962 Racism, White Privilege, and Healing America with Reverend Michael Beckwith

"I am here to contribute to a kind and just global society. Let me be an instrument of peace."As thousands around America continue to protest racial injustice in the wake of George Floyd's death, Lewis is joined by Reverend Michael Beckwith to discuss how to fight against racism, how to think and talk about our biases, and how to create a more loving, compassionate, equal country. Resources:-Anti-Racism for White People-Guide to Allyship-For more, visit lewishowes.com/962. And text Lewis at 614-350-3960 to start a conversation. Get more from Lewis! Get my New York Times Bestselling book, Make Money Easy! Get The Greatness Mindset audiobook on SpotifyText Lewis AIYouTubeInstagramWebsiteTiktokFacebookX

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

• 0:00Lewis Howes?

  This is episode number 962 with Reverend Michael Beckwith.

• 0:07Lewis Howes?

  Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, a former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week, we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin.

• 0:33Lewis Howes?

  Please, I can't breathe. They're going to kill me. Everything hurts. Those were among the last things George Floyd said before he died under the knee of the Minneapolis police. Protests are still sweeping the country more than a week after Floyd was killed. And I know many of you out there are feeling anger and pain. I am too. The School of Greatness has always focused on positive growth, change, love, and healing. And I realize that racial justice is an essential part of that. So I'm committing to that now. Because we can't all achieve greatness and live our best lives if we aren't all truly equal. And I understand there's a lot of work I need to do personally, both internally

• 1:15Lewis Howes?

  and externally, and that this work will take time. I'm going to make mistakes. I'm going to say the wrong thing. And you might also. But my intention is to help build a more kind, equal, just, loving world. And I hope that's your intention as well. And today, I'm starting by having a conversation with Reverend Michael Beckwith, the founder and spiritual director of the Agape International Spiritual Center. He's one of LA's foremost Black leaders and an old friend. And our dialogue was extremely powerful for me. And a few things we dive into are how we can educate ourselves and begin to make a difference, what white people like myself need to do right now, and why this apocalyptic moment

• 1:59Lewis Howes?

  might be one to create actual change. I hope you enjoy this episode and please share it with a friend if you find this resource helpful. So let's dive into this episode with Reverend Michael Beckwith. But first, I want to thank our sponsor.

• 2:16Lewis Howes?

  What an emotional, just journey for this year, just a year.

• 2:21Speaker 01

  Yeah. Oh, you mean with all, everything pandemic and everything. I've probably cried more in these last two weeks than I've cried in like a couple of years.

• 2:29Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 2:29Speaker 01

  You know, just seeing the video and memories I've had of racism that I've experienced and, you know, it just bubbled up.

• 2:38Lewis Howes?

  Well, welcome everyone to the School of Greatness podcast. We're super excited about our guest today. The inspirational Reverend Michael Beckwith. Thank you so much for being here, my man. Appreciate you. We've had you on before and it was one of our favorite episodes and interviews and people keep talking about today. And we are in an incredible time right now where there's a lot of pain, there's a lot of anger, there's a lot of frustration, and there's a lot of miseducation, especially by white people. There's a lot of white privilege. I think for millennials have a lot of a lack of education understanding. And I wanted to bring you on because you are such a leader of spiritual hope and inspiration.

• 3:17Lewis Howes?

  And you're rooted in love. And I think that's what I appreciate about you the most is your principles and guiding root of love. And that's what I want us to talk about today is how can we be more loving as a society? How can we be more loving as human beings? And how can we be a solution to the problems in the world right now? And I wanted to ask you first, just how are you feeling?

• 3:43Speaker 01

  You know, right this moment, I'm feeling, I'm feeling good. You know, I guess over the last couple of weeks, I probably have cried more than I've cried in a couple of years, you know, just witnessing the atrocity and the, the public lynching that we all saw, you know, obviously brought tears to my eyes. And every time I see it, it's still a visceral emotion about that because it brings up memories as well of me growing up and experiencing, you know, that, that kind of, that kind of racism. Not that kind of racism, but racism, period. But.

• 4:18Lewis Howes?

