Patrisse Cullors ON: How To Use Your Art To Heal Your Emotions & Make An Impact On The World

Do art, activism, and politics mix? They do when you’re Patrisse Cullors, best-selling author and cofounder of Black Lives Matter and Reform LA Jails. On a recent episode of On Purpose with Jay Shetty, Cullors and Shetty sat down to talk about how she keeps her artistic and creative side alive through activism and politics. Listen in to this powerful episode to learn more about this member of Time Magazine’s 20 Women of 2020 project. Text Jay Shetty 310-997-4177 A Word From Our Sponsors: If you need life insurance, head to https://www. Policygenius.com right now to get started. You could save $1500 or more a year by comparing quotes on their marketplace Go to https://www. Blinkist.com/JAY to start your FREE 7 day trial AND get 25% off a Blinkist Premium Membership and up to 65% off audiobooks (yours to keep forever) You can receive $10 Off Your First Pair of Feetures by going to https://feetures.com and using my code ONPURPOSE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Jay Shetty?

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• 0:44Jay Shetty?

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• 1:29Jay Shetty?

  AG1 Next Gen is one of those easy habits to keep. It's the clinically-backed, comprehensive daily health drink that supports your gut health, energy production, and foundational nutrition all in one scoop. AG1's ingredients are sourced from quality partners for absorption, potency, and nutrient density to deliver the foundational nutrition your body needs. And alongside a proper diet, AG1 Next Gen meets 94% of nutrient requirements and it's clinically shown to enrich the gut microbiome. For a limited time, save 20% on your first subscription order of AG1 Next Gen or AG1 Pro at drinkag1.com/onpurpose. That's drinkag1.com/onpurpose.

• 2:16Jay Shetty?

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• 3:10Speaker 01

  Guess what? If you fight for black lives, you also get more free. So this isn't just about black people. Yes, we are asking you to put your attention on black people, but recognize that our liberation is bound into one another. And so when black people get free, we all get free. And that is, I think, the like, sort of like, foundation of Black Lives Matter.

• 3:41Jay Shetty?

  Hey, everyone. Welcome back to On Purpose, the number one health podcast in the world, where we focus into all of the areas and themes that affect our mental, emotional, and physical health. And this includes everything that's happening in the world around us. Now, you know that I focus in on trying to speak to guests where we can all learn together as a community, as a family, as part of the On Purpose audience. And I'm so excited because today I get to sit down with an individual, not someone that I'm just curious and interested about, but someone that I believe that I have a lot to learn from and that I think we'll all get the benefit of from hearing deep answers to these questions that I know you've sent me and questions that I have myself.

• 4:26Jay Shetty?

  Now, I want you to be able to expand your mind today. I want us to train ourselves today to listen without judgment. Allow us to stretch our minds without comparison or judgment and be able to listen to truly understand. Today's guest is none other than Patrice Cullors. She's an L.A. native and artist, co-founder of Black Lives Matter and Reform L.A. Jails. Cullors worked for Black Lives Matter recently received recognition in Time Magazine's 2020 100 Women of the Year project. She's a bestselling author and a faculty director at Arizona's Prescott College of New Social and Environmental Arts Practice, MFA program that she has developed.

• 5:09Jay Shetty?

  In 2019, she joined Freeform's Good Trouble, Season Two and Three, as staff writer and actor. For the last 20 years, she's been one of the front lines of criminal justice reform. Today, we're here to learn more about her, her purpose, and how we can all improve the world we live in together. Patrice, thank you so much for doing this.

• 5:30Speaker 01

  Thank you. Thanks for having me. I really appreciate it.

• 5:33Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, no, it's gonna be fascinating today to dive into you. I actually mentioned to a few of my friends who are doing some incredible work in this space that I was interviewing today and they were excited for me and they were like, you're so fortunate and lucky. So I want you to know that, that that's how I feel right now as well. I'm really grateful to you and your team for taking out the time. I wanted to start off by getting our community to understand more about you, you as a person, you as an artist, you and your background, because I think that often that's so missed in conversations and media pieces that are five minutes and quick interviews. And you have this rich history and background of your own. And I wanted to start off with this question because you earned an MFA from USC.

• 6:16Jay Shetty?

  I wanted you to tell us about how you keep your artist and creative side alive through what you do today.

• 6:24Speaker 01

  Thank you for asking about that. I think a lot of people see my activism and sort of relegate it to the world of politics. But I actually argue that my art and my activism are extensions of my political values. And so my art has been something that I have practiced since I was a young girl. I was an artist before I became politicized. And a few years ago, a mentor of mine, Suzanne Lacy, actually brought me to art school. And she said, hey, I'm at USC. I think you'll really value getting an MFA. And I was like, no, I did the BA thing, wasn't even that excited about that. Like, I really loved being a community organizer and an artist.

• 7:07Speaker 01

  Um, and she said, no, really like spend two years on your art. And I begrudgingly applied, but with curiosity. I mean, obviously I consented to applying and I got in and I didn't tell anybody in my family. For like, for probably a month because I wanted to try it out. And if I didn't like it, I would leave. But the minute I entered my studio, so all of, all the artists who got into the program get their own studio. I just started crying and I was like, oh, I, I need this. I need my practice in this way. And so I got to spend two years, um, in an expensive fellowship.

• 7:45Speaker 01

  Um, really, you know, holding down my art practice and it changed me. And I left the program really being reminded that art is at the center of all of what I do. And art is how I both heal, but also art is how I intervene in cultures of violence.

