game. You still
(20:41):
have to fucking show up and win the game right
and play the game and on that court, it's anybody's
game who's playing better that night. And I think life
is is really very much like that. And I think
that often time past trauma, whether it's our own, whether
(21:04):
it's our own families, sort of beginst the cloud. That
message of like it can literally happen to anyone or
your past doesn't have to define you. Right, And I've
mentioned this a bunch, but like my parents, products of
(21:25):
their own environment, didn't believe.
Speaker 1 (21:31):
That people from our background.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
Could find success in the entertainment industry, let alone something
they truly love doing, right, I'm talking about myself here,
So for a long time there was a lot of
tug and pull about my capability of doing these things,
and as much as they wanted to support me, their
own past trauma didn't allow them to and made them
(21:55):
talk negatively about what I was doing.
Speaker 3 (22:02):
And a lot of people succumb to that messaging.
Speaker 2 (22:08):
Unfortunately a lot of us, and I have, at different
points in my life, allow the negative messaging to seep
through and convince us that what we feel in our
heart is wrong or make us doubt our own capabilities
at the end of the day. But I want to
(22:28):
point out and I don't try to. I don't minimize
how difficult this is. But with the awareness of hindsight here,
or just the awareness that we can have by having
a general conversation taking out the personal emotion or attachment
to a specific situation, that's the moment that caused us
(22:52):
to really fail, The moment that we started listening to
the negative chatter. Those are the moments that made us
not be capable of all we could be, and they're
(23:13):
the moments that allowed our past, or our circumstance to
define our future. Yes, life is hard, and for some
it's harder than others. And yes, some of us might
be going through an incredibly difficult fucking time right now.
Speaker 1 (23:29):
I don't take that away from anybody.
Speaker 2 (23:36):
But whether it's next week, next year, ten years from now,
with the right mindset, your life could be completely different
than it is right now or than it has been.
Speaker 1 (23:53):
I'm not going to blow smoke up your ass.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
And tell you that it's going to be easy or
that it's right around the corner. I can't give you
that guarantee. And that's particularly why I love somebody like
Nipsey Husse's story. You're talking about somebody who was dedicating
over a decade of their life at the highest possible
level of dedication towards a singular goal. And again it
(24:15):
took them over ten years to achieve what is you know,
recognizable success. So for some of us, myself included, our
path is going to be longer.
Speaker 1 (24:28):
For me. I was just thinking about this the other day.
Speaker 2 (24:30):
I was making fifteen dollars an hour up until I
was about thirty years old.
Speaker 1 (24:36):
Right.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
I didn't get a full time, like contracted job with
a higher salary bump.
Speaker 1 (24:45):
Until I was halfway through my thirtieth year of this
in this world. Right, So that was a lot of
belief that I had.
Speaker 2 (24:57):
To have in my vision, in myself and where I
think I could take this right, And the only reason
I achieved anything was because I had that innate belief
that regardless of the fact that I am, you know,
a Puerto Rican kid who is the product of you know,
(25:21):
two working class parents, you know, one of which and
my father broke up, debt and woke, you know, grew
up dead broke, and my mother being a teacher you know,
in the Bronx like the you know, I obviously could
(25:46):
have been born into much worse circumstances, but also I
wasn't born into a circumstance that would say, yeah, this
is going to be somebody who's going to like live
a life of purpose and make his dreams come true
and work for himself. There would have there's no clear
pathway to that based upon what I was born into.
My blind faith is what got me there, and even
(26:07):
now I have to have that same blind faith, right
because I have to find the belief in myself and say,
this wasn't a mistake, This wasn't luck that I found
myself in this position. This is the product of my
(26:29):
hard work, my vision, and my talent, and I can
continue to recreate that success and also elevate to a
higher level based upon all the factors that got me here.
Because I'm defining what I'm capable of, I'm not allowing
anybody else to and truthfully and even beyond that, right like,
(26:54):
there are a lot of people who didn't believe that
I could be doing these things, didn't see in me
what I saw on myself.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
I could have listened to them.
