December 23, 2025 • 36 mins
What if next year wasn’t about becoming someone new — but finally becoming yourself?
In this special year-end episode of My Legacy, hosts Martin Luther King III, Arndrea Waters King, Marc Kielburger, and Craig Kielburger revisit powerful conversations about truth, courage, and the freedom that comes from living authentically — even when it’s hard, messy, or misunderstood.
Featuring:
- Sarah Jakes Roberts on embracing your story, breaking silence, and finding purpose through radical honesty
- Marie Forleo on letting go of perfection, trusting your voice, and learning to observe without absorbing
- Sterling K. Brown on stepping off the expected path and answering a deeper calling
- Jemele Hill on courage, integrity, and standing in your truth when the stakes are high
- Sophia Bush on shedding expectations, honoring change, and finally coming home to yourself
If you’re entering the new year ready to stop performing and start living in alignment, this episode is your invitation to step into the truest version of you.
Subscribe for more extraordinary conversations with remarkable people.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Vest was about the expectation on women, the exhausting demand
to be small, but not so small, to no matter
what you do, you have a career. How dare you
not have kids? You have kids? How dare you not
have a career? You wait to consider getting married. You're
(00:24):
a crone. You got married young. You must have been
dumb and you didn't know what you were doing. It's
just we can't quite get it right. I'd tried to
make everybody happy, I'd lost my individual way.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
New Year, mel you, how about true you?
Speaker 3 (00:42):
In this best of episode of My Legacy House, Martin
Luther King the Third, Andrea Waters, King, Mark Kilberger, and
Craig Kilberger look back on the conversations that reveal what
it really means to tell the truth about who you
are and stand in it even when it's hard or messy.
We'll hear from Marie Forley on My success starts with
being yourself. Jamel Hill on how courage isn't planned, it's revealed.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
Sterling K.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
Brown on stepping off the expected path to set yourself free.
Sophia Bush, I'm letting go of others expectations to live
your own best life. First up, Sarah Jakes Roberts on
how embracing her truth became her greatest calling.
Speaker 4 (01:22):
Sarah becoming a mom at fourteen, I'm sure that was
a lot of judgment, a lot of pressure, expectations, especially
when you look at it within the faith community, right,
So what do you remember around that in that moment
and how do you feel it shaped you and your
legacy moving forward.
Speaker 5 (01:44):
Fourteen is such a young age to become a mother
that I think to properly contextualize it, you have to
understand that I was not afraid of being pregnant or
having a baby. I thought I was going to get
in trouble. I'm like, oh my gosh, I'm going to
get grounded or my parents to be so upset. It
wasn't until I saw their response that I began to
(02:04):
realize that this is much bigger than like you got
in trouble, Like your life has completely changed. But to
my mom's credit, one of the things she told me,
she's like, I didn't get rid of my babies. I
didn't give them away. Whatever you decide to do, I'm
going to stick with you every step of the way.
And she did that, and a man, there were so
many moments where I've won. I felt like the pregnancy
(02:26):
just solidified this idea that I don't belong in that family.
So if you go back to that image of me
as a little girl being confused and amazed, I think
in that moment, it was solidified, like, oh, my goodness,
you don't belong here, and so it became so easy
for me to kind of move into the background. But
I think in moving into the background that it also
gave me an opportunity to discover my identity outside of
(02:49):
my family name. It's like I'm already the black Sheep,
I'm already disconnected. Now I get to just kind of
figure out who I am and what I want to
do with my life. And though my life had certainly
had some twisting turns, even since having the pregnancy, I
found a real sense of being okay with myself without
the validation of other people, because I'd lost it in
many ways. And the moment that I began to really say,
(03:11):
you know what, this is my story. I'm gonna love it,
I'm gonna embrace it, and I'm gonna wake up each
day and really do the best that I can. I
begin to see my life change for myself and so
I started writing this blog just about me. I was
in this toxic marriage, and I was like, you know what,
my life is unraveling, and I'm gonna help it come
undone by telling these stories on this blog. And people
(03:33):
started gravitating towards my message, like, oh my gosh, that's me.
You took the words that I couldn't say, Oh my gosh,
this is what I would pray to God if I
could pray these things. And I was like, oh my goodness,
this is not ministry, Like, this is just me telling
my story. I can't be a ministry. I'm a teen mom.
And so I wrote this blog post where I was like,
I'm gonna just let everybody know that I'm a teen
mom so they can stop putting that pressure on me.
(03:53):
It kind of backfired because they were like, oh my goodness,
now that I know that you have a story too,
now I trust you even more.
Speaker 6 (04:01):
And Sarah, when I think of your ministry and I
think of women involve it has been built on this
radical transparency, Like you have redefined what it means to
be a woman of faith based on radical transparency, your past,
your marriage, You're sharing your stories. Why has it been
so important for you to be this radically transparent with
all those.
Speaker 7 (04:21):
Who look to you.
Speaker 5 (04:23):
You know, I don't know that I saw it as
radical when it started. Like I said, I kind of
thought that if I told people, they would be like, oh,
my goodness, will leave her alone and it won't be
a thing. But the more that I realized how many
of us are suffering in silence, the more I felt like,
if I can tell my story and it helps someone else,
then I'll tell it one more time, and if it
helps someone else, I'll tell it another time. And I
(04:46):
think what I have learned is that through isolation, the
darker voices, the harder voices, the meaner voices that we
hear in our head, they're louder, and until you hear
someone say like, hey, I felt that too. But I'm
telling you it wasn't always like that, or that I
found a flicker that it gives someone permission to start
looking for light even in their dark seasons. And I
(05:09):
didn't want to. I didn't want to be in ministry.
I didn't have this as like a goal in my heart.
And so I'm like, if I'm gonna do this, I'm
gonna at least be honest. I don't want anyone to
ever be surprised that because I preached a message that
I experienced depression, that I worked at a strip club,
Like I want you to know, like this is what
you're getting. It is not much, but I am gonna
(05:30):
give my best. I'm gonna share my best, and if
I make you feel less alone, then girl, we could
grab arms and move towards better together. But I just didn't.
I just didn't want to. I didn't want to live
on a pedestal. I wanted to be able to Sometimes
on my social media, I'll be like all glammed up,
dressed up. Other moments I'll literally be snatching my wig
off and washing my face like this is like this
(05:51):
is all of who I am, and I just don't
want people to be connected to this caricature. I don't
want to be trapped in my own life, and so
for me, my honesty has been my freedom. My honesty
has been the runway that allows me to not feel
stuck in this life. And I think because of that,
(06:11):
my prayer is that I'll continue to have endurance for
what is ahead because I don't have to figure out
how do I keep this mask up? How do I
keep this facade going? My greatest question is how do
I continue to be honest in a way that reaches
the most unlikely person?
Speaker 8 (06:31):
Ria, I wanted to ask you a question. You know,
it was many years ago when you were twenty three
years old. You had the courage to launch Marie TV
when many women at that time were not creating that
type of content. And that was courageous, that was adacious,
that was wonderful and obviously been now very successful. I'm
sure there's been lots of upstowns in that process. But
how did you find your confidence and trust in yourself
(06:54):
to go ahead and to create that vision, to create
that platform, to create that voice.
Speaker 9 (06:59):
I was born in seventy five, so it was kind
of grown up in the eighties there. And my idea
of a successful, powerful business woman had like huge shoulder
pads and she was in this corner glass office. It
was kind of imagery that I think I just saw
in the media. And I had this notion that one
had to be perfectly educated and speak at a particular
(07:21):
level and use particular language in order to be successful.