• 8:07Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, I think art has such an important role to play. Art was my, my favorite subject growing up. And when I decided not to pursue it beyond the age of 18 in an academic sense, my teachers were really let down by me because I was such a sellout that I, I gave up. But, but I feel like my work today, that the artist never leaves you, like that, that feeling never leaves you. And it, and it always finds a way to come back. And, and I wanted to ask you about that because you're, obviously, you know, your past influence has affected your creation of your first solo show, which was Rest by Reprieve and Healing. Tell us about what you were processing through that piece and what of your past was kind of coming out.

• 8:48Speaker 01

  Sure. Okay. You really know this.

• 8:54Speaker 01

  Like deep dive.

• 8:56Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, I'm, I'm a, you know, the, the podcast is called On Purpose because I'm so deeply into just trying to understand humans. And, and I think you're such a fascinating human. And, and I think seeing you as through just one lens and one layer is, is kind of the mistake I think we make today as a society. We try and put people into boxes and put people into bubbles and we're like, that's all you are. You can't be anything else. And so anyway, I'm trying my best. So thank you for encouraging me.

• 9:24Speaker 01

  No, I love that. I have a lot of gratitude. I talk to a lot of people and a lot of people interview me and they're not interested in the multifaceted matrice. So I'm like deeply appreciative of this moment. Um, sure. My, my solo show for my thesis project was Respite, Reprieve and Healing: An Evening of Cleansing. And my good friend and creative collaborator, Damon Turner, um, helped curate this piece. And when I was developing it, I was trying to think about like, I'm often thinking about the senses when I'm making work. I'm some performance artist and I do a lot of public art with my performance. So I was thinking about like,

• 10:07Speaker 01

  what did I want people to feel like while they were witnessing it? What did I want them to see? What did I want them to smell? What did I want them to hear? And this is important for me because I feel like for a long time, especially from like 2013 to 2016, a lot of my art was very, I was, I was processing my trauma around, um, you know, my work being so deeply steeped in Black Death. And so, so much of my work was like a reprocessing of that trauma. And it was a, it was a really painful experience in my work and my practice. And so going through this art program, I got to really like deepen into that

• 10:47Speaker 01

  trauma, but also I think on the other side of it, I recognized that I, obviously I've survived. And so there's deep resilience there. And so I wanted my piece to look at resilience and look at the impact um, this movement and, and Black Death has had on my body, but also how I've actually been and how Black women at large are deeply resilient. And so I spent the first part of the piece in a hundred year old bathtub um, of salt, of Epsom salt. And while that was happening, there were fourteen performers in white robes getting their hair washed in salt and honey. Um, and it was all Black performers. And, um,

• 11:32Speaker 01

  at the end of that piece, they tied their hair up with a rope. And there was this one individual who was sort of like the sorcerer tying folks' hair up with a rope. And It was on, it was in a backyard of this home in South Central and it was really beautiful because I wanted to, there's the imagery of rope and black people is a very disturbing imagery traditionally and historically. But this was not that. And this was like, um, these, you know, fourteen black folks coming together around their hair and then bounding themselves up, um, uh, and with their heads like together as, as a unit, as a collective. Um, and not because they were dying, but because they were alive. And so that felt really important to me.

• 12:17Speaker 01

  But while all this is happening, um, I had recorded audio of sort of me just thinking about things and like processing out loud. And, um, then there was also a, a, a really beautiful team of musicians who are playing and, uh, my good friend Damon Davis, we used his song Light Years to sort of be the, the, the song, the score for the piece. So as you can tell, lots of things were happening all at once because that's how I process. Uh, it's how I do things. And, um, by the time the, that kind of first piece of the artist, um,

• 12:58Speaker 01

  washing hair was done, I was pulling myself up out of the bathtub of salt. It was four hundred pounds of salt. So super, super heavy. And I had this gorgeous dress made by, um, my designers at Katula, um, who make, um, West African, um, garb. And so I pulled myself up and there was just sort of this beautiful dress I had on. My hair was done by, um, an artist named Nena Soulfly. And it was these long kind of Medusa braids. And as I pulled myself out of the bathtub, I crawled to a trough of coconut milk, um, and then plunged myself in that milk and washed myself. And so this was like

• 13:42Speaker 01

  a really cleansing moment. And there was probably about three hundred people at the piece. It was in a backyard. So at every moment, like folks were sort of. Being moved along. I really like processions. Um, I think like having people move with you in a piece and be a part of that piece. And is really important in my work. And then everybody, I requested everybody come and wear white. Um, and so by the end of the piece, um, I sort of walked over to where originally people were getting their hair washed and um, took the dress off and looked at the audience uh, and just like held space while the music was still playing the live music and then walked off and that was the piece.

• 14:27Speaker 01

  I don't think I've described that piece out loud in that way. So that was actually really helpful for me. I was like, how do I make this visual? It's so many things happening at once.

• 14:37Jay Shetty?

  I'm so glad you did that. Like, that is such a beautiful description. And I mean, I was with you the whole way and it made me think that how amazing would it be if art was used in media more?

• 14:49Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 14:50Jay Shetty?

  Because that visual that you've just painted for me, and like you were saying, the redefining of how the rope is perceived.

• 14:56Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 14:57Jay Shetty?

  It it's so incredible to think that actually through that art, you're just rewiring the narratives for people in their minds. Which you can't do if you're not seeing it through art. It's so hard to do it literally sometimes.

• 15:09Speaker 01

  That's actually right.

• 15:10Jay Shetty?