Speaker 2 (27:04):
I could have allowed them to define my future for me,
but I didn't, And I struggle now, but I still
fight to not allow that to continue to be the case, right,
And I think that's what's so inspiring about these stories
when you think about it, why I love them so
(27:24):
much and why I like to harp on it. Because
anything is truly possible, And as long as you're trying
to be better tomorrow, I don't believe anything you've done
(27:46):
in the past can really fuck up your entire life,
with the exception of.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
Maybe some really extreme things.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
And yeah, I do believe, you know, karma is real
and things you do can catch up to you. But
I believe that only happens when you don't learn the
lesson from them, and when you continue to sort of
play in the mud, if you will. Right, Like, on
the flip side of what we're talking about, somebody like Diddy,
his like world is crumbling right now in his past
has caught up to him because he continued to play
(28:18):
in that mud for years. Right He didn't, you know,
sort of have a negative experience like a nipsey hustle,
going to prison or whatever it might be, and then
turning his life around. Did He kept living in that mud.
And that's the difference right there, where your past can
catch up to you for sure, if you don't stop
the bullshit and try to course correct, right. And if
(28:41):
you course correct, I do believe good things will follow
as long as you keep staying faithful to the idea
that your life can be different than what it is
or what it has been.
Speaker 1 (28:50):
You know.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
I'm gonna pause here real quick, and then I want
to touch on Jelly roll story a little bit, because
I think it's also really inspiring, particularly for me, but
I think anybody listening as well. So we'll talk about
that in a second, but we'll take a quick break first,
and then we'll.
Speaker 1 (29:05):
Be right back.
Speaker 2 (29:10):
All right, We are back, and I want to touch
on the story of Jelly Roll, who, again you don't
have to know who this is to get something from it,
but he's a country musician who's now like one of
the new faces of modern country.
Speaker 1 (29:23):
And if you don't know who that.
Speaker 2 (29:24):
Would google it what he looks like, because he's not
what you'd expect as the face of country music. He
is a large dude with face tattoos where's Jordan's And
he himself comes from a background of addiction and prison time.
(29:53):
And his story is particularly interesting because he was a
drug dealer and I believe he was surrounded by addicts.
Speaker 1 (29:57):
I don't remember I specifically he was an.
Speaker 2 (29:58):
Addict, but definitely addiction being a part of his life,
being a part of the life of those around him,
those closest. And he spent some time in prison. I
believe his first child was born while he was actually
in prison. And he gets out of jail in his
mid twenties and begins to really start taking music far
(30:20):
more seriously than he had in the past. And for him,
his first big break didn't come again almost ten years later,
similar to Nipsey a decade later of doing this, and
his first big break was literally like a regional song.
And what I also love about his story again, your
(30:41):
past doesn't have to define your future. He started out
as a hip hop artist and then would include singing
in some of his songs, and people gravitated towards that,
and he sort of began to pivot more into making
songs where he was singing andevitably became countries from Tennessee
and then again ten years plus of trying to do
(31:04):
something has some regional success on a whim.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
He is inspired and I.
Speaker 2 (31:15):
Think he had a dream, if I'm not mistaken, woke
up and was inspired by the dream and writes this
song called save Me, And the next day he's has
to be in the studio anyway, they're like wrapping up
final production on an album that he was making, and
they record this song, and they finished writing it and
recording it all in the span of like forty eight hours.
(31:38):
And I believe they even shot like a video for
an acoustic video for it in the studio and just
randomly drop it and that video goes viral, like crazy viral,
and all of a sudden, Jelly Roll is now this
big name in country music. Right, But again, this is
(32:00):
ten years of this dude plugging away. This is a
dude who started out making a completely different genre of music,
a dude who his life was trailer parks and drugs
in jail time.
Speaker 1 (32:12):
And I alluded to this at the beginning of the show.
Speaker 2 (32:15):
But he then is nominated for like Grammys and nominated
in the Country Music Awards CMAS and wins Best New
Artists there, and he stands up there and gives us
really fucking inspiring speech. I employ to go find the
whole speech. It's not super long, it's Copdan. It's long,
(32:37):
but again talks about the irony of a thirty nine
year old man winning Best New Artist Dude thirty nine
years old by music industry standards is ancient, particularly if
you are a new artist like most record labels wouldn't
(32:59):
look to Why sit you at that age.
