December 21, 2023 • 38 mins
MEternal Live from the 2023 Mental Wealth Expo! Co-hosted by Danisha Baughn, we discuss building mental strength, experiencing healing, and gaining a healthier mindset featuring: Dr. Ashley-Lowe Simmons, Minister Vinnette Williams, Ashlee Muhammad and Elena Brown.
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(00:00):
Welcome to a live episode of MeEternal. This is officially Panel one,
which is about building mental strength,healing and being strong through our mindsets.
And joining us today is Minister VenetteWilliams of Miracle Emotions and Ministry. We
have Elaina Brown, wellness advocate andherbalist, doctor Ashley Lowe Simmons, and
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Ashley Muhammad, who is a mom, an entrepreneur, and a mental health
advocate. So welcome ladies. Okay, I'm sorry. My co host today
him Well, I'm Denisha. Youcan call me Danny. I'm also a
mom, mental health clinician, andan entrepreneur. Yes, and you also
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host a conversation in Combos. Absolutely, our hosts Convos, which is a
spin off of my career and mentalhealth to get the Black community healthier in
our relationships. Awesome, Awesome.We're going to start today on healing right
and the body and the mind weredesigned to be whole, so we're gonna
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talk a little bit about that today. I just want to want to go
around the panel and just ask youall, how does stress affect the body
and how can we train our bodiesto offset the effects of anxiety and depression.
If you'd like me to start.Yeah, So I know for me
personally, right, because it affectsall of us differently. I know for
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me it stress immediately goes to mynervous system and it like attacks my nervous
system, and then then I feellike it's like debilitating me and I'm completely
out of whack, and I keepyou know, excuse me for the TMI
like run into the bathroom and likejust very nervous and jittery. And so
what I have done personally to kindof counteract that is pay attention to my
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body. When I start to feellike a bit of uneasiness, I have
to take a step back. Ifit's a conversation, if it's a you
know, and of course you know, I communicate that like just give me
a second, you know, Ineed to kind of like self regulate,
take a few deep breaths, kindof think of some positive things in my
mind, and then I'm typically ableto kind of you know, jump whatever,
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jump back into whatever it is,but in a more calmer and peaceful
position. And so that like myvoice isn't getting elevated or I'm not letting
the elevation of others kind of contributeto how I'm feeling because a lot of
times there's like a funny joke thatsays, like we're all going to therapy
to deal with people who refuse togo to therapy, right, So it's
like just because we're self regulating andwe're taking that second to kind of take
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some deep breaths and understand where weare there are you know, ninety percent
of the people in our lives aren'tdoing that, and so it's just trying
to not let like affect, letthe actions of others affect, you know
that once you've taken that time.So that's how I you know, that's
how it works for me. That'sgreat, Minnesova, And that how does
stress affect the body? The body? The body is the templuff. The
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Lord God made us in his imageand his lightness. He made us the
prosper in our body. Our bodyis designed to connect to the spirit of
God. If our mind is outof control, if our mind is not
in alignment with the will of God, with the Word of God, then
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the body is going to be operatingoutside of health, outside of prosperity.
The Word of God declares that youwish for all that we prosper and be
in good health. Now if weare stress, if we are stress,
then our body is not going toprosper. Our body is going to be
broken down with all kinds of decay, sickness, disease, fear, you
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know, the things that affect you. It all has to do with the
mind. Okay, stress affect themind. And so when your mind is
stressed, you are paralyzed. You'renot able to think positively, You're not
able to feed the cells of yourbody with positivity. And so stress,
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yes, can only come under controlwhen you know who you are, when
you know what God has for you, and when you align yourself with the
will of God. That's good.Yes, So stress and anxiety can be
completely debilitating. It can completely offsetnot just your mental health, but your
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physical health as well. So whenpeople a lot of times when we are
sick, or we think we're sick, or we have a cold, it's
a lot of times it's because wehaven't gotten enough rest. We've allowed stress
to come in and completely disrupt ourday, our mental, our physical.
So it can be completely disruptive toeverything that you have going on. And
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so it's important and I'll leave witha tidbit. I know you didn't ask
for tips, but I'm gonna giveone every morning. I don't care if
it's three minutes, five minutes,whatever it is. Take some time for
yourself, get your mind in alignmentwith your body so that you can operate
in a fast that is conducive toyou doing the things that you want to
do. This morning, as lateas I woke up to come here,
I took fifteen minutes to go runon the treadmill because I needed to get
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my mind in alignment with my bodyright. So it will disrupt you completely
if you allow it to, andit will make you feel sick in your
physical body. So yes, good. So I completely agree with everything that
everyone has said. And you'll allnotice that I use a lot of analogies
because being a clinician, I liketo make it as practical as possible.
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Yes, and so I liken stressto being. You know, for those
of you all that celebrate Thanksgiving orany holiday, we have a paper plate
generally, right, and you're pilingfood on that plate because there's tons of
food. And so for me,when it comes to stress, it's like
you've put too much on your plateand you can't handle it. And so
what happens to that plate is itbegins to double over. Right. And
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so, just like Elle said,stress affects you at the very that your
cellular level. It affects your mind, it affects your body, It affects
your soul. Because we're trying beings, right, We're not just body.
Everything is connected. And so whenyou become stressed, overwhelmed, anxious,
all of those things, it's affectingyour nervous system. It's all breaking down,
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and then it's you know, andso that's what stressing anxiety does.
That's good. Yeah, kids areall good. Can I say something really
quick sure? To her point aboutwhen about it affecting your body. I
had a panic attack, right.I had never had a panic attack before,
so I didn't know what it feltlike, what it looked like,
or any of the signs. Itwas so bad that I thought I had
COVID. It had to be rushedto the er. And it was literally
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triggered from an argument that I washaving with someone. Like my body like
froze and I got like chills,and it was the worst thing that I've
ever experienced, and had no cluethe entire time that it was a panic
attack, So it will absolutely debilitateyour outer body just as much as it
does to your inner for sure.I'm just going to stop for one second.
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Where's Amber? Yeah? Can youjust tell her? DeAndre? Can
you ask them to have the DJturn the music down a little bit,
just let them know that we're recordingin here. I appreciate that. Okay,
awesome, I'm sorry, go ahead, Denisha, all right. I
love everything I heard you all say, but I felt like I wanted to
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hear something else. So I'm gonnaask you this, and I'll start with
Dota Ashley. I call it likethe quicksand when we're sinking into like so
many things and feeling overwhelmed. Andwhat I want to know from each of
you, starting with you, DotaAshley, is like, what tools do
you use daily or weekly to kindof pull yourself out of that Quicksand I
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love that. So I have amental health is line right, because I
believe that mental health is the foundationof everything that we do. And yesterday
I had on a shirt that saysthat we have to learn how to just
be right. We are human beings, but so often we're always doing all
the roles. Mom clinician whatever roleyou play, you're always doing things.
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So for me, what I dois I take time to just be.
My grandmother said the other day,she said, oh, well, I
don't know why you have that shirton you. You're always doing stuff because
I have to unlearn and relearn howto be. And I don't try to
meditate for five minutes or for tenminutes because the life that I've lived,
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that's way too much for me.So I take sixty seconds and I breathe.
If I'm in the shower, I'mpraying, I'm putting on worship music.
