Sacred Lessons in Music: Healing, Purpose & Redefining Masculinity

 In this episode of Sacred Lessons, host Mike de la Rocha sits down with internationally renowned musician and changemaker Aloe Blacc. Together, they explore how music can be more than art, it can be medicine, activism, and a call to healing. From his Panamanian roots and Afro-Latino identity to global hits like “The Man” and “I Need a Dollar,” Aloe shares how his artistry bridges culture, justice, and resilience. This conversation dives deep into identity, fatherhood, and the courage it takes to redefine masculinity by leading with love.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
What are the psycles fathers passed down that sons are
left to yield. What if being a man was holding
it all together? I've been learning how to let go.
This is a space where that's speak truth to find
the power to heal and transform. I'm Mike Dela Rocha.
Welcome to Sacred Lessons. Music is more than entertainment. It's

(00:25):
a compass, a mirror medicine. For centuries, communities of color
have turned a song not just to survive, but to heal,
to resist, and to reimagine what's possible. Welcome to Sacred Lessons.
I'm Mike Dela Rocha. This episode will explore how art
and identity become pathways for healing and transformation. Today, I'm

(00:49):
honored to welcome a dear friend and one of our
generation's greatest songwriters who embodies this truth. Musician, change maker, storyteller,
Alo Black. Alo, thank you so much for being here.
I was trying to think we've known each other for
I think two decades almost and if not more, and

(01:14):
absolutely in love with your family and in love with
you for all that you stand for and all that
you do from from day one, and I want to
get into it, but from you know, from hip hop
to global anthems. What I love about you is you
there's not a box for an Alo Black. When we talk,

(01:37):
You're going to take me into a conversation about neuroscience
and space travel. And mister Bellafonte reminds us that we
always have to be gatekeepers of truth. And so before
we just get into it, how did you even get
into this whole? Like, what was the upbringing? PanAm you
know Panama and all that.

Speaker 2 (01:59):
Yeah, I had a pretty humble youth. My parents were
both civil servants, so let's say my mom worked for
the county in the courthouse. My dad was a marine
in the United States Marine Corps. Grew up in a
small town that was not yet an incorporated city, you know,

(02:24):
and I had, I guess, you know, an ideal childhood,
you know, both parents in the house, siblings, good schools.

Speaker 1 (02:35):
But hip hop. Hip hop was what got me into
music really early. It was what.

Speaker 2 (02:42):
Gave me a voice and was my opportunity to engage
with my friends in ways that were creative and dynamic.
Helped me design a personality and a character without having
to follow main to the mainstream and growing up as

(03:07):
one of a handful of students of color, in kids
of color in my neighborhood. Hip hop felt like it
was my own and that I could communicate that engage
in it and be enveloped by it in a way

(03:27):
that you made me feel even more unique and even
more special. And it educated me in a lot of
ways in how to make music, but I think most
importantly how to stand in front of other people and communicate,
and not just on stage, but just in life, without

(03:52):
fear and with total confidence that I have twenty more
words after this one that I'm delivering to you that
are going to be relevant and the right words to say.

Speaker 1 (04:07):
And then how did you make that transition? So hip
hop gave you the foundation, the community, and then you
make a transition to like soul.

Speaker 2 (04:16):
It was a long process because hip hop was a
long process. I mean I started writing rhymes when I
was nine years old, wow, And I started recording when
I was fifteen. And I stopped doing hip hop every
day all day when I was twenty five. Not that
I stopped it completely, I just stopped it stopped being

(04:37):
my main modus of communication.

Speaker 1 (04:44):
And so that trajectory of.

Speaker 2 (04:49):
Why did you stop that I didn't stop it completely,
but it took a backseat because when I went to
I went to USC, it was in university and had
these t one Ethernet lines and we could basically download
using LimeWire, Napster, any of those programs. We could download

(05:15):
any song in the world that existed, and I started
studying more music, more than what I had studied when
I was making hip hop. Making hip hop, you're studying
music because you're looking for samples. So you're listening to
the greatest jazz records, You're listening to the greatest rock records.
You're already hearing amazing musicianship arrangements, production and performance. But

(05:43):
the records that you have access to are limited by
where you can go to dig for records and whose
parents have a record collection. And what the Internet did
at that point in time was gave us access to everything.
And so where my parents had, okay, they had salsa records,
they had R and B records, they had pop records,

(06:07):
but I didn't have both. So Nova so I was
able to download Kaitano Wloso, Antonio Carlos Show, Being a Strugio,
Berto Georgia Bend. I started really digging into the diaspora
of Afro music and getting deeper there, and then started

(06:29):
listening to songs that my parents never records that my
parents never had, singer songwriters like Kat Stevens and Joni Mitchell.
They didn't have those records. Maybe my friend's parents had them.
I would hear, you know, records from like Steely Dan
and Leonard Skinner at my friend's house, but not at

(06:49):
my house. So I had a chance to start digging
into things that were not available to me. And I
was impressed by the way that other lyricists were you
using words. I thought, Okay, I've done this hip hop thing.
My crew loves me. When we go out and we
battle other crews, they love me. I can get on

(07:11):
stage and perform for strangers they love me. That's cool,
it works. But what else can I do with this
voice and this love affair with words and linguistics? And
I started finding in the Paul Simon's and the Cat
Stevens and the singer songwriters like the pen of Bernie

(07:39):
Topping with Elton John, things that I really wanted to
attempt to see if I could approximate their greatness and
then also use melody at the same time, you know,
and I ended up falling in love with soul music,

(08:01):
so the Nina Simone and Sam Cook and the the
song that really got me was a Change Is Gonna
Come by Sam Cook. And I'd gone on tour with
this hip hop group called the loop Pack in Europe,

(08:29):
and the loop Pack is made of wild Child and
mad Lib, and on that particular tour, wild Child is
the MC for the most part. Mad Lib also MCS,
but he used to make all the beats and he
didn't go on that tour, so I was a stowaway
on that tour. Was there was an extra seat in
extra bed, and I took the extra seat in the

(08:50):
extra bed. When I came home, mad Lib's younger brother,
oh no, he's also a producer. He gave me a
beat CD of sixteen beats and I recorded fifteen raps
and on the last beat, I was like, I'm just
gonna sing Change is Gonna Come. And he showed that

(09:10):
to the label he was on and they signed me
as a vocalist as a singer, so then my career became.
It was almost a night and day. I was like, Okay,
if you're gonna sign me as a singer, then I
need to learn how to sing. And so all that
studying I was doing with these other genres and these
singer songwriters started to get put to use.