Speaker 1 (33:01):
You're too old to be a star.
Speaker 2 (33:04):
To be relatable at that point unless you had previous success.
But there he is, thirty nine years old winning Best
New Artists, defying the odds and the standards and the
norms of his industry, and that, right, there is a
lesson in the past doesn't have to define you, right,
(33:25):
or the way things have previously been done or normally
done doesn't have to define your success, because we get
tripped up on that a lot as well, where it's like, oh,
I don't see anybody who looks like me doing this thing,
or who sounds like me, or who is in my
style doing this thing. That must mean it's not wanted
(33:45):
or needed. There's not an opportunity for me. And you're
dead wrong there, right. If you're doing something and you
don't see people doing it in the way that you're
doing it, that should fucking be an alarm belt in
your head that you're onto something. But again, we've been
trained by previous generations and societal norms of like what's
(34:11):
normal and the idea of our circumstances dictating our lives
at any given moment, no matter what we're going through,
we have the ability to take charge of our life
(34:31):
and not allow those circumstances to dictate the rest of
our life. And that quote that I alluded to what
he said, he said, there's a reason why the windshield
on our car is bigger than the rear view mirror. Right,
rear view mirror, the little mirror on the top of
your windshield. It's important because you do need to see
what's behind you, but the higher priority is what's in
(34:55):
front of you.
Speaker 1 (34:56):
Right.
Speaker 2 (34:56):
From a technical standpoint of driving a car, you're going
to crack if you're just staring.
Speaker 1 (35:00):
Into the rear view mirror.
Speaker 2 (35:03):
Now, it's important to know what's going on in back you. Right,
So the analogy would be, it's great to learn the
lessons from the past to be aware of those things.
But once you've done that, you know, once you've glanced
into your rear view mirror, it's eyes back on the
road in front of you. Right, the windshield is where
(35:23):
you're going, That's what's important. That's far more important than
what's behind you. What's in front of you is far
more important, which is why the windshield.
Speaker 1 (35:33):
Is bigger than the rear view mirror. And I think
what I was called something I was called.
Speaker 3 (35:39):
To today.
Speaker 2 (35:46):
In this podcast. You know, I have somebody on my
heart that I'm thinking of. You know, I'm not going
to call him out by name, but one of one
of somebody who I've met as a listener of the
show and we've stayed in contact with social media, and
he reached out to me just letting me know that
he's going through a really difficult moment for him and
his family right now.
Speaker 3 (36:03):
And I hope that a message like this gets through
to you.
Speaker 2 (36:18):
And I know you're going through difficult moment and I
speak to anybody who is. But this doesn't have to
define you or where your life is going to go
after this. Yeah it might slow you down. Yeah you
have some shit to figure out and work through, but
(36:40):
you can and will work through it. And as long
as you have the right mindset, this won't define you.
And in fact, one day it's just going to be
something that you look back on and reflect on and
use it as a teachable moment or a lesson or
a moment to say, I'm just so grateful that we
(37:00):
moved through that and that I had the presence of
mind to not get lost in a negative headspace that
would make that moment my permanent reality, or make that
that sadness, that anger, that frustration I was feeling in
that moment a permanent way of being, because.
Speaker 1 (37:17):
That's what it also ends up happening. A lot of times.
Speaker 2 (37:21):
We get caught in frustration, anger, disappointment, or that that
sort of like that just feeling of being trapped by
your circumstances, and we allow it to become a way
of life for us. And I think that's that's the
trap so many people fall into. It's like a it's
(37:44):
like an elephant. I could fuck up this analogy of
the story, but like they're talking about how elephant keepers
they have elephants on like these leashes or whatever, and
they have them trained to think that these leashes can
contain them.
Speaker 1 (37:59):
Really, leashes are like connected to a small stake in
the ground.