  But the metaphors and everything. So, but I wish I was there live now. So you you're gonna have to figure out how to do this again. It's that's so cleansing. Literally, like I get when I was hearing it, it just felt so like, you know, there was so much cleansing. I'm sure the people that were there were just completely transformed and impacted by it. So thank you for describing that so beautifully. Usually it's hard to describe things in words, but uh, but but moving on from that, tell me if if someone showed you a glimpse of the work you do today, who you are today, if someone showed you that glimpse at ten years old. When you were ten, would, is that what you saw for yourself? Or when you were ten or whatever age you wanna pick?

• 15:48Jay Shetty?

  What was your aspiration? Like, what were your goals? What were your values? What were you seeing was your future growing up in Van Nuys and you know, locally to where you are now, not far away from where we both live, like where where did you see your future?

• 16:03Speaker 01

  It's a good question. You know, I just finished recording the adapted version of my book into a YA. And part of adapting it, we decided that we're gonna take my journals from when I was a teenager and sort of go through them and put them in different parts of the book. And I was pretty much the same.

• 16:28Speaker 01

  I love that. Pretty much the same. Like, there was a journal entry where I was like, "Police do not transform or heal our communities," like when I was sixteen years old. And so, like, I was already planting the seeds for my adult self. And I think if someone were to say, "Hey, this is what you..." Like, "Hey, ten-year-old, or twelve, or fifteen, or sixteen-year-old, this is what you're gonna be doing." I probably would respond, "Thank God. Like, that's what I dreamed of. Like, that's what I imagined." I spent a lot of time, as an adolescent, like, dreaming of being able to change and help my community, not just like my family, my immediate family, but like wanting to make big changes.

• 17:11Speaker 01

  And I was, you know, I idolized people like Audre Lorde and Angela Davis and Huey P. Newton and so many of the Black power figures. I really believed that I was, you know, my dad used to always tell me I was born in the wrong generation. Like, "You missed it. There was a whole time when people did that, that you wanna do, but that's not gonna happen again." So I think I would be, like, relieved, like, "Okay, good. Like, I did the things that I wanted to happen." Like, that feels resonant. And I, I just, like, chuckled as I read journal, like, read my old journals. I was like, "Oh, my goodness, Patrice, you were so intense." Like, I'm so glad that I found this work in this world. And also, like, that I was

• 17:54Speaker 01

  found art so early, because I was already such an intense child that needed, like, a ki- a, a kind of container to help me with all the big feelings I had. I had very big feelings. I noticed things. I, you know, I was, like, very empathetic. And so, art, and I think also activism and organizing, really helped contain all of the big feelings I had about what was happening in the world.

• 18:22Jay Shetty?

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• 19:06Jay Shetty?

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• 20:35Jay Shetty?

  What I love about what you just said is like when you think of art, you think of it as like very flowing and unorganized. And then you said, but activism that needs to be organized. And I kind of love those two going together because it's almost like, it's almost like the heart and head kind of getting into synergy.

• 20:52Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 20:53Jay Shetty?

  And the art allows you to be fully expressive. But then in activism, we can be more explaining and, you know, really helping people understand. So I love the way you brought those two things together, right? I wonder whether, you know, you're obviously a professor and you're teaching social justice. And I guess, how do you think that's changed from when you were learning and reflecting about that? When you were younger, as we just talked about? And how are you seeing people being educated on it today? Do you think there have been positive changes in that education space? Seeing as you stepped in as well yourself? Was there a gap that you saw that you felt like, no, this needs to be addressed differently?

• 21:32Speaker 01

  Yes, so the program I teach is actually a masters in fine arts program. That is both a combination of social justice and art.

• 21:41Jay Shetty?

  I see.

• 21:42Speaker 01

  So it's, that's the gap. I mean, there, I'm not, and my program isn't like the first of its, like the first program to do this. So I want to be really clear, there's lots of programs who have done this. But what I was, what I tried to do in creating this program is think about all the things I didn't get when I was in art school. And so, you know, my program was amazing and I had a lot, I had a really positive experience, especially because my cohort was incredible. And from my cohort, you know, three of us, Alexandra Dorries and Noe Olivas, and I all started an art gallery and studio in Inglewood. So like, we've, we've kind of extended our experience and we're like, we're not done playing together. Like, let's go build this other thing.

• 22:26Speaker 01

  And through that, recognize that the world of academics in the art space and social justice space is often deeply lacking empathy. And so our program is an online program for mostly working artists, like working artists who just didn't get their degree and like need to go through a program. And so we spend a lot of time on like the artist's practice and building up the empathy around their practice. I feel like The training of artists is pretty sterilized. Like, if you, I'm so glad you didn't go to art school. That would have been a terrible tragic experience. Because what usually happens at art school is they actually train you out of being an artist.

• 23:09Speaker 01

  And they really train you into being a vehicle of capitalism and a commodity. And so while I don't have a problem necessarily with making your art a commodity, some artists are really successful. I think that should not be the only way you have to express your art. And so our program is really building out the empathy. And so we have a lot of healers who are also artists in our program. So we have a course that's specifically art as healing. And I think it's super powerful, the work that we're trying to do. We have courses that are deeply rooted in environmental activism around art.

• 23:49Speaker 01

  And my, you know, my work is to often intervene into what I think is

• 23:59Speaker 01

  a space that isn't giving the full breadth of what can be given, and then also create a new vehicle. Because we can intervene all day, but if we're not creating the new vehicles or where people can change, then people just end up, just end up like, you know, shouting and not really changing. So that this program, the MFA program is really, it's an experiment. We're experimenting. And what I love about the program and my students is that we have a cohort that's mostly students of color, which is also deeply rare in art programs. And it's, our faculty is reflective of that. It's a mostly all people of color faculty.