My husband is a trainer, sosometime he'll give me go to the
gym and do this exercise for anhour and I'm like, oh, this
is just way too much. Youknow, I'm almost forty. I don't
know if my body can handle this. Let me just walk around the track
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for two laps, and that's whereI start. So I just start small
and then I build upon that.I'm glad you said that because a lot
of people do feel like there's avery specific way to go about healing and
building our mental strengths. So thankyou for a pointing out. Absolutely yeah,
I love that you said that,and I love what you said about
doing things that match your lifestyle.So for me, I will do yoga,
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I will do meditation, I willput on music I love listening to
music, and I will pray outjournal. So these are all little things
that you can do to implement betterhealth into your life. But I always
tell people too, I have ashirt that says health over hustle. And
I know we like getting to thebag. We want to get into the
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money as quick as possible. Wetrying to create generational wealth. But y'all,
there is nothing, and I meannone of that matters if you are
not well in your mind, ifyou are not well in your body.
We have to get centered and makethat a priority as much as we make
get into the bag of priority,because they're both important. We come,
I'm sorry, we come from adeficit. As people of color. We
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don't have the same vantage points thatother people have. So we're trying to
do it all and juggle all theballs, and that's okay, but we
have to remember ourselves and to prioritizeourselves. And as mothers, we tend
to put everybody else, everything elsebefore us. Be selfish. Sometimes every
day I want you to be selfishfor a little bit of time. Get
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on your yoga met right, takea few minutes to write an affirmation.
I'm beautiful, I'm gifted, I'mwonderfully made. I can do this,
I can do anything I put mymind to. You be surprised at how
just writing one sentence down the dayand repeating that in your head will have
an impact on yourself, on yourmental, on your physical, and on
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your spirit as well. So justa few tabits. Yes, for me,
I learned to connect with God,continue to stay in the spirit because
we are a spirit being, weare human having. We are a spirit
having a human experience. And sowhat I do is to make certain that
I continue to connect with the HolySpirit, because with all the Holy Spirit,
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we're not able to walk as weare designed to walk, which is
in victory. Okay. God expectsus to walk in success, in victory
and be whole. And so wheneverstress comes, I know that that's not
my portion. Okay. So Itap into the world of God and allow
the Word of God to transform mythinking. And as the Word transform my
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thinking, then my whole being comesinto alignment with what the Word of God
designed for me. And so I'mable to walk in peace. I'm able
to command joy because even when thereis nothing to rejoice about, the joy
is in me because I connect withthe spirit of God. And so as
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I stay in that place, becauseif I come out of that, anytime,
I step out of the place ofthe world, and I'm you know,
not stable anymore. But when Iknow that God picked for me to
prosper, it, it's real forme to walk in wholeness and I stay
in that mindset, the spread upthe Lord helps me to walk in victory.
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So that's that's how I overcome.And the quick sun that to talk
about, that's how it comes comesout of it for me. It's so
funny because to you know, youguys, two answers, My answer is
pretty much like a combination of both. Right when you like you said,
we have a ton of things todo in a day, right, a
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thousand decisions to make, But whoI am at my core and why I
started the business and you know,everything that I do with in the community,
it starts with how we feel aboutourselves. Every single decision that we
make a day starts with how wefeel about ourselves. If as women,
if we feel like we look alittle feel a little big. That day,
we're gonna wear something that can kindof conceal that. Right, every
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single thing that we do is directlyderived to how we internally feel about who
we are as human beings. Andso that's literally where I start. I
start my morning every day with speakinglife into myself. You know, at
to your affirmations. I am,you know, I am not the things
that people have said about me inthe past. I am so far you
know above those things. I ambeautiful, I am kind, I am
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patient, right, and I evensay that I am the things that I
know I'm not yet Sometimes you gottafake it till you make it. Right.
I look in the mirror every dayand say, I am patient.
I am the most impatient. Igot out of the uber and walked the
rest of the way. I'm thatimpatient, right, That's just who I
am. But in the morning Iwas like this morning, I was like,
Ashly, you are the most patientperson lying. But I have to
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tell myself that because eventually, guesswhat, I'll start to believe it,
Because the same way people repeating negativethings to you over and over again,
you'll start to those will start tolike kind of live withinside of you.
The positive things will too, andso that is to me, I can
walk above quick saying that it's notquick to me, it's actually slow,
Okay, quick saying ain got nothing, no, Ashley, And that is
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literally what I have to tell myselfin order to be able to get through
even the toughest of days. Sothat's that's what works for me. That's
great. I'm glad you brought upsome of the negative stuff too, because
I think sometimes we like focus onlike this positive mindset, which is great,
right, But what I wanted toask everybody is what are some of
the strongholds that you think hold usback mentally? Perception, family trauma,
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perception trauma. Yeah, that's it. Social media, the comparisons that we
face on social media, And apastor that I used to listen to said,
comparison is the thief of joy,that's right. And so when we
are constantly inundated with information and who'sdoing what and everybody's highlight real, right,
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it can have an effect and impacton you. So yeah, Also
some of the things that you gothrough, like in your family, like
relationship situations like you're married and youare having challenges in your marriage, or
maybe you have a child that haveyou know, gone wrong and you're wondering
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what have you done wrong? Andthen you know, thoughts begin to come
into your mind regarding what you didwrong or you know, and so it
builds up strongholds and it allows younot to be able to walk in the
truth. As you talk about beingpositive, sometimes the Word of God says
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that we are to call those thingsthat be not as though there were.
So even though it's not yet,you don't see the perfection yet, but
God already made you perfect. Inhis eyes, you are perfect. But
you have to come into that mindset. You have to come into that God
perspective in order for you to ableto experience it. And so that's It's
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will for us to be able toexperience it. So strongholds are built up
by us not able to align withthe perspective of God, of our creator.
And that's one of the reasons whya lot of people and a lot
of us, because there are timeswe find ourselves with strongholds and we have
to bring them down. And likefor myself, as a little girl,
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I had strongholds coming up, andthose were some really issues that have faced
my life. One of the stronghold, can I go there? Sure,
go ahead. One of the strongholdwas the fact that I didn't know my
father and I was given to thewrong father. And then eventually I found
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my father because the first the fatherthat I was given to, he didn't
accept me as is his child.But the grandmother accept me. But then
eventually they found my father because hedidn't want to keep me anymore. But
as a little girl, I feltrejected and throughout my life there was strongholds.
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I could not do anything good,I could not do anything right.
I feel like I was a failure. So I had strongholds throughout most of
my life going through school, Ididn't want to do no work. As
a matter of fact, I waswhen I found my real father, I
was molested by him and so Inever feel like I was accepted anymore.
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But having born again, that's wherethe strongholds was now broken down, and
now I know my identity. SoI'm telling you strongholds can hold you in
bondage. You're not able to walkinto your true call, your true purpose
because of strongholds. Yeah, Iagree. I think to touch on family
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trauma right, denish I have thisconversation fairly often about how, you know,
a lot, like a lot ofpeople maybe were like raised with our
grandparents and things like that, becauseyou know, when you're born in eighties,
it's a little tricky, you knowwhat I mean, It could go
either way with how your parents were. And so you know, I actually
built my self love platform, youknow, growing up with the idea that
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my mother wanted nothing to do withme, and just that alone, right,
is like, well, how canI be good enough as now an
adult? Right? Because I hada phenomenal grandmother. She did the most
amazing job. But now I'm lookingfor in a partner what I was hoping
that I would have gotten from amother right as a woman. And so
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it's like, you can't expect aman to be that for you. That's
that's not gonna work, right.And so then when you start to really
like unlearn and like repack all theseideas of what you thought life was supposed
to be and how you thought,you know, the cookie cutter idea of
how it was supposed to go,it is it's freeing, for sure.