Speaker 1 (09:32):
You know, I could you know, as two musicians. I
can go all day on this conversation because I will
share that you more than anyone else. I know, you
study like everything. Like I remember a conversation we probably
had like ten fifteen years ago, and You're like, Mike
studied lallabies and I'd be like, why hello, and you're like,

(09:53):
because the psychology of how we consume is based upon
our childhood and these are there's a reason why these
work to teach words or language. And then and then
you're like, so I'm going to structure it in such
a way where unconsciously you're not even gonna know why
is this song hitting me so good? Because I studied

(10:14):
hooks over centuries in time and now it's all coming
making sense. It's one of those things.

Speaker 2 (10:21):
And of course, you know, I want to be you know,
careful to to qualify that particular statement. And I'm talking
about if you're looking for something that's going to be
crossover potential, you know, massive audience adoption, and there are ways,
there are ways to to work that into what you do.

(10:44):
But at the same time, you know, and the same
breath I could say, and then throw that all out
right and be as unorthodox as possible, just to create
something that is so such a breath of fresh that
it also grabs people's attention. And I appreciate a lot

(11:07):
of different methods all of it, and they and they
serve their purpose. It's at different times, so I employ
them at different times.

Speaker 1 (11:13):
So let me ask you, growing up, it seems like
in a predominantly white environment like I did on Mexican
Chicano or Alfred Latino, did that inform the way you
thought about how I'm going to use my voice? Yeah? Yeah, absolutely,
I mean it's code switching.

Speaker 2 (11:33):
Is what ultimately I learned, you know, is the terminology
and linguistics. And when I'm with my family, we speak
a certain way. When we're with other folks from Panama,
there's a certain dialect and communication. When I'm with my friends,

(11:54):
there's a certain communication, and then when I'm in the
academy there's a certain type of communication. When when I'm
on stage as a soul artist versus as a hip
hop artist, totally different communication styles. And you know, some
will say, well, what then, what's your authentic self? And
that's really really difficult to two identify, and it's almost

(12:23):
an unfair question because to use, you know, something like
what's your authentic self would would a.

Speaker 1 (12:32):
Presume or or cannote that you you are.

Speaker 2 (12:35):
Not genuine And I would say, ah, I'm as genuine
as they come. Yeah, I would say, it's all of that.
It's all of that. That's that's the ultimate enpath exactly right.
I'm here and seeing you and I'm with you, not
that I'm going to lumber into a space and just

(13:00):
not try to accommodate the the energy. It's interesting, interesting,
and sometimes you know, I enjoy people who don't accommodate energy.
They're the ones that we all say, damn they can't

(13:20):
they They are the people who you always notice when they.

Speaker 1 (13:24):
Enter the room, correct, right, Yeah. And then what's interesting
is when you when you get down to the brass
tacks of those those particular individuals, you find that that's
their strong suit. And it's a cover in a lot
of ways. Wow. So I was just it's funny how
spirit works, because I was just about to talk about

(13:46):
the cover while there was two things one is you've
worked with some of the biggest names in music. They've
been grateful to work with you and vice versa. But
music it oftentimes it is a mask for who we
really are, or our persona that we wish we could

(14:06):
be when the cameras aren't on or we're not on
a stage. A lot of this conversation about masculinity and
manhood is around performance, and so I guess my question
really is in your journey, how have you balanced that
between Yeah, I'm the allow black on stage, but then

(14:29):
the father at home, I'm the husband at home, and
we both have strong wives that keep us grounded. But
how do you balance that? Oh? The balancing act is tough.
You know.

Speaker 2 (14:42):
I when I'm home, I'm trying to be the the
best support that i can be because I'm often gone, right,

(15:02):
And so the argument that happens a lot is you
can't just come home and start trying to be in
control of how the house works, because that's that's creating
too much confusion and you know, drama. So I've got

(15:23):
to sit back and again, you gotta be the ultimate
EmPATH just you know, blend in. And with that, it's
also undoing some of the the lessons are learning that
I received as a youth coming up in a Latino

(15:47):
household and a military household. Right, So there's two dynamics
that if anybody knows anything about those two dynamics, there's
there's a masculinity play that's happening. And took me time
to metabolize that to deep let me dig deeper. What

(16:11):
is that play?

Speaker 1 (16:12):
That play is like control. There's a there's a deep.

Speaker 2 (16:27):
Hunger for control on the man's part, on my part,
and there's a deep hunger for respect and discipline, and
these all the things that have been instilled in me,
which I believe are necessary. Now what may not be

(16:49):
necessary is the approach that I learned. And having to
unlearn it and try something different is what is the
challenge and completed. And it took a few books and
a few years for me to really come to terms

(17:10):
with this other way, this more gentle and more thoughtful way.

Speaker 1 (17:18):
Of being a dad and a man in the house
and a husband. And what was it a mom? I
don't want to answer this, but I'm assuming it's a
number of things. It's one you saying I want to
parent differently or learn from how my father parented me

(17:39):
and take those gifts, but also things that I would
do different. It's books, like you said, it's your own
self awareness, and it's those community that community around you,
from you know, Maya to friends. If I'm a man,
I'm listening to this podcast, and I know that there's
always been a tension in the struggle in my household

(18:01):
with control and power, because really patriarchy, masculine, it's all
about power, and sometimes men of color, when we're disempowered
by the society, we try to act out power in
different ways that we can, but we know innately like
there's got to be another way. So what would you
tell man that's like, hey, I want to do things differently?

(18:23):
How did you do that? Alo? How did you get
to the point where I was like raising a military household,
a Latino household. I saw these things I want to
raise mind to children different. I don't know.

Speaker 2 (18:35):
Mine was very rudimentary in the beginning in terms of
my path to changing. I just reduced everything to absurdity
except for a few things that I felt were the
most important things. Right, nothing matters except the very important
things the money I make, the roof over my head,

(18:57):
and the safety of my family. When anything comes close
to the foci of those three things, then I'm a
turn up, right Otherwise it's whatever, it's nothing, Let it go,
slide off my back. Let me ask you something because

(19:17):
you just so.

