❤️ Fierce & Fiery: The Red Thread of Pride

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:12):
Hello, friends, So happy to have you here with me
today at Radical Joy. If you've been here before, welcome back.
If this is your first time with me, well I'm
glad you're here. Each week, i'm here with you talking
to myself about things that weigh on my mind and heart.
Hoping if you're dealing with something similar, we can adjust
our perspectives as you listen. Hey, if you're struggling with

(00:32):
something that needs immediate attention, please know the help was
available just on nine eight eight nationwide in the US
to reach the Mental Health and Suicide Crisis Hotline. All
of us here at Clau Studios believe that mental health
is a vital part of our well being. The more
people I meet and the more places I go, the

(00:53):
more I realize how important it is to make people
aware of the fact that there is no shame in
enjoying the parts of our lives that are incredible. It's
time for some radical Joy, and this week, the three
fingers pointing back at me are for the color red
represented in this episode by Anger and Compassion, part one

(01:13):
of a seven part series for Pride Month. We had
a meeting not long ago, and we've wanted to do
this for at least a couple of years, and it
worked out so that we could get this done this year.
Pride Month is something we have so many people in
our listening audience that identify with the Rainbow community, and

(01:34):
we want to make sure that we acknowledge them, see them,
tell them that we love them and stand by them
strongly in anything and everything. And so we had a
little meeting about we're going to go through the entire
Rainbow ROUDGIBIV, making sure that we cover each one of
the colors and a yin and yang of emotions that
go with each of those colors. It's pretty easy to

(01:55):
come up with the negative, and what we wanted to
do is try to find something that countered it. I
don't like thinking in opposites, but I think for our purposes,
this is something that we could definitely work on so
that moving forward, we have a way of acknowledging what
we're feeling that could be considered negative and having a
countering emotion or heart mindset that would help to understand

(02:20):
and work through those difficult emotions moving forward. So as
for red the red easily that seems a very simple
thing to do. We can go just as quickly as
we want to the Disney Pixar inside out red being
anger or rage, and I think a lot of people

(02:41):
can definitely sympathize and or relate to that very strong feeling.
It is a wildly effective motivator. And the thing that
we had to come up with was something that felt
as though it was a balancer, something that could equalize
whenever the rage got just a little bit too much.

(03:02):
And I spoke with my producer about it, Carrie and
I agreed that compassion was probably the most effective whenever
we think of something like that as far as sort
of tempering that heat with something that could still be useful,
something that we could manifest or direct in a way
so that we could still be very effective in our

(03:23):
daily lives, something that we could use to fuel a
positive outcome, and something that we could add to it
so that it didn't just consume. Because if any of
you are like me, and I think maybe several of
you are, I deal with anger on a daily basis

(03:45):
for any number of reasons I consider to see I
continue to see injustice and just what appears to be
almost unplanned or unstructured, hateful and just thrown into the world.
And I think that I continue to rage on the inside,

(04:06):
and then there's a part of me that needs to
know a way to balance it so that it doesn't
it doesn't completely rob me of the joy that I
continue to try to build in my life. As well.
I had a very kind, candid conversation with a friend
of mine. I'll be honest, I don't hear from him
very often, but when I do, it's always so nice,
and we were talking about what we do whenever these

(04:29):
kinds of things threaten to just burn us to a
crisp what do I do. I want to put good
into the world. I want to put love and strength
and kindness into the world. And then whenever I do that,
I met with so much anger and what appears to
be just malice. It's not just that people are angry,

(04:50):
it's just they want to see others hurt. They want
to see people they don't know, they want to see
the idea of these people eradicated. And I'm like, well,
this is what I'm going through, and tell me if
this is what you're feeling, so we can maybe figure
it out together. My first, my go to, my knee
jerk reaction is anger. I'm mad. Oh, I'm so mad

(05:14):
that this is happening, because it feels like people aren't
putting any thought into it. It just feels as though
it continues to happen, and they continue to double down
and triple down, and they just continue to add this
opposite of goodwill into the universe. And they put a
very specific flag on it, meaning a flag of a nation,
and that hurts me because that's what I would consider

(05:35):
the flag of my birth and I still identify very
strongly with being American, and though the things that they're
doing now in the name of that nation and or
in the name of being a Christian or any other
number of things where I identify very heavily or have
for years and years and years, it makes me mad

(05:59):
they're using those things to label what it is they're
doing as pro America or pro Christian, and I just
I rage. I rage because that is not the America
and that is not the christ that I was raised
to follow, or identify with or be a part of.