  For, for, for white people like myself, who most white people are probably never experienced any type of racism the way that you have, in, in general, I'm speaking, what are some of the types of things that you had to face growing up? To give context to people like myself who never had to walk down the street, you know, wondering if someone's coming behind you, a police officer or...

• 4:41Speaker 01

  All of that. You know, in the edu- in the education, I can remember being graded down in my papers because I was, we had to, we had to write like a future autobiography. So in junior high school, I wrote, I was gonna follow in my father's footsteps in law, go to USC, do X, Y, and Z. And the teacher said, "You're never gonna go to USC." You, you, you, you know, uh, she dimmed my hope. I mean, I went to USC, by the way. I went to Morehouse, I transferred to USC. But I can remember her saying that people like me, I shouldn't dream that big. I remember telling my mother about that. My mother went up to the school and handled her business.

• 5:16Lewis Howes?

  What year is this, or what year is this?

• 5:17Speaker 01

  This is junior high school, so this is back in the sixties.

• 5:20Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 5:21Speaker 01

  You know?

• 5:21Lewis Howes?

  People like you, meaning what? People...

• 5:24Speaker 01

  Black people.

• 5:24Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 5:25Speaker 01

  You know?

• 5:25Lewis Howes?

  Did she say black people?

• 5:26Speaker 01

  No, she said, "You're people," something like that. I remember her name, I'm not gonna say her name.

• 5:31Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 5:31Speaker 01

  She's probably passed on, or maybe she's had a great change, who knows? Okay, so that's the educational piece that, that, that was, that was this.

• 5:37Lewis Howes?

  That was in school?

• 5:38Speaker 01

  It was in school.

• 5:39Lewis Howes?

  Okay.

• 5:40Speaker 01

  You know, I was on the track team in high school. We'd jog around my block. Pulled over by the police, you know, "Where, where are you going?" I got my sweatsuit, I had my LA high. You know, I'm jogging, I'm on the track team, you know? So my mother would make us go down to the police department and file a complaint. That was a part of the rules of our family.

• 6:00Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 6:00Speaker 01

  You know, if a police officer stops you, get their badge number, file the complaint. Now, if we didn't do that, we got in trouble. You know, so, so my mother and dad, you know, basically had to talk with us about how to get home safely, how to deal with police officers, yes sir, no sir, get the badge number, file a complaint. You know, so that was just part of our upbringing.

• 6:23Lewis Howes?

  This is in the sixties and seventies?

• 6:25Speaker 01

  Yeah, uh, fifty, sixty, seventies. Um, I mean, I could, I could give you, I don't wanna go down that whole list, but I remember at Moreho- Morehouse College, you know, we rented a hotel for a party. You know, it was like a, a, a, our own version of a frat party.

• 6:41Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 6:41Speaker 01

  And, um, police came, remember, threw me and my guys up against the wall. "What are we doing here?" Says, "We rented, we have a room." "You, you can't have a room here," you know, and threw us up against the wall, arrested us for, um, criminal, what was it, uh, some kind of, um, this is mischief or something, I don't remember what it was.

• 7:02Lewis Howes?

  They're essentially finding a way to make you wrong.

• 7:04Speaker 01

  Right. Yeah, so I can go down the list. When I, right before I started Agape, I spoke at a community in Fulton. The congregation overwhelmingly wanted me to be their minister. I said, I really don't think I'm a fit for this, but I'll be a guest speaker. They really wanted me, threw my, my name into the hat. Congregation wanted me and then a small group of people started saying that if we break this black man to be the minister of this church, the property value is going to go down. People are going to start parking their cars on the lawn. There's going to be litter and trash everywhere, you know? And they started this whole thing. And what's interesting about that is that the people in that community,

• 7:48Speaker 01

  which was mainly a white church, they didn't know that their friend that they were sitting next to was a racist. All the racists thought that everybody was thinking like them. And all the people that were progressive and just into, you know, loving humanity, thought everybody was thinking like them, but I show up and everybody gets revealed. And so I eventually said, no, this is not my place to be. And I, I started Agape and.

• 8:14Lewis Howes?

  When did you start, when did you start Agape?

• 8:15Speaker 01

  1986.