Speaker 1 (19:19):
A lot of my book is unpacking this actual question
that I was conditioned brought up. Like a lot of guys,
you got to provide. Yeah, you have to protect. Yeah,
and our worth is actually defined by what we do.
And I think those are all true. And something innately

(19:42):
within me is trying to tease out what is that
fourth thing or third thing? Because those things are true,
but from a human level, like what is and like
you and I were doing a lot of work in
Alta Dina, for example, with the fires, and you actually
came to one of the men's circles, but right when
we got deep there was other things. But these are

(20:03):
men that lost their home. Some men's job was burnt down,
so then they lost their job. And when we hold
that sacred space, I'm looking at another man and all
those things we just said they don't have, so are
they a man? And that's where it's like, well, what
is then that fourth piece? Because yeah, we're going to

(20:24):
turn up innately if someone threatens those we love, or
something's threatening our of the roof over a head. But
when you're literal ash, yeah, what is that? Or or
what are your thoughts on that? What is that?

Speaker 2 (20:39):
Others I haven't I haven't been in that situation. Of course,
I've been in proximity and heard the stories and learning
from other men who who are experiencing this. But something
that's bringing me some peace of mind is this understanding

(21:01):
that this life experience is a life experience and to
then reduce even the things that I'm holding as important
to absurdity is hard for me. But in the presence

(21:22):
of these folks who have no option, right, what I
what I glean is your health and life and love
are the only things left that actually matter. So can
you can you preserve the love? And can you preserve
your health your life? Those are the things that ultimately

(21:47):
are really grounding me at this moment. My dad passed
away last year, and prior to his passing, he had
had a heart attack three years prior. That heart attack
had him in the hospital where the quadruple bypass. That

(22:09):
heart attack also coincided with a near death experience. My
dad told me that he floated above his body. He
looked down, he saw himself lying lifeless. He saw the light.
He went toward the light. He heard a voice, and
the voice said, it's not your time, and he came back.

(22:29):
And that three years in between was the time that
most amount of time I had ever really spent with him.
Was that three years almost daily, if not weekly, for sure,
because I moved him really close to the house, and

(22:49):
he was with me and my kids and my wife
very often. And it really was the eye opening experience
of love and health, love and health. And since then

(23:10):
I've been diving really deep, almost on an addicted, addictive level,
of listening to other people's near death experiences. And that's
all they say in conclusion, Love is the answer.

Speaker 1 (23:27):
Were there things during those three years, I'm assuming there
was a lot of unspoken things that were spoken.

Speaker 2 (23:34):
Oh too much, too much, And I don't know that
we all we've resolved everything. I mean I I but
I'm glad that we had as much dialogue and as
much time as we could have.

Speaker 1 (23:48):
Conversations. We've been having. Is this thing about our fathers
in particular, and other men have said, oh, I started
talking to my dad because he started to get old
and frail. Mm hmm. What is it within us that
it takes a near death experience for us to finally
communicate with our fathers? Why do you think that is? Man?

Speaker 2 (24:11):
Our fathers are invincible right growing up, your father's the
person who can do anything and.

Speaker 1 (24:21):
Manage any situation. And when they become.

Speaker 2 (24:26):
Dependent, it's really eye opening and you recognize the tables
have turned and now you're in that position. But it
also then for me, it makes me project further into
the future. I'm like, oh, wow, one day I'm going
to be in this position and my son is going
to be in my position. You know, what is the

(24:49):
material of that future relationship?

Speaker 1 (24:51):
And how can.

Speaker 2 (24:52):
I be sure that it's the kind of relationship I want?

Speaker 1 (24:56):
How are you doing things differently with your kids than
given that what you just said?

Speaker 2 (25:01):
Man, I mean, it's down to the point where it's like,
mistakes are not failures. There are opportunities to learn. Let's
learn from this consequences over punishment, and the consequences are
known prior to the actions, right, Just figuring out how

(25:25):
to do things so that it's not like, uh, I'm
not living in a in the responsiveness and reactiveness of
animal instinct. It's really sentient and conscious being and you know,

(25:47):
forethought and intention, so that he learns that. And yesterday
we had a huge breakthrough. He had to melt down
because his sister was able to do something she's two
years senor that he wasn't able to do. And he
was ultimately throwing a tantrum, but his tantrum was just

(26:07):
kind of like silent and obstructive.

Speaker 1 (26:10):
He was trying to keep.

Speaker 2 (26:12):
The family from engaging in an event because he wasn't
able to do it. And eventually I said, you need
to go outside, take a breath and relax, and he
didn't do that. He went to his room, but then
five minutes later he went outside. He got on the swing,

(26:35):
and five minutes after the swing, he came inside and
he apologized to me. And I'll tell you, you know,
he's nine years old and when he walked in, he
could have been thirty five. Like there was a man
talking to me. That was a really special moment. It
was a huge growth moment for him.

Speaker 1 (26:54):
I think, I want to honor you because I kind
of see him as like you're mini me, and our
children learn from watching us, and you know, there's something
ancestral and instinctual with your son going outside and being

(27:15):
in nature for the wind to cool him down. Yeah,
and we maybe not put words to it, but ancestrally,
that's what nature's there for to have this take a centering,
take a breath, get clarity, and then come in and
him to come and say I'm sorry or apologize. Most men,

(27:35):
like you say, don't even do. And so one, I
want to honor the parenting and the lessons. Is there
anything you learn in those three years with your dad
or I guess is there anything that was left unspoken
that you didn't get a chance to tell your dad? Oh? Man, unspoken?

Speaker 2 (28:00):
I feel like we said everything, like we had the fights,
even even you know, after we had the the honoring moments.
I feel like we said it all. I honestly do.
And I feel like that's partially why when he had

(28:21):
his second I'm assuming it was a heart attack when
he passed, finally that he was able to go because
whatever was supposed to be done was done. I'm hoping
that's what I hope, And what's the go ahead. Yeah,
I don't know that there was much more to say.

Speaker 1 (28:38):
I feel like, man, you know, I think I took
the time to give him his flowers as much as
I could. And what's the what's one lesson you took
from that that you're passing on to your children.

Speaker 2 (28:57):
Just for me, it's more conversation. Let's spend time talking
to one another, because we can get stuck in the
we can get stuck in the roles of parent child
and never be in communication with one another because we're

(29:23):
always in transaction. And that, I think is there's a
big miss if you don't ever get to communication and
you're always in that age and generational transaction dynamic.

Speaker 1 (29:39):
What you're teasing out is centering not just the conversation,
but the balancing of power. It is right, it really is, yo.

Speaker 2 (29:52):
I mean, just to be able to explain things to
my kids in ways that get them to grow in
levels that I certainly would have benefited from at a
younger age. You know, we had we had religion, and
we had church, but it wasn't the same kind of.

Speaker 1 (30:14):
Lesson.