And I remember being on Wall Street, on the floor
of the New York Stock exchange and trying to kind
of step into my idealized image of what a successful
young woman was. And I tried to do that in
the magazine world, both on the advertising side and the
editorial side, and kind of all these different beautiful opportunities
(07:43):
that were career opportunities. But I kept feeling completely disconnected
because I was trying to be something that I wasn't.
And so after feeling like a failure and leaving jobs,
even though I had a very strong work ethic and
I was never afraid of work, I couldn't deny from
a soul level that I wasn't where my soul wanted.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Me to be.
Speaker 9 (08:07):
And the moment that I relaxed and said, you know what,
I don't speak perfectly, I don't have I graduated from college.
I was the first in my family to go to college.
But I don't have higher degrees. I am way far
from perfect. I'm quirky, I'm weird, I have a strange
sense of humor. I like all of these different things.
And I started just expressing the true essence.
Speaker 2 (08:27):
Of who I am.
Speaker 9 (08:29):
That's actually when things started to come together. So releasing
this notion of perfection, releasing this notion of having to
be someone that I genuinely wasn't. That was the only
place it came from. That and just a lot of
pain of failure of trying to be something I wasn't
and it did not work out.
Speaker 8 (08:46):
You taught me so many these amazing things, and I
want you to share with us what are the coolest
things that you've taught me that I love, And just
explain this to our viewers in the way that you
do because you're such a great storyteller, which is observe,
don't absorb.
Speaker 9 (09:01):
Yeah, I think first of all, this is really really helpful,
especially for those of us who are empaths, those of
us who are really also sensitive to energy, those of
us who tend to also have people in our lives that,
let's say, have different kind of energy that is not
necessarily a good chemistry match for you. So the notion
of observing and not absorbing. And I'll just say this,
(09:24):
you know, for especially what my life has been like
these past couple years. You know, family, we love them,
and then sometimes same thing like Josh and I you
need to shake each other.
Speaker 2 (09:34):
Because you're like God, gotta get away.
Speaker 9 (09:37):
Same thing can happen in our work environments and with
our friendships. So I think observing someone it's like observing
what they're going through, having ultimate compassion for what they're experiencing,
being there in terms of listening, mirroring what they're going through,
without absorbing it into your own energetic field, taking it on,
(09:59):
becoming responsible for fixing it, for figuring it out, or
thinking that you are necessarily the cause of this other
person's distress or upset or stress, even if they tell
you that you are. So you know, I have been
through this most recently and again my mom, God bless her.
(10:20):
She's still with us. She's struggling a lot right now.
And you know, she said some things in the past
little stretch of time that were extremely hurtful and some
might say cruel. I've shared some things with Christian. She
was like, WHOA, that's a lot. And so it comes
back to this notion of me going like and I
can observe her in her pain. I can observe her
(10:42):
what she's experiencing, which is a lot of terror and
a lot of fear and a lot of loss of control.
And I can empathize with the notion of what she's
experiencing and how those lash outs might be directed at
me if I'm in her presence, but I don't have
to absorb it and take it on. I don't need
to be a sponge, and I don't need to. As
(11:03):
painful as this is. As the daughter of the woman
who taught me that everything is figure outable, I don't
have to figure it out for her, nor is that
my role. I can trust at a very deep level
that there is for me, and this is my own
belief system. There is a higher power watching over her.
She is on her own soulful and spiritual journey, and
(11:26):
the greatest gift I can give both her and myself
is to show up. And Chris taught me this one
only love in the room, meaning bringing only love in
the room. Can I observe her and not absorb that negativity?
Can I observe her and not absorb her pain and
her fear?
Speaker 2 (11:43):
As my own?
Speaker 6 (11:45):
Scrolling won't change your life, but subscribing just might tap
that button and stay connected to conversations.
Speaker 10 (11:50):
That can.
Speaker 2 (12:00):
Now back to my legacy.
Speaker 6 (12:02):
I am enough of a fan of yours that I
did actually at one point watch one of your films
and go, gosh, is he a classical train actor. Did
he study Shakespeare? I remember googling your background and going
what he went to Stanford for economics and then worked
at the Federal Reserve. Like that, I did not expect
as a background. So when did acting move from a
hobby to a calling for you?
Speaker 7 (12:22):
Uh? Sure?
Speaker 10 (12:23):
So I acted all during high school from Saint Louis, Missouri,
and had a great time doing it, but didn't know
or consider to be a practical pursuit. I got in
Stanford University and they had the number one e coime program,
and I was like great. I was in a program
called in Roads for minority students interested in business and industry.
I had an internship at the Federal Reserve Bank, and
(12:46):
for two years I had like a pretty clearly set path. Right,
I was gonna get up. I probably go into investment banking.
Speaker 7 (12:52):
I do all right.
Speaker 10 (12:53):
I had to make a contribution to my family. I
always thought that a pursuit of the arts was something
for people who didn't have to make a financial contribution
to their families or their community, et cetera. It was
a privilege that I was not afforded in my mind.
Got to Stanford University and I was living in one
of the ethnic theme houses, the African American theme house
(13:16):
called Jamay, which they thought mint unity, but it actually
means cooperative economics is one of the seven principles of Quanta. Well,
you know, we tried. It was the seventies. We're trying
to figure stuff out anywhere.
Speaker 4 (13:27):
And by the way, they're still touting that. We were
just touring a couple of weeks ago, and they're like
Stirling And here's why I mean like that is that
is part of that is part of your religion, the legend.
Speaker 2 (13:38):
Yes, so sorry, keep going.
Speaker 7 (13:40):
That's the wife and I lived in that present together.
Speaker 10 (13:43):
We did our first play together, and it was the
first time because I went to this college prep school,
first time getting a chance to play.
Speaker 7 (13:50):
A part that was specifically African American.
Speaker 10 (13:53):
I'd done Tennessee Williams and aren't familiar and all these
sorts of things Shakespeare, but like to do the words
of August Willison and the play Joe Turner Coming Gone
has this man is trying to reunite his daughter with
her mother because he gets taken away from his family
and put in a chain game. And I had a
wonderful time during the show and Professor Elon, who was
(14:15):
a black man at Stanford who directed the play, and
he said, listen, I know you don't plan on major
any this, but I think that the department gets a
lot from your involvement in it, and I think you
get something out of it as well. So why don't
you just keep auditioning for plays? And that's what I did,
And after two years of doing that, I said, oh,
this thing that I think is a hobby is actually
(14:38):
the calling. My grades and ECON would go up and
all my other classes would go up anytime I was
doing a play because I was doing something that fed
my soul and I wasn't following a path that I thought.
Speaker 7 (14:48):
I was supposed to be on that other people thought
I was supposed to be on.
Speaker 10 (14:51):
I was on the path that I was supposed to
be on because God told me. And I went to
my mom. I said, Mom, thing about changing my major
and she said, okay. I said, I'm thinking about changing
it to acting. And she said what I knew, And
she said and she said, Andrew, she goes, did you
pray about it? And I said, yes, ma'am, I did,
(15:11):
and she said, and this is the way you feel led?
And I said, yes, ma'am, I do, and she has
been one of my staunchest supporters from that moment, hasn't missed.
Speaker 7 (15:20):
The play et cetera.
Speaker 10 (15:22):
She now has been living with als for the past
eight years or so, but up until that point she
was everywhere that I was in a performance.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
So beautiful, gerline, you've called Revn beckwith a spiritual mentor when.
Speaker 11 (15:35):
You first heard his teachings, what immediately resonated with you?
Speaker 10 (15:40):
Wow, this is so interesting because I think there there
there are things that when I first introduced to a
Gape through my wife Ryan the Schellbata, who went there
first and coming from a very sort of like fundamentalist
Christian background, it was interesting because I was.
Speaker 7 (15:59):
Like, what is this dude?