• 8:16Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 8:16Speaker 01

  So right before that, that particular church, it was a big earthquake, split and they had.

• 8:22Lewis Howes?

  The Fuller, the Fuller Church, wow.

• 8:24Speaker 01

  It split, they had to evacuate their building. And then eventually they hired this woman and they hired a white woman really fast. They wanted a little diversity, so they hired a woman. And then she stole a bunch of money and left.

• 8:38Lewis Howes?

  Oh, man.

• 8:39Speaker 01

  All the things they were afraid of happening.

• 8:41Lewis Howes?

  Hey.

• 8:41Speaker 01

  Happened by a white woman.

• 8:43Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 8:44Speaker 01

  You know, but anyway, we, I don't need to just.

• 8:47Lewis Howes?

  This has happened at every stage of your life.

• 8:49Speaker 01

  Oh, absolutely.

• 8:50Lewis Howes?

  From education as a little boy to high school to college to in the workplace.

• 8:56Speaker 01

  Right.

• 8:56Lewis Howes?

  Do you feel like when you, after you started Agape? You know, for the last 24 years now, do you continue to feel racism in L.A.? As a leader in spirituality, as a leader of the church, as a leader of humanity?

• 9:12Speaker 01

  Agape, we're in our 34th year.

• 9:14Lewis Howes?

  34 years.

• 9:14Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's a extremely diverse community. It's a, we wanted to build, be an example of the beloved community that Dr. King talked about. You know, where all people are worshiping together, serving together, growing together. So I'm kind of in a little bubble where that's concerned. So.

• 9:35Lewis Howes?

  Right, right.

• 9:37Speaker 01

  And because I'm kind of known, I don't really have a lot of things coming at me in that way. I know it's there, you know? And the beautiful thing about the space of Agape is that people come and we get to deal with those issues. Like, very soon, we're gonna have some dialogues where people are gonna be able to just come together. Like the Rodney King situation, after certain things, the community comes together. Now, now it'll be on Zoom, comes together and actually talks it out. You know, they talk about privilege, they talk about how it feels to be black, how it feels to be a woman, how it feels to be gay. You know, whatever the case may be. So it's a safe space for people to really get into the conversation and not avoid it.

• 10:20Speaker 01

  And then take ownership of perceptions that you might have, that you may have inherited from your parents or whatever, and begin to dismantle and transmute that. So I do know that racism is alive, racism is still alive. It's systemic in the, in the culture. I mean, when you look at it from a historical context, you look at 1619, when the first, I don't like to call them slaves, like just say, forced immigrants. You know, that, that they turned into slaves, arrived, and the United States wasn't even a union yet, you know? It took these Africans to Virginia, thus began slavery.

• 11:05Speaker 01

  Now, the idea was, in order to justify it, the good Christian people at that time had to say they were less than human. They were like a horse, or a dog, you know, cow. So that way, they could abuse them, because they're not really abusing a human being. They're abusing these people from Africa that aren't human. So that became a part of the narrative within the fabric of our society. So then, when slavery was abolished, then you had the Jim Crow era. You had public lynchings of black men. The point being, laws have come into effect to stop segregation, Jim Crow-ism, public lynching, slavery, etc.

• 11:48Speaker 01

  But the underlying narrative is still active in many people. So at this particular time in human history, you see that the veil has been lifted. So you actually see racial superiority. You see the supremacist rising up, being very bold. Like they were in Charlottesville, very bold about who they are, primarily because of who we have in the office at this time, making it easy for that to show up.

• 12:13Lewis Howes?

  Why do you feel like they're showing up that way?

• 12:15Speaker 01

  I think it's two reasons. One, we're in an apocalyptic moment, the apocalypse, which means, apocalypse simply means the lifting of the veil. When you lift up the veil, it means what was hidden is now visible. So all these things that have been hidden for a long time, or denied, or people saying, "You're exaggerating," we can now see it.

• 12:40Lewis Howes?

  Right, right. You know? Saying, "Oh, this was just..." I'm seeing all these videos, saying, "If it wasn't on videotape, you wouldn't believe it."

• 12:45Speaker 01

  You wouldn't even believe it. "Oh, you're exaggerating, you're making that up."