Speaker 2 (30:15):
And all the lessons that I received from my parents
were all in practicum, right, It's like through living life
and seeing it. My dad would be fixing the car,
changing the brakes, changing the oil, and he'd have me
there with him, right, and I would be pissed because

(30:35):
I want to go do something else. And not that
I learned how to do either of these things, but
what I did learn is that anything is possible with
your own bare hands.

Speaker 1 (30:48):
You just got to do it.

Speaker 2 (30:50):
I remember sitting down while he was tiling the bathroom floor,
handing him the tools, doing some of the work with him,
just upset, like why do I have to here and
do this? Man fixing the roof, fixing the plumbing, all

(31:12):
of it. Was The lesson ultimately was you can do anything.
I'm going to show you that it is possible. And
so those are really important lessons. And for my kids,
I've been working with them because I use words. I've

(31:37):
been working with them from a very young age with
using using language and songs and words to educate them
and grow them because the mantras that we tell ourselves
are really important, and so they have these these affirmations,
these words.

Speaker 1 (32:00):
Which I find a lot of and correct me if
I'm wrong. But I feel like in your song writing,
you're intentional about putting these mantras that you're growing into
and have inherited into your songs into the actual songwriting.
So like, unbeknownst to the listener, this is my assumption.

(32:21):
But I'm singing along to something, for example, the Man, Right,
it's one of your popular songs, I'm the Man on
the Man. But it's like a it is it's a loop,
it's a mantra. Yeah, that's intentional. I'm assuming super super intentional. Well,
I'll tell you the releasing the song is intentional, right, yeah,
because I've probably written other songs that aren't positive mantras.

(32:45):
But there's no reason for me to put that poison into.

Speaker 2 (32:47):
The world, right, And I wrote it just because of
an exercise, you know, Like I can think a million
different concepts, I only have enough time to write a few,
and I only have even less time to release them,
and even less time to promote them.

Speaker 1 (33:03):
So ultimately, what gets shared with the public.

Speaker 2 (33:07):
Are the things that I think are worthy of the
entire world hearing and benefiting from. But uh, you know,
I'm capable of just as much silly music as i
am the good music I put out.

Speaker 1 (33:24):
Well, you also mentioned something right now about you didn't
say this word, but it was like toxic or like
the other stuff that you could put out. I mean,
it's already out there.

Speaker 2 (33:35):
So my goal is to counterbalance, you know, to be
light in amidst the darkness, right, because all of the
things that you could tell yourself that are negative, that
could keep you down, all of that's availance, all exists,
and most people make the choice to consume it.

Speaker 1 (33:51):
You are what you eat. Let me ask you something
because what I've always always always admired from Afar before
we met and then knowing you is you've been consistent
on this message of love, vulnerability, but as a form
of justice. You've always used your music for healing since

(34:12):
I met you. Now this is pre you know, I
didn't know you're doing the hip hop days.

Speaker 2 (34:16):
Well, the hip hop days is almost the same, just
because I was a big fan of the Native Tongue
family and they were in the early, you know, early
nineties making hip hop that was a pro black It
was affirming your heritage and your right, rightful place in

(34:37):
the world as a citizen of the world, regardless of
your color, but also because of your color, and.

Speaker 1 (34:50):
That was really formative for me.

Speaker 2 (34:52):
The caress Ones, the Native Tongues, Tribal Qus Dae La,
Soul Jungle Brothers, even Nwa As vulgar, misogynistic and violent
as they were, they were also pro black. And that's
what I gleaned from it was this uprightness in the

(35:13):
face of in the face of oppression and real danger,
which in.

Speaker 1 (35:26):
This particular exact moment in time, how do you see
yourself as one of those voices? The answer? The answer
is love.

Speaker 2 (35:39):
I mean, I keep thinking about how do you rage
against the machine? And the only real way is with love?
Because to fight fire with fire only gets you burned,
and the machine doesn't process love. And so in the end,

(35:59):
what do we want? And whatever we want in the
end is the tool that we should use too to
change the to change today and to improve tomorrow.

Speaker 1 (36:10):
So maybe you know when I asked about how your
your words absurdities, you get rid of the absurdities and
what matters, right, maybe then that fourth stool, if you will,
would be love. But the hard part for men is
love is oftentimes defined as something like passive or too

(36:33):
vulnerable to the definition. It's kind of like non violence, right,
like people say, oh, non violence, no arm, rebellion, for example,
not knowing that ethos of non violence is really strength.
It's like inner strength. So for me, It's like longevity.

Speaker 2 (36:48):
If you want to play the long game, what is
going to what is going to work in the long game?
And there are a couple of reason a couple of
ways to look at the long game. What is the
long game on Earth? And the other a long game
after your existence on Earth? And in all the examples

(37:09):
that I can find where things have worked for it
worked well for a long time. Love is at the
center of it. Right, So, I mean it's a difficult
principle to put into practice every day all day. Does

(37:32):
that mean I have to love everyone on the other
side of the aisle at all levels of administration? And
do I have to love people on the other side
of the ocean who are committing heinous genocidal acts? Do
I have to love the person behind bars that you

(37:53):
know committed violence against my loved ones? The heart answer
is yes. But what better tests for manhood to show

(38:13):
true strength? What better tests for strength?

Speaker 1 (38:16):
You know? Bal Hooks defines love as an action. It's
a choice, even parenting, like you know, reading her trilogy,
she did just because your parent doesn't mean you love
your child that's her. You have to choose that for
the long game. And so right, now, in this moment,

(38:37):
what would you tell man this? And no, although I
can't love right now, need to be harder. I need
to protect my community. People are being hunted, kidnapped, stolen
off of streets of la and coming to your neighborhood
if it's not there ready, how do you? How do you?
How do you hold that tension?

Speaker 2 (39:00):
The antidote to entropy and the heaviest gravity is love.
And so if you want the pendulum to keep swinging,
punch it fourth, the pendulum will stop. Hugg it.

Speaker 1 (39:16):
It's the heaviest gravity, it's the antidote to entropy, calms everything.
And then this, I agree, this is probably the new
you know, because gender, like race, is a construct. And
even when I've been on tour with the book, I

(39:37):
struggle because it's really about energy. Yeah, it's not about
male females, like we're all encompass all these energies. But
this system machine is really wanting to tear apart all
of our identities and not just accept the fullness of
who we are as people. And I've been trying to
figure out and I don't know the language, and maybe

(39:59):
this is why I wor in conversation because you are
a lover and studier and like words. Like you said,
you've taught your children how to communicate, and for too long,
men are not taught how to communicate. We're taught to dominate,
to control, to suppress, which is everything that's being thrown

(40:22):
at us right now. So it's almost like we're asking man,
recondition yourself, because your automatic response will meet violence with violence.
But the truest, the truest essence of who we are
is actually the opposite of that, and that is the
new world. Does that make sense? Absolutely, it does make sense.

