The Courage to Change When Everyone Wants You to Stay the Same | Danté Stewart

Former college football player turned minister Danté Stewart reveals what happens when you stop shrinking yourself to fit others' expectations and start trusting your own evolution. Drawing from his acclaimed memoir Shoutin' in the Fire https://amzn.to/3HAou1J, Stewart shares intimate stories about navigating faith, identity, and belonging, offering a fresh perspective on what it means to grow beyond your community's boundaries while staying true to yourself. You can find Danté at: Website https://www.dantecstewart.com/ | Instagram https://www.instagram.com/stewartdantec | Episode Transcript https://www.goodlifeproject.com/podcast/deconstructing-faith-religious-trauma-spiritual-authenticity-dante-stewart If you LOVED this episode, you’ll also love the conversations we had with Rabbi Steve Leder https://pod.link/goodlifeproject/episode/NjI5N2MyYjU0MmM4NDUwMDEzNTU2Yjll about how to live, what really matters. Check out our offerings & partners: Join My New Writing Project: Awake at the Wheel https://jonathanfields.substack.com/aboutVisit Our Sponsor Page For Great Resources & Discount Codes https://www.goodlifeproject.com/sponsors/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy https://acast.com/privacy for more information.

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

• 0:00Jonathan Fields?

  So what happens when a college football player becomes a minister, only to realize the very faith community he's dedicated his life to isn't actually where he feels like he belongs? And what if that moment of truth reveals something far bigger about why an entire generation is walking away from organized religion and what they might be walking toward? These questions kind of crackled through the conversation I had with Dante Stewart, as we explored what it really means to stand in your truth when the cost of authenticity feels devastatingly high. What started as a discussion about spirituality and religion in modern life, transformed into a profound exploration of courage and belonging and the fierce grace that it takes to grow beyond the boundaries of other set force.

• 0:44Jonathan Fields?

  Dante is an award-winning writer, cultural critic, and minister whose work appears in The New York Times, The Atlantic, Washington Post, and more. His critically acclaimed memoir, Shouting in the Fire, examines faith, identity, and belonging in a racially fractured America. And a former college football player turned theologian and essayist, Dante brings both intellectual rigor and just raw emotional honesty to every conversation. Through powerful, personal stories, he really shines a light on what becomes possible when we just trust our evolution, even as others want us to stay the same. And his surprising take on how to metabolize suffering rather than avoid it really got me thinking. So excited to share this conversation with you. I'm Jonathan Fields, and this is Good Life Project.

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• 3:31Jonathan Fields?

  There's a question that I would love to get your take on. I think it was just last week, I saw one of the sort of like giant survey agencies came out with a poll that looked at religiosity over, you know, like a period of like a long window of time. And they broke it down for the first time that I saw by boomers, Gen Xers, millennials and Gen Z. And I think we've all heard that people on the whole are getting less and less religious over time. Was really surprising for me to see was that Gen Z in particular, there's been a massive exit from religion, from like basically all faith. I'd love your take on that. Like what, what are your thoughts on that?

• 4:14Speaker 04

  I think, first of all, thank you for having me on here. When I heard that I was going to get a chance to speak with y'all, it's very much a welcome invitation. So I'm really excited to be here with y'all. I think for me to answer that question, I can kind of only answer out my own experience. I think on some level, people are tired. I think people are tired. Of the way in which like religion has not lived up to its own kind of ideals. And on another level, I think people were more connected, even though we're more kind of disillusioned with one another. In a very real way, we're more connected between humans than we've ever been before. Which means I think people are more sensitive to their religious experiences, to vastly diverse religious experiences.

• 4:57Speaker 04

  And I think people realize that you got options. When you got options, you realize that you can kind of allow your expression, your expression of your spirituality to kind of fit what you need. I think that that may be a part of it. I think people are exhausted. Young people are just tired of the way religion has gone. And, you know, we have seen the slow kind of leak of religion's insufficiency. You know, and it has now turned into a kind of all out massive pour. And you're talking about the way in which, and I'm particularly thinking about Christianity because I'm Christian. The ways in which people have linked and unnecessarily tied Christianity to politics in the most unhealthy way.

• 5:38Speaker 04

  And people are saying, well, if this is what you believe that your faith is to embody, then I don't want anything to do with that. And I think people are, you know, just tired of the ways in which faith has been used as a weapon. To be wielded rather than a world to be ventured in and explored. You know, as I think about my own kind of relationship of faith and is ever evolving nature. You know, for me, I'm, I'm, I think as I get older, I get a little bit more sensitive and expansive to realize that like, you know, I'm not the only one that got something to offer to this world. You know, we're humans. We get to offer, you know, something to contribute to the good life.

• 6:18Speaker 04

  And that means that like, we have to be diverse in our approach and in our experience. And whenever that doesn't, you know, necessarily live up to his ideal, then we get a chance to like change. And I think, you know, people are like, hey, I get another option. I get a better shot at this than the way I've experienced. I'm willing to take that shot.

• 6:36Jonathan Fields?