Speaker 2 (38:04):
An elephant, which is incredibly powerful and you know, just
gigantic animal could easily rip this thing out of the
ground if it wanted to. But it's been trained to
think that it's stuck in that place, so it never
actually tries to. And I think that's what oftentimes happens
to so many of us, particularly marginalized communities, who have
(38:27):
known nothing but pain and suffering for the most part,
or have gone through intense traumatic experiences, or haven't seen
themselves represented in places of prestige or success. Right, we
become the elephant, the elephant who doesn't know its own strength,
who doesn't realize that we literally could just rip off
(38:49):
the leash that's holding us back, the chains that are
holding us back from living the life that we want
to live, the freedom that we're longing for. And I
think that's what's important to sort of realize we have
so much power in our mentality, you know, the way
that we think we could have so much power, I
(39:11):
should say, but oftentimes we relinquish that by giving into
the negativity around us, the naysayers, the dire circumstances we've
been dealt. We allow them to make us think we
are weaker than we actually are, we are more powerless
(39:31):
than we actually are, that we don't deserve to be
in the places that we know we are capable of
being somewhere deep inside of us or the places we
belong to be. And I think that is what is
trapping and historically has trapped so many of our previous
generations of our community.
Speaker 1 (39:48):
But so many of us still.
Speaker 3 (39:50):
Fall into that trap, or even when we're in.
Speaker 2 (39:53):
Spaces, we don't give ourselves the credit or minimize ourselves
because we still feel like we don't belong here.
Speaker 1 (40:04):
And that's sort of what I'm getting at, And that's.
Speaker 2 (40:05):
Why this chapter was so powerful for me, a powerful
reminder for me, because I recognize so much of what
holds me back is me personally. Now we'll tie everything
we talked about today in a neat little boat in
a segment called conclusion STU. But first we'll take one
more quick break and then we'll be right back time
(40:27):
for company soon, all right. So I hope that that
was just maybe a reminder that some of us needed,
you know, to keep pushing, to have patience, to recognize
that all of our journeys are different. Some of us
(40:48):
are blessed to find what we've been looking for at
a younger age. Others have to wait longer to find
said life that they're driving for.
Speaker 1 (40:58):
But in either circumstance.
Speaker 2 (41:00):
And even if you haven't gotten there yet, regardless of
of what age you are in this life, or where
you are, or whatever it might be, you have the
capability of getting there. It's just maintaining the mindset that
keeps you energized and working towards it. Right, Like, the
thing I keep fucking harping on is it's you versus you, Right,
(41:23):
it's you versus you. The only defeat can come at
the hands of yourself, essentially you giving up, you, relinquishing
your power to external circumstances. Outside of that, inevitably you
can win. Inevitably, you can get to a place that
(41:46):
you're happy about in your life. But you have to
just keep fucking going. You have to maintain the faith. Right,
talk about Nipsey Hustle. Dude went through so many circumstances.
I didn't even get a chance to mention here, like,
so many ups and downs, so many moments where he
was about to make it, and then something happened and
it set him back to square one, and he just
(42:07):
kept fucking going, kept chipping at it like a cycle, right, Like,
like just this determined psychoticness, and eventually he got there,
you know, jelly roll, same fucking thing. Like man, dude
is not supposed to be the face of country music,
yet here he is the new face of country music.
Speaker 1 (42:30):
Right here he is.
Speaker 2 (42:31):
Though it's just beautiful. I'm not supposed to be here
talking to you. Here I am, and I've so many
other things I want to do, and I remind myself, Dude,
you've got this, and everybody listening doesn't matter what your
past says, what the norms are.
Speaker 1 (42:46):
You got this.
Speaker 2 (42:47):
You have the ability to prove everybody wrong. Underdog stories
happen all the fucking time. Why can't you be one
of those stories? The only answer to that, as to
why you can't be.
Speaker 1 (43:00):
Is because you give up on yourself.
Speaker 2 (43:02):
If you don't, you too can be bigger and better
than the circumstances you were born into. The circumstances that
you find yourself in right now. You just have to
keep going. And yeah, I know it's easier said than done.
It's fucking tough, it's demoralizing, it's heartbreaking when these setbacks happen.
But again, it's what do you allow your mind to
(43:24):
do in those moments? Do you allow your mind to
just give up and to essentially say all right, life,
all right, job, all right, this blah blah blah, this person,
I'm gonna allow you to now be my ruler and
you dictate what my quality of life is gonna be,
because that's what you're doing. When you give up, you're
just saying, hey, all right, fuck it. Let somebody else
(43:46):
or something else decide what my life is gonna look like.