(40:45):
It's just hard to get there.

Speaker 2 (40:46):
We are conditioned from our parents and from society around
us and media in a certain way. And although we
all all have access to religions and church and these
kind of philosophies, putting them into practice is very difficult.

(41:08):
And we don't have great examples of putting anything into practice.
And so I always think about the very unique example
of Nelson Mandela, who spent twenty seven three quarter years
in jail, and he came out and he did not
harbor animosity and he did not call for violence.

Speaker 1 (41:26):
That is the example. Well, would we have the examples?
If you would you tell someone right now then, because
it's true, right you all these forces around us that
is feeding us noise, negativity, Like you said, we can
find all that stuff. It's a practical way for us

(41:47):
to like remember who we are. Oh wow, A practical
way to remember who we are, you know, because there's
all these different steps. But if I'm listening, I'm like, yo,
I got it. Ala that Yes, in theory, I agree.
Practice is hard, like you said, like how do I
get to a point to love the orange man knowing

(42:09):
that that's a wounded child. But if I want the
long the hug might do more than the anything else.
Practice is hard, but we do things, both of us
do things to get us to a point where we
can consider and act upon those opportunities. But what would

(42:29):
you tell someone that's like, bro, I'm not there, or
how can I get there? What's one thing I should
do to get there? Wow?

Speaker 2 (42:39):
Good question? All right, if you're not there, what is
one thing you could do to get there? Let me
think about this for just a second. Maybe I've talked
through it and I'll divine an answer that makes sense.
But I've never thought about how to train anybody other
than my kids. Okay, let's start with the words you

(43:04):
tell yourself. So start with forgiving yourself and forgiving everyone
around you. Number one. And this is just me making
this up as we go. I have not I've not
really deeply thought about how I can educate someone. And
I appreciate you jumping in because I know you like
to think about it.

Speaker 1 (43:20):
One of my one of my sayings early on with
when I got married to my we had was I
don't raise adults, So.

Speaker 2 (43:28):
We have to come to each other already. You know, grown,
I'm not trying to raise somebody else. But here you
go asking me how to raise an adult.

Speaker 1 (43:34):
Okay, well, ironically, that's kind of what we're talking about. Yeah,
it is.

Speaker 2 (43:41):
Change the words that you use to yourself, how you
speak about yourself, change the words that you use for
around other people, and how you speak about other people.

Speaker 1 (43:51):
It's that's number one.

Speaker 2 (43:52):
The basic thing you could do is number one, stop
with judgment, negative gossip. That's an easy first hopefully an
easy first step. Give yourself grace and respect the possibility
of who you can be. That you can be a

(44:13):
person who is more loving when you feel comfortable in
that space, and that then extend it. Okay, who's someone
that you don't think that you normally would want to
accept and start leaning in. I don't know the names

(44:38):
of these people, but there are a couple of stories
I've heard of African Americans who befriended grand masters of
the KKK and flip them completely converted them to becoming
not just ex members, but allies in.

Speaker 1 (44:57):
Humanity.

Speaker 2 (44:58):
Let's say, maybe not allies in the movement for Black Lives,
but at least allies in humanity. So it's totally possible,
and I'm not expecting anybody to go that far.

Speaker 1 (45:09):
I haven't gone that far. But to what extent can you.

Speaker 2 (45:16):
Transform yourself and your immediate family, friends, community, and it
transformed the relationship you have with yourself and those people,
and then extend the too outside.

Speaker 1 (45:29):
So words, what are the words? Just put together this.

Speaker 2 (45:35):
Sheet of affirmations from my kids recently, if I can
remember all of them. I am love, I am kind,
I am capable, I am brave, I am mercy, and
so just the words that, and then you have to

(45:58):
understand what the words mean too. So you can't just
say the words, but you have to really fully understand
what the words mean, and you have to really fully
agree that you can accept that. Yes I am. I
am mercy. I will give people grace and I will
forgive them and I will not judge them.

Speaker 1 (46:17):
Very hard, very hard, but very doable. It's possible. Yeah,
thank God, love you so much because we are hopeless romantics.
I got a nickname one time by Bo Taylor. They

(46:40):
called me. He's like, hey, bro, your milk money. I
mean no, no, yeah, milk money? Now is that what
he's saying. Yeah, he said you're milk money. I was like,
why are you calling me that? Bro? He's like, because
you were that one kid in middle school that would
walk down and we would punk you for your milk money.

(47:01):
But you would still come because at some point you
were going to flip us and then we'd be like, hey,
we can't take his money no more. Let him pass.
So your milk money. And I always thought, and this guy,
you know, he helped broken truce in South LA of gangs, right,
and this is someone that when he walked in the room,

(47:24):
you knew he walked in the room. And I always
look being a punk kid, I'm like, I got to
befriend that dude. One because I'll be safe, but two
that's like the highest form of respect. And I don't
know why Bo's spirit just came to me right now,
but people would have said, there's no way you're going
to do a truce between like crips and bloods or

(47:44):
these rival There was just no way. And it was
people the same complexion because it's society and the structures,
the conditions, just acting out their pain because we didn't
have any other ways to act out. And BO would say,
people thought, there's no away, the violence and the homicides
are going to go down, But I knew it was.
I was crazy enough to think so. And it kind

(48:07):
of reminds me that that's love and action. Actually, I
love because the affirmation started with I am. And once
you're like rooted in the I am, you realize there
is no us them, It is I, it is we,
you know, because a lot of native traditions, even my
native ancestry, there's no word for I exactly. They don't

(48:29):
acknowledge the independent self. Right, So what I'm taking from
this is, like everything you just said off the dome,
here's three four things you consider. Right, If you flip
it rather than I into we, maybe we could see
the humanity in each other. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (48:47):
A lot of There are really interesting analyzes of societies
that have the collective we in all of the language
that they use, and Japan would be one of those
those societies. The collective we is really important, and so
individuation is, and in some of the indigenous cultures is

(49:13):
kind of psychotic, and having more than you need is
is a psychosis. You know, we all exist and we
all share, and we are all one. This is certainly
not conducive to a capitalistic society. It's important in capitalism

(49:36):
for it to thrive that everyone feels like an individual
and that they need to express their individuality, and in
order to do that they need to buy something to
demonstrably show that they are different and separate. But you know,
I don't think that it's mutually exclusive. I think we

(49:57):
can still have the collective we in a capitalistic society.
That just means that all of us have to understand
the function of capitalism and who we are within this
system and how we navigate it by choice rather than blindly.