  Yeah, I mean, that really resonates with me. And it kind of goes along with what I was thinking a little bit too. I'm curious what you think about this because I've kind of been looking at them. I was wondering about this, this stat. And I've always had this sense that even beyond religion, that young generation, Gen Z in particular, and even younger millennials, they're less willing to toe the line, you know, and more willing to say like to actually kick the tires and be like, how is this actually working for me? And if I look at my parents or like grandparents, the generations above me, how has it worked out for them too? And if this has been centered in their life and I look at them and I'm actually not, I'm not really seeing the outcomes that I'd love to see or the impact. And then look at my own life and I'm like, I'm kind of not buying into it.

• 7:21Jonathan Fields?

  I feel like younger generations, and maybe this has always just been younger generations, right? It feels like they're less willing to basically just adopt what's been handed down to them as a sacred transmission. Don't question it, don't challenge it, just do it, abide by it. And they're kind of like, now I need to figure out like, I want to know the why and I want to know the how and I need to see if this actually fits for me. And a lot of them are deciding it doesn't. I mean, what's your take on that?

• 7:45Speaker 04

  Yeah, I think, I think that's true. I know that a lot of people, you know, you started talking about like philosophy and moral philosophy. You know, there are people who say like, there is not, they see the limitations of utilitarianism and the usefulness of a thing. You know, and I think there is something good about actually questioning, is this thing actually working the way it was intended to work? Now for me, and I can only speak for Christianity. I think that we have to challenge what we mean by work. I think, I think older generations, many of their ideas of working was, you know, I kind of have my kind of own individual relationship with God

• 8:28Speaker 04

  or I have my relationship with my church community and, you know, my life, religion is just a part, another aspect of the web of experience. Rather than like religion should actually like do something to change the world we live in. You know, now granted, I'm black American. So, you know, my, my experience of religion would be very catered to like being Southern and black, which means that like religion.

• 8:54Speaker 04

  Is like, almost totalizing in a sense, that like God is in everything and everywhere and everything can be moved and altered and changed. And that religion can be a force for good, even if, you know, the kind of oxymoronic ways religion is used as an instrument of control. You know, I think that like, younger generations, they're more willing to be like, I bet, cool, that don't work for me, I'm out, see you later, period. I think there's something useful about that too, though, because I think like, life gets boring, at least to me, I'm a writer, you know, I'm a writer, I'm a person that goes into like art museums and I can sit in art museums and like, you know, like just explore

• 9:36Speaker 04

  the art museums and find something generative that of like sitting and returning and questioning and looking out in the world and, you know, being adventurous and things like that. So for me, uh, you know, as a personality type, I'm kind of more adventurous and I look forward to like, expansion and evolution. Some people's personality types aren't like that. But like, for me, I'm like, the other day, I was thinking about Jesus, and there's a story in the Bible where Jesus says no to his parents. And, uh, he, he says no to his parents, they're looking for him, and he say, I'm going about doing my father's business, da, da, da, da, da. They, parents done went away, he doing his own thing. And I think about that story and the other part of that story where it says like, you know, he, Jesus grew in wisdom and in stature.

• 10:17Speaker 04

  And the religion of that day, going to synagogue and things like that, Jesus, if we look at his story, that means that like, yo, he matured, he was able to say no, and he was able to grow and expand and even be different than the kind of received religion that his parents were engaging in, the rituals that they were engaging in. Not saying that, you know, he was one to like uphold the system or tear it all the way down, but I think there's something generative there to be thinking about, okay, if Jesus could do it, you know, then why can't we, then why can't I? You know, if he has to grow in wisdom and stature, and that growing for him allowed him to grow his theology, to challenge the ways that people were embodying their faith,

• 11:01Speaker 04

  even if it meant that like, you know, people would think that he is wild, he's crazy, he was willing to do it, he was brave enough and courageous enough to do it, then if it's good enough for him, then it should at least, we should have grace enough for it to be good enough for young people today.

• 11:13Jonathan Fields?

  Yeah, I mean, it's such an interesting take. What you're describing is somebody who's sort of like looking at something that was said, this is the way to be. And, and it's him saying, I'm gonna get curious about that. And it's not resonating with me. So I need to actually, I need to say no. And I need to go figure out like, what is resonant for me? And I feel like faith these days, across so many traditions, doesn't create the room for that. They don't create space for that. It's sort of like, this is the way it is. This is the way it's always been. There are a small number of sort of anointed people who will tell you what this means. And whatever that translation is, isn't really supposed to be challenged. And I think a lot of folks are not okay with that anymore.

• 11:53Speaker 04

  Not at all. I mean, when have we ever been, you know, we're humans, you know? When have we ever been good at other people challenging us? Like, I'm in therapy and like, you know, I don't like when my therapist be like, well, let me challenge you on something that you deeply hold. And I'm a fighter too. I love to fight. I mean, I love to squabble. I love to argue. I am a very opinionated individual. And I think that like, you know, we're as human beings, we aren't really good at changing our minds or evolving or expanding. And I think part of it is about fear, not even bad. You know, it's, it's, it's like, whatever we receive and whatever we embody, it works. And so it's like, it's very difficult to allow yourself to go through changing your

• 12:38Speaker 04

  mind about something that your community, when you think about like, for me, when I think about morality, you know, I think that morality is also like a communal project, right? So the community, you know, determine what's good, what's right, what's fair. And that's going to differ based on, you know, various communities. This is me using my sociology degree from Glimpse. So like, these communities are going to generate their own kind of standards of meaning and things like that. Not saying, I'm not saying that they're right, you know? It just, sometimes it is. Now, in order for, for you to be someone to be like, I bet I'm gonna try and like, explore, be more curious, you have the possibility of like, making yourself like, a recipient of punishment, or ostracization, or whatever they call it.