So to your point that is,I can empathize with that and understand that
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one thousand percent because those traumas ofour upbringing a lot of what it is
to become the best versions of ourselvesis unlearning things that we just thought were
the norm. Yes, I'm gladthat you ended with that point, because
that's where I want to jump backin for everyone when we speak of trauma.
I got to a point where Ifelt like undoing trauma is probably impossible.
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That's what I said to myself,Is that really possible? So what
I want you, ladies to reflecton, is that journey of undoing the
trauma, Like, do you feellike this is ongoing forever where there is
a possibility to really undo the traumathat we've been through. I think it's
about management, right. I don'tthink you can undo trauma. Trauma being
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a person of color stretches back beforeslavery, right, and so I can't
undo what was done four hundred yearsago, right. But what I can
do is make a conscious choice thatfor my life, like the Bible says,
ask for me and miles will servethe Lord. So for as for
me and my house, we'll manageour trauma through little little tibbits, bite
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sized pieces, whether it's taking ataking time to like really think about your
thoughts. Right, So, like, what can I control in this situation?
Do I have to respond the waythat my family has taught me to
respond? And a lot of blackand brown families like we grew up with.
My grandmother played a pivotal role inraising me just because of some of
the choices and decisions that my parentsmade that weren't the best right, And
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so we have to choose what we'regoing to do. We have to make
that choice that just because it happenedin this house doesn't have to stay in
the house. If it stays inthe house, then that means that you
are allowing the trauma to be complex. Right, And it's like she talked
about strongholds. One thing builds onanother, and then it becomes to the
point that it's so strong that ittakes so much for you to try to
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even like get through. Right,It's almost like it's a damn, and
it's stopping the flow of your progressionin life. It's stopping the flow of
how you communicate with others. It'sstopping the flow of relationships. Like I
grew up seeing my mother and fatherfight literally all the time. And so
when I approached marriage, I waslike, if a man ever put his
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hands on me, like he betterthan ever, I'm gonna be in jail.
Right. That was my thought process. But now that I'm married,
though, some of those things stillcome up from what I experienced in my
childhood. I have to make aconscious decision like, all right, Ashley,
are you gonna respond based on whatyou've seen and you know and you're
aware that that's unhealthy? Or areyou want to make a choice to do
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something different? Like, all right, let me just take a moment,
let me breathe. I need totalk to my husband, and I don't
need to swing on them, youknow what I mean, that's what I've
seen, doesn't mean that that's howI have to respond. So, you
know, as human beings, wehave to make the choice that we're gonna
consciously choose to do something different,and in that doing, that's the managing
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of the trauma. Yeah, sothat almost comes second nature. Yeah,
it's ongoing for sure. I doyoga quite a bit daily, and I
tell people all the time it isa practice. It is Yoga isn't just
something Oh you go and you doit and you're done. Yes, that
can be true, but it isa practice. You get better and better
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and better at it, and Ithink same for your mental health and for
managing stress and anxiety. It's apractice, y'all. We think about however
many years you've been alive, doingthings the way you've done them over and
over and over again. It isgoing to take time, and as you
go through life, you will havenew experiences that bring on new thoughts and
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new revelations and new things that youhave to deal with, and so you
have to practice, which is whyI think is so important to implement some
of some of the things we talkedabout earlier. Right, so taking five
minutes while you're in a shower topray, or taking a second to journal,
you have to do it daily.And in listening somebody, sometimes I
feel like we can be too pridefulfor our own good. There is nothing
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wrong with being proud of who youare and standing your ground and being firm
and what you believe. However,we all need help at some point,
and it's okay to call on afriend, it's okay to call a therapist,
It's all okay to call doctor Ashleyand be like, girl, I
don't know how to do this.You know this is different, different,
It's okay. We have to learnto be vocal about our needs, our
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desires. And I feel like aswomen, a lot of times we get
so caught up and being strong andbeing the fighters for our family and this
pillar of strength that we don't takea moment to be like, you know
what, I ain't got it.I need help. I need somebody to
help me. So don't be afraidto enlist the help because it's ongoing.
It's not gonna stop. If youhave children, You're gonna worry about them
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children until you close your eyes untilyour last breath. So get some help,
do the things. It's never gonnastop, okay. So the word
of the Lord declares that he senthis word to heal our issues, our
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infirmities, our problems. And sohis word is Christ, Jesus. Christ
Jesus came into the world to destroythe work of darkness, and the work
of darkness is everything that we faceon a daily basis, the challenges of
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life, the failure, the disappointment, the rejection, the discouragement, everything
that we face. It's a problemthat comes to rob us off our best.
And so God so loved that Hesent his son to undo the trauma.
We cannot do it in our ownability, in our own strength.
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So we can find little things hereand there to fix it it. But
two tools, you're gonna find yourselfin the same place, same mental situation.
But when Christ comes into your life, it comes into your life to
undo that trauma. And yes,the spread of the Lord will undo that
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trauma. You will remember it.But the pain and the grief and the
the the the they bondage that itwill put you in when you receive him,
that trauma is demolished. That's thattrauma. That that that that fear,
and that that paralyzation that you usedto have, or or the failure
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to to walk in your best inyour potential. It is demolished. And
now you know who you are andevery day you can able to walk in
the God perspective and the God purposefor your life. And so that's how
my trauma was on do it isundone. I'm not who I used to
be. I'm telling you I wasa failure before, but now I'm a
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winner. I'm victorious, and it'sall because I invite Him into my life.
It comes to undo that and it'sit is of a fact, okay,
because when we when we continue tolive in that mindset of defeat,
on the mindset of your past oreven your present situation, you're not able
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to manage it on your own.But the word of God comes, as
I said earlier, that the wordcomes to heal our mindset. And so
it all has to do with howwe think, because the mind is very
powerful. The mind is the gatewayto the soul. Our soul is the
mind, the will and the emotion. And so when the mind is messed
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up, our will and our emotionis going to be messed up. And
so as you come to no Christis able to give you that tool and
that ability to fix what is outof place and what is damage and what
needs to be restored. I thinkfor me it's really I don't know if
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I would even want it to beundone completely right, because I think that
a lot of times the things,well, I'm very much of the mindset
that things don't happen to me,they happen for me, right, So
even down to an abusive relationship,of course, when I'm in it,
it doesn't right, I'm a victim. Something is technically happening to me right,
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once I come out of that now, and I am I have made
it out, and I am nowvictorious out of that because there are millions
of you know, people who donot. I now can take the time
to say Okay. While yes,and I was in it, of course
I did not want those things happening. But now guess what I know moving
forward, I will never ever acceptagain. It has given me strength to
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speak up for myself anytime I feelslighted or shorted. Right, the trauma
of what has happened to our peopleactually spoke of, you know, over
four hundred years ago. That hasgiven us a resilience unlike anything, you
know, unlike any other culture I'veever seen. Right, it has given
us loyalty, more loyalty to youknow, our people and our tribe right
than I've ever known. So Idon't know if I would want it to
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be completely undone, but I knowthat it helped a mindset to now never
ever be a victim in a situationever again. Right, And so I'm
thankful for those things because now Ican walk in a new light. I
have a completely new purpose, andit really allowed me to even grow closer
to God in that way to say, Okay, I need you kind of
to speak to me and tell mewhat exactly it is that I'm supposed to
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learn from that situation. And I'lleven ask him that, like in a
very small I was in an airportand my ticket wasn't working or it wasn't
scanning or something, and I wasextremely frustrated because I'm literally walking to get
on a plane, and I said, God, what are you trying to
teach me? Like right now?And ask him that in any moment,
because I'm like, Okay, I'msupposed to be learning something here. Nothing
is happening to me by chance orhappening to me at all. It's happening
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for me to realize something on theother side of it. Yeah, one
thing really quick. So the pastorminister, I'm not sure what the exact
title was, but she was talkingabout guy doing the trauma, and I
just want to say that the wordalso says to take captive every thought,
right, and so that's still achoice that we have to make, to
take captive every thought. That's great, that's great. So we have two
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minutes and we're going to go aroundreally quickly, and I just want to
have everyone give one thing right asto how we can leverage challenges and adversity.