And guess what, they're not going to probably give a
fuck much about it, right or by you being negative
or down or not giving a fuck about yourself, that's
how your interactions world are going to go. People are
gonna pick up on that, and you're going to get
the bottom of the barrel in every aspect of your
(44:06):
life because you have.
Speaker 1 (44:07):
Not made the distinction that you deserve more.
Speaker 2 (44:12):
And it's a tough pill to swallow, right to reflect
back on our life and all that we've seen and
all the fucking mistakes and us not being where we
want to be. It's a tough pill to swallow and
say I have nobody to blame or place responsibility on
but myself. And I can either be angry at that statement,
(44:37):
or I could use it as a moment of awakening
to say no more. Right, And I say this to myself, Yeah,
I can.
Speaker 3 (44:46):
I can, fucking I can blame circumstance.
Speaker 2 (44:49):
Right. I even started this by saying an opportunity fell
through that was out of my hands, and yet to
a degree it was. But there are two things there.
In reflection. I could have been a bigger pain in
the ass to those people who are dragging their feet
and made them make this a priority just to get
(45:09):
me off their back, or be like I am now
picking up the pieces and saying, all right, I'm gonna
be quarterback on this.
Speaker 1 (45:20):
I'm gonna figure this out. I'm not going to allow
that to be a loss. I'm gonna allow it to
be a setback.
Speaker 2 (45:28):
And now I'm going to figure out how to pick
up the pieces and rebuild this thing that I worked
so hard on.
Speaker 1 (45:36):
And now, knowing what I know.
Speaker 2 (45:42):
And that I'm gonna care about this more than anybody else,
is going to moving forward, I'm gonna be a fucking
shark and a hawk and making sure everybody's doing their
job and doing things on time.
Speaker 1 (45:56):
Right.
Speaker 2 (45:57):
I could have allowed that moment to break me, but
instead of making a fucking learning lesson, and I'm moving
forward with my life and That's what I want for
all of you going through something. Develop that mindset, like
that's the only way we're going to survive this thing
called life.
Speaker 1 (46:14):
That's the only we're going to make the best of it.
Speaker 2 (46:15):
We have to have this mindset and don't beat yourself
up in the moments that you give in or you
cave in.
Speaker 3 (46:20):
Like it's awareness. It all starts with awareness, awareness to.
Speaker 1 (46:23):
The power you have.
Speaker 2 (46:25):
Then in those moments, you might fall short of what
you wanted to say or do, but it's a lesson
and it keeps building up that awareness. So in the
moment you catch yourself when you're going down that negative mindset,
you flip it and you say, nope, I'm in control.
Where's the opportunity, where's the lesson. That's what it is,
catch yourself in that moment. So I feel like maybe
I've been a bit redundant with some of these talking points,
(46:46):
but legitimately it's been so obvious to me how important
it is to develop this mindset and how so many
of us unfortunately haven't been taught that mindset or don't
believe in ourselves in the way that we should. And
I want to keep rid of reading that. So hope
this helps somebody out there. If you're going through something tough,
I get it. I empathize for you. But it's up
(47:10):
to you to get yourself out of that situation, and
you can do it. You just have to keep believing
in yourself. With that said, thank you so much for
tuning in. I will catch you on Thursday for an
exciting Thursday Trends episode.
Speaker 1 (47:23):
A lot going on until then at DJ Dramas. You
want to be a part of.
Speaker 2 (47:27):
The new Mastermind just be social club again. It's free
group membership thing we're doing now. We're building out a
real community. I'm really excited and it just takes all
of us showing up. So more messages like this one,
private stuff that you won't be able to find anywhere else.
So just DM me at DJ Dramas you want a
link to that, and I'll send you the link so
you could join our new community over there. With that said,
(47:48):
I'll catch you on Thursday, so then stay safe, we'll
talk soon. Life as a Good INNGO is a production
of the micro Thura podcast Network and iHeartRadio
Host
DJ Dramos
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