Speaker 1 (50:19):
So, since we all grew up in sapatismo, there is
a possibility for many worlds to exist in one world. Yeah,
I think so, because that's what I take from what
you just said, because that's like a whole nother podcast
I want to go down episode. But this idea of

(50:40):
like there are no binaries. So even in talking to
you right now, I'm checking my own self being like,
if I believe there's a system that is oppressing us
or myself, then I got to either change the system,
retool the system, or another system. And they're not. They

(51:02):
can co exist. They don't have to be either or,
And I feel like right now we're in this time
where everything is either or me, you, us them, and
that's getting way from the fact that we can co exist,
we can co build. And then that's to me, the
biggest thing that I see with man is this binary

(51:24):
that's preventing them or inhibiting them from just expressing who
they are because they're afraid of like, well I'm not that,
so I got to hide who I am or I
self harm or harm someone else that I love. And
this is this is this journey I'm on at least
to unpack all that because people would like active as

(51:45):
a jump on you right now, what are you talking
about alo no capitalism, down with capitalism, blah blah. But
I'm like, when do we take that when we want
when do we be alos nine year old and go
outside and take a breath on the swing and be
connect to the child that didn't know about all this
stuff but knew we could play together in the sandbox.

Speaker 2 (52:07):
Yeah, there are multiple possibilities. We Ultimately, you just have
to just acknowledge who you are and the power that
you have and being part of a system of love
and community and that you know, like you were mentioned before,

(52:31):
that the constructs that we've that we operate based on,
and that kind of fuel our activism. It's a crazy
cognitive dissonance for me because I understand that they're constructs.
And so while I might be on the front lines
as an activist trying to chant down Babylon, the construct

(52:55):
that I'm trying to chant down.

Speaker 1 (52:58):
Is a that is just that. And so.

Speaker 2 (53:03):
At what point do we, you know, step out of
the matrix and just say, okay, can we all agree
that this is a construct. And the more that we
fight it again, the more we punch the pendulum, the
more it swings.

Speaker 1 (53:22):
But there are.

Speaker 2 (53:28):
I guess we're you know, we all are very tied
to our mortality, and so you do what you feel
is going to keep you safe, and hopefully it does.
But if we can figure out really how to transform,

(53:53):
I think that's this non the non violent resistance is
the best method. It is the I think the most
effective method because it is a type of love.

Speaker 1 (54:07):
It is and I guess just to wrap this segment
piece and keep coming back to knowledge of self and
love of self and seeing love as the the strongest energy,
strongest force that we do have. So if I was

(54:27):
talking about constructs and like masculine energy that's supposed to
be like rugged, tough, don't cry, be strong, Well, the
strongest force and the energy is love. But we as
men are not taught how to access that, express that,

(54:51):
or be that. But in this conversation, you've given little
nuggets how you're doing it with your own children that
I can gleam to do that with the adults. You know,
and I know you've made the problems of why I'm
not here to train adults. But right now we're in
the circus time where I'm trying to figure out, through art,

(55:12):
through writing, through music, through community, how do we reprogram
ourselves as a society. And a lot of the harm, unfortunately,
is being perpetuated by men that I'm a part of
that one identity. So I'm like, okay, cool words, Yeah,

(55:34):
grace and reaching out to someone that is really a
mirror for the things I might actually not like about myself,
which is true always, which is why my negativity are like, ah,
is so like that.

Speaker 2 (55:52):
So you know what really made me think about it
was we spend a lot of time, in particular you
and I and then the people who we we hang
with a lot of time engaged in criminal justice reform
and the redemptive work that happens in prisons, And then

(56:13):
who are we to not offer that grace and put
potential for redemption to anybody on the other side of
the aisle?

Speaker 1 (56:23):
Right? Yo? Yes, yeah, so that's all. That's all I
wanted to say. I was like, oh, wait a minute,
So you mean I can go spend a day with
a literal murderer exactly.

Speaker 2 (56:37):
And then go and fight for that person's right to
re enter society, but then not want to acknowledge that
this other person who just has an ide ideological violence.

Speaker 1 (56:52):
Against me is not worthy of the same.

Speaker 2 (56:56):
Grace that flipped me that made me recognize, Okay, love,
love just has to be love.

Speaker 1 (57:03):
It's gonna be hard, but yeah, I don't want to
be a hypocrite exactly. That's probably why we're still hopefully
we'll always be friends, because even with this podcast, I've
been having internal conversations like who do you interview and why?
And I literally use that same example, I'm performing in

(57:23):
San Quentin in a month, you know, Or to even
get deeper, I have family members that were just released
from there for violence against children, which is the biggest
no no. But does that mean, like exactly like you
said that, I don't give them the opportunity to heal?

(57:46):
Do I not create a space for all of us
to heal? And once the answer is yes, and I
feel I lost a part of myself because then I'm like,
to your point, we're replicating the same thing that we're
trying to supposedly transform or take down or whatever. So
I honor that. So I want to dig in a

(58:12):
little bit more. Just around there's so much intention into
what you put out in the world. And just as
a creative musician storytelling myself, can you give us a
glimpse into your creative process, Like how do you get
to a point where you're putting out this mantra that
becomes a global anthem that allows people to like recenter

(58:35):
feel good about themselves. Like, what does that process look like? Yeah?

Speaker 2 (58:40):
A lot of times the words will come to me first,
and it could be a phrase, it could be just
a couple of words or one word, and then it
could also come with melody. And I'm playing with these
ideas for weeks at a time, just in my head,
developing the uh, the melody or the phrasing, and eventually

(59:06):
I get to you know, maybe put putting the idea
down as a solid poem, or I get to the
studio and start working on chords for the for the progression.
But ultimately it's like what story can I tell? And

(59:28):
sometimes it comes from meeting people and hearing stories or
having experience for myself that I feel like is worthy
of writing down and and then synthesizing the entire intention

(59:48):
into a into a song. I have a you know,
a few songs that really, really I feel strongly about
one I wrote for my dad before he passed, and
I got a chance to perform it for him called
Daddy Told Me So. And for me, the intention here

(01:00:10):
was one to honor my father. But there's also this
lack of.

Speaker 1 (01:00:18):
This conversation in popular music, and not to say that
I made a pop song. It's more of a coffeehouse
acoustic kind of song. But should it make it into
the popular sphere, these words will stand as a reference

(01:00:44):
to the father son relationship in especially coming from a
black man, where the father son relationship is absent from
almost all of our modern music.