I think the best way to leverageit is exactly is exactly what I
said, if you can if it'spossible for you, right, because everything
is not possible for everybody, Butif it is possible for you to look,
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go look at a situation that happenedthat might have been traumatic for you,
you know, an issue with yourfriendship, anything. If you can
take the time to say or realizethat that thing happened for you to learn
something and you can actually figure outwhat that is, I think that's the
best tool that you can have.It has changed my life drastically for me.
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It's for you to recognize who youare, what you're called to do,
and what you're called to be.That you're not your own, your
God's creation, your God's children.He has a plan for you. You
knows the plan he has for you. It's good, it's prosperous. But
unless you'll align yourself with him,you're not able to partake and leave life
to the fullest. To that point, I think every single time I have
(30:40):
ever faced the adversity or something reallychallenging and really hard in my life.
It has led me to purpose everysingle time. So when you get to
feeling like, man, something isnot right. This is really hard.
I can't go on. Just knowthat through the toughest times, the most
beautiful things are births. And whenthings look really ugly, don't give up
(31:03):
because you're nine times out of tenyou're right there. So when I see
adversity, it's almost time to belike, oh, it's time to get
it now because it's getting real hardbecause something is on the other end of
that. So stay the course,don't give up, know that it's all
working out for your good right,and know that something is going to be
(31:25):
birth. Keep pushing. It's likegiving birth. Literally push, push through
the pain. Yeah. So Iwant everybody to just take their hand,
to just look at their hand,and then I want you to just touch
your hand. Right, So wehave senses right. So a lot of
times in life when situations happen,we try to focus on everything. We
have to focus on that which wecan control. And I said, look
(31:47):
at your hand, because I playedsports in school. So if I have
the ball and I'm dribbling, I'min control of that ball. Denisia can't
control what I'm doing with that ballright, And so in life, we
have to look at our hand andask ourselves, regardless of what the situation
is, what can I control inthis situation and focus on that. Don't
focus on I can't focus on therain outside and the weather. I can't
(32:10):
focus on all of the traffic inNew York City. I can focus on
whether or not I get out ofthe car and I walk so I can
get to my destination. That's withinmy control. So I just encourage you
to take time to look at yourhand as a reminder, because it's tangible
and hopefully we all have hands.If you don't touch another area in your
body, and ask yourself, howcan I control this situation and do that
(32:35):
so good? Did you want toadd something? Sure, I say,
do what we're doing here. Builda community, find those people, get
close to them, and make itlike an army so we could all fight
together, especially in the black community. We need to do that. We
need to keep doing things like this. That's great, Well, this is
a great conversation. I appreciate youladies coming up here. I want to
(32:57):
be obedient to God. I thinka lot of the reasons why He's trusted
me with a lot of things.Is because of obedience. Right. So
there may be some people in thisroom and I just I feel this yearning
in my spirit because I was oncesitting in a place of darkness. I
was once sitting in a place ofnot having hope. I was once sitting
in a place of feeling very farfrom God. So if that is you
(33:21):
today, right, I would beremiss to have a mental Wealth expo and
sit up here and talk about healingand wholeness and not offer you an opportunity
to come to God. All right, So we're gonna pray. I'm going
to ask Minister Vernette to lead whoeverfeels led in their spirit in this room.
Yes to the Lord, go ahead, Amen. Amen. Healing begins
(33:46):
with acknowledging that you are sick.It doesn't mean that you are physically sick,
but you can be mentally sick.The fact that if you are outside
of God, in other words,if you are not surrendered to Him,
if you're not born again. TheBible says that everyone has to be born
(34:08):
again before you can enter the Kingdomof God. We're all born in sin,
we were all separated from God.But Jesus came as a son of
God to redeem mankind back to God. As I said before, that he
is the word that comes to usto heal us. Every situation that you're
facing right now, all the challengesthat you face. Jesus can bring healing
(34:32):
too that situation. And when youaccept him, your name will be written
in the book of Lamb lam theLamb Book of Life. And so as
I encourage you to accept him today, give him a chance. When you
accept him that challenges that you hadin the past, the sall nature that
(34:55):
you had that separates you from theLord is going to give you ease nature
that connects you with the Father.So I want to encourage you to just
just give him your give him atry. The Bible says, past and
see that the Lord is good whenyou won't know unless you taste. So
I want to give you the opportunityto invite Christ into your life. Is
(35:17):
anyone here that would like to getto know him more and to give him
a chance? Anyone? Why don'twe do this? Because this is this
is like an open form and anopen space. I encourage you. Wherever
you are, you can close youreyes right. We all have an opportunity
(35:37):
to choose. I'm not forcing anybody, but I'm going to pray this prayer
right and if you want to receiveand you want to repeat after me,
I welcome you to do so,and you could stay right where you are.
So I'm gonna pray and you canrepeat after me. So, Father,
we come to you in Jesus' name, Come to Jesus. We thank
you for your grace. We thankyou for your mercy, thank you for
(35:59):
your Jesus. We declare that you'reour Lord and Savior, that you died
for us, that you love us. Holy Spirit, come into our lives,
lead, guide God, and directus in the name of Jesus Christ.
And I'm just going to pray.Father, we just come to you
(36:20):
today. I thank you for thisopportunity. Father, you saw where I
was in a dark space, andif you could use somebody like me where
I was, God, I knowthat you can use the people in this
room. So I thank you HolySpirit for moving upon these people. There's
no accident for anybody sitting here today, and I will always be obedient to
the call Father God. So Ijust thank you for the souls that are
(36:44):
in this room. I thank youfor using me. I thank you for
using these young ladies up here tospeak life into these people. And we
don't take any of this for granted. In Jesus' name, Amen, Amen,
Amen, thank you for so listen. I want to thank you all
for coming here today. I amnot ashamed of my faith. Okay,
(37:07):
I only get to be where I'mat in life. I was a little
girl that dreamed of working in radio. I dreamed of being in New York
City. I dreamed of doing allthese things, and it's only been the
grace in the hand of God.Right. So I encourage you today if
you have a dream in your heart, God will give it to you right,
more than you can ask or think. Right. But it starts with
(37:30):
being obedience. I'm not talking aboutbeing perfect, because God knows. He's
been so graceful to me and allmy shortcomings and my mistakes. And one
day when I write my book,you can read about all everything that I
did wrong. All right, ButI encourage you today to just be encouraged.
Right, even if you find yourselfin a dark space. God loves
you, He sees you, heknows your name, and I appreciate you
(37:52):
all here for coming. Thank youso much. Amen,
Welcome to a live episode of MeEternal. This is officially Panel one,
which is about building mental strength,healing and being strong through our mindsets.