• 24:44Speaker 01

  So I feel very grateful for this program and what it's providing, not just my students, but me and also the academic and art world.

• 24:53Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, absolutely. Let's all pretend to be your students right now, or everyone who's listening. And I want to ask you from that perspective, let's say someone's listening and they're like, Patrice J, you know, I, I get it, like art is healing, it helps me express, but hey, I'm not really artistic, like I don't even know how to draw, like, you know, the, the hangups that people have, or we forget our childlike self and we, we lose that ability to. So if someone's like, Patrice, I want to get in touch with my inner artist again, I want to be able to express myself through art or journaling, where's a good place for someone to start? If they're just like, I, I need to just understand my emotions and feelings more like you were when you were a young person and seeing all of this happening and I want to express myself through art, not to

• 25:34Jay Shetty?

  make a brand out of it or put it on Instagram, but just, you know, just for myself, where's a good place for someone to start?

• 25:41Speaker 01

  I love that question. Um, I think, uh, the first place to start is to feel. Feel your sensations, feel what's in your body, your hands, your feet, your legs, your stomach, your chest, your, your shoulders, like part of growing up, I think, in places like the West is it divorces you, you from your feelings, it divorces you from your emotions and so much of the place of art is, comes from what you feel, it's an expression of what you feel, it's an extension of what you feel and so I would, and, and to remind people who are listening is um, numbness is also a feeling.

• 26:22Speaker 01

  We may not know that, we may not recognize that, but being numb is, is supporting something that, that needs to be supported in you and so people who've dealt with a lot of trauma, we often go numb because the experiences, if we allowed ourselves to feel everything we felt, we'd probably be crushed, literally. So numbing is actually a feeling too and so check out the places where you feel numb. Um, I'm a big fan of meditation, I'm a big fan of a practice called somatics, um, which is like, which part of it is, they have centering practice where you just like take your time, whether you're sitting down or standing up

• 27:03Speaker 01

  and breathe into your stomach and slowly allow yourself to feel all of the feelings that you feel and.

• 27:12Speaker 01

  Sometimes they're too big and too much and you don't have to feel them that big. You can feel them at 10% or 20% and from there, you know, I'm, I don't, I, although I do write a lot, I like to record my voice a lot. So record a note, note in your phone or, you know, whatever, you know, on your computer and just like, take the time to say out loud what you're feeling and where you're feeling it. And I promise you, if you do that for like 30 days, like even if it's a couple of times a week, you'll start to notice patterns, you know? So I feel all my feelings in my throat, my chest and my stomach, literally.

• 27:50Speaker 01

  Happiness, sadness, fear, like that's like the place where I feel it. And it really helps to notice that because then I can be like, okay, right now I'm feeling these feelings like happiness. Oh, okay. Great. Like I could express it in this way or I'm feeling sadness. I could express it in this way. And that to me is like a really good locator of how to show up for yourself first and then show up for the other things that you love to do, like art.

• 28:24Speaker 02

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• 28:54Speaker 03

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• 29:04Speaker 04

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• 29:10Speaker 05

  What would happen if I stopped doing it? You stop, you freeze in there. That's what?

• 29:14Speaker 04

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• 29:18Speaker 05

  I'm not the first then.

• 29:19Speaker 04

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• 29:24Jay Shetty?

  What a rich answer. Thank you for that. Yeah, that's, that's gonna be so useful to so many people. Listening because like there's no, you haven't given anyone a format like it's not like painting a picture. You don't have to have a skill to be able to do that. You just need to be still almost to just listen and hear and and and actually that's really so much at the heart of the message that I'm hearing right now for the world is the ability to just be still and listen and hear and observe both in ourselves and in others because it feels like that's the ability that's been lost uh in in me included and and in so many of us, the ability to just be still and actually just hear and listen, understand, observe

• 30:05Jay Shetty?

  and not like judge and make a conclusion and and draw up a plan and it's I think it's so fascinating to see how mu- so much of that mindset comes from being an an artist in some sense.

• 30:17Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 30:17Jay Shetty?

  Allowing ourselves to be there.

• 30:19Speaker 01

  But my brother, um, his experience with law enforcement and honestly, like my entire neighborhood's experience with law enforcement deeply impacted um my worldview. And I think when you grow up as a child and sort of like the people who are in government like in theory, they're supposed to be the people that protect you, take care of you, but they're doing the opposite like eh they are not, not only are they neglecting, but they're they're intentionally abusing um your loved ones, your family and everyone around you. I think that that really shaped my

• 31:01Speaker 01

  why my w- worldview around like, okay, well, if these people who are being paid are not only not protecting me, but they're abusing and neglecting me, then who do we go to? Like who is supporting us? Who is take caring? Who's taking care of us? So with my brother's situation, you know, he was nineteen when he was brutally beaten by the sheriff's department and that experience, it's it's interesting because I don't know if you've ever had this experience, but You know, children have like a different understanding of time and like memory. So when my brother experienced his, his beating by the sheriffs in the county jails, I didn't necessarily know that that's what happened.

• 31:44Speaker 01

  I just knew it in my spirit, like something, I knew that he was taken away. I knew something really bad had happened and my mother hadn't shared it with us. She didn't share it with her children. The only people, the only person that ever knew what happened with my brother until we all found out was my, my grandmother, her mother. But it would, it would take almost a decade until I knew the details of what happened to him. And I realized it a decade later when I came across the ACLU, um, American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California. Um, their complaint against the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department. And that complaint basically was 70 sworn testimony,

• 32:28Speaker 01

  um, of prisoners inside of the county jail that shared their story of essentially not just being abused, but tortured by the sheriff's department. Things like people's, um, front teeth being knocked out, um, their skulls being, um, shattered, um, being carved into their bodies, like words. Um, and what I realized while I was reading that, while it was deeply disturbing to read, I was like, oh, this is what happened to my brother. I didn't, no one ever told me those words, but I knew it. I was like, this is what happened to him. And so he had just been released from prison.