• 13:23Speaker 04

  And things like that. You can be like outsider. I mean, some people like to be loners. It's cool. But some people who would want to generate like meaning and contribute to the community. Sometimes they may struggle with being considered an outsider. And I think that like, like, like, sometimes that fear is not about like what we actually believe. It's about what we believe that people will become if we reject the projections that we're projecting on the world about what we should be and what we should believe together. And so I think there's nothing wrong to me with changing your mind. Saying like, I don't know, or I haven't thought about that. Let me think a little bit deeper about that.

• 14:04Speaker 04

  But a lot of times we live in a culture, we just don't have grace with one another. Hey, let me be real, bro. Like, I believe I'm a gracious person, but in a very real way, sometimes I'm not a gracious person.

• 14:16Jonathan Fields?

  Just like all of us. Yeah.

• 14:17Speaker 04

  Exactly. So if we could just be honest, like, not all of us are gracious. And I think, you know, people struggle to be patient in our change or be courageous in being willing to change because we struggling to have this kind of communal aspect of grace. Communal morality means absolutely nothing without communal grace.

• 14:43Jonathan Fields?

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• 17:07Jonathan Fields?

  So you write about it in the book, Shout! In the Fire. It really opens up with this metaphor of fire. And you're using fire as a metaphor for spiritual fervor, internalized pain, for grief and grace, and then rage and redemption. Take me into this.

• 17:22Speaker 04

  Wow. I love the way you describe, use those words to talk about my book, because the further I get away from it, and in some sense, the more I return to it. So there's a distance, because it's been written so many years ago. And I still have conversations like today about it, even as I'm working on other work. And it's just so interesting now to hear. The words that are, you know, used when it comes to like people thinking about my book and the word that you use like, you know, I think you said something about grief and say it again one more time.

• 17:54Jonathan Fields?

  Yeah, it was like grief and grace.

• 17:56Speaker 04

  Yeah, I love that grief and grace.

• 17:58Jonathan Fields?

  Yeah, I mean, you could describe it in so many different ways, but it's just the metaphor of fire is really, it's poignant. And I think people can kind of step, they can take that metaphor and make it feel ripe for whatever like it represents to them.

• 18:11Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, because in a very real way, the book is a journey. And this is me kind of talking about my own book as I'm a character in the story. You know, the book is very much following a young man who is simply trying to find his way in the world. A young black man and that's from South Carolina who grows up in a, grows up in very rural, poor America. And I didn't really address this in this particular book. The layers of like being from the black rural South when it comes to like economics and, you know, being from a small town of 2,000 people. But here's the story of a young man who's attempting to find himself and he's fighting against the, all these kind of voices of what he should become or what he should do.

• 18:56Speaker 04

  And he listens to those voices and he becomes a thing oftentimes that he doesn't want to become until those things doesn't work anymore. And he has to make the decision whether he's going to remain the same or whether he's going to be courageous enough or vulnerable enough, because for me, before there is ever courage, there's vulnerability. And the only thing that protects vulnerability is courage. So there's a relationship between vulnerability and courage to me that I think is woven through the book in which like the fire is about the heat, the struggle of what it means to be young and black and American and Christian and Southern as it relates to going off to college or, you know, growing up in your own family life, going to white churches.

• 19:42Speaker 04

  That fire is about, you know, how hard it is and the challenges of. You know, the pain associated with fire and being burned. But it is also about an internal fire. This kind of internal spark, like a force, an energy, or a voice, or a composure in which that tells the young man like, this is who you are. This is what you must become. And as you are going through the fire outside of yourself, don't forget the spark that lies within. And if you can hear the voice in the flickery that lies within, you will always find what you're supposed to be in this world. And I think people who read the book,

• 20:26Speaker 04

  I think, once they leave the book, they will be giving more of themselves because, you know, being young and black and American isn't the only conditions in which like we have to encounter fire or have to be reminded of our internal spark and flame. I think everybody in their lives at some point have to go through their own particular fires. And for me, I think the book is just, you know, a metaphor of I've been through the fire. I've been burned by it. I've been changed by it. Now come along, let's go through it together.

• 20:58Jonathan Fields?

  Yeah, I mean, it's really interesting the way you tie up just the notion of fire also. It's got these two qualities, you know? It's like, it's the fire that, you know, it can either, it can burn, but it can also forge. And sometimes it does both at the same time.

• 21:12Speaker 04

  Oftentimes it does both.

• 21:13Jonathan Fields?

  Right? And we're constantly trying to avoid it, but sometimes also we can't avoid it, you know? And it's like, there's so often, I feel like for so many of us, there's an other side we want to be on or we want to get to. And like, we're trying to figure out, how do we get there without going through this? How do we get there? Like, there's a, I can see like there's a fire in front of me. On the other side, there's something I really want. There's a way I want to be. There's something, way I want to live there, whatever it is. And it's like, how do I get around the fire to get to that thing? And end of the day, it really doesn't work. You kind of got to go through it.