Speaker 10 (16:03):
Right? There are certain things they're like like just sort
of like not necessarily what I was accustomed to.
Speaker 7 (16:09):
And then I had to listen with new ears.
Speaker 10 (16:14):
It's as if, as in the Bible, say, give me
ears to hear, eyes to see in a heart of understanding.
And there was nothing but love that was coming from
out of his mouth. That's all I could hear. I
was hearing about ways to connect with people. I was
hearing about this sort of false illusion of separation and scarcity,
and it sort of melted away. And I was in
(16:35):
the congregation and hymns would be playing, and people would
be dancing and they would be fully self expressed. And
there would be people like who came from a very
black church background, and they were hitting the beat and
they were jamming the groupment. And then there were people
from a very different background and they're dancing, very.
Speaker 7 (16:52):
Flowy and moving.
Speaker 10 (16:54):
I said, how beautiful is this that everybody can be
in this space together and expressed themselves as they are, authentically,
fully truly, And I saw the division that I thought
existed melted away, and I was able and free to
just love people as they are. I think that is
(17:15):
the greatest gift that the rev Has sort of led
me in this journey, is to love people unconditionally.
Speaker 7 (17:22):
And I don't even think we recognize.
Speaker 10 (17:23):
How the conditions we place on our love until you
get a chance to see it at the sixty thousand
foot view and be like, oh wow, I actually had
more judgment than I was conscious of.
Speaker 7 (17:34):
Right, Wow, that's amazing. That is just beautiful description of
a gape man in your experience as beautiful. Thank you
that you're beautiful too. Man.
Speaker 6 (17:48):
You talk about courage, and I want to reflect on
what that courage has meant because you know, very famously
in twenty eighteen, you called out President Trump's racism, You
called out Jerry Jones his stance on players taking a knee,
and that ultimately cost you your job. You know that
that's courage. And so when you talk about courage, when
(18:09):
you reflect back on that time, what did that teach
you about your voice? What did that teach you about
your values? And frankly, what did it teach you about
your willingness to risk it all for what you believe in?
Speaker 12 (18:19):
Well, I'm sure a lot of people who have been
in far more dangerous positions than that one. Especially as
you know, with you all being so intimately acquainted with
the civil rights movement, is that you don't know if
you're going to meet the moment until the moment find you.
Speaker 2 (18:33):
You have no idea.
Speaker 12 (18:35):
So if you would have asked me before that actually happened, Hey,
if this was the scenario, what would you do? You
think you know what you would do, You think you
know how you might respond, but you don't really actually
know till you're right there in the fire and so
all of the decisions that I made as the you know,
White House called for me to be fired, as you know,
(18:56):
Donald Trump singled me out on social media as that
was happening. I mean, I'm making mental decisions in real time,
and I had to sort of have a few moments
with myself and saying like, Okay, if this results in
you being fired, like right in this moment, what are
you going to do? Or if they put it on
the table, hey, either apologize to the president or you're
(19:19):
gonna have to leave here.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
What are you gonna do?
Speaker 12 (19:22):
And I every instinct and every cell in my body
was like, if they asked me to apologize to the president,
I'm not gonna do it. And I made that clear
very early. I'm never apologizing to him. I said what
I said, and we just got to live with that.
The other part of it, too, is like knowing that, hey,
if this is the end of the road right here.
You know, I didn't leave ESP until a year later,
(19:44):
and I'd left on my own terms, and if at
the moment they had to make a business decision, I
just I would have lived with it. I mean, it
wouldn't feel good, especially given all the work that I
put in to get to that point, and there's not
many people who get the opportunity to anchor the six
o'clock Sports Center, one of the sort of treasured time
(20:06):
slots at ESPN.
Speaker 2 (20:08):
But if that was the result, that was the result.
Speaker 12 (20:10):
And at when stuff like this happens, where your integrity
and your character is questioned.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
You have to be able to live with yourself.
Speaker 12 (20:19):
And I would not have been able to live with
myself had I capitulated in a way that I think
would not have spoke to who authentically I am. So
it was a lot of lessons that I've found out
in real time, and just because the situation was there,
And I'm thankful for that, because when similar situations, maybe
(20:43):
not always involving the President of the United States, but
when other tests of your character, your integrity, when those
things happen, it's muscle memory.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
Now you're confident because you've already done it.
Speaker 12 (20:57):
And I've done it at a level that most people
don't get to do it at. And so when I'm
in meetings or in determining business relationships and things pop
up where you have to stand on something, I'm so
much more comfortable doing that because I've already done it before.
It's very similar to, you know, an athlete. I mean,
(21:18):
I'm sure Michael Jordan missed a lot of game winning
shots before he actually made him, and when he finally
made one, it became muscle memory, and then after that
that dude was never losing. So I sort of approach
it with the mentality that an athlete might.
Speaker 4 (21:31):
So even before that happened. Let's also go back to
your beginning days of ESPN, because as you mentioned earlier,
you found yourself in rooms where you were, you know,
most times one, if not the only woman, you know,
certainly probably the only black woman. So if we're talking
about legacy on this show, you know, and you at
(21:54):
ESPN early two thousands, you know that legacy is there.
But you said, what about that time, that it is
both isolating and yet motivating. Can you share with our
listeners a little bit by what you mean by that?
Speaker 12 (22:08):
So the isolating part is when I was a sports
columnist at the Orlando Sentinel. This would have been in
two thousand and five. In most of two thousand and six,
I was the only black female sports columnist at a
daily newspaper in North America, and noticed I didn't just
say America.
Speaker 7 (22:27):
Right.
Speaker 12 (22:27):
So that's one out of four hundred and five newspapers,
and that is an embarrassing statistic for the.
Speaker 2 (22:34):
Profession of journalism.
Speaker 12 (22:37):
And a lot of people might have thought that that
would have given me some sense of accomplishment.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
It did not. It.
Speaker 12 (22:43):
What it was communicating to me, and even worse, communicating
to other women who might want to get in the business,
is that your voices aren't necessary nor are they valued.
And so that's the isolating part, and you know it
also comes with a lot of scrutiny because you're the
only one, and a lot of black people have been
in this situation in all industries. Is that when you're
(23:07):
the only one, you then become the test case, right,
So you have to carry yourself a certain way because
you are living with the burden of if I mess up,
no one else is coming after me. Black people aren't perfect, right,
So it's like, if I make some junior mistakes or whatever,
if that's the reason why you won't see value in
(23:29):
black women having voices in the sports space, then that
to me reflects more on you than it does on me.
So you're carrying all of this, but at the same time,
you know, getting to ESPN, a place that is considered
to be for our profession at the very top. If
you're in sports media, being the most powerful sports media
company in America, then you know there's something to be
(23:53):
celebrated by being able to advance and take that step
and realize that all the hard work has brought you
to this place and brought you to this sense of elevation.
But it's always to me about who is able to
come behind you. As a result, now ESPN is in
a very different position because they can hire whoever they want,
(24:14):
and you look at their team picture and it's very
diverse because they have a lot of women. And even
before I got there, Robin Roberts was the one who
set the table, you know, and so they've always had
a steady pipeline of women of color and putting them
in certain positions. Where I was a little bit different
(24:36):
is that they were traditional anchors, and I was one
of the few that were able to develop a footthol
and an imprint at ESPN by giving my opinion, by
creating conversation based off my perspective and my experience that
I had as a sports journalist over the course of
many years, so I was very thrilled to be but
(25:00):
I also was fully aware that if I walk into
one more room and I'm the only one in there,
that's not a good room. It's like there, I've never
been one of those people. And there, unfortunately are some
people of color who are like this that they do
want to be the only one in the room. I
don't want to be the only one in the room
because I don't know everything. I don't represent the entire
(25:22):
totality of women of black women.