And joining us today is Minister VenetteWilliams of Miracle Emotions and Ministry. We
have Elaina Brown, wellness advocate andherbalist, doctor Ashley Lowe Simmons, and
(00:21):
Ashley Muhammad, who is a mom, an entrepreneur, and a mental health
advocate. So welcome ladies. Okay, I'm sorry. My co host today
him Well, I'm Denisha. Youcan call me Danny. I'm also a
mom, mental health clinician, andan entrepreneur. Yes, and you also
(00:42):
host a conversation in Combos. Absolutely, our hosts Convos, which is a
spin off of my career and mentalhealth to get the Black community healthier in
our relationships. Awesome, Awesome.We're going to start today on healing right
and the body and the mind weredesigned to be whole, so we're gonna
(01:03):
talk a little bit about that today. I just want to want to go
around the panel and just ask youall, how does stress affect the body
and how can we train our bodiesto offset the effects of anxiety and depression.
If you'd like me to start.Yeah, So I know for me
personally, right, because it affectsall of us differently. I know for
(01:23):
me it stress immediately goes to mynervous system and it like attacks my nervous
system, and then then I feellike it's like debilitating me and I'm completely
out of whack, and I keepyou know, excuse me for the TMI
like run into the bathroom and likejust very nervous and jittery. And so
what I have done personally to kindof counteract that is pay attention to my
(01:44):
body. When I start to feellike a bit of uneasiness, I have
to take a step back. Ifit's a conversation, if it's a you
know, and of course you know, I communicate that like just give me
a second, you know, Ineed to kind of like self regulate,
take a few deep breaths, kindof think of some positive things in my
mind, and then I'm typically ableto kind of you know, jump whatever,
(02:05):
jump back into whatever it is,but in a more calmer and peaceful
position. And so that like myvoice isn't getting elevated or I'm not letting
the elevation of others kind of contributeto how I'm feeling because a lot of
times there's like a funny joke thatsays, like we're all going to therapy
to deal with people who refuse togo to therapy, right, So it's
like just because we're self regulating andwe're taking that second to kind of take
(02:29):
some deep breaths and understand where weare there are you know, ninety percent
of the people in our lives aren'tdoing that, and so it's just trying
to not let like affect, letthe actions of others affect, you know
that once you've taken that time.So that's how I you know, that's
how it works for me. That'sgreat, Minnesova, And that how does
stress affect the body? The body? The body is the templuff. The
(02:51):
Lord God made us in his imageand his lightness. He made us the
prosper in our body. Our bodyis designed to connect to the spirit of
God. If our mind is outof control, if our mind is not
in alignment with the will of God, with the Word of God, then
(03:12):
the body is going to be operatingoutside of health, outside of prosperity.
The Word of God declares that youwish for all that we prosper and be
in good health. Now if weare stress, if we are stress,
then our body is not going toprosper. Our body is going to be
broken down with all kinds of decay, sickness, disease, fear, you
(03:38):
know, the things that affect you. It all has to do with the
mind. Okay, stress affect themind. And so when your mind is
stressed, you are paralyzed. You'renot able to think positively, You're not
able to feed the cells of yourbody with positivity. And so stress,
(04:00):
yes, can only come under controlwhen you know who you are, when
you know what God has for you, and when you align yourself with the
will of God. That's good.Yes, So stress and anxiety can be
completely debilitating. It can completely offsetnot just your mental health, but your
(04:23):
physical health as well. So whenpeople a lot of times when we are
sick, or we think we're sick, or we have a cold, it's
a lot of times it's because wehaven't gotten enough rest. We've allowed stress
to come in and completely disrupt ourday, our mental, our physical.
So it can be completely disruptive toeverything that you have going on. And
(04:45):
so it's important and I'll leave witha tidbit. I know you didn't ask
for tips, but I'm gonna giveone every morning. I don't care if
it's three minutes, five minutes,whatever it is. Take some time for
yourself, get your mind in alignmentwith your body so that you can operate
in a fast that is conducive toyou doing the things that you want to
do. This morning, as lateas I woke up to come here,
I took fifteen minutes to go runon the treadmill because I needed to get
(05:10):
my mind in alignment with my bodyright. So it will disrupt you completely
if you allow it to, andit will make you feel sick in your
physical body. So yes, good. So I completely agree with everything that
everyone has said. And you'll allnotice that I use a lot of analogies
because being a clinician, I liketo make it as practical as possible.
(05:31):
Yes, and so I liken stressto being. You know, for those
of you all that celebrate Thanksgiving orany holiday, we have a paper plate
generally, right, and you're pilingfood on that plate because there's tons of
food. And so for me,when it comes to stress, it's like
you've put too much on your plateand you can't handle it. And so
what happens to that plate is itbegins to double over. Right. And
(05:55):
so, just like Elle said,stress affects you at the very that your
cellular level. It affects your mind, it affects your body, It affects
your soul. Because we're trying beings, right, We're not just body.
Everything is connected. And so whenyou become stressed, overwhelmed, anxious,
all of those things, it's affectingyour nervous system. It's all breaking down,
(06:16):
and then it's you know, andso that's what stressing anxiety does.
That's good. Yeah, kids areall good. Can I say something really
quick sure? To her point aboutwhen about it affecting your body. I
had a panic attack, right.I had never had a panic attack before,
so I didn't know what it feltlike, what it looked like,
or any of the signs. Itwas so bad that I thought I had
COVID. It had to be rushedto the er. And it was literally
(06:39):
triggered from an argument that I washaving with someone. Like my body like
froze and I got like chills,and it was the worst thing that I've
ever experienced, and had no cluethe entire time that it was a panic
attack, So it will absolutely debilitateyour outer body just as much as it
does to your inner for sure.I'm just going to stop for one second.
(07:00):
Where's Amber? Yeah? Can youjust tell her? DeAndre? Can
you ask them to have the DJturn the music down a little bit,
just let them know that we're recordingin here. I appreciate that. Okay,
awesome, I'm sorry, go ahead, Denisha, all right. I
love everything I heard you all say, but I felt like I wanted to
(07:21):
hear something else. So I'm gonnaask you this, and I'll start with
Dota Ashley. I call it likethe quicksand when we're sinking into like so
many things and feeling overwhelmed. Andwhat I want to know from each of
you, starting with you, DotaAshley, is like, what tools do
you use daily or weekly to kindof pull yourself out of that Quicksand I
(07:42):
love that. So I have amental health is line right, because I
believe that mental health is the foundationof everything that we do. And yesterday
I had on a shirt that saysthat we have to learn how to just
be right. We are human beings, but so often we're always doing all
the roles. Mom clinician whatever roleyou play, you're always doing things.
(08:05):
So for me, what I dois I take time to just be.
My grandmother said the other day,she said, oh, well, I
don't know why you have that shirton you. You're always doing stuff because
I have to unlearn and relearn howto be. And I don't try to
meditate for five minutes or for tenminutes because the life that I've lived,
(08:26):
that's way too much for me.So I take sixty seconds and I breathe.
If I'm in the shower, I'mpraying, I'm putting on worship music.
My husband is a trainer, sosometime he'll give me go to the
gym and do this exercise for anhour and I'm like, oh, this
is just way too much. Youknow, I'm almost forty. I don't
know if my body can handle this. Let me just walk around the track
(08:48):
for two laps, and that's whereI start. So I just start small
and then I build upon that.I'm glad you said that because a lot
of people do feel like there's avery specific way to go about healing and
building our mental strengths. So thankyou for a pointing out. Absolutely yeah,
I love that you said that,and I love what you said about
doing things that match your lifestyle.So for me, I will do yoga,
(09:11):
I will do meditation, I willput on music I love listening to
music, and I will pray outjournal. So these are all little things
that you can do to implement betterhealth into your life. But I always
tell people too, I have ashirt that says health over hustle. And
I know we like getting to thebag. We want to get into the
(09:33):
money as quick as possible. Wetrying to create generational wealth. But y'all,
there is nothing, and I meannone of that matters if you are
not well in your mind, ifyou are not well in your body.