• 21:49Speaker 04

  Yeah, you know, I, I think the poet Robert Frost is so helpful here. You know, he says, the only way out is through. And I believe that to be true. I think the only way to get through the fire is to go through the fire. I'm reminded, I was saying, I sent my friend this poem the other day called, I Worried by Mary Oliver. I'm actually doing my MFA in poetry now. And so I've been, you know, I've been kind of maturing as a writer, you know, not just, you know, minister, but like journalist, poet, essayist and minister, you know, really trying to deepen my craft and voice and grow myself and challenge myself.

• 22:33Speaker 04

  And I came across this poem by Mary Oliver the other day. I sent it to my friend called, I Worried. And the poem is, is Mary Oliver, you know, worrying about so much, worrying about whether she was going to be able to make it, worrying about her health, worrying about this, worrying about that. And at the end, the last two stanzas of the poem is her picking herself up and going out and standing up and walking and, and moving. And I'll never forget sending that poem because it reminded me of an event that I did where someone asked me, you know, how do you metabolize suffering? And I think about, you know, any type of muscle or energy. The only way to get it going and to metabolize it is to move it.

• 23:16Speaker 04

  And I think so many people struggle. I'm talking, I'm preaching to myself right now in this season of my life, you know, cause as much as we would like the fire of, of yesterday to never become the fire of tomorrow. The fact is like there's, we're going to constantly encounter fires in life. And the fire that we passed through before should, like you said, forge us to be ready to say, okay, I've been through this before, so I can get through it again. And so I think that like, the only way to get through the fires of life that all of us going to have to go through, the only way to, you know, metabolize our suffering or our fear is to utilize. That energy to move us forward.

• 23:59Speaker 04

  To complain about things, you know, worry, allow yourself to worry. Cause so, so often, you know, we dissociate so much, you know, with our fear and our anger and our sadness. That when it's time to move, you know, we struggle to move because we have not allowed ourselves to feel what we feel. So I think, yeah, the only way out, as Robert Frost says, is through.

• 24:21Jonathan Fields?

  We were talking about metabolizing suffering and how a lot of people are trying to just figure out, how do I opt out of it entirely, basically? And the truth of the world is we don't, you know, we're going to experience it a lot. And but like, what do you do with that? I think is one of the big questions, you know? It's interesting, right? Because part of what you write about also is this notion, and you know, and you've written a bunch about how you've grown up, you know, a kid in South Carolina. And that part of the message that you took in was that in some way, shape or form, like part of your job was to shrink. It was like, if you want safety, you know, part of, part of that comes with invisibility.

• 25:01Jonathan Fields?

  And like for you, that's something that sets a pattern in motion that becomes really fraught to live that way.

• 25:09Speaker 04

  Oh, one hundred percent. And, and what's so wild is, you know, I feel like, I feel like I'm always wrestling with the ways in which I feel like I've had to shrink. I don't think we, human beings, ever get to a point. I think we do get to a point where like, like Denise Levertal, now I become myself the poet. I, I think we get to a point where we are becoming ourselves, but we're always in some sense, fighting against the version of us that felt like we had to shrink in order to be ourselves. You know, and you talk about religion, put in that, you know, you're talking about like, the shrinking version of you is the more moral version of you.

• 25:51Speaker 04

  The version of you that's more free, that's more expressive, is the more immoral version of you. And so we're dealing not just with, you know, wrestling through, you know, processing who we're becoming, trying to, you know, generate language for our own journeys, but we're also dealing with like, Dislodging ourselves from patterns of internalized shame and internalized guilt that don't belong to us. You know, so it's like, I resonate so much with you thinking about shrinking because like, I feel like I've, I've always kind of been on a journey and we are always on a journey, especially, and I think if, if you're the type of person who has a temper, like, you know, there's always more to grow toward, or there's always more to learn.

• 26:34Speaker 04

  You know, I think that we're always going to, you know, deal with the struggle of like smallness and growth. And I feel like being a football player is a part of that too, because it's, you know, I never forget, you know, like, what have you done for me lately? You know, yesterday really don't matter. You're always in competition against yourself and where you can grow. And you're always fighting against yourself. Sometimes that's healthy, sometimes it's not. Because sometimes there would never be a point in which you come to the feeling that like I have arrived at who I'm supposed to be. There's always this new self. It's like you got a whole season to get better and the way you start isn't the way you should end up. Sadly, is that once you get into life,

• 27:19Speaker 04

  in football, you got a beginning of the season and you have an end of the season. With life, you know, life is such a long thing. And so I think for so many of us who are used to shrinking, and I think about myself, yes, so much of what I write is about visibility, is about human beings, you know, not shrink, because I believe that like, I don't know, I'm just wild enough to believe that God, like, or life, or our communities truly want the best for us. And truly wanting the best for us means that we're becoming the version that we were always intended to be. You know, every day I wake up, have a picture that's in the restroom of our home

• 28:04Speaker 04

  and that picture simply says, God smiles at the thought of you. And every day I look at that and I try and ingest it. I don't always believe it. You know, because like to become who you are and to stop shrink. Means that like, you know, you've really got to deal with how people around you got used to a small version of you. And I think that so many people who go through that, we go through it and and we we believe that like some sense of rejection is going to take place. If I become who I am, and I just believe that sometimes, man, we've created, and that may be true. But like, it's the story we've learned to believe about ourselves.