• 12:48Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 12:48Speaker 01

  You know, so I think because of the energy of people on the planet who have been praying and meditating and doing spiritual work, the planet itself raising its vibration, things are easier to be seen. And then we have this evolutionary trigger, who's like a transformational Mr. Magoo in office, who incites a lot of things, so it becomes easier to be seen. So people feel emboldened because of who's in office. So, oh, you know, it's like a dog whistle. You know what I mean? He says certain things, they're like, "Okay, let's go rally," you know? And so all of this can be seen now, which was hidden before. And so... That's the good and bad news.

• 13:29Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, social media as well being a landscape for people, every person to have a voice publicly and show these things.

• 13:36Speaker 01

  Right, so the good news is we see it. You know, the bad news, it exists. The good news is, you can't heal something that you're denying. If you deny that you have cancer, you know, "No, that's just a pain in my knee," or whatever, and you know, "Go check." You know, that's not gonna heal it by you denying that you have an issue. You have to actually examine it and see it, and then provide what is necessary for your healing. So now that we can actually see abusive power and force by police departments, we can actually see racism, now we can begin to have a conversation as to how to dismantle it. And I think that's the time we're living in now.

• 14:15Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 14:16Speaker 01

  So that's the good news of the protest.

• 14:19Lewis Howes?

  What's the bad news?

• 14:20Speaker 01

  The bad news is that the narrative is being hijacked by violent anarchists, that are primarily white. You know, that they're trying to steal the narrative of the fact that this man, George Floyd and others that preceded him, you know, unarmed, handcuffed, pretty much subdued.

• 14:44Lewis Howes?

  On the ground.

• 14:45Speaker 01

  On the ground, was murdered, I have to say, by four officers. You know, the one that had the knee, the two that were sitting on him, and the one that was, you know, not doing anything. You know, so I think we gotta ask ourselves sometimes, where are we not doing anything?

• 15:02Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 15:02Speaker 01

  Where are we seeing something, or hearing a terrible conversation, hearing a racial slur? And we don't do anything. You know, so he represents the people that see stuff, don't say anything. The man who had the knee on the neck represents just pure aggression, racism, abusive power. The two that were laying on him, you know, aiding and abetting. So everybody has to look at themselves, "Am I aiding and abetting? Do I have a knee on somebody's neck? Or am I just looking and not saying anything? I just don't wanna have the conversation, it doesn't affect me." It affects us all.

• 15:46Lewis Howes?

  It affects us all. And I was reading some anti-racist literature, and there was a section in this literature talking about, for white people, of how to talk about this for the first time. And some of the questions were, "In the first time you're talking about it, I'm afraid I don't know enough."

• 16:04Speaker 01

  Right.

• 16:04Lewis Howes?

  The second thing is, "I'm afraid to say the wrong thing."

• 16:07Speaker 01

  Right.

• 16:08Lewis Howes?

  The third thing is, "I don't know what steps to take."

• 16:12Speaker 01

  Right.

• 16:12Lewis Howes?

  And I think, again, coming from a place of white privilege, of not having to experience these types of systemic challenges. I think this is what a lot of white people feel. They don't know how to bring it up, what to say. And it's not white people's responsibility to ask people to educate them, but it's more the responsibility to do the research and do the work.

• 16:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 16:39Lewis Howes?

  But what, I guess, feedback would you give to the white community on, you know, how to be empowered?

• 16:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 16:47Lewis Howes?

  And not be afraid?

• 16:48Speaker 01

  Two things. One, I saw Jane Fonda recently speaking to this. And she was being asked about it, and she's progressive, you know, climate change, anti-war.

• 16:59Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 16:59Speaker 01

  You know, she's spoken on a lot of issues. And she admitted that, you know, she was aware racism obviously exists. But she was aware that she was ignorant of a lot of the ways by which brown and black people experience their life on a daily basis.

• 17:13Lewis Howes?

  The nuances.

• 17:14Speaker 01

  The nuances and walking into a room, suddenly you're the other, or whatever, you know. So she started researching. She said for the past three years, she went and got books, started studying, started reading the historical context, the different ways that this has been perpetrated throughout the years. And she's much more sensitive to it now. Now she can speak to it. So to answer to your question, there has to be research. Now, what people need to understand is that racism, bigotry, is not going to be dismantled by black and brown people. It's going to be dismantled by white people.