• 33:09Speaker 01

  Um, and, and when I read that complaint and I called him and my mom and I said, finally, this sheriff's are being sued. And they said, um, my brother said to me, at least someone will get justice. And it was like, that was like the moment I was like, oh, okay. Like that did happen to him. And so we went through a whole process and I actually created an entire performance piece around that 86 page complaint. And that piece is what then was the inspiration for my local organization called Dignity and Power Now, which has successfully created civilian oversight of that sheriff's department

• 33:49Speaker 01

  and has been a huge watchdog around the abuse of that department and also successfully stopped uh, two, three point five billion dollar jails that were going to be built in Los Angeles County. So my brother's story and the impact it had on me and my family definitely transformed how, not only how I understood the state's relationship to black people in particular, but also my role in fighting it back. And being like, you messed with the wrong family. You don't get to do that and not be held accountable. And even though it took me a decade plus to receive that kind of accountability, I still fought and fought and fought and I stayed present for that fight. And I didn't do it alone.

• 34:32Speaker 01

  Hundreds, and I would argue now thousands of people joined us in holding the sheriff's department accountable and continues to.

• 34:40Jay Shetty?

  Hmm. Well, thank you. Thank you for sharing that. What, what gave you the, what gave you the courage to, you said there, you mentioned it many times, like to fight and you continue to be present in that fight? Like, what even gave you the belief? Because I feel like for a lot of people right now, who may want to see change or they agree that things need to change, but then they get discouraged at the first hurdle. They get discouraged at the first change, you know? And, and obviously you've been, you've been fighting for this for a long time and you're not stopping and you're finding new ways and you've turned art into activism in a powerful way. Like, what has constantly given you the belief and the courage? Because for most of us, and you made this point earlier too, sorry, I know I'm disconnecting dots of what you said.

• 35:25Jay Shetty?

  But, you know, for so many of us, it's like, we, we just care about our family just about. And then kind of we'll see what happens with the rest of the world. And, you know, you said at an early stage, you realized it wasn't just about your family, it was about the community. And then of course, with your brother having this experience, and then you're like, okay, well, how does this stretch beyond just him? And now beyond to the world? What is it that gives you the belief and courage? A, to extend yourself that something will change? And B, that you want to care for more than just the people right around you, just your community? Because that's where it started with this group you're saying, but now it's extended.

• 36:04Speaker 01

  I think love. Um, a deep and profound love for my family and my community. My brother was my first best friend. Literally, um, we would sit in um, our room. When I was a kid, I remember be I talked a lot as a child. I still talk a lot, but I was very like precocious like. I talked a lot, very curious. My mom said that I would sit. In the in the car seat when I was first learning how to read and we would she'd be driving and I would tap my brother and ask him, what does that sign say? What does that sign say? Like, I really was curious. So he was the brother that like, just like would hang out with me.

• 36:46Speaker 01

  Listen to me and um, and just, you know, my other brother, he's like much older than me. Um, so I think I was probably a little like annoying. He really loved me and he took care of me. He was like a deep caregiver, but Monty was like my friend. And so I spent a lot of time with him. And so as we got older. And I started to see what was happening to him and how he was being responded to. I my love for him was really big and it made me want to keep fighting. And I also felt like. My brother is my brother suffers from schizoaffective disorder, so he has severe mental illness and. I felt like the odds were against him. And so there's this whole apparatus that's like.

• 37:28Speaker 01

  Three point billion dollar institution that doesn't want to support him and instead is like criminalizing him. Well, the least I can do is be his advocate and being his advocate meant also being the advocate of many like him.

• 37:43Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, that extension of it is what's.

• 37:48Jay Shetty?

  So much what you said, driven by love.

• 37:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 37:51Jay Shetty?

  Uh, because when you're when you're going above and beyond, you know, your family and the people around you that you grew up with and. Even your community where it started out and it keeps extending, you can see that that's really, really driven by love and. You know, I think I think for a lot of people. Even even for me for many, many years and, you know.

• 38:11Jay Shetty?

  I think it was hard to understand the difference in what you experienced. So being a person of color from London and experiencing racism growing up with my parents, who are my mother's from Yemen and my father's from India, and then also experiencing racism myself, you kind of, even in my own ignorance, you kind of just bucket up the racism you experienced to feel like that must be the racism that kind of everyone goes through, if that makes sense?

• 38:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 38:39Jay Shetty?

  You kind of just put this blanket over and it's again, this human mind that just wants to like bucket stuff off and be like, "Oh, they're probably going through the same thing that I'm going through."

• 38:46Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 38:47Jay Shetty?

  And then, and then very, you know, more recently, having a very intimate conversation with myself and be like, "Oh no, this is different. It is a different thing that's happening here, right? Like it's a different experience, there is a different situation, there is, there is far more structural impact here that the community is facing, not what I faced, which was, which is different to that. And, and I think, you know, so many people have struggled, and you've probably asked this question a million times, but I, I feel I've got my head around it slowly, but I, I want people to really cement it and for me to. And I want you to take a moment to just share what Black Lives Matter means to you and what it actually means, as opposed to the challenge that people constantly have with

• 39:32Jay Shetty?

  it, with the all lives, the blue lives, or the... Because I, even though it's, it seems so simple now, when you're kind of on the other side, it feels so simple, but it's so easy to not understand it. So that would be really useful.