Speaker 2 (25:24):
I do not do that. And so it's important that.
Speaker 12 (25:29):
We all you know, when we go in these rooms,
that's not just about getting in the room. It's about
getting in the room and kind of breaking it up
and opening the door even wider so that more of us.
So it's a you know, a flood of us coming in.
Speaker 4 (25:41):
I loved when Kamala Harris said upon accepting the vice presidency,
I might be the first, but I won't be the last.
I love that sentiment. And so here you are at
you know ESPN, you know, seemingly from the outside, you know,
riding on top of the world. Then you had this
(26:02):
unfair attack and this fall from where you had worked
so hard to be But throughout all of that Ian
was there and he, you know, walked with you through
that storm and was always at your side. So my
question is for you, Ian, and particularly for couples that
are listening right now and if they're going through the storm,
(26:24):
they're watching someone that they love go through the storm,
what advice would you have for couples walking that path.
Speaker 11 (26:32):
I believe communication is the key, you know, constant communication.
When Jamel had when she was going through her storm,
really first and foremost, I wanted to make sure that
I was there and she felt my presence and she
knew that she wasn't alone. We had a lot of
good times and that was probably the most challenging part
(26:53):
of our relationship up up to that point. So my
biggest thing was making sure that she didn't feel alone,
making sure that she felt my presence and we were
going to get through this together. And naturally, I'm a fixer,
so sometimes I have to dial that back because sometimes
she may just want event and she just needs a
listening ear versus you know, solution after solution. But my
(27:17):
goal was to remain positive throughout the entire situation because
I knew something good would come from it. And a
lot of things came from it that were good on
a positive note. So just positivity and communication would be
my advice to any couples going through any type of turmoil.
Speaker 12 (27:35):
Yeah, and I remember when I got suspended, So I
had a two week suspension. I think I spent the
first week with you, right, So I and you know
that to me said a lot about our relationship. Is
that My immediate instinct after I got suspended was I
need to hop on the plane and I need to
be with him, right because I knew that the comfort
(27:57):
I was looking for, I knew the solace I was
looking for. I knew all of that could be found
in him. And you know that spoke volumes about our
you know, relationship, and I know it probably wasn't the
easiest for you in the sense of that, you know,
here you have me being discussed on all these news channels,
and you know he's also in the corporate world, so
(28:20):
you have colleagues that are watching this.
Speaker 7 (28:22):
Well.
Speaker 11 (28:23):
The challenge for me was, you know, under normal circumstances,
if I was dating a regular woman, if she got
into an issue with someone at work, I would just
go up there and have a conversation with that being
the president of the United States.
Speaker 7 (28:35):
So it was a little handcuff. So it was a
little challenge for me. So and that's another thing.
Speaker 11 (28:40):
You know, we have fun, so making her laugh and
just making her feel comfortable.
Speaker 4 (28:45):
Scrolling won't change your life, but subscribing just might. We're
sharing real stories, heart won wisdom and unforgettable lessons that
stay with you long after the screen goals. Start tap
that button and stay connected to conversations that truly count.
Speaker 6 (29:03):
Now back to my legacy, Sophia Naw.
Speaker 4 (29:06):
I wanna turn to a deeply personal essay that you
wrote in in Glamour last April about your coming out journey.
M and I want to read something that you wrote
because I thought that it was just so, so very powerful.
So I want to quote your exact words, which is, M,
(29:28):
I finally feel like I can breathe. I don't think,
I ni, I don't think. I can't explain how profound
that is. I feel like I was wearing a weighted
vest for who knows how long. I hadn't realized how
heavy it was until I finally just put it down.
(29:48):
That kind of clarity doesn't usually come without heartbreak. So
what was the turning point for you.
Speaker 1 (29:57):
If I may. You know, it's interesting how bite sized
the world wants to make your life or your experiences
when you are a public person. And I understand why
the totality of a life, you know, someone's journey is
(30:19):
it's not clickbait material, and so you won't expect this.
But the reason this really relates back to Nia and
our friendship is because there was so much public fascination
about well, what is she? How does she identify?
Speaker 7 (30:36):
Is?
Speaker 1 (30:37):
Explain? Explain? Explain? And they wanted to make it about
this coming out, you know, and part of me and
part of Nia were like, has nobody been paying attention
to like anything I've ever said since I've been on TV,
or all the all the people I've kissed since I've
been on TV, Like what are we doing? So there
was humor in it, certainly there was absolutely given again
(31:00):
this rising fear mongering. There was a real importance I
understood for saying the words and saying them in a
way where they could be both hopefully inspiring or freeing
to someone else, but also to say all of us
deserve to take up space and deserve to have a
(31:21):
full spectrum of rights. But The thing that people didn't
see behind the scenes was the journey to get there.
And the vest wasn't just about identity. The vest was
about society. The vest was about the expectation on women,
the exhausting demand to be small but not so small,
(31:46):
to no matter what you do, you have a career.
How dare you not have kids? You have kids? How
dare you not have a career. You wait to consider
getting married, You're a crone. You got married young. You
must have been dumb and you didn't know what you
were doing. It's just we can't quite get it right.
And what I had to come to terms with was
(32:09):
that I'd carried certain traumas rather than push them back
on the people who'd given them to me, I'd tried
to make everybody happy. I'd lost my individual way, maybe
in a way because I'd prioritized community so much that
I finally said, well, I guess it's time, And I
(32:31):
guess it's time I do the thing everybody tells me
to do, and I'll make the list and check the boxes.
And everybody says, once you've done it, you'll be happy.
And I checked all the boxes, and I really wasn't happy,
and I didn't know how to say that to anyone
but Nia, and I didn't know how to say when
(32:55):
people said, well, why did you get married and why
did you do this? I didn't know I would go
through the next step, the family building stuff by myself.
I didn't know until it happened to me. And I
didn't know how to say that. I didn't know how
to deal with the shame and the kind of embarrassment
that I'd been wrong and that I'd been wrong really publicly.
(33:15):
And I called my best friend and she if I may,
I'm just making sure I'm allowed to say the thing,
but she said me too, And we both knew what
was going on obviously with each other. We talk one
hundred times a day. But when I said I think
I have to be done and in her own life
(33:36):
and in her own world with her own young son,
she said, I do too. I can't. I would never
wish for someone else to be heartbroken, but to have
my best friend in the world having her version of
the same experience, and both of us saying we got
(33:57):
to like, we got to put it down and we
got to try to make a new way in the
most profound way I knew I wasn't crazy. I knew
I wasn't doing something rash. I knew I'd literally exhausted
every option, I'd gone to, every therapy, I'd done every
bit of the homework, and I had to just say,
(34:20):
it's okay to change your mind, it's okay to learn something,
and based on that learning, make a new decision for
your future. And so everybody wanted to make it about,
you know, the next person in my life. Because the
next person in my life was a woman. Plenty of
people were shocked. It wasn't nea by the way I
(34:41):
was like, I was like, she is my wife, just
not like that. But you know what, I think what
people didn't understand was that the journey started again in
a community of women. And there were two of us,
and then there was a best friend from college, and
then there was a woman I would eventually fall in
love with. And then there was another friend, you know,
(35:02):
dealing with will I stay or will I go because
of addiction in her family with her husband, and the
community of women who who didn't go really bad timing,
you know, you just had this whole big thing. They
didn't lean out and critique, they leaned in and said
it's okay. Those women helped me take off forty years
(35:25):
of expectation and people pleasing and just trying to do
it right because it hadn't felt right ever, no matter
how hard I tried. And it was yes about stepping
into that portion of my identity in a way, but
what it really was in totality was a was a
homecoming and a learning to honor myself. And I learned
(35:49):
how to honor myself watching the strongest woman that I
know and a group of the most impressive women we
love honor themselves. I had the courage of that conviction
because of what I was being shown in both love
and example by the women in my life.