(06:21):
And luckily this person did agree with the like, yeah, yeah, no,
you're not alone. I think a lot of people that
started there are now having a very difficult time continuing
there it's like, okay, so then what like, what do
we do? Like the way that I know to fight?
I can't fight in just this one color, because if

(06:43):
I do, it will literally consume me. It will cut
me off from people that I have loved my entire life.
What do I do? How do I operate? And the
longer we talked and the deeper we dug, I told him,
I feel a quiet sadness. That's what I feel in
this anger is one thing because I can holler, and

(07:07):
I can stand on what I know to be true
and right and good, and I can point fingers and
I can set things on fire, and it feels amazing
because I know that there are people who will agree
with me, and hopefully something that I will say will
also move them, inspire them to do something on their
own turf, on their own terms, to do something really

(07:29):
helpful in what they see as injustice in the world. Fantastic,
And we have to temper that with something, knowing that
even though we feel unreasonably justified in getting this angry,
we must also temper it with something that can be
very helpful to those who don't respond well to that

(07:50):
volume of discussion. And that's where our compassion comes into
play where we have to understand and look at the
things that many many people are out there and they
are suffering, and they are angry, and they are feeling
wildly mistreated by the way the world is working right
now and the way that they see as moving forward

(08:12):
in it doesn't always match up with what the rest
of the world may see as what is effective to
get to a place where they can earn more money
for their families, where they can feel more a part
of the national discussion, where they can feel as though
they are not left behind by a community that has
more opportunities afforded to them because of where they grew

(08:37):
up or how much money their family had or who
that family knew. And I get it, and I want
to have compassion and understanding for these people. I most
definitely do. It is difficult sometimes to do that, why
because it feels as though these people one something and
they want to instead rely on and lean on that

(08:59):
victory instead of trying to figure out, Okay, now we've won,
Now how do we all move forward so that what
I was feeling I can fix it by working with
the powers that be, by relying on them to be
our representatives and our public servants, so that what I
was feeling can now be sort of adjusted, so that

(09:23):
now I can start feeling as though what is happening
now is in the greater good and in the benefit
of more people in the country, in the world instead
of just those select few at the very top of
the food chain. Well, great, I would love to see
that happen as well. I think that would be a

(09:45):
wonderful thing for whoever is in power to make sure
that we continue to focus on those kinds of populations,
both domestic and abroad, so that we can all work
to make sure that those things continue to improve for
the folks who are literally the backbone of the nation,
who are the people who put the world in a

(10:07):
better place. Yes, my question is this, how does that look?
What is that? And we have to ask a very
specific question because some people are willing to blindly follow
whoever's in power to do the things. And I will
give us this, some people are dead set against anyone
doing anything positive in this administration and in their faith

(10:33):
for that person or persons to accomplish that goal. I
get it, I do, I really really do. And on
the days when it's difficult to get it. I just
kind of have to give myself a little bit more space,
go after a little bit larger snack, perhaps a longer nap,
and wake up and get ready on a full belly

(10:54):
to understand what it is we need to do in
order to reach that understanding on all sides of the art.
I'm careful not to use the word both, and that
was the first word that came to my mind. Both.
We're so quick to put so many of these things
into a binary, and that's not what I want to do.
What I want to do is open this discussion to
so many opinions and ideas and mindset so that we

(11:15):
can all continue to focus on whatever it is we
need to do in order to gain a greater understanding
of our neighbors who we are ready to punch in
the throat. There's that anger, and instead what I'm going
to do is move into the compassionate part of that.

(11:35):
I understand it. We are angry why because we were
sold a bill of goods that now doesn't seem like
what we bought, Okay, And I think that's on many, many,
many sides of this. There are so many people out
there that we're taught one thing. Well, if I do this,

(11:56):
and I am a good person, and I settle down
and I marry well, and I make babies and I
raised them to be good people, then then I can
start taking advantage of all of these other things that
I was promised from the very beginning, and I can
sort of like lean back and rest and be okay
in the fact that I did everything right. And maybe
that isn't happening. Let's take another perspective on this. I

(12:21):
was raised to believe that you made good grades in
high school, and you did all the extra curriculars, and
you tried your best to get into a good school,
and you took out all these enormous loans and you
did the things, and then you were supposed to get
out and get a good job because you worked your
tail to the bone for all of this education, all
of these good things, because that's what you wanted to do.