Speaker 2 (01:00:58):
Maybe it's another genre. I venture to say that it's
pretty absent from the highly saturated market of heartbreak, anxiety,
depression songs. So my thought is, what are the songs

(01:01:19):
that can counterbalance the messages that are being put out
into the world. There's a song I heard years ago
where one of the lyrics was live fast, Die Young,
which is, you know, catchphrase, a common phrase. But I
really feel strongly about how the words you use can

(01:01:40):
create your reality. And I think it's important to be
careful with the words you use, and even the words.

Speaker 1 (01:01:46):
That you play with.

Speaker 2 (01:01:47):
It's almost like it's a loaded words are a loaded gun,
and you could be playing with it and pointing it
around and you're not going to shoot it. But sometimes
accidents happen. And so while these songs are on the
radio and we're playing with them and we don't really

(01:02:07):
mean them. Sometimes accidents happen. Sometimes all that play makes
you so well equipped that this is who you are
now and that lived last die young lyric. I just
felt like, man, there's got to be an antidote to

(01:02:29):
that song on the radio right now. So, you know,
I wrote, I wrote a song called Live my Life
which literally said the opposite. I don't want to die
young because I feel my life has just begun so
many things I want to do before I'm done.

Speaker 1 (01:02:44):
I don't want to die young. It's just finding and
I could. I could. Basically, I have so much content
that I could write just by being playing Devil's advocate
from what I hear on the radio, you know, and
it's been it's been fodder for a lot of songs.

(01:03:06):
But I also have these.

Speaker 2 (01:03:08):
Downloads of of ideas that I've got to I've got
to write and get out for myself anyway, so, you know,
finding ways to humanize everyone's conditions from you know, people
who are well off to the people who aren't. Like
showing that there's a lot of similarity more than difference

(01:03:31):
between us.

Speaker 1 (01:03:32):
All. I wonder there's a follow up. I don't know
this is the right word. But given that we as artists,
folks trying to improve our world, you know, we we've
been blessed to stand on the shoulders of like huge giants.
I was referencing before he came, Wayne Cramer, mister Belafonte,

(01:03:57):
his books here, you feel sense of responsibility? Like when
I hear you talk right now, do you feel that's responsibility?
Do you feel it's a calling? Do you feel like
you know, mister b passed on the baton to a
lot of us, Like.

Speaker 2 (01:04:14):
What do you feel? Absolutely, it's a sense of responsibility.
He passed the baton. He's expecting something from us. And
the reason why I think I was called to him
is because I was expecting something from myself, and so
it just kept me in in community.

Speaker 1 (01:04:31):
What were you expecting from yourself?

Speaker 2 (01:04:32):
For myself, expecting to be someone who is remembered for
making the world a better place and not just someone
who won a bunch of awards, sold a bunch of records.
Because to me, the value ultimately is in whose lives

(01:04:52):
did you change for the better? Not in did I
get the bag and then do nothing for anyone else.
None of my heroes were rich, right, and the ones,

(01:05:13):
the ones who were uh used their privilege in the
most amazing ways, like mister b Right, he was rich,
but then again, somebody had to pay for security for
Martin Luther King and the funeral, you know, and the
private transportation and sometimes the groceries for the family back

(01:05:37):
at home. So you know, there's there's an education and
there's a responsibility. We I think we all understand what
we're supposed to do as artists because of folks like him.
Had a chance to just a lucky chance to meet
Bono and the Edge recently, and we had this conversation

(01:06:00):
about our mutual love and respect for mister b And
in that conversation, Bono told me a story that led
to a song.

Speaker 1 (01:06:09):
That I wrote where Martin.

Speaker 2 (01:06:12):
Luther King was in a meeting with the NAACP and
with Harry and everybody was bemoaning the relationship with the
White House at the time, and in particular the Attorney General,
who was Bobby Kennedy, and they thought that he was
being intransigent and not able to he was not really
coming to terms with helping with the civil rights movement

(01:06:34):
at that particular time. And doctor King got incensed and
he was really upset that people were speaking badly, and
he just slammed his hand down on the table and
he said, I want you to stop talking bad about
Bobby Kennedy. And now this is the story that I'm
getting from Bono. And I thought that I knew I
heard everything from mister B, but I didn't hear this

(01:06:54):
particular story. And doctor King said, I want you to
find me one good thing. And when he said the
words one good thing. When Bono said those words, hair
on my arms stood up, and I was like, that's
a song because I could you know, I'm listening to
the story, but I'm seeing the whole image and I'm
feeling the energy and this this demonstrative from Doctor King

(01:07:16):
to the room of to find one good thing. Ultimately,
mister B you know, extended the Olive branch, befriended Bobby
Kennedy and became the best of friends with him, and
Bobby Kennedy was a huge instrumental ally in the movement
for civil rights. And it was just that concept of

(01:07:41):
unconditional love, like find one good thing, and that led
to a song.

Speaker 1 (01:07:48):
That I ended up writing.

Speaker 2 (01:07:49):
I'm so glad Bono didn't write it first, even though
he knew the story years before I knew it.

Speaker 1 (01:07:55):
But yeah, that's beautiful. Thank you for sharing that. I
hadn't heard that one either. And by the way, give
my cell phone number to Bono. I need to run
a conversation with the Thank you Elo. One good thing,

(01:08:17):
One good thing. I was just last week. I was
in Colorado and I got to see for the third
time mister Ba's film that you're prominently in. I've seen
her like four times, and man, I was weeping extensively.

(01:08:41):
And part of the reason why I was weeping was
one is my relationship with Carmen Perez, because she's given
twenty years to the gathering. And part of the reason
is because my own self doubt about being an artist.
Because of Carmen, mister B paid for me to go

(01:09:03):
perform in Berlin, Ireland. You know this black icon, Like
there's no jay Z without mister B. He's the first
artist to sell a million record for the first and
artist all genres. And I don't want to say single
handedly because it's never like that, but paid for the

(01:09:27):
civil rights movement to unfold. I mean, and he you know, he.

Speaker 2 (01:09:32):
Put his white friends in a headlocking, but they you know,
not a headlock. They all came willingly, they all helped,
but he found one good thing. That's that's a huge,
huge thing. You need folks like that in the movement.

Speaker 1 (01:09:44):
I mean the head of the NRAA for like twenty
years was one of the people that was speaking alongside him,
Charlton Heston at the march on Washington. That's crazy, Like
you know what I mean, like just putting that into
context today, Like could.