• 39:44Speaker 01

  Yes. Um, you know, the, the Black Lives Matter and so many words as a, as a project, it's an experiment to challenge white supremacy. We created Black Lives Matter as a response to a deep pain and trauma that our collective community felt, which was Trayvon Martin was a seventeen-year-old boy who was killed by a grown, white, passing man in Sanford, Florida. And many of us believed, because we all knew that George Zimmerman killed him, that there was going to be some form of justice. And he did not, um, there was no justice, and there still has been no justice for Trayvon Martin.

• 40:28Speaker 01

  And so, when we witnessed that trial, that pretty much year-long trial, where very quickly we understood that Trayvon Martin was on trial for his own murder. And then we sat and not physically, but we sat and watched, you know, whether it was on TV or on our social media, the jury come back and say not guilty. And that final not guilty, I think, was like a collective slug to everybody's chest, right, to Black people in particular. And that was our Emmett Till moment. It was our moment where we realized,

• 41:13Speaker 01

  oh, not much has changed when it comes to white supremacy, institutionalized white supremacy. And this child was stolen from us. And the parents have to deal with that forever and also have to deal with a system that doesn't care that he was stolen from us. So what do we do? And what is the collective response? It's not, it wasn't just on Sabrina Fulton to respond. It was on all of us to respond collectively. And so Black Lives Matter, it becomes a collective response to collective trauma. And then it also

• 41:57Speaker 01

  becomes a reminder of what's possible. So Black Lives Matter becomes a space where we get to decide what's possible for us on our own terms. And that's the power of Black Lives Matter. We always, we created it because we wanted it to be nimble. We wanted it to be able to take the shape it needed to take in whatever moment it needed to take it. And so first, it was a hashtag. We took that hashtag into the streets during protests. And then quickly, it became an organizing infrastructure. And so we can't, it's not just about protesting. How do we build a longevity? And so we're seven years old, July 13th. And that is because we have stayed the course.

• 42:40Speaker 01

  Black Lives Matter has turned into a global network with chapters across the globe, here in the US, Canada, and the United Kingdom. And so, so much of our work has been about how do we meet Black people who are at in the moment? Then how do we build off of the imagination, the collective imagination? And then while we're building this thing for black people, how do we call in our allies and say, hey, guess what? If you fight for black lives, you also get more free. So this isn't just about black people. Yes, we are asking you to to put your attention on black people, but recognize that our liberation is bound into one another. And so when black people get free, we all get free.

• 43:25Speaker 01

  And that is, I think, the like, sort of like, foundation of Black Lives Matter.

• 43:31Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, really, really well explained. And I think that's something that hopefully everyone listening can can identify with and and resonate with and and understand where that sits. Tell me about some of the most, because I guess people often may ask the opposite. And I'm I'm not, I'm interested in this, it's like, what are some of the most hope giving conversations and moments that you've had in the last seven years? Hopefully, in the last 12 months, hopefully recently, what are the, are there any? And if there aren't, that's, you can be honest too, but what are the most hope giving conversations that you've had within the black community and outside of it that has made you feel that people are getting it and that people are going in the right direction?

• 44:15Speaker 01

  Yeah, I just, I just went on a social distance retreat for

• 44:20Jay Shetty?

  That sounds fun, I want to be one.

• 44:23Speaker 01

  Um, with a company called Trap Heels, creative agency called Trap Heels. And that was, it was powerful. It was this really amazing opportunity to do work, but in a way that is like deeply rejuvenating and restorative. And so there was like a healer on site who was just like holding space in whatever ways you needed it. And We like had all the crystals and the sage and like the people who had the amazing vibes and we just like held space, held a lot of space.

• 45:07Speaker 01

  And that, I don't get to work like that often, actually. So that retreat, that social distance retreat was so healing and so powerful. And we spent a lot of time talking about healing. And the power of meditation and yoga and sound bowls.

• 45:31Jay Shetty?

  And love, yeah.

• 45:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, and just like really taking that time to be connected, be connected with self, with each other, with the land. It was, it was really powerful. It was exactly what I needed and I felt like I didn't get to do the work that I said I was going to do. But it was the work that I needed to do.

• 45:58Jay Shetty?

  What I'm fascinated by hearing from you today, Patrice, is like this. It just sounds like there's so much internal work happening at the same time as the external work's happening. And that, that is something that I wasn't, not that I didn't think you were doing it, but I'm not so aware of.

• 46:14Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 46:14Jay Shetty?

  And, and I love hearing that because I think sometimes people are just like, well, sometimes you just gotta go out there and do something.

• 46:21Speaker 01

  That's what most people do.

• 46:23Jay Shetty?

  Shall we say that again?

• 46:24Speaker 01

  That's what most people do. They just go out there and do things.

• 46:28Jay Shetty?

  Do things, yeah.

• 46:30Speaker 01

  In it and like, like a machine. That's how we're trained. That's what we're trained to do.

• 46:34Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, but it, but it seems like, what, what is that healing doing to make the activism? Is it making the activism more purposeful, intentional? What is it doing to that part? Because I think people forget that they're connected and, and the way you're living sounds very interconnected and synergized. What is that doing for the activism and for the changes that need to happen? For you doing these, whether it's meditation or spirituality or any of these experiences for you in healing, as you said?