(12:41):
That was the goal. Get something good so that you
can provide for a wonderful family. Once you're out, pay
back all of these loans, make all of this money,
and do these great things with your life, and eventually
you'll be able to retire and rest and do the
things you wanted to do because you put them off
because you had to do these things in your youth
to set you up for a fantastic future. And now

(13:04):
that is not maybe what you're getting. And if that
makes you rage, hey, I get it, and I support
it because I think a lot of us are dawning
on that realization now. And so what we have to
do is not only get angry about that, because it

(13:26):
is a righteous and justified anger. We have to find
a way to communicate that anger between groups of people
who are angry, I think for similar reasons, but on
different journeys. Okay, because I think that there are a
lot of people out there that get mad because they
went one way and they ended up in a lesser

(13:50):
advantageous position, and they get mad at maybe the people
who they see as being better off for whatever reason.
Maybe it is because they got more education, or they
had more opportunities, or they were born into a different
family that perhaps new other people so they could move
in different circles. There are so many reasons we could

(14:12):
be mad about things. I would like to also perhaps
offer that there are a million different reasons that we
could be really understanding about the way people get angry
and why they're there. I think a lot of us
are sharing of a very similar amount of frustration that

(14:34):
eventually leads us into anger and perhaps teeters over into rage.
And I think one of the most balancing forces in
the world for that is a compassionate aspect of it.
There's an element of compassion that must play into this.
Can you get mad about it? Absolutely? Can you be
frustrated whenever you see that people that you held in

(14:55):
very high esteem now support a group of people that
are continuing to do terrible things in the nation that
eventually bleeds into the world. Also, yes, yes, you can do.
I think it perhaps even a tiny bit unfair that
I ask us all to exercise compassion on these people. Yeah, yeah,

(15:20):
I do, because I tell you, if anybody were to
come to me with that, I'd be bowed up, ready
to come on, glued on somebody's happy ass that they
even thought to ask me such a silly thing, And
eventually I would have to digest that and I would

(15:41):
have to be okay with it, because these are people
assuming and chances are very good if somebody came to
me with something like that, knowing how upset I am
about the way some people are responding or choosing to
continue to follow what I see as a dark path.
If someone were to be so bold as to approach

(16:04):
me with something, I would consider, so what, just how
very dare you? And honestly not me just custom a
blue streak and wonder what in the blue blazes of
hades they were thinking even suggesting it. I would need
to give that more thought. I would have to put

(16:27):
that under my pillow while I slept at night to
see if I could come to a better conclusion in
the morning when I woke, because if somebody who cared
enough about me asked that of me, I would need
to give that just a little bit more thought, because
right now I'd be like, absolutely not. You may take
that and the horse you rode in on a one

(16:49):
hundred percent for unlawful common acknowledge yourself whatever it was
you were thinking, because how very dare you? And and
chances are if they're that kind of friend to me,
they would know that would be my initial reaction, And
I pray that they would give me the grace so
that I could come back around that and realize that, yes,

(17:11):
they still need my compassion, they still need my understanding,
and I want to give that to them. I don't
want to completely forgive them. I want to hold them
accountable for terrible ideas and following what I see to
be a harmful way of thinking and governing. And I

(17:32):
would never want to say anything as mean spirited or
as unhelpful as I told you. So they know, they know,
these are people that know these kinds of things. So
I must take it on myself compassion, not entire forgiveness,
not entire forgetting. What it is is compassion to know

(17:54):
that when you lie in a group of people meaning play,
not telling an untruth, though that applies. That's somewhere I'm
going with this immediately. It is difficult to continue to
swim upstream whenever the current is so strong, eventually you
get swept up in it. And I will give that
the credit it is due, and I will also give

(18:20):
weight to the intellect and the strongheartedness of the people
I love in my life to know that they will
realize that they are getting farther and farther from the shore,
and they're gonna have to wake up one day and
they're gonna have to stop floating and stop treading, and
they're going to have to really fight against that current

(18:44):
to get back to the land. I don't want these
people to drown in it. I don't, And I'd be
lying through my teeth if I said there wasn't a
part of me that wanted them to learn the hard way,
because it is like, we haven't been talking about this
for literal years. And there's another side of this that

(19:08):
continues to say, there's one thing to have a conversation
with your people, but you don't do that twenty four
hours a day, seven days a week, three hundred and
sixty five days a year like some of their quote
unquote news networks do for them. Because anger is a
really effective motivator. Hates right next door also wildly effective

(19:34):
in this entire situation. And whenever you hear these kinds
of things come out of the mouths of these people
that you see daily, which leads to a relationship of
sorts and a trust of sorts, and they continue to say,
you are not to blame for what's happening. You are