Speaker 2 (01:10:01):
You imagine if he had if he had just said, no,
Charlton's not the right guy because we have too many
ideological issues. Now you find the thing that you can
stand together on and let's work on that and hopefully
by that proximity, I can win you to my side
even more.

Speaker 1 (01:10:19):
Right So, I guess the calling from mister B hanging
out with both of our fathers wherever they are in
the spirit world. The question that was never answered, maybe
that's our question is everything we're talking about is leading
up to the civil Rights Bill passing, and then when

(01:10:40):
it does pass, the conversation that mister B also shared
with us, everyone should be excited. And they're in a
room mister B, Martin, Luther King Junior, all of these
folks and Martin Luther King sitting there in deep somber reflection, crazy,

(01:11:01):
and mister b goes up to, Hey, why you we
just did this. We just passed the Civil Rights Act,
we just got rid of desegregation. And you remember what
he said, Yeah, it's the fire, the fire fire quote. Yes,
I'm afraid that we desegregated into a burning house. And

(01:11:21):
so our call today is to how do we become firefighters?
But that he asked that question fifty years ago, So
my question for us isn't even necessary the firefighters. But
it's like the world builders in a lot of ways,
how do we become the firefighters and the architects at
the same time to draw one person in And.

Speaker 2 (01:11:42):
But that's maybe that's what we were talking about earlier,
the constructs, right, Yeah, they fought so hard to dismantle
the legalities around a construct, right, And I think that's ultimately,
you know, just to think about what doctor King was processing,
was like, oh man, there's something bigger than this construct

(01:12:05):
that we really should have been going after. But hey,
we can do what we can, you know, one step
at a time. As humans, we figured these things out
in stages and steps.

Speaker 1 (01:12:16):
One good thing. Yeah, well that's a perfect subway. So
we end every episode what we call the Sacred five
because there's so much man, thank you very much, but
they're like, just I'm gonna ask you five questions. You
answer in one word or a sentence. But it's our
way to give like practical steps, kind of like what

(01:12:38):
I was asking earlier for folks that are on their
own journey, and so I'll just ask them and then
whatever comes to you instinctually, you just share. So the
first one, name three things that make you feel safe
connected and whole. Three things that make me feel safe

(01:13:00):
connected in a whole, My wife, my music, and my spirituality.

(01:13:23):
Beautiful here that my number one. Number two, This one,
I'm actually excited to hear. What song, book, or prayer
brings you back to yourself? Oh wow, Okay, there's a

(01:13:45):
tough one. One.

Speaker 2 (01:13:47):
As a musician, it's probably more of a song and
it's probably a song like Lean on Me by Bill Withers.
It says and does everything that I want to do,
And it just says, it says and does everything that

(01:14:08):
I want to.

Speaker 1 (01:14:08):
Do as an artist. Beautiful love it. What's one daily
ritual or practice that grounds you? It's dinner with the family.
It's probably the most grounding because we're all there, you know,

(01:14:32):
in the morning is usually me with the kids, or
my wife with the kids if I'm out of town.
But you know, being able to just sit and actually,
more than dinner, it's the fact that my kids, they're
getting older and they're a little bit too old now,
but we still take time before we go to bed

(01:14:54):
to just sit and talk to them and to me.
That's that's the most that's really really grounding. Beareful. What's
one small action that a listener can take on their
healing journey? Forgive yourself? Okay, right away? Right away? Yeah,

(01:15:20):
why not let it go? You have to forgive yourself.

Speaker 2 (01:15:27):
If you let it go, it shows up in negative
ways in your relationships with other people, but just from
a physiological sense, it manifests as disease.

Speaker 1 (01:15:41):
So let it go right away. And last one, share
a one line blessing or quote that.

Speaker 2 (01:15:52):
Inspires you online blessing or quote that inspires me? Is
I am my ancestors greatest dream, wildest dream. I've heard

(01:16:23):
it said a few different ways. I love that one too.
Where can folks.

Speaker 1 (01:16:31):
That want to continue to walk alongside you besides you
on your journey. Where's the any projects coming up or
places that folks can keep tabs on you?

Speaker 2 (01:16:43):
I think the best place to keep tabs is on
my Instagram account. But aside from social media, what I'm
what I'm asking for folks to do is to tell
me stories. The last album I released is called Stan Together.
It's an album full of songs that have inspired by

(01:17:03):
nonprofit organizations and positive social missions. In the spirit of that,
I want to make my next album or a future
album if it's not my next inspired by the stories
that are delivered to me through my website from people
all around. So if you have a really powerful personal

(01:17:26):
story or a story that you can tell me from
someone else, share it with me through the website. Is
that Alo black dot com, Ilo black dot com, slash
contact or just hit the contact button.

Speaker 1 (01:17:37):
Okay, awesome, well thank you. I usually end trying to summarize,
you know, the gems from the conversation, and my mind
always thinks in threes. So I was thinking threes. But honestly, dude, like,

(01:17:58):
there's so many things I want to say right now,
but I guess what I will just center is one
is the power of communication in words, which is interesting
because you know, we recorded the intro before the convo
and it was all centered on words. One is like
what we tell ourselves and what we tell others because

(01:18:21):
there's magic and power inwards. Two the mantras that we
do tell ourselves so that we can remember our divinity
and our power. Three, fatherhood with grace is acknowledging power,
but also the beauty, the wonder the experience in our

(01:18:44):
own children, and that teaching ourselves or reteaching ourselves how
to communicate with each other is fundamental. And the last
thing I'll say, just because I'm on the threes, the
strongest force in the universe is love, no matter what
society tells us, and if we can harness that, then

(01:19:07):
anything is possible. Like the mantra you tell your children,
but also in this moment in time, force us one
us not to believe in that power, which is divine power.
It's the power of the cosmos. It's love, it's not fear,
it's not the vision. But if we can actually embody that,

(01:19:29):
I guess that's ultimately what I'm trying to get at. Bro.
I thank you, I honor you, I appreciate you, but
I love you for every single day really thinking cognitive
like consciously, how am I going to embody love and
the interactions I have with myself and others wherever I go.
And so I'm blessed to know you. I'm blessed that

(01:19:51):
this moment in time, your songs are in the world.
I'm blessed for you modeling. How do we repairent ourselves
and our chi in a healthy, loving way. And I
am hopeful for what's to come because we are firefighters,
but we're also architects. Yeah, so thank you, thank you.

(01:20:14):
Sacred Lessons is a production of My Heart's Michael through
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