We have to get centered and makethat a priority as much as we make
get into the bag of priority,because they're both important. We come,
I'm sorry, we come from adeficit. As people of color. We
(09:54):
don't have the same vantage points thatother people have. So we're trying to
do it all and juggle all theballs, and that's okay, but we
have to remember ourselves and to prioritizeourselves. And as mothers, we tend
to put everybody else, everything elsebefore us. Be selfish. Sometimes every
day I want you to be selfishfor a little bit of time. Get
(10:15):
on your yoga met right, takea few minutes to write an affirmation.
I'm beautiful, I'm gifted, I'mwonderfully made. I can do this,
I can do anything I put mymind to. You be surprised at how
just writing one sentence down the dayand repeating that in your head will have
an impact on yourself, on yourmental, on your physical, and on
(10:35):
your spirit as well. So justa few tabits. Yes, for me,
I learned to connect with God,continue to stay in the spirit because
we are a spirit being, weare human having. We are a spirit
having a human experience. And sowhat I do is to make certain that
I continue to connect with the HolySpirit, because with all the Holy Spirit,
(11:00):
we're not able to walk as weare designed to walk, which is
in victory. Okay. God expectsus to walk in success, in victory
and be whole. And so wheneverstress comes, I know that that's not
my portion. Okay. So Itap into the world of God and allow
the Word of God to transform mythinking. And as the Word transform my
(11:22):
thinking, then my whole being comesinto alignment with what the Word of God
designed for me. And so I'mable to walk in peace. I'm able
to command joy because even when thereis nothing to rejoice about, the joy
is in me because I connect withthe spirit of God. And so as
(11:46):
I stay in that place, becauseif I come out of that, anytime,
I step out of the place ofthe world, and I'm you know,
not stable anymore. But when Iknow that God picked for me to
prosper, it, it's real forme to walk in wholeness and I stay
in that mindset, the spread upthe Lord helps me to walk in victory.
(12:09):
So that's that's how I overcome.And the quick sun that to talk
about, that's how it comes comesout of it for me. It's so
funny because to you know, youguys, two answers, My answer is
pretty much like a combination of both. Right when you like you said,
we have a ton of things todo in a day, right, a
(12:30):
thousand decisions to make, But whoI am at my core and why I
started the business and you know,everything that I do with in the community,
it starts with how we feel aboutourselves. Every single decision that we
make a day starts with how wefeel about ourselves. If as women,
if we feel like we look alittle feel a little big. That day,
we're gonna wear something that can kindof conceal that. Right, every
(12:52):
single thing that we do is directlyderived to how we internally feel about who
we are as human beings. Andso that's literally where I start. I
start my morning every day with speakinglife into myself. You know, at
to your affirmations. I am,you know, I am not the things
that people have said about me inthe past. I am so far you
know above those things. I ambeautiful, I am kind, I am
(13:16):
patient, right, and I evensay that I am the things that I
know I'm not yet Sometimes you gottafake it till you make it. Right.
I look in the mirror every dayand say, I am patient.
I am the most impatient. Igot out of the uber and walked the
rest of the way. I'm thatimpatient, right, That's just who I
am. But in the morning Iwas like this morning, I was like,
Ashly, you are the most patientperson lying. But I have to
(13:39):
tell myself that because eventually, guesswhat, I'll start to believe it,
Because the same way people repeating negativethings to you over and over again,
you'll start to those will start tolike kind of live withinside of you.
The positive things will too, andso that is to me, I can
walk above quick saying that it's notquick to me, it's actually slow,
Okay, quick saying ain got nothing, no, Ashley, And that is
(14:01):
literally what I have to tell myselfin order to be able to get through
even the toughest of days. Sothat's that's what works for me. That's
great. I'm glad you brought upsome of the negative stuff too, because
I think sometimes we like focus onlike this positive mindset, which is great,
right, But what I wanted toask everybody is what are some of
the strongholds that you think hold usback mentally? Perception, family trauma,
(14:26):
perception trauma. Yeah, that's it. Social media, the comparisons that we
face on social media, And apastor that I used to listen to said,
comparison is the thief of joy,that's right. And so when we
are constantly inundated with information and who'sdoing what and everybody's highlight real, right,
(14:52):
it can have an effect and impacton you. So yeah, Also
some of the things that you gothrough, like in your family, like
relationship situations like you're married and youare having challenges in your marriage, or
maybe you have a child that haveyou know, gone wrong and you're wondering
(15:13):
what have you done wrong? Andthen you know, thoughts begin to come
into your mind regarding what you didwrong or you know, and so it
builds up strongholds and it allows younot to be able to walk in the
truth. As you talk about beingpositive, sometimes the Word of God says
(15:33):
that we are to call those thingsthat be not as though there were.
So even though it's not yet,you don't see the perfection yet, but
God already made you perfect. Inhis eyes, you are perfect. But
you have to come into that mindset. You have to come into that God
perspective in order for you to ableto experience it. And so that's It's
(15:56):
will for us to be able toexperience it. So strongholds are built up
by us not able to align withthe perspective of God, of our creator.
And that's one of the reasons whya lot of people and a lot
of us, because there are timeswe find ourselves with strongholds and we have
to bring them down. And likefor myself, as a little girl,
(16:21):
I had strongholds coming up, andthose were some really issues that have faced
my life. One of the stronghold, can I go there? Sure,
go ahead. One of the strongholdwas the fact that I didn't know my
father and I was given to thewrong father. And then eventually I found
(16:44):
my father because the first the fatherthat I was given to, he didn't
accept me as is his child.But the grandmother accept me. But then
eventually they found my father because hedidn't want to keep me anymore. But
as a little girl, I feltrejected and throughout my life there was strongholds.
(17:07):
I could not do anything good,I could not do anything right.
I feel like I was a failure. So I had strongholds throughout most of
my life going through school, Ididn't want to do no work. As
a matter of fact, I waswhen I found my real father, I
was molested by him and so Inever feel like I was accepted anymore.
(17:29):
But having born again, that's wherethe strongholds was now broken down, and
now I know my identity. SoI'm telling you strongholds can hold you in
bondage. You're not able to walkinto your true call, your true purpose
because of strongholds. Yeah, Iagree. I think to touch on family
(17:52):
trauma right, denish I have thisconversation fairly often about how, you know,
a lot, like a lot ofpeople maybe were like raised with our
grandparents and things like that, becauseyou know, when you're born in eighties,
it's a little tricky, you knowwhat I mean, It could go
either way with how your parents were. And so you know, I actually
built my self love platform, youknow, growing up with the idea that
(18:12):
my mother wanted nothing to do withme, and just that alone, right,
is like, well, how canI be good enough as now an
adult? Right? Because I hada phenomenal grandmother. She did the most
amazing job. But now I'm lookingfor in a partner what I was hoping
that I would have gotten from amother right as a woman. And so
(18:33):
it's like, you can't expect aman to be that for you. That's
that's not gonna work, right.And so then when you start to really
like unlearn and like repack all theseideas of what you thought life was supposed
to be and how you thought,you know, the cookie cutter idea of
how it was supposed to go,it is it's freeing, for sure.