• 28:45Speaker 04

  And as writers, our job is to challenge the story, to challenge the narrative, to challenge the metaphor, to challenge the narrative arc of our lives and our growth in hopes that we encounter things and are changed by it and give it more of ourselves. So when I go to the page, my simple job is this, is like, I want to attempt to be more of myself. And I want to attempt to give you more yourself. And if we can do that, then like, that is our whole job as humans. That's love. Love is being able to be and give everything to ourselves that we believe we deserve.

• 29:23Jonathan Fields?

  That resonates really strongly. I guess my deeper curiosity, though, is this. Sometimes we shrink because we don't want to be rejected, because we don't want to be, you mentioned earlier, like ostracized, kicked out, like, we want to belong in community and follow whatever the norms are. Other times we shrink for very practical reasons, like safety, like you're a kid, you're growing up, a young black man in the South, right? Part of this for you isn't about being rejected, and this is some part of what you write about. It's about safety.

• 29:50Speaker 04

  Oh, yeah.

• 29:51Jonathan Fields?

  You know, it's like showing up in a particular way that's smaller than who you are, because you want to be alive, you want to be safe.

• 29:57Speaker 04

  Oh, yeah.

• 29:57Jonathan Fields?

  That's a harder problem to solve in my mind. Like, so when you say, it's like when you say be more visible and you're like, be who you are and like, that is a huge amount of faith. If part of the the reason you're shrinking is because of the perception that'll make you safer, and maybe the very real, the reality that it will make you safer, to then go out and say, no, I'm going to be more visible, I'm going to be more of who I need to be and who I am. It's like you're you're challenging not just rejection. You're stepping into a place of faith that somehow you're you're going to be okay even showing up in that deeper, more real, authentic place. And this was your story. That's big. That's a big move.

• 30:36Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now, you know, what's funny is like, I'm such a person that like, I don't like to talk about myself often. You know, in my own journey that like, you're right, it is big. Because when I think about it, man, to be young and black and American, like, you really do like gotta shrink and become invisible to survive this country. Especially playing football on the level that I did and that we did. I never forget like when Trayvon Martin was murdered. Like, I wasn't one of the ones who was like, you know, protesting or things like that. And and we had a small group who did. But I wasn't one of the ones who did because I wanted to be safe. Like, I wanted, you know, I felt like I had too much at stakes in order to put myself out there.

• 31:21Speaker 04

  And a lot of times, you know, it's easier to put out yourself out there when you got a lot to lose. It's much harder to put yourself out there when you got everything to lose. And oftentimes, being black in this country, you know, we got everything to lose. You know, this country gave us so little and we made something of it. And what little we do have, this country has constantly attempted to try and take away. We think about right now, and this is in 2025. And we're still dealing with the rolling back of rights. We're still dealing with people trying to undo many of the freedoms that we so hard fought for. We still live in a country in which like, books are being banned, funding is being cut. People don't care highly about like what's going on in rural America.

• 32:04Speaker 04

  No matter where you in Wisconsin, whether you in South Carolina, where I'm from. People oftentimes aren't just like not caring, but they're like actively against. So to me, to show up in spite of that, you're right, is the ultimate expression of faith. Because there's the possibility of loss. And you believe, you begin to believe that even if I lose something, I don't lose everything. And that everything I don't lose is who I am as a person. I'll never forget. So like my granddaddy, I love my granddaddy, right? I carry his obituary wherever I go. I have some friends who, I'm Christian, but I have friends who practice hoodoo and they'd be like, hey, bro, like, make a cup of coffee to your granddaddy, you know, and sip coffee with your granddaddy. I do.

• 32:46Speaker 04

  You know, and I'd be like, hey, hey, granddaddy, like I have conversations with granddaddy, everything. You know, and so like, like for me, it's being generative and life-giving. So one of the things about my granddaddy I love, you know, it's like he's a black man from South Carolina, born in the 1930s. In spite of like serving in this country, now I'll never forget when 1965, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 happened. My granddaddy, born in South Carolina, born as a baby of the Great Depression, born in a time in which this country, you know, were just years removed from one of the bloodiest periods in American history for black people, 19, the early 1900s to about to the 1920s, especially black Southern folk. You know, 1919 was, you know, they were like lynching black people all over. And you're talking about like, he has proximity to these stories.