Speaker 3 (36:10):
We're taking a short break over the holidays, but we're
not leaving you empty handed. Every Tuesday, we're sharing some
of the best moments from twenty twenty five to help
set you up for a great new year.
Speaker 7 (36:20):
We'll be back with all new episodes on January thirteenth.
Speaker 3 (36:23):
Make sure you subscribe so you don't miss a single one.
Vest was about the expectation on women, the exhausting demand
to be small, but not so small, to no matter
what you do, you have a career. How dare you
not have kids? You have kids? How dare you not
have a career? You wait to consider getting married. You're
(00:24):
a crone. You got married young. You must have been
dumb and you didn't know what you were doing. It's
just we can't quite get it right. I'd tried to
make everybody happy, I'd lost my individual way.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
New Year, mel you, how about true you?
Speaker 3 (00:42):
In this best of episode of My Legacy House, Martin
Luther King the Third, Andrea Waters, King, Mark Kilberger, and
Craig Kilberger look back on the conversations that reveal what
it really means to tell the truth about who you
are and stand in it even when it's hard or messy.
We'll hear from Marie Forley on My success starts with
being yourself. Jamel Hill on how courage isn't planned, it's revealed.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
Sterling K.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
Brown on stepping off the expected path to set yourself free.
Sophia Bush, I'm letting go of others expectations to live
your own best life. First up, Sarah Jakes Roberts on
how embracing her truth became her greatest calling.
Speaker 4 (01:22):
Sarah becoming a mom at fourteen, I'm sure that was
a lot of judgment, a lot of pressure, expectations, especially
when you look at it within the faith community, right,
So what do you remember around that in that moment
and how do you feel it shaped you and your
legacy moving forward.
Speaker 5 (01:44):
Fourteen is such a young age to become a mother
that I think to properly contextualize it, you have to
understand that I was not afraid of being pregnant or
having a baby. I thought I was going to get
in trouble. I'm like, oh my gosh, I'm going to
get grounded or my parents to be so upset. It
wasn't until I saw their response that I began to
(02:04):
realize that this is much bigger than like you got
in trouble, Like your life has completely changed. But to
my mom's credit, one of the things she told me,
she's like, I didn't get rid of my babies. I
didn't give them away. Whatever you decide to do, I'm
going to stick with you every step of the way.
And she did that, and a man, there were so
many moments where I've won. I felt like the pregnancy
(02:26):
just solidified this idea that I don't belong in that family.
So if you go back to that image of me
as a little girl being confused and amazed, I think
in that moment, it was solidified, like, oh, my goodness,
you don't belong here, and so it became so easy
for me to kind of move into the background. But
I think in moving into the background that it also
gave me an opportunity to discover my identity outside of
(02:49):
my family name. It's like I'm already the black Sheep,
I'm already disconnected. Now I get to just kind of
figure out who I am and what I want to
do with my life. And though my life had certainly
had some twisting turns, even since having the pregnancy, I
found a real sense of being okay with myself without
the validation of other people, because I'd lost it in
many ways. And the moment that I began to really say,
(03:11):
you know what, this is my story. I'm gonna love it,
I'm gonna embrace it, and I'm gonna wake up each
day and really do the best that I can. I
begin to see my life change for myself and so
I started writing this blog just about me. I was
in this toxic marriage, and I was like, you know what,
my life is unraveling, and I'm gonna help it come
undone by telling these stories on this blog. And people
(03:33):
started gravitating towards my message, like, oh my gosh, that's me.
You took the words that I couldn't say, Oh my gosh,
this is what I would pray to God if I
could pray these things. And I was like, oh my goodness,
this is not ministry, Like, this is just me telling
my story. I can't be a ministry. I'm a teen mom.
And so I wrote this blog post where I was like,
I'm gonna just let everybody know that I'm a teen
mom so they can stop putting that pressure on me.
(03:53):
It kind of backfired because they were like, oh my goodness,
now that I know that you have a story too,
now I trust you even more.
Speaker 6 (04:01):
And Sarah, when I think of your ministry and I
think of women involve it has been built on this
radical transparency, Like you have redefined what it means to
be a woman of faith based on radical transparency, your past,
your marriage, You're sharing your stories. Why has it been
so important for you to be this radically transparent with
all those.
Speaker 7 (04:21):
Who look to you.
Speaker 5 (04:23):
You know, I don't know that I saw it as
radical when it started. Like I said, I kind of
thought that if I told people, they would be like, oh,
my goodness, will leave her alone and it won't be
a thing. But the more that I realized how many
of us are suffering in silence, the more I felt like,
if I can tell my story and it helps someone else,
then I'll tell it one more time, and if it
helps someone else, I'll tell it another time. And I
(04:46):
think what I have learned is that through isolation, the
darker voices, the harder voices, the meaner voices that we
hear in our head, they're louder, and until you hear
someone say like, hey, I felt that too. But I'm
telling you it wasn't always like that, or that I
found a flicker that it gives someone permission to start
looking for light even in their dark seasons. And I
(05:09):
didn't want to. I didn't want to be in ministry.
I didn't have this as like a goal in my heart.
And so I'm like, if I'm gonna do this, I'm
gonna at least be honest. I don't want anyone to
ever be surprised that because I preached a message that
I experienced depression, that I worked at a strip club,
Like I want you to know, like this is what
you're getting. It is not much, but I am gonna
(05:30):
give my best. I'm gonna share my best, and if
I make you feel less alone, then girl, we could
grab arms and move towards better together. But I just didn't.
I just didn't want to. I didn't want to live
on a pedestal. I wanted to be able to Sometimes
on my social media, I'll be like all glammed up,
dressed up. Other moments I'll literally be snatching my wig
off and washing my face like this is like this
(05:51):
is all of who I am, and I just don't
want people to be connected to this caricature. I don't
want to be trapped in my own life, and so
for me, my honesty has been my freedom. My honesty
has been the runway that allows me to not feel
stuck in this life. And I think because of that,
(06:11):
my prayer is that I'll continue to have endurance for
what is ahead because I don't have to figure out
how do I keep this mask up? How do I
keep this facade going? My greatest question is how do
I continue to be honest in a way that reaches
the most unlikely person?
Speaker 8 (06:31):
Ria, I wanted to ask you a question. You know,
it was many years ago when you were twenty three
years old. You had the courage to launch Marie TV
when many women at that time were not creating that
type of content. And that was courageous, that was adacious,
that was wonderful and obviously been now very successful. I'm
sure there's been lots of upstowns in that process. But
how did you find your confidence and trust in yourself
(06:54):
to go ahead and to create that vision, to create
that platform, to create that voice.
Speaker 9 (06:59):
I was born in seventy five, so it was kind
of grown up in the eighties there. And my idea
of a successful, powerful business woman had like huge shoulder
pads and she was in this corner glass office. It
was kind of imagery that I think I just saw
in the media. And I had this notion that one
had to be perfectly educated and speak at a particular
(07:21):
level and use particular language in order to be successful.
And I remember being on Wall Street, on the floor
of the New York Stock exchange and trying to kind
of step into my idealized image of what a successful
young woman was. And I tried to do that in
the magazine world, both on the advertising side and the
editorial side, and kind of all these different beautiful opportunities
(07:43):
that were career opportunities. But I kept feeling completely disconnected
because I was trying to be something that I wasn't.
And so after feeling like a failure and leaving jobs,
even though I had a very strong work ethic and
I was never afraid of work, I couldn't deny from
a soul level that I wasn't where my soul wanted.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Me to be.