• 17:46Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 17:46Speaker 01

  You know, we're pointing our finger to it. That just happened. He pulled me over for no reason.

• 17:51Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 17:52Speaker 01

  I was fired, even though that person was hired after me, or whatever, you know. We can point our finger to it. But it has to be those that have a level of privilege that actually assist in the dismantling process of that.

• 18:07Lewis Howes?

  When white people, I mean...

• 18:10Lewis Howes?

  I feel like, hopefully I don't speak in too general terms, but I feel like millennials,

• 18:17Lewis Howes?

  most millennials probably unaware of this happening in the Midwest, they're probably unaware. I speak for myself, growing up.

• 18:24Speaker 01

  Right.

• 18:24Lewis Howes?

  I grew up in a small town in Ohio. My dad brought in seven exchange students from around the world, from five years old until I was about ten.

• 18:33Speaker 01

  Right.

• 18:34Lewis Howes?

  That came to live with us. He wanted us to be, to see the world by not having to travel.

• 18:38Speaker 01

  Right.

• 18:38Lewis Howes?

  He brought people from Japan, France, Germany, Brazil. So from a young age, I got to live with brothers and sisters who were seventeen, eighteen of different cultures and races. But there were two moments in my life when I realized, oh, like, things aren't okay in the world. One, when I was eight years old, my brother got sentenced to six to twenty-five years for selling drugs to an undercover cop. He got out on four and a half years on good behavior. But I remember at eight years old, we went to go to the visiting room of the prison for the first time, where they allowed families to come in on the weekends for a certain time. And I go to the prison and we, you know, my, my older siblings are there, my parents are there.

• 19:20Lewis Howes?

  We, we go into the prison, we're in the visiting room and we're sitting at a table of chairs. And as I'm looking around at all the other families and inmates, we're essentially the only white people.

• 19:30Speaker 01

  Right.

• 19:30Lewis Howes?

  And I remember looking around thinking, huh, as an eight-year-old, like, why are we the only white people here?

• 19:35Speaker 01

  Right, right.

• 19:36Lewis Howes?

  You know, and that was just my first idea of like, oh, this is something happening.

• 19:41Speaker 01

  That's a, that's a great awakening, because we represent seventeen percent of the population, but about eighty or ninety percent of people in jail.

• 19:47Lewis Howes?

  I know, it's in a couple million.

• 19:48Speaker 01

  Black people are doing all those crimes.

• 19:49Lewis Howes?

  Right, right, right. And so that was my first, like, okay, I'm an eight-year-old, I'm trying to figure out who I am in the world, what is, you know, what is the world? You know, what am I? Am I being, I'm growing? And I noticed this. The second blatant incident was when I was, uh, living in Huntsville, Alabama, in the South. And I remember driving from Columbus, Ohio to Huntsville, Alabama. And as I crossed the border from Tennessee to Alabama, I noticed Confederate flags. And I noticed, I was driving behind a pickup truck that had a Confederate flag and a shotgun hanging in the back of the pickup truck. And I went to go play arena football in Huntsville, Alabama.

• 20:33Lewis Howes?

  It was all, I was one of the few white guys and it was all black guys.

• 20:36Speaker 01

  Right, right.

• 20:37Lewis Howes?

  And just hanging out with them for six months, all my friends, teammates, and going into the restaurants and going to stores and driving with them, just noticing and hearing these stories, I go, huh, like this stuff doesn't happen to me.

• 20:50Speaker 01

  Right.

• 20:50Lewis Howes?

  And I don't have this type of anxiety or fear.

• 20:53Speaker 01

  Right.

• 20:53Lewis Howes?

  And those, those kind of two moments stick out for me as, wow, there's an issue and there's a problem that I have never had to face and white people have, we've had to face other problems.

• 21:02Speaker 01

  Right, everybody has issues.

• 21:04Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, but we don't face this.

• 21:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, right, that's just, yeah, so those were, those were wake up moments for you. We actually had a direct experience of something. As I was, I was saying earlier, we represent approximately seventeen percent of the population.