• 33:31Speaker 04

  And you're talking about like being not far removed from Emmett Till. And you're not even talking about like the stories, the smaller stories of the ways in which black people live in a constant grip of American terror all throughout the continental United States. In ways that are like, for every one headline, there's like 10, 15 acts of small violence that people don't report on. And people like my granddaddy in the small rural South, when the Voting Rights Act came down in 1954, 1964, uh, 65, after the Civil Rights Act of 64, my granddaddy got up in his pickup truck. And you want to know what my granddaddy did? My granddaddy went around town, he picked up everybody and said that no matter what,

• 34:12Speaker 04

  we in South Carolina, I'm gonna pick up everybody so that they can have a right to be fully human and to vote and make their voice known. That is a radical risk. Why? Because you are in a moment, in a state where people really don't just don't want you to exist, they don't want you to change anything. So for me, I think like, yeah, it's showing up as your full self, no matter who you are, whether you're black, whether you're this, whether you're that. Like it is, you're right, the ultimate form of faith, because you can lose so. Much, and yet you're not willing to lose yourself. And so for me, I'm preaching to myself right now, you know, because it's the older you get, I feel like the less brave you become.

• 34:52Speaker 04

  So it's like, I hope that I become a person that as I deepen my understanding of life, it also deepens my commitment to radical choices. You know, because stability status quo would create a sustainable life. But like risk, choice, imagination would create a full and whole life. And I don't just want a sustainable life. I want a life in which like, we can take some risks to like be everything we can be.

• 35:27Jonathan Fields?

  I mean, I think so many of us want that also, you know, um, but it's just, you know, fear stops you and we all have different fears and we all like come from different places and different histories where like the fears can be radically different. And we'll be right back after a word from our sponsors. This message is brought to you by Apple Card. Ah, fall, that cozy season where we swap the swimwear for sweaters and sunnies for scars. But before the Halloween decorations are put away or Thanksgiving table has been set, there's already holly jelly music playing in the grocery store, reminding you that the year is coming to a close. Time to kick end of year into high gear.

• 36:08Jonathan Fields?

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• 36:36Jonathan Fields?

  Good Life Project is sponsored by TinCan. So if you grew up in the 70s or 80s, you probably still remember your best friend's phone number and stretching the kitchen phone cord around the corner for privacy. Our executive producer, Lindsay, wanted that same freedom for her kids, eight and 10. So in January, she got them a TinCan. Now, friends call the house to chat, make plans, and check in without borrowing her phone. They even keep a handwritten phone book next to it. I kind of love that. TinCan is the new school way for kids to talk with their friends. It's a secure landline that lets them call all their favorite people, but with parental controls to keep them protected. No screens, no algorithms, no texting, just a phone being a phone.

• 37:18Jonathan Fields?

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• 37:48Speaker 01

  With no fees or minimums on checking accounts, it's no wonder the Capital One Bank guy is so passionate about banking with Capital One. If he were here, he wouldn't just tell you about no fees or minimums. He'd also talk about how most Capital One cafes are open seven days a week to assist with your banking needs. Yep, even on weekends, it's pretty much all he talks about, in a good way. What's in your wallet? Terms apply. See CapitalOne.com/Bank. Capital One, N.A., Member FDIC.

• 38:22Jonathan Fields?

  It's interesting. Your story is sort of like this, and I know you don't love talking about yourself, but I'm going to talk about you. It's fine. It's cool. Because it's really powerful example in a lot of ways. You've talked a number of times about playing football and establishing yourself and establishing a name for that, and then sort of moving out into the world and moving into the world of faith. But the world of faith you first moved into was a world of faith that didn't fit you.

• 38:46Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 38:47Jonathan Fields?

  And you did everything. You basically were like, let me figure this out. I want to be a part of this. I want to be in community. Like, I want to try and make it so these are my people. You hit a moment where you're like, it's not working. Like, this whole, the community, the approach, the, it's just not working. And rather than, again, getting to this moment and saying, you know what, I'm gonna shrink again. And because I want to, I want to fit in, again, you said, no, I can't do this. You know, and really started, and it meant walking away from a community, a sense of belonging, a set of beliefs that had been kind of like wrapped around you for a window of time, a season of your life.

• 39:30Jonathan Fields?

  And really going out and, I'm gonna make this analogy, and maybe uncomfortable for you. You described the story of Jesus earlier in a conversation about how he looked at his parents and said, no, I gotta go like explore and figure out what's right for me. And it's kind of like you had your own version of that.

• 39:44Speaker 04

  Oh, it's not comfortable for me at all.

• 39:46Jonathan Fields?

  Yeah.

• 39:47Speaker 04

  That's, that's true.

• 39:48Jonathan Fields?

  But it's not untrue. I'm, I'm not saying, I'm not comparing you to him and saying like-

• 39:52Speaker 04

  Oh, no, no, but like saying no and saying, let me figure out what works. I think that's very true about my story. It's like, I feel like I've always been this type of person though. For me, it's like, I don't know what it is. I feel like I've never been a person that's so tied to something ultimately, to where I can't walk away. I think, and this is partly because of the people around me, is I love people. My friend said the other day, bro, you just love people. And because I do love people, like I pay attention to their stories. And I'm like, once you get to know people beyond your own kind of community and environment, then like you get to believe that there's more possible for you than you're settling for right now.