Speaker 9 (08:07):
And the moment that I relaxed and said, you know what,
I don't speak perfectly, I don't have I graduated from college.
I was the first in my family to go to college.
But I don't have higher degrees. I am way far
from perfect. I'm quirky, I'm weird, I have a strange
sense of humor. I like all of these different things.
And I started just expressing the true essence.
Speaker 2 (08:27):
Of who I am.
Speaker 9 (08:29):
That's actually when things started to come together. So releasing
this notion of perfection, releasing this notion of having to
be someone that I genuinely wasn't. That was the only
place it came from. That and just a lot of
pain of failure of trying to be something I wasn't
and it did not work out.
Speaker 8 (08:46):
You taught me so many these amazing things, and I
want you to share with us what are the coolest
things that you've taught me that I love, And just
explain this to our viewers in the way that you
do because you're such a great storyteller, which is observe,
don't absorb.
Speaker 9 (09:01):
Yeah, I think first of all, this is really really helpful,
especially for those of us who are empaths, those of
us who are really also sensitive to energy, those of
us who tend to also have people in our lives that,
let's say, have different kind of energy that is not
necessarily a good chemistry match for you. So the notion
of observing and not absorbing. And I'll just say this,
(09:24):
you know, for especially what my life has been like
these past couple years. You know, family, we love them,
and then sometimes same thing like Josh and I you
need to shake each other.
Speaker 2 (09:34):
Because you're like God, gotta get away.
Speaker 9 (09:37):
Same thing can happen in our work environments and with
our friendships. So I think observing someone it's like observing
what they're going through, having ultimate compassion for what they're experiencing,
being there in terms of listening, mirroring what they're going through,
without absorbing it into your own energetic field, taking it on,
(09:59):
becoming responsible for fixing it, for figuring it out, or
thinking that you are necessarily the cause of this other
person's distress or upset or stress, even if they tell
you that you are. So you know, I have been
through this most recently and again my mom, God bless her.
(10:20):
She's still with us. She's struggling a lot right now.
And you know, she said some things in the past
little stretch of time that were extremely hurtful and some
might say cruel. I've shared some things with Christian. She
was like, WHOA, that's a lot. And so it comes
back to this notion of me going like and I
can observe her in her pain. I can observe her
(10:42):
what she's experiencing, which is a lot of terror and
a lot of fear and a lot of loss of control.
And I can empathize with the notion of what she's
experiencing and how those lash outs might be directed at
me if I'm in her presence, but I don't have
to absorb it and take it on. I don't need
to be a sponge, and I don't need to. As
(11:03):
painful as this is. As the daughter of the woman
who taught me that everything is figure outable, I don't
have to figure it out for her, nor is that
my role. I can trust at a very deep level
that there is for me, and this is my own
belief system. There is a higher power watching over her.
She is on her own soulful and spiritual journey, and
(11:26):
the greatest gift I can give both her and myself
is to show up. And Chris taught me this one
only love in the room, meaning bringing only love in
the room. Can I observe her and not absorb that negativity?
Can I observe her and not absorb her pain and
her fear?
Speaker 2 (11:43):
As my own?
Speaker 6 (11:45):
Scrolling won't change your life, but subscribing just might tap
that button and stay connected to conversations.
Speaker 10 (11:50):
That can.
Speaker 2 (12:00):
Now back to my legacy.
Speaker 6 (12:02):
I am enough of a fan of yours that I
did actually at one point watch one of your films
and go, gosh, is he a classical train actor. Did
he study Shakespeare? I remember googling your background and going
what he went to Stanford for economics and then worked
at the Federal Reserve. Like that, I did not expect
as a background. So when did acting move from a
hobby to a calling for you?
Speaker 7 (12:22):
Uh? Sure?
Speaker 10 (12:23):
So I acted all during high school from Saint Louis, Missouri,
and had a great time doing it, but didn't know
or consider to be a practical pursuit. I got in
Stanford University and they had the number one e coime program,
and I was like great. I was in a program
called in Roads for minority students interested in business and industry.
I had an internship at the Federal Reserve Bank, and
(12:46):
for two years I had like a pretty clearly set path. Right,
I was gonna get up. I probably go into investment banking.
Speaker 7 (12:52):
I do all right.
Speaker 10 (12:53):
I had to make a contribution to my family. I
always thought that a pursuit of the arts was something
for people who didn't have to make a financial contribution
to their families or their community, et cetera. It was
a privilege that I was not afforded in my mind.
Got to Stanford University and I was living in one
of the ethnic theme houses, the African American theme house
(13:16):
called Jamay, which they thought mint unity, but it actually
means cooperative economics is one of the seven principles of Quanta. Well,
you know, we tried. It was the seventies. We're trying
to figure stuff out anywhere.
Speaker 4 (13:27):
And by the way, they're still touting that. We were
just touring a couple of weeks ago, and they're like
Stirling And here's why I mean like that is that
is part of that is part of your religion, the legend.
Speaker 2 (13:38):
Yes, so sorry, keep going.
Speaker 7 (13:40):
That's the wife and I lived in that present together.
Speaker 10 (13:43):
We did our first play together, and it was the
first time because I went to this college prep school,
first time getting a chance to play.
Speaker 7 (13:50):
A part that was specifically African American.
Speaker 10 (13:53):
I'd done Tennessee Williams and aren't familiar and all these
sorts of things Shakespeare, but like to do the words
of August Willison and the play Joe Turner Coming Gone
has this man is trying to reunite his daughter with
her mother because he gets taken away from his family
and put in a chain game. And I had a
wonderful time during the show and Professor Elon, who was
(14:15):
a black man at Stanford who directed the play, and
he said, listen, I know you don't plan on major
any this, but I think that the department gets a
lot from your involvement in it, and I think you
get something out of it as well. So why don't
you just keep auditioning for plays? And that's what I did,
And after two years of doing that, I said, oh,
this thing that I think is a hobby is actually
(14:38):
the calling. My grades and ECON would go up and
all my other classes would go up anytime I was
doing a play because I was doing something that fed
my soul and I wasn't following a path that I thought.
Speaker 7 (14:48):
I was supposed to be on that other people thought
I was supposed to be on.
Speaker 10 (14:51):
I was on the path that I was supposed to
be on because God told me. And I went to
my mom. I said, Mom, thing about changing my major
and she said, okay. I said, I'm thinking about changing
it to acting. And she said what I knew, And
she said and she said, Andrew, she goes, did you
pray about it? And I said, yes, ma'am, I did,
(15:11):
and she said, and this is the way you feel led?
And I said, yes, ma'am, I do, and she has
been one of my staunchest supporters from that moment, hasn't missed.
Speaker 7 (15:20):
The play et cetera.
Speaker 10 (15:22):
She now has been living with als for the past
eight years or so, but up until that point she
was everywhere that I was in a performance.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
So beautiful, gerline, you've called Revn beckwith a spiritual mentor when.
Speaker 11 (15:35):
You first heard his teachings, what immediately resonated with you?
Speaker 10 (15:40):
Wow, this is so interesting because I think there there
there are things that when I first introduced to a
Gape through my wife Ryan the Schellbata, who went there
first and coming from a very sort of like fundamentalist
Christian background, it was interesting because I was.
Speaker 7 (15:59):
Like, what is this dude?
Speaker 10 (16:03):
Right? There are certain things they're like like just sort
of like not necessarily what I was accustomed to.
Speaker 7 (16:09):
And then I had to listen with new ears.
Speaker 10 (16:14):
It's as if, as in the Bible, say, give me
ears to hear, eyes to see in a heart of understanding.