(19:55):
a victim, meaning whenever you put it through a lens
or two of a little bit more critical thinking, what
they're really saying is you did everything that was asked
of you, and you're still standing here in less money
than you thought you were going to have. Maybe your
relationship with your family is not what you thought it
would be. Maybe these things that people sold you or

(20:19):
told you years ago did not come to fruition for
whatever reason that might be. And now you're mad, and
I get it, Well, boy, do I get it. I
think a lot of us are dealing with something like that,
loads of us. Here's the thing. What I want to
continue to do is give grace to people because our
goals look differently. Marriage and a family. Great. There's one

(20:44):
college and a fantastic job, okay, super, there's another building
a community in your church or your organizations or whatever
it is that you find to be fortifying and building
this wonderful group of people who continue to lift you up.
And that didn't come to fruition. Okay. Yeah, there's a

(21:04):
lot of ways to look at this that you spent
a lot of time doing because you were told when
you were younger and perhaps a bit more optimistic or open,
that it was going to lead you to this. And now,
what where are we standing? What are we doing? This
ain't at all what they told me it was going

(21:25):
to be. Correct, because let me tell you something, whenever
we forecast a lot of times, what we're going to
do is cast that into the future in the best
possible outcomes. Everybody looks to the future with hope and optimism,
and when that doesn't come one hundred percent to fruition,
I think that a lot of us get upset. I

(21:47):
know I would I do constantly. What I want to
do is not throw a shade of cynicism over it.
What I want to do is make sure that I
also take off about eighteen percent for real, and I
don't do that for negativity. I don't do that out
of anything other than the fact that we need to

(22:07):
understand that not everyone that we encounter is going to
be on our path one hundred percent, and they're not
going to be gung ho about it is perhaps we are,
and so they're going to perhaps attach themselves to your wagon,
but they're going to be a little bit more of
a drag than they are a little bit more of
a driving force, okay, And we have to continue to

(22:29):
look at that and when we get angry, as pardon me,
I am almost always want to do when things don't
go my way, I need to take a moment, and
I need to be compassionate with the other people who
are involved in this, because it is unrealistic for me
to expect everyone who attaches themselves to my wagon to

(22:52):
be as excited about it as I am. That's silly.
That's not the way we work it. That's just completely
and totally unrealistic. Now, am I going to tell you
to dream hard and dream big and gopher broke every
time you put your pen to paper or you put
your finger to your temple, whenever you're thinking of your
your best and brightest, most wonderful dreams and goals and aspirations. Yes,

(23:14):
do it. Dream big and understand that everyone that you
meet that can help you get where you're going is
not going to be as one hundred percent on it
as you are, so we have to prepare for that
as well. And when we exceed those expectations, huzzah, What
a glorious thing to have happened to us, right, Yes,

(23:39):
And when those people can't meet us where we want
to be, when they drag at us, not necessarily out
of malice, but just out of not knowing any different
or not knowing exactly how to help us get where
we're going, please, please, please, we have to temper that anger,
that rage with compassion and understanding. Knowing that that that

(24:04):
is the element on the other side of that very
strong emotion that can help us continue to fuel our
motion forward is a huge, huge, huge help. Okay, it
is to me, and I'm hoping it will be to you,
because I did not know how to approach those kinds
of things until we had this wonderful discussion in the

(24:25):
meeting talking about Pride Month. Also, may I just say
right now, I get so angry about the fact that
so many things have been taken off the calendar in
the United States of America, the official calendar, things like
June tenth, things like Pride Month, all these kind of
things that continue to kind of chip away at everything
that we want to do when we celebrate diversity, equity,

(24:47):
and inclusion among all of the people in the United
States of America. And whenever I look at the flip
side of that now, because I am angry about it,
the compassionate parts of me reminds the rest of me
that's ready to just swing a fist or a club
or a bat or whatever at people who want to
be so unbelievably ridiculous. I don't need it on the

(25:12):
national calendar to celebrate it, or the people who benefit
the most from it, or the people who have the
most reason to celebrate for it. I don't need permission
for that. Now, what I can do in that number one,
I can hear the anger in my voice when I
say something like that, and I can hear the compassion

(25:32):
on the other side of it. It doesn't need to
be mealy mouthed to be understanding and caring and feeling
for those who have the most reasons to celebrate and
who continue to bring these topics to our attention so
that we can appreciate who and what they are and
what they have done for the nation and the world.