• 47:04Speaker 01

  I don't know. I think only time will tell. Like, I do it not for the activism. I do it for myself and my family. And I have a four-year-old. And so, um, healing work has always been at the center of my work. Um, it's, it's a big part of how I I'm able to survive, um, is by, by doing that, that inner healing work. Um, but it's also about like quality of life. Um, the work that I do is heavy. It's intense. It's, um, I get a lot of intense sort of like needs and inquiries from people. And so I,

• 47:46Speaker 01

  I, I really was called to healing work in my early twenties because I recognize, oh, I'm, I'm being, I'm on this path. And it's not sustainable if I don't have a, a sense of like grounded healing. So I'm always striving for that. Like, I've done all the things, acupuncture, Reiki, like, that's just how I've always been. And I'm so grateful. I'm so grateful that I've had access, um, to be able to, I live in California, so I feel like Californians, especially LA, like, we discovered kale before the rest of the country. You know what I mean? So like, in some ways, whenever I go do talks of like the deep south or Midwest, I'm always like, I'm, I'm gonna start talking about crystals, everybody. And, but that's just, that has been,

• 48:29Speaker 01

  it's who I am. Like, it just really deeply is who I am. I've always been like this. I have an altar to my ancestors. Like, it just is my ground. And it's, it, it gives me a kind of purpose of self. Because it's very easy to look outward and to think that your purpose is outside of you. And it isn't. It really is inside of you. And it directs what you do outside of you. But if we only focus on what's outside of us, like, we really do become shells. And there is times in my life where I only focused on what's outside of me. And it was deeply detrimental to my physical, emotional, mental health.

• 49:07Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, thank you for sharing that. I don't know if your team shared with me, but I lived as a monk for three years. I know, I studied, I looked you up. Yeah, so meditation and spirituality is a huge, huge part of my life. So hearing that in yours is a beautiful thing we share. I hope we get to create some sacred space together. I know, I think we're gonna be friends. Yeah, I hope so. I don't know if you've ever experienced ketan, but it's the collective chanting with sacred sounds. And it's really, really special. I have a friend that comes over from London every year and we hold these events in my home with a lot of friends.

• 49:46Jay Shetty?

  So yeah, yes, I love it. I love your energy already. But no, for me, it's beautiful to hear it because I think, and I loved what you said that you just do it for yourself. Like, you know, you do it for your children, your child, your family. I think those are such beautiful ways of seeing it. And I guess, I think a lot of people right now, and it's kind of like that, like a lot of us have struggled to make the right decisions for ourselves. But we at least aspire to make the right decisions for future generations. That's exactly right. And I think, you know, a lot of people right now are seeing that and they're saying, well, you know, maybe if it was me and my, you know, I would have let it go. But my kids are growing up in this world and this is not working.

• 50:26Jay Shetty?

  What are some of the things that, before we find out on the allied piece, before we get into that, what are some of the things that people can genuinely do to not just be activated around moments that we've seen in the world? Whether obviously it's Breonna Taylor, it's George Floyd, like these horrific murders and tragedies. How is it that you're not activated around them, but that it continues? What is needed? Because I think that's a message that I keep hearing and you can correct me if I'm wrong. But it's how is it, how is this sustained in a real way that brings about real change? So that everyone's children can grow up in a world without any racial injustice?

• 51:11Speaker 01

  I mean, I think, you know, what I try to tell people is find an organization and commit to it. And I say that because the only way that we fight institutional racism is if we're fighting institutions that are fighting institutional racism. You can't do it alone. As I got older, I realized I had so much inside of me. I needed an organization. I needed to have a container to figure out, okay, I want to take on everything I can. What do I feel most moved by? What bothers me the most? What keeps me up at night? All right, let me do that work. And that was really critical for me as a young person. And I started organizing

• 51:54Speaker 01

  at sixteen years old. You know, I had my, I did my first petition against my school administration. And, and then I realized, ooh, I liked that feeling. I like having agency. I like being able to be like, you did something wrong to me. And I'm not just gonna yell in your face. I want to actually organize lots of people around this to make sure it changes. So this doesn't happen to me again. It doesn't happen to other people. And that's what so many collectives, organizations are doing. I also tell people, if you feel moved by something and it doesn't exist, create it, start it. That's important, too. Like, lots of organizations exist, started because they didn't exist. That infrastructure didn't exist. So that's super important.

• 52:40Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, I think, I think that's a great reminder. And yeah, I often say to people that you may not find your purpose through your passion, but you find it through your pain.

• 52:48Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 52:49Jay Shetty?

  And for a lot of people, that's where it stems from, is that they find something really painful that they went through or that they see people going through, and they want to go and serve that and make a difference. But I, I love how you keep bringing it back to just, you know, having to, having to take personal responsibility for what we see, which, which is such a strong message. I know we only have five minutes left. I have like a million more questions I can ask you. So we may have to do a part two at some point. But what I, what I want to do is we, we end every episode of On Purpose with two segments. One's called Fill in the Blanks, and you're an artist, so I think you'll like this. And then the final five. So the Fill in the Blanks is I read out sentences and you fill in the blank at the end.

• 53:28Speaker 01

  Okay, great.

• 53:29Jay Shetty?

  It's kind of like your journal. So we get to, we get a little dive into what your journal may look like. Okay, so Fill in the Blanks, this is the first one. Freedom for all is.

• 53:39Speaker 01

  Oh, uh, freedom for all is

• 53:44Speaker 01

  liberation.

• 53:46Jay Shetty?

  Okay, true equality starts with?

• 53:49Speaker 01

  Fighting for black lives.

• 53:52Jay Shetty?

  Being brave means?