And there was nothing but love that was coming from
out of his mouth. That's all I could hear. I
was hearing about ways to connect with people. I was
hearing about this sort of false illusion of separation and scarcity,
and it sort of melted away. And I was in
(16:35):
the congregation and hymns would be playing, and people would
be dancing and they would be fully self expressed. And
there would be people like who came from a very
black church background, and they were hitting the beat and
they were jamming the groupment. And then there were people
from a very different background and they're dancing, very.
Speaker 7 (16:52):
Flowy and moving.
Speaker 10 (16:54):
I said, how beautiful is this that everybody can be
in this space together and expressed themselves as they are, authentically,
fully truly, And I saw the division that I thought
existed melted away, and I was able and free to
just love people as they are. I think that is
(17:15):
the greatest gift that the rev Has sort of led
me in this journey, is to love people unconditionally.
Speaker 7 (17:22):
And I don't even think we recognize.
Speaker 10 (17:23):
How the conditions we place on our love until you
get a chance to see it at the sixty thousand
foot view and be like, oh wow, I actually had
more judgment than I was conscious of.
Speaker 7 (17:34):
Right, Wow, that's amazing. That is just beautiful description of
a gape man in your experience as beautiful. Thank you
that you're beautiful too. Man.
Speaker 6 (17:48):
You talk about courage, and I want to reflect on
what that courage has meant because you know, very famously
in twenty eighteen, you called out President Trump's racism, You
called out Jerry Jones his stance on players taking a knee,
and that ultimately cost you your job. You know that
that's courage. And so when you talk about courage, when
(18:09):
you reflect back on that time, what did that teach
you about your voice? What did that teach you about
your values? And frankly, what did it teach you about
your willingness to risk it all for what you believe in?
Speaker 12 (18:19):
Well, I'm sure a lot of people who have been
in far more dangerous positions than that one. Especially as
you know, with you all being so intimately acquainted with
the civil rights movement, is that you don't know if
you're going to meet the moment until the moment find you.
Speaker 2 (18:33):
You have no idea.
Speaker 12 (18:35):
So if you would have asked me before that actually happened, Hey,
if this was the scenario, what would you do? You
think you know what you would do, You think you
know how you might respond, but you don't really actually
know till you're right there in the fire and so
all of the decisions that I made as the you know,
White House called for me to be fired, as you know,
(18:56):
Donald Trump singled me out on social media as that
was happening. I mean, I'm making mental decisions in real time,
and I had to sort of have a few moments
with myself and saying like, Okay, if this results in
you being fired, like right in this moment, what are
you going to do? Or if they put it on
the table, hey, either apologize to the president or you're
(19:19):
gonna have to leave here.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
What are you gonna do?
Speaker 12 (19:22):
And I every instinct and every cell in my body
was like, if they asked me to apologize to the president,
I'm not gonna do it. And I made that clear
very early. I'm never apologizing to him. I said what
I said, and we just got to live with that.
The other part of it, too, is like knowing that, hey,
if this is the end of the road right here.
You know, I didn't leave ESP until a year later,
(19:44):
and I'd left on my own terms, and if at
the moment they had to make a business decision, I
just I would have lived with it. I mean, it
wouldn't feel good, especially given all the work that I
put in to get to that point, and there's not
many people who get the opportunity to anchor the six
o'clock Sports Center, one of the sort of treasured time
(20:06):
slots at ESPN.
Speaker 2 (20:08):
But if that was the result, that was the result.
Speaker 12 (20:10):
And at when stuff like this happens, where your integrity
and your character is questioned.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
You have to be able to live with yourself.
Speaker 12 (20:19):
And I would not have been able to live with
myself had I capitulated in a way that I think
would not have spoke to who authentically I am. So
it was a lot of lessons that I've found out
in real time, and just because the situation was there,
And I'm thankful for that, because when similar situations, maybe
(20:43):
not always involving the President of the United States, but
when other tests of your character, your integrity, when those
things happen, it's muscle memory.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
Now you're confident because you've already done it.
Speaker 12 (20:57):
And I've done it at a level that most people
don't get to do it at. And so when I'm
in meetings or in determining business relationships and things pop
up where you have to stand on something, I'm so
much more comfortable doing that because I've already done it before.
It's very similar to, you know, an athlete. I mean,
(21:18):
I'm sure Michael Jordan missed a lot of game winning
shots before he actually made him, and when he finally
made one, it became muscle memory, and then after that
that dude was never losing. So I sort of approach
it with the mentality that an athlete might.
Speaker 4 (21:31):
So even before that happened. Let's also go back to
your beginning days of ESPN, because as you mentioned earlier,
you found yourself in rooms where you were, you know,
most times one, if not the only woman, you know,
certainly probably the only black woman. So if we're talking
about legacy on this show, you know, and you at
(21:54):
ESPN early two thousands, you know that legacy is there.
But you said, what about that time, that it is
both isolating and yet motivating. Can you share with our
listeners a little bit by what you mean by that?
Speaker 12 (22:08):
So the isolating part is when I was a sports
columnist at the Orlando Sentinel. This would have been in
two thousand and five. In most of two thousand and six,
I was the only black female sports columnist at a
daily newspaper in North America, and noticed I didn't just
say America.
Speaker 7 (22:27):
Right.
Speaker 12 (22:27):
So that's one out of four hundred and five newspapers,
and that is an embarrassing statistic for the.
Speaker 2 (22:34):
Profession of journalism.
Speaker 12 (22:37):
And a lot of people might have thought that that
would have given me some sense of accomplishment.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
It did not. It.
Speaker 12 (22:43):
What it was communicating to me, and even worse, communicating
to other women who might want to get in the business,
is that your voices aren't necessary nor are they valued.
And so that's the isolating part, and you know it
also comes with a lot of scrutiny because you're the
only one, and a lot of black people have been
in this situation in all industries. Is that when you're
(23:07):
the only one, you then become the test case, right,
So you have to carry yourself a certain way because
you are living with the burden of if I mess up,
no one else is coming after me. Black people aren't perfect, right,
So it's like, if I make some junior mistakes or whatever,
if that's the reason why you won't see value in
(23:29):
black women having voices in the sports space, then that
to me reflects more on you than it does on me.
So you're carrying all of this, but at the same time,
you know, getting to ESPN, a place that is considered
to be for our profession at the very top. If
you're in sports media, being the most powerful sports media
company in America, then you know there's something to be
(23:53):
celebrated by being able to advance and take that step
and realize that all the hard work has brought you
to this place and brought you to this sense of elevation.
But it's always to me about who is able to
come behind you. As a result, now ESPN is in
a very different position because they can hire whoever they want,
(24:14):
and you look at their team picture and it's very
diverse because they have a lot of women. And even
before I got there, Robin Roberts was the one who
set the table, you know, and so they've always had
a steady pipeline of women of color and putting them
in certain positions. Where I was a little bit different
(24:36):
is that they were traditional anchors, and I was one
of the few that were able to develop a footthol
and an imprint at ESPN by giving my opinion, by
creating conversation based off my perspective and my experience that
I had as a sports journalist over the course of
many years, so I was very thrilled to be but
(25:00):
I also was fully aware that if I walk into
one more room and I'm the only one in there,
that's not a good room. It's like there, I've never
been one of those people. And there, unfortunately are some
people of color who are like this that they do
want to be the only one in the room. I
don't want to be the only one in the room
because I don't know everything. I don't represent the entire
(25:22):
totality of women of black women.
Speaker 2 (25:24):
I do not do that. And so it's important that.
Speaker 12 (25:29):
We all you know, when we go in these rooms,
that's not just about getting in the room. It's about
getting in the room and kind of breaking it up
and opening the door even wider so that more of us.
So it's a you know, a flood of us coming in.
Speaker 4 (25:41):
I loved when Kamala Harris said upon accepting the vice presidency,
I might be the first, but I won't be the last.