(25:53):
And what I will continue to do is raise them
up and thank them and continue to open as much
of a circle and a discussion as I possibly can
so everybody feels safe and heard and respected and that
is okay. And I can use that rage and anger
to throw some elbows for anybody who doesn't necessarily want

(26:14):
to continue to open the circle. And then I can
use my compassion to kiss that booboo that I have
just inflicted on someone, to let them know that it
was nothing against you personally. It was against the fact
that you have chosen a path I cannot agree with
and will not allow you to stand in the way
of someone else's existence, and my anger I will channel

(26:37):
towards you until you accept and willingly open yourself to them,
and then I will hold that and pet you and
coo at you, because yes, I did that because you
were doing something to someone who you considered an idea
instead of a person, and you stood against it, and

(26:59):
you needed to understand that's not how we do this.
And if that's how you feel you're going to do this,
you need to understand that you're going to meet You're
going to get bucked up on. I don't know how
else to say it to you. The time for tolerance
understanding is always around. If you don't meet us where
we must be met, we will exercise other options. I

(27:24):
don't see that as unkind or intolerant. What I see
that is the time for having to convince others of
the humanity of other people on our planet is over.
That is not the discussion any longer. The discussion now
is how much force must I use in order for
you to understand we're not asking, and we leave that open.

(27:53):
I'm not here to mealy mouth any longer. I am
not here to pussy foot or tiptoe. What I'm here
to do is to lay a very large, strong hand
on you, first in kindness and connection, and then to
put a force behind it so that you understand that
you can no longer stand directly in the way, because

(28:13):
we are no longer allowing it. That doesn't sound very nice, No,
it doesn't. It doesn't sound very nice at all. And
it wasn't meant to. We came in connection and love
and hope and community, and we were met with something

(28:34):
that did not wish to move. And I need everyone
that is listening to the sound of my voice to
understand that is no longer the question. You will move,
and we will connect and love, and the least and
the most of our brethren will meet in the same circle.
And if you don't like it, that is two damn bad.

(29:00):
And once your feathers get ruffled, I will meet you
where you are with our new friends, and we will
talk about how much we have in common, and I
will do my best to smooth you with the compassion
that lies on the other side of anger. However, you

(29:20):
will no longer be an obstacle to these people who
have tried to be themselves for as long as time
has been around. Welcome to the new tolerant, Welcome to
the new anger tempered with compassion. Please understand that this

(29:43):
is the new normal, and we expect you to understand.
Welcome to a new era of Radical Joy. Friends. For
those of you who are joining us for the first time, Congress,
what a wonderful episode to join us on. For those

(30:04):
of you who have been here before, welcome back. I
love that we have a community that continues to grow
and hopefully continues to endure. Whenever we grow like this,
it is painful to grow like this. It is it
is a new understanding. It is a new dawn of
what we hope to do here at Radical Joy. And

(30:25):
I could not be more excited that you're here. Thank
you for growing with us. If you're the kind of
person who likes to leave a re of you, please do.
On whatever platform you're listening, leave us a five star review,
take a screenshot of that, send it to us so
we can send you some swag. We're into a brand
new look here at Radical Joy. We rebranded at the
very beginning of this season, and we're thrilled you're here

(30:46):
and would love to send you something new and different
that also embodies the new things that we're trying to
do in a new way. Please understand how excited I
that you're here. I hope this new fla finds you
just as excited as I am, and so are all
of us here at LW Studios. Please always understand that

(31:06):
no matter how bold we get with our words, we
will never stray for making sure that everyone out there
knows just how much we love y'all. Thank you for

(31:28):
taking time to share a moment of joy and hope
with me. We're so grateful you're here. If this is
your first time, take a moment to check out our
archive see if there's something else in there that fires
you up rekindles the joy in you. Hey, spread the word.
If you got something out of being with us today,
we welcome your thoughts and suggestions. Now. I rarely run
out of things to talk about, but if there's something
I haven't covered that's on your mind or heart, I

(31:49):
want to hear from you. To learn more about me
and CELW Studios, follow the links in the show notes Hey,
don't forget. When you leave Radical Joy a review, be
sure to send us a screenshot, send you some kick
ass swag to show our gratitude. I am not a
therapist or a medical professional. If you're experiencing a mental
health emergency, please call nine to eighty eight to reach
the National Crisis Lifeline. This content and other content produced

(32:13):
by CLAU Studios and affiliated partners is not therapy, and
nothing in this content indicates a therapeutic relationship. Any opinions
of guests on this podcast are their own and do
not represent the opinions of James or CLA Studios. Please
consult with your therapist or see what in your area
if you're experiencing mental health symptoms. Everything in this podcast
is for educational and entertainment purposes. Only have a great

(32:36):
one and we will see you next week for another
dose of Radical Joy. Love y'all to try to

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