• 53:55Speaker 01

  Showing up for yourself first.

• 53:57Jay Shetty?

  Absolute kindness is not?

• 54:03Speaker 01

  Absolute kindness is not? That's such a strange sentence.

• 54:09Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, it's a hard one, yeah. You can change, you can edit the sentence if you don't like it.

• 54:13Speaker 01

  No, I'm gonna try this. Well, the first thing that came to my head was passive aggressive.

• 54:18Jay Shetty?

  Yeah, I, I think that's good. I think that's good, I like it, I like it. I wish everyone would.

• 54:26Speaker 01

  Smile, smile.

• 54:27Jay Shetty?

  I love that.

• 54:28Speaker 01

  Each other.

• 54:29Jay Shetty?

  I love that. Okay, these are your final five. So these are, with you I may go, but we've got a few minutes so we can go into it. Usually they're one word or one sentence answers, but okay. What do you believe most people misunderstand about activism?

• 54:44Speaker 01

  Oh, um, that it's only protest.

• 54:49Jay Shetty?

  Hmm, okay, let's, let's expand. Tell me more. What, what else is it?

• 54:53Speaker 01

  People think that, um, activism is like when you go show up to a protest or there is a protest and that's it. Like that, that it's like, and that's like zero to one hundred. There's all the, there's all this in between. From like saying that you want to become an activist and, and, and really an organizer. And then the protest. The protest is actually the last thing you do. Protest usually happens when you've tried everything else, when you try to talk to your elected official, when you sent them a letter, when you organize everybody to, to show up to the board meeting, when you, um, you know, made your public comment where you've, you know, you pressured them through other people. The protest is basically when every elected official or appointed official has ignored your demands.

• 55:38Speaker 01

  Protest is the next, the final step to be like, alright, I've tried everything, now I'm showing up. So activism isn't just protest.

• 55:46Jay Shetty?

  Wow, that is such a profound answer. Thank you so much for, for expanding on that. Alright, number two. See, I knew I was gonna go off tangent with you. I can, I can do it. Uh, question number two for you. What question do you ask yourself the most? Or what's a question you reflect on yourself the most?

• 56:01Speaker 01

  Um, I usually wake up thinking, what am I doing today so I can change the material conditions for black people?

• 56:10Jay Shetty?

  Wow, beautiful question. Thank you. So, so led by purpose, that question. That's amazing. Okay, that was two. Question number three. If you could create a law that everyone in the world had to follow, what would it be?

• 56:24Speaker 01

  Um, if I could create a law, I think it would be that there would be a community block party every, once a month. So everybody would come out on their block, they would bring food, like, it would be like, um, mandated. No one would get in trouble if they didn't do it though. So it would be a loose law. I don't believe in criminalizing. So, but the law would be, you need really, really to create a culture around like everybody having like a block party once a month. And like, everybody's like home on the block would be open. If you live in an apartment, all your, the doors would be open and people would just like live and have food and hang out

• 57:05Speaker 01

  and talk philosophy and art and, and how we're gonna change the world together.

• 57:11Jay Shetty?

  Wow, I wanna live on, I wanna live on that block. That's, okay, cool. Uh, I never had that answer before. It's a brilliant answer, by the way. No one has ever said anything close to that. Uh, question number four and five. So question number four. What's the biggest lesson that you've learned in the last 12 months?

• 57:28Speaker 01

  Oh, um, that you can plan as much as you want, but there is always a bigger plan.

• 57:40Jay Shetty?

  Beautiful. Okay. And fifth and final question, I think this is incredible. But can you please share the importance of the date, February 2nd, 2020?

• 57:53Speaker 01

  Is that when Covid happened?

• 57:55Jay Shetty?

  No, no, no. It's the LA City Council declared it.

• 58:02Speaker 01

  It's Patrice Cullors's Day! I forgot that quickly.

• 58:07Jay Shetty?

  I love that. I love that. That's the best.

• 58:10Speaker 01

  I'm like, wait, what happened? Covid?

• 58:12Jay Shetty?

  You took it like a trivia question. You thought it was like, you know, like a historical trivia question. It wasn't. It was about you.

• 58:18Speaker 01

  I love that you all know that.

• 58:20Jay Shetty?

  There's no trick questions in my interviews. Everything's about Patrice Cullors's Day. Yeah. Tell us about the significance of it. What does that mean?

• 58:28Speaker 01

  I had no idea that was gonna happen. I showed up to an event that my local chapter put on for me and a council member, Herb Wesson, and the city council declared that February 2nd, 2020 is Patrice Cullors's Day.

• 58:41Jay Shetty?

  Yeah. Well, thank you. Thank you, Patrice. Thank you so much. Everyone who's been listening or watching, I hope today you got a deep dive into Patrice Cullors as the person, the human, the energy, the presence, because I did. I definitely feel I got to know you so much better today and I appreciate you being so open and vulnerable and letting us go in this completely different direction.

• 59:03Speaker 01

  I love it.

• 59:04Jay Shetty?

  You know, I really appreciate that, Patrice. Thank you for going on this journey with us. And yeah, I think we're gonna be friends, so I'm excited to, once we can all see each other again. I want to come to one of your block parties and I'm gonna invite you to the Kirten's at our place for some spiritual healing. But yeah, thank you for doing what you're doing. Thank you for being a messenger and an artist and an activist too and just sharing so many elevated insights around activism with us. I think that's what you've done. You've really, for a lot of us, at least me especially, rewired my thought processes on what true activism is. So, thank you for doing that.

• 59:45Speaker 01

  Thank you so much. I really appreciate it.

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