• 40:35Speaker 04

  You know, a lot of times we grow up or we come into environments in which like we believe this is the only thing for us. And then the story we receive about ourselves is that there are no other alternatives and options. There is nothing more for me here. And I just think that like, that may be cool for some people to live that way, to be like, all right, cool, I'm good with where I'm at. And for me, I'm like that too. I'm good where I'm at until it don't work. And when it don't work, I'm at least willing, you know, to challenge like why it doesn't work, why it doesn't work for me. And to be like, all right. At some point, I'm just gonna be like, I'm gonna bounce and I'm gonna bounce out and I'm gonna just be like, okay,

• 41:18Speaker 04

  I'm gonna figure out what does work. And like, I think it's all depended on like, having people around you who can become a safe place to land when you gotta jump. I was talking to my friend the other day and she was using this narrative, this story of like, a young man at a swimming pool. Imagine myself being a young man at a swimming pool and I had jumped in the pool before. I had swam before, but time had kinda done his work on me and I wasn't in the pool and like, here she is trying to get me to believe that I can swim again, but then I'm at the edge of the pool. I'm saying, oh, I can't swim. I can't do it. I can't swim. And here are all these people who are in the pool who had seen me swim,

• 42:01Speaker 04

  who had jumped with me before, who had seen me, you know, do beautiful breaststrokes and seen me freestyle. And they seen me even dip my foot into the water and they saw the process of me jumping in one season, but then time had gone at work and I settled and fears came in. And she's like, yo, do realize this is that like, you're afraid right now to jump again because you believe that this time is gonna be the time to ruin you. Without realizing that you've jumped and swam so many times before and all you gotta do is trust that the people in the water will catch you and guide you where you need to go.

• 42:46Speaker 04

  And I think for me, I think for so many people, we get to the point where it's like, we forget that like, we have swam before and we've made it through. And we didn't drown and it didn't destroy us. Big changes, big leaps, big bounds. It took something from us. It took a lot of courage. It took a lot of faith to do it. But like, there's people in the water who's like, hey, come on, dip your foot in, jump, it's okay. And I think like, for me, I've never really been a person to be like, all right, I can't jump. I can't leap. You know, and I think for so many people, it's not that like, Like we get complacent or we settle is that like the muscle, the faith muscle atrophies,

• 43:28Speaker 04

  the bravery muscle atrophies because oftentimes communities can in some sense make that bravery muscle atrophy. And when we so used to being somewhere that's just like, that doesn't really challenge us or like, doesn't really, you know, maybe we people who like, I, well, I done mastered this. It's time for me to bounce. I done mastered this part of my journey. It's time for me to go. And oftentimes we think that like, okay, you're supposed to be somewhere forever. When in actuality, maybe it's just for a season and it's time for you to jump again. Because somebody else needs your bravery. So on another level in this story, the more you jump, the more people that believe they can jump as well.

• 44:13Speaker 04

  And so it's like, if we lose that, we lose our sense of self. And maybe we are the ones who are to jump and not the ones that's supposed to stay on the sideline. So.

• 44:26Jonathan Fields?

  I have to ask you now, when your friend was sort of like sharing this story with you and saying like, okay, so like, here's what's going on. Was she talking to you about something that you're grappling with right now, a jump that you're thinking about?

• 44:38Speaker 04

  Yeah, she was in this moment.

• 44:40Jonathan Fields?

  Are you open to sharing?

• 44:41Speaker 04

  Nah, not really. Nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah. I can't share. Yeah, nah, nah, nah, nah.

• 44:47Jonathan Fields?

  Down the road, down the road.

• 44:48Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Cause it's like, cause for me in this present moment, I mean, I think, I think a lot of the junk is about, like Dante, what do you want in life?

• 44:59Speaker 04

  And you know, are you willing to like, allow yourself the vulnerability of saying what you want without the fear of like, being considered a bad person, without the fear of like, oh, they're not gonna like me if I do this. Or, well, you know, it just doesn't, things don't work anymore. Or they don't work the way they should work. Or maybe, you know, you want things to look different. And I think that like, As I'm grappling with my own life, it's so funny this podcast is happening at this very moment where I'm going through one of the hardest times of my life. And it's taken a lot of bravery to show up for work, to show up for myself, to show up for my family, to show up for, you know, my dreams and my goals and my desires.

• 45:44Speaker 04

  I think it's so funny that I'm going back to like shouting in the fire because I felt like I was so brave when I was writing that book. And I feel so scared in life right now. And um, she was dragging me a little bit in a way to tell me Dante, you've already jumped before. It's okay to not know all the answers, to not know all the moves, to not know whether you, you know, gonna swim or drown, but she's like, hey G, it's only three feet, my boy. You're a five foot, you're a five foot nine, five foot ten. You act like life is asking you to jump into ten foot water, nah, bro.

• 46:28Speaker 04

  You've jumped before and it's okay to jump again. You know, I'm much different as a human. I think different, I talk different. I want different things than like, you know, when I was younger. And I think trusting the process of my evolution and my growth as a human being in this present moment is like, those are the big leaps of life, to trust the process of my life and unfolding. And she was like, in this present moment, you know what you feel you must do. You're just afraid of the consequences, but trust yourself. You got it.

• 47:03Jonathan Fields?

  The end of that book that we've been referencing is a declaration of becoming. And there's one line where you say, I became who I was always meant to be. It feels like you're dipping back into that as we speak.