So to your point that is,I can empathize with that and understand that
(18:55):
one thousand percent because those traumas ofour upbringing a lot of what it is
to become the best versions of ourselvesis unlearning things that we just thought were
the norm. Yes, I'm gladthat you ended with that point, because
that's where I want to jump backin for everyone when we speak of trauma.
I got to a point where Ifelt like undoing trauma is probably impossible.
(19:21):
That's what I said to myself,Is that really possible? So what
I want you, ladies to reflecton, is that journey of undoing the
trauma, Like, do you feellike this is ongoing forever where there is
a possibility to really undo the traumathat we've been through. I think it's
about management, right. I don'tthink you can undo trauma. Trauma being
(19:42):
a person of color stretches back beforeslavery, right, and so I can't
undo what was done four hundred yearsago, right. But what I can
do is make a conscious choice thatfor my life, like the Bible says,
ask for me and miles will servethe Lord. So for as for
me and my house, we'll manageour trauma through little little tibbits, bite
(20:06):
sized pieces, whether it's taking ataking time to like really think about your
thoughts. Right, So, like, what can I control in this situation?
Do I have to respond the waythat my family has taught me to
respond? And a lot of blackand brown families like we grew up with.
My grandmother played a pivotal role inraising me just because of some of
the choices and decisions that my parentsmade that weren't the best right, And
(20:30):
so we have to choose what we'regoing to do. We have to make
that choice that just because it happenedin this house doesn't have to stay in
the house. If it stays inthe house, then that means that you
are allowing the trauma to be complex. Right, And it's like she talked
about strongholds. One thing builds onanother, and then it becomes to the
point that it's so strong that ittakes so much for you to try to
(20:53):
even like get through. Right,It's almost like it's a damn, and
it's stopping the flow of your progressionin life. It's stopping the flow of
how you communicate with others. It'sstopping the flow of relationships. Like I
grew up seeing my mother and fatherfight literally all the time. And so
when I approached marriage, I waslike, if a man ever put his
(21:17):
hands on me, like he betterthan ever, I'm gonna be in jail.
Right. That was my thought process. But now that I'm married,
though, some of those things stillcome up from what I experienced in my
childhood. I have to make aconscious decision like, all right, Ashley,
are you gonna respond based on whatyou've seen and you know and you're
aware that that's unhealthy? Or areyou want to make a choice to do
(21:38):
something different? Like, all right, let me just take a moment,
let me breathe. I need totalk to my husband, and I don't
need to swing on them, youknow what I mean, that's what I've
seen, doesn't mean that that's howI have to respond. So, you
know, as human beings, wehave to make the choice that we're gonna
consciously choose to do something different,and in that doing, that's the managing
(21:59):
of the trauma. Yeah, sothat almost comes second nature. Yeah,
it's ongoing for sure. I doyoga quite a bit daily, and I
tell people all the time it isa practice. It is Yoga isn't just
something Oh you go and you doit and you're done. Yes, that
can be true, but it isa practice. You get better and better
(22:21):
and better at it, and Ithink same for your mental health and for
managing stress and anxiety. It's apractice, y'all. We think about however
many years you've been alive, doingthings the way you've done them over and
over and over again. It isgoing to take time, and as you
go through life, you will havenew experiences that bring on new thoughts and
(22:41):
new revelations and new things that youhave to deal with, and so you
have to practice, which is whyI think is so important to implement some
of some of the things we talkedabout earlier. Right, so taking five
minutes while you're in a shower topray, or taking a second to journal,
you have to do it daily.And in listening somebody, sometimes I
feel like we can be too pridefulfor our own good. There is nothing
(23:03):
wrong with being proud of who youare and standing your ground and being firm
and what you believe. However,we all need help at some point,
and it's okay to call on afriend, it's okay to call a therapist,
It's all okay to call doctor Ashleyand be like, girl, I
don't know how to do this.You know this is different, different,
It's okay. We have to learnto be vocal about our needs, our
(23:26):
desires. And I feel like aswomen, a lot of times we get
so caught up and being strong andbeing the fighters for our family and this
pillar of strength that we don't takea moment to be like, you know
what, I ain't got it.I need help. I need somebody to
help me. So don't be afraidto enlist the help because it's ongoing.
It's not gonna stop. If youhave children, You're gonna worry about them
(23:48):
children until you close your eyes untilyour last breath. So get some help,
do the things. It's never gonnastop, okay. So the word
of the Lord declares that he senthis word to heal our issues, our
(24:11):
infirmities, our problems. And sohis word is Christ, Jesus. Christ
Jesus came into the world to destroythe work of darkness, and the work
of darkness is everything that we faceon a daily basis, the challenges of
(24:32):
life, the failure, the disappointment, the rejection, the discouragement, everything
that we face. It's a problemthat comes to rob us off our best.
And so God so loved that Hesent his son to undo the trauma.
We cannot do it in our ownability, in our own strength.
(24:56):
So we can find little things hereand there to fix it it. But
two tools, you're gonna find yourselfin the same place, same mental situation.
But when Christ comes into your life, it comes into your life to
undo that trauma. And yes,the spread of the Lord will undo that
(25:18):
trauma. You will remember it.But the pain and the grief and the
the the the they bondage that itwill put you in when you receive him,
that trauma is demolished. That's thattrauma. That that that that fear,
and that that paralyzation that you usedto have, or or the failure
(25:44):
to to walk in your best inyour potential. It is demolished. And
now you know who you are andevery day you can able to walk in
the God perspective and the God purposefor your life. And so that's how
my trauma was on do it isundone. I'm not who I used to
be. I'm telling you I wasa failure before, but now I'm a
(26:07):
winner. I'm victorious, and it'sall because I invite Him into my life.
It comes to undo that and it'sit is of a fact, okay,
because when we when we continue tolive in that mindset of defeat,
on the mindset of your past oreven your present situation, you're not able
(26:29):
to manage it on your own.But the word of God comes, as
I said earlier, that the wordcomes to heal our mindset. And so
it all has to do with howwe think, because the mind is very
powerful. The mind is the gatewayto the soul. Our soul is the
mind, the will and the emotion. And so when the mind is messed
(26:52):
up, our will and our emotionis going to be messed up. And
so as you come to no Christis able to give you that tool and
that ability to fix what is outof place and what is damage and what
needs to be restored. I thinkfor me it's really I don't know if
(27:15):
I would even want it to beundone completely right, because I think that
a lot of times the things,well, I'm very much of the mindset
that things don't happen to me,they happen for me, right, So
even down to an abusive relationship,of course, when I'm in it,
it doesn't right, I'm a victim. Something is technically happening to me right,
(27:37):
once I come out of that now, and I am I have made
it out, and I am nowvictorious out of that because there are millions
of you know, people who donot. I now can take the time
to say Okay. While yes,and I was in it, of course
I did not want those things happening. But now guess what I know moving
forward, I will never ever acceptagain. It has given me strength to
(28:00):
speak up for myself anytime I feelslighted or shorted. Right, the trauma
of what has happened to our peopleactually spoke of, you know, over
four hundred years ago. That hasgiven us a resilience unlike anything, you
know, unlike any other culture I'veever seen. Right, it has given
us loyalty, more loyalty to youknow, our people and our tribe right
than I've ever known. So Idon't know if I would want it to
(28:21):
be completely undone, but I knowthat it helped a mindset to now never
ever be a victim in a situationever again. Right, And so I'm
thankful for those things because now Ican walk in a new light. I
have a completely new purpose, andit really allowed me to even grow closer
to God in that way to say, Okay, I need you kind of
to speak to me and tell mewhat exactly it is that I'm supposed to
(28:44):
learn from that situation. And I'lleven ask him that, like in a
very small I was in an airportand my ticket wasn't working or it wasn't
scanning or something, and I wasextremely frustrated because I'm literally walking to get
on a plane, and I said, God, what are you trying to
teach me? Like right now?And ask him that in any moment,
because I'm like, Okay, I'msupposed to be learning something here. Nothing
is happening to me by chance orhappening to me at all. It's happening
(29:07):
for me to realize something on theother side of it. Yeah, one
thing really quick. So the pastorminister, I'm not sure what the exact
title was, but she was talkingabout guy doing the trauma, and I
just want to say that the wordalso says to take captive every thought,
right, and so that's still achoice that we have to make, to
take captive every thought. That's great, that's great. So we have two
(29:29):
minutes and we're going to go aroundreally quickly, and I just want to
have everyone give one thing right asto how we can leverage challenges and adversity.