I love that sentiment. And so here you are at
you know ESPN, you know, seemingly from the outside, you know,
riding on top of the world. Then you had this
(26:02):
unfair attack and this fall from where you had worked
so hard to be But throughout all of that Ian
was there and he, you know, walked with you through
that storm and was always at your side. So my
question is for you, Ian, and particularly for couples that
are listening right now and if they're going through the storm,
(26:24):
they're watching someone that they love go through the storm,
what advice would you have for couples walking that path.
Speaker 11 (26:32):
I believe communication is the key, you know, constant communication.
When Jamel had when she was going through her storm,
really first and foremost, I wanted to make sure that
I was there and she felt my presence and she
knew that she wasn't alone. We had a lot of
good times and that was probably the most challenging part
(26:53):
of our relationship up up to that point. So my
biggest thing was making sure that she didn't feel alone,
making sure that she felt my presence and we were
going to get through this together. And naturally, I'm a fixer,
so sometimes I have to dial that back because sometimes
she may just want event and she just needs a
listening ear versus you know, solution after solution. But my
(27:17):
goal was to remain positive throughout the entire situation because
I knew something good would come from it. And a
lot of things came from it that were good on
a positive note. So just positivity and communication would be
my advice to any couples going through any type of turmoil.
Speaker 12 (27:35):
Yeah, and I remember when I got suspended, So I
had a two week suspension. I think I spent the
first week with you, right, So I and you know
that to me said a lot about our relationship. Is
that My immediate instinct after I got suspended was I
need to hop on the plane and I need to
be with him, right because I knew that the comfort
(27:57):
I was looking for, I knew the solace I was
looking for. I knew all of that could be found
in him. And you know that spoke volumes about our
you know, relationship, and I know it probably wasn't the
easiest for you in the sense of that, you know,
here you have me being discussed on all these news channels,
and you know he's also in the corporate world, so
(28:20):
you have colleagues that are watching this.
Speaker 7 (28:22):
Well.
Speaker 11 (28:23):
The challenge for me was, you know, under normal circumstances,
if I was dating a regular woman, if she got
into an issue with someone at work, I would just
go up there and have a conversation with that being
the president of the United States.
Speaker 7 (28:35):
So it was a little handcuff. So it was a
little challenge for me. So and that's another thing.
Speaker 11 (28:40):
You know, we have fun, so making her laugh and
just making her feel comfortable.
Speaker 4 (28:45):
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Speaker 6 (29:03):
Now back to my legacy, Sophia Naw.
Speaker 4 (29:06):
I wanna turn to a deeply personal essay that you
wrote in in Glamour last April about your coming out journey.
M and I want to read something that you wrote
because I thought that it was just so, so very powerful.
So I want to quote your exact words, which is, M,
(29:28):
I finally feel like I can breathe. I don't think,
I ni, I don't think. I can't explain how profound
that is. I feel like I was wearing a weighted
vest for who knows how long. I hadn't realized how
heavy it was until I finally just put it down.
(29:48):
That kind of clarity doesn't usually come without heartbreak. So
what was the turning point for you.
Speaker 1 (29:57):
If I may. You know, it's interesting how bite sized
the world wants to make your life or your experiences
when you are a public person. And I understand why
the totality of a life, you know, someone's journey is
(30:19):
it's not clickbait material, and so you won't expect this.
But the reason this really relates back to Nia and
our friendship is because there was so much public fascination
about well, what is she? How does she identify?
Speaker 7 (30:36):
Is?
Speaker 1 (30:37):
Explain? Explain? Explain? And they wanted to make it about
this coming out, you know, and part of me and
part of Nia were like, has nobody been paying attention
to like anything I've ever said since I've been on TV,
or all the all the people I've kissed since I've
been on TV, Like what are we doing? So there
was humor in it, certainly there was absolutely given again
(31:00):
this rising fear mongering. There was a real importance I
understood for saying the words and saying them in a
way where they could be both hopefully inspiring or freeing
to someone else, but also to say all of us
deserve to take up space and deserve to have a
(31:21):
full spectrum of rights. But The thing that people didn't
see behind the scenes was the journey to get there.
And the vest wasn't just about identity. The vest was
about society. The vest was about the expectation on women,
the exhausting demand to be small but not so small,
(31:46):
to no matter what you do, you have a career.
How dare you not have kids? You have kids? How
dare you not have a career. You wait to consider
getting married, You're a crone. You got married young. You
must have been dumb and you didn't know what you
were doing. It's just we can't quite get it right.
And what I had to come to terms with was
(32:09):
that I'd carried certain traumas rather than push them back
on the people who'd given them to me, I'd tried
to make everybody happy. I'd lost my individual way, maybe
in a way because I'd prioritized community so much that
I finally said, well, I guess it's time, And I
(32:31):
guess it's time I do the thing everybody tells me
to do, and I'll make the list and check the boxes.
And everybody says, once you've done it, you'll be happy.
And I checked all the boxes, and I really wasn't happy,
and I didn't know how to say that to anyone
but Nia, and I didn't know how to say when
(32:55):
people said, well, why did you get married and why
did you do this? I didn't know I would go
through the next step, the family building stuff by myself.
I didn't know until it happened to me. And I
didn't know how to say that. I didn't know how
to deal with the shame and the kind of embarrassment
that I'd been wrong and that I'd been wrong really publicly.
(33:15):
And I called my best friend and she if I may,
I'm just making sure I'm allowed to say the thing,
but she said me too, And we both knew what
was going on obviously with each other. We talk one
hundred times a day. But when I said I think
I have to be done and in her own life
(33:36):
and in her own world with her own young son,
she said, I do too. I can't. I would never
wish for someone else to be heartbroken, but to have
my best friend in the world having her version of
the same experience, and both of us saying we got
(33:57):
to like, we got to put it down and we
got to try to make a new way in the
most profound way I knew I wasn't crazy. I knew
I wasn't doing something rash. I knew I'd literally exhausted
every option, I'd gone to, every therapy, I'd done every
bit of the homework, and I had to just say,
(34:20):
it's okay to change your mind, it's okay to learn something,
and based on that learning, make a new decision for
your future. And so everybody wanted to make it about,
you know, the next person in my life. Because the
next person in my life was a woman. Plenty of
people were shocked. It wasn't nea by the way I
(34:41):
was like, I was like, she is my wife, just
not like that. But you know what, I think what
people didn't understand was that the journey started again in
a community of women. And there were two of us,
and then there was a best friend from college, and
then there was a woman I would eventually fall in
love with. And then there was another friend, you know,
(35:02):
dealing with will I stay or will I go because
of addiction in her family with her husband, and the
community of women who who didn't go really bad timing,
you know, you just had this whole big thing. They
didn't lean out and critique, they leaned in and said
it's okay. Those women helped me take off forty years
(35:25):
of expectation and people pleasing and just trying to do
it right because it hadn't felt right ever, no matter
how hard I tried. And it was yes about stepping
into that portion of my identity in a way, but
what it really was in totality was a was a
homecoming and a learning to honor myself. And I learned
(35:49):
how to honor myself watching the strongest woman that I
know and a group of the most impressive women we
love honor themselves. I had the courage of that conviction
because of what I was being shown in both love
and example by the women in my life.
Speaker 3 (36:10):
We're taking a short break over the holidays, but we're
not leaving you empty handed. Every Tuesday, we're sharing some
of the best moments from twenty twenty five to help
set you up for a great new year.
Speaker 7 (36:20):
We'll be back with all new episodes on January thirteenth.
Speaker 3 (36:23):
Make sure you subscribe so you don't miss a single one.
Hosts And Creators
Craig Kielburger
Marc Kielburger
Martin Luther King III
Arndrea Waters King
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