• 47:16Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, I'm thinking even like right now as a writer, you know? You know, as a writer, I'm going through this right now where, you know, when I think about like, Writing Shouting in the Fire, you know, is a very different moment. It's in 2020, you know, 2021, and it's just a very different moment for Americans. And as a young writer, you kind of speak in your mind of whatever you feel, you know, and things like that. And it's good, it's right. But then like, right now, and I'm like, I'm trying to be a storyteller in a way that like is more robust. I like different type of writing now. I like more like immersive journalism,

• 47:52Speaker 04

  and poetry, and essays, and things like that. And like, I want to explore humans outside of myself, which is much different. Like, I'm working on my second book right now, and it's, uh, I'll be done in about a month and a half with it. This book is the kind of next step in my journey as a writer and a human, you know, where so much of the same themes of Shouting in the Fire has been explored in this book, but I'm stepping back and saying, let me travel to Yvale. Let me travel to Vietnam. Let me travel to Charleston, South Carolina. Let me travel to these different places, New Mexico. Let me travel, you know, to these different,

• 48:33Speaker 04

  to New York, and, um, begin to explore like heartbreak, and what heartbreak does to us, and what we do with it, and figure out how we can use our heartbreak as a force for creative good. You know, and of course, Shouting in the Fire is that. You see that woven in Shouting in the Fire, where, you know, heartbreak and anger and grief is used for good and as a creative force. But like, right now, and it's like, for me, you know, I'm just a different human than I was. And that takes a lot of bravery, because like, people get used to, you know, you being a certain type of way, or like, you know, my work on social media. It's like, sometimes you get tired as a writer. And sometimes you're like, well,

• 49:19Speaker 04

  I don't want to talk about Donald Trump today, bro. I just, I wanna, I wanna go watch some films and talk about Ryan Coogler or Alfred Hitchcock. You know, I wanna go read some poems and let's talk about poems and things like that. Let's talk about basketball, you know, let me talk about sports. And of course, those other things gonna be layered in there, but it's like, you know, life is so interesting. And I think, like, I'm such a curious human being that like, my desires and interests change, you know, ever so often. And it takes a lot of bravery to accept that, like, okay, the person I was writing book one will be different than the person that I am writing book two.

• 50:00Speaker 04

  But like Ryan Coogler said the other day in an interview, he says, every movie I made, it was the best movie that I can make at that moment. And like, hey, this the best I got to offer right now. And back then, that was the best I got to offer then. And then in another year, when I'm working on my young adult novel, that'd be the best thing that I can offer right then. And every version of the self matters. And I think a lot of times we think that, like, okay, our journeys to becoming ourselves only matter when we become the thing we always wanted. And that's just not the case. The journey matters every day we wake up and decide we're gonna take it.

• 50:39Jonathan Fields?

  Hmm, yeah. Feels like a good place for us to come full circle as well. So I always wrap with the same question here, and that is, in this container of Good Life Project, if I offer up the phrase "to live a good life," what comes up?

• 50:52Speaker 04

  For me, to live a good life is to be okay with, like, that life is life. And that every day, you know, life presents a new opportunity to be more of who you are. And then the good life is a life in which you can look at everything you became and look at everything you came from and realize it meant something and it accounted for something. And that the only thing the world demands of you is for you to just try and be yourself as much as you can every day. That's the good life. That's the life that counts. It don't matter how much money you make, how many books you write, how many mistakes you make, how much failure you have, how much fear you possess.

• 51:35Speaker 04

  If you wake up in the morning and you begin to ask yourself, what can I do today to give me life? That's the good life, to be able to ask that question, to make small steps to, like, live it.

• 51:46Jonathan Fields?

  Thank you.

• 51:47Speaker 04

  Yeah, thank you, man.

• 51:50Jonathan Fields?

  If you loved this episode, you'll also love the conversation we had with Rabbi Steve Leder about how to live what really matters. You can find a link to that episode in the show notes. This episode of Good Life Project was produced by executive producers Lindsay Fox and me, Jonathan Fields. Editing help by Alejandro Ramirez and Troy Young. Christopher Carter crafted our theme music. And of course, if you haven't already done so, please go ahead and follow Good Life Project in your favorite listening app or on YouTube, too. If you found this conversation interesting or valuable and inspiring, chances are you did, because you're still listening here, do me a personal favor, a seven-second favor, share it with just one person. I mean, if you want to share it with more, that's awesome, too, but just

• 52:32Jonathan Fields?

  one person even, then invite them to talk with you about what you've both discovered, to reconnect and explore ideas that really matter, because that's how we all come alive together. Until next time, I'm Jonathan Fields, signing off for Good Life Project.

• 52:57Speaker 01

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• 53:27Speaker 03

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• 54:16Speaker 07

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• 54:44Speaker 01

  With no fees or minimums on checking accounts, it's no wonder the Capital One Bank guy is so passionate about banking with Capital One. If he were here, he wouldn't just tell you about no fees or minimums. He'd also talk about how most Capital One cafes are open seven days a week to assist with your banking needs. Yep, even on weekends. It's pretty much all he talks about, in a good way. What's in your wallet? Terms apply. See capitalone.com/bank. Capital One, N.A., Member FDIC.