I think the best way to leverageit is exactly is exactly what I
said, if you can if it'spossible for you, right, because everything
is not possible for everybody, Butif it is possible for you to look,
(29:52):
go look at a situation that happenedthat might have been traumatic for you,
you know, an issue with yourfriendship, anything. If you can
take the time to say or realizethat that thing happened for you to learn
something and you can actually figure outwhat that is, I think that's the
best tool that you can have.It has changed my life drastically for me.
(30:15):
It's for you to recognize who youare, what you're called to do,
and what you're called to be.That you're not your own, your
God's creation, your God's children.He has a plan for you. You
knows the plan he has for you. It's good, it's prosperous. But
unless you'll align yourself with him,you're not able to partake and leave life
to the fullest. To that point, I think every single time I have
(30:40):
ever faced the adversity or something reallychallenging and really hard in my life.
It has led me to purpose everysingle time. So when you get to
feeling like, man, something isnot right. This is really hard.
I can't go on. Just knowthat through the toughest times, the most
beautiful things are births. And whenthings look really ugly, don't give up
(31:03):
because you're nine times out of tenyou're right there. So when I see
adversity, it's almost time to belike, oh, it's time to get
it now because it's getting real hardbecause something is on the other end of
that. So stay the course,don't give up, know that it's all
working out for your good right,and know that something is going to be
(31:25):
birth. Keep pushing. It's likegiving birth. Literally push, push through
the pain. Yeah. So Iwant everybody to just take their hand,
to just look at their hand,and then I want you to just touch
your hand. Right, So wehave senses right. So a lot of
times in life when situations happen,we try to focus on everything. We
have to focus on that which wecan control. And I said, look
(31:47):
at your hand, because I playedsports in school. So if I have
the ball and I'm dribbling, I'min control of that ball. Denisia can't
control what I'm doing with that ballright, And so in life, we
have to look at our hand andask ourselves, regardless of what the situation
is, what can I control inthis situation and focus on that. Don't
focus on I can't focus on therain outside and the weather. I can't
(32:10):
focus on all of the traffic inNew York City. I can focus on
whether or not I get out ofthe car and I walk so I can
get to my destination. That's withinmy control. So I just encourage you
to take time to look at yourhand as a reminder, because it's tangible
and hopefully we all have hands.If you don't touch another area in your
body, and ask yourself, howcan I control this situation and do that
(32:35):
so good? Did you want toadd something? Sure, I say,
do what we're doing here. Builda community, find those people, get
close to them, and make itlike an army so we could all fight
together, especially in the black community. We need to do that. We
need to keep doing things like this. That's great, Well, this is
a great conversation. I appreciate youladies coming up here. I want to
(32:57):
be obedient to God. I thinka lot of the reasons why He's trusted
me with a lot of things.Is because of obedience. Right. So
there may be some people in thisroom and I just I feel this yearning
in my spirit because I was oncesitting in a place of darkness. I
was once sitting in a place ofnot having hope. I was once sitting
in a place of feeling very farfrom God. So if that is you
(33:21):
today, right, I would beremiss to have a mental Wealth expo and
sit up here and talk about healingand wholeness and not offer you an opportunity
to come to God. All right, So we're gonna pray. I'm going
to ask Minister Vernette to lead whoeverfeels led in their spirit in this room.
Yes to the Lord, go ahead, Amen. Amen. Healing begins
(33:46):
with acknowledging that you are sick.It doesn't mean that you are physically sick,
but you can be mentally sick.The fact that if you are outside
of God, in other words,if you are not surrendered to Him,
if you're not born again. TheBible says that everyone has to be born
(34:08):
again before you can enter the Kingdomof God. We're all born in sin,
we were all separated from God.But Jesus came as a son of
God to redeem mankind back to God. As I said before, that he
is the word that comes to usto heal us. Every situation that you're
facing right now, all the challengesthat you face. Jesus can bring healing
(34:32):
too that situation. And when youaccept him, your name will be written
in the book of Lamb lam theLamb Book of Life. And so as
I encourage you to accept him today, give him a chance. When you
accept him that challenges that you hadin the past, the sall nature that
(34:55):
you had that separates you from theLord is going to give you ease nature
that connects you with the Father.So I want to encourage you to just
just give him your give him atry. The Bible says, past and
see that the Lord is good whenyou won't know unless you taste. So
I want to give you the opportunityto invite Christ into your life. Is
(35:17):
anyone here that would like to getto know him more and to give him
a chance? Anyone? Why don'twe do this? Because this is this
is like an open form and anopen space. I encourage you. Wherever
you are, you can close youreyes right. We all have an opportunity
(35:37):
to choose. I'm not forcing anybody, but I'm going to pray this prayer
right and if you want to receiveand you want to repeat after me,
I welcome you to do so,and you could stay right where you are.
So I'm gonna pray and you canrepeat after me. So, Father,
we come to you in Jesus' name, Come to Jesus. We thank
you for your grace. We thankyou for your mercy, thank you for
(35:59):
your Jesus. We declare that you'reour Lord and Savior, that you died
for us, that you love us. Holy Spirit, come into our lives,
lead, guide God, and directus in the name of Jesus Christ.
And I'm just going to pray.Father, we just come to you
(36:20):
today. I thank you for thisopportunity. Father, you saw where I
was in a dark space, andif you could use somebody like me where
I was, God, I knowthat you can use the people in this
room. So I thank you HolySpirit for moving upon these people. There's
no accident for anybody sitting here today, and I will always be obedient to
the call Father God. So Ijust thank you for the souls that are
(36:44):
in this room. I thank youfor using me. I thank you for
using these young ladies up here tospeak life into these people. And we
don't take any of this for granted. In Jesus' name, Amen, Amen,
Amen, thank you for so listen. I want to thank you all
for coming here today. I amnot ashamed of my faith. Okay,
(37:07):
I only get to be where I'mat in life. I was a little
girl that dreamed of working in radio. I dreamed of being in New York
City. I dreamed of doing allthese things, and it's only been the
grace in the hand of God.Right. So I encourage you today if
you have a dream in your heart, God will give it to you right,
more than you can ask or think. Right. But it starts with
(37:30):
being obedience. I'm not talking aboutbeing perfect, because God knows. He's
been so graceful to me and allmy shortcomings and my mistakes. And one
day when I write my book,you can read about all everything that I
did wrong. All right, ButI encourage you today to just be encouraged.
Right, even if you find yourselfin a dark space. God loves
you, He sees you, heknows your name, and I appreciate you
(37:52):
all here for coming. Thank youso much. Amen,
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