• 21:16Lewis Howes?

  In the US?

• 21:17Speaker 01

  In the US.

• 21:18Lewis Howes?

  And how many, what's the population in prison?

• 21:20Speaker 01

  About eighty, ninety percent per people of color. Now, we're not doing all those crimes, everybody else is not innocent, you know what I mean? But we're targeted. So, you know, I can, I remember going to department stores and you, right away, somebody's following you thinking you're gonna steal something. I'm not a thief, you know, but you're targeted.

• 21:39Lewis Howes?

  So you're having an extra eye on you?

• 21:40Speaker 01

  Yes, extra eye, here's a black guy coming in, what's he gonna steal? You know, so I think we're, we're targeted because of the color, color of our skin, so, and then, you know, justice, you know, they say justice is blind. We've known that justice peaks. That justice raises up that little blindfold and if you're black, Mexican, or poor, you get a different standard of justice than if you're white and rich.

• 22:06Lewis Howes?

  You get a harder punishment.

• 22:08Speaker 01

  Harder punishment, plus you gotta plead out, you have, and you have many.

• 22:11Lewis Howes?

  You have to plead guilty to get a less of a.

• 22:13Speaker 01

  Yeah, even if, even if you're innocent, sometimes it's better to plead guilty because you're gonna lose, you have a public offender, you can't afford it, you're gonna probably lose if you go to the jury, which means you're gonna get more time. So you had many people in jail who didn't do it. But it was just better just to plead out, get this thing over and move on.

• 22:33Lewis Howes?

  And that's the legal system.

• 22:34Speaker 01

  That's the legal system.

• 22:35Lewis Howes?

  That we need to fix.

• 22:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 22:37Lewis Howes?

  As well.

• 22:38Speaker 01

  And plus, justice needs to be blind. You know, I was jokingly saying the other day that, you know, we should have a system when a person comes in, you don't even know what color he is. He's in a box or something.

• 22:49Lewis Howes?

  You don't see him.

• 22:50Speaker 01

  Your jury can't see whether he's a white guy or a black guy.

• 22:52Lewis Howes?

  That's interesting.

• 22:53Speaker 01

  You know, and you have the defense attorney, you have the prosecutor.

• 22:56Lewis Howes?

  And it's all based on evidence.

• 22:57Speaker 01

  It's all based on evidence only, you know, oh, that black guy, I know he did it. I know he did it, you know, whatever the case may be. I mean, of course, that's probably never going to happen, but I've thought, how do I make justice blind for real?

• 23:09Lewis Howes?

  That's interesting.

• 23:10Speaker 01

  You know.

• 23:11Lewis Howes?

  This has been happening for obviously decades. You were talking about the riots in the 90s in LA, the unjust killings of the past, all these things. Why this moment, in your opinion?

• 23:21Speaker 01

  I think, I think a couple of reasons. One, things had been going on for a long time with no justice. You know, we can go Trayvon Martin, we can go case after case after case where there wasn't any justice meted out, the police officers were never convicted. So I think it was a buildup of energy. And so this particular one, right after the Ahmaud Arbery killing, where he's jogging and two supremacists track him down and kill him, short period of time, we have this happening. So I think it's a buildup of energy.

• 24:02Speaker 01

  And some of the police chiefs around the nation have been saying that George Floyd is going to change policing. I mean, these are police chiefs coming out and saying he's really going to change policing. So I think if you go back to 1955, when Emmett Till was killed, he was from Chicago, went down to the South to visit some relatives, and a woman said that he, a white woman said that he had whistled at her. They broke into his house, took him out of the house, these guys, killed him, murdered him. That created such an outrage that it put a spark into the civil rights movement. I think this can be one of those moments.

• 24:42Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 24:43Speaker 01

  Where you have this moral outrage because everybody is seeing, there's no ifs, ands and buts about it. You know, I mean, they may.

• 24:50Lewis Howes?

  See the video.

• 24:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, you see the video. They may try to do some things with the autopsy and try to get a lesser sentence for the guy. But you see him sitting, you see him with his knee on there and people are saying to him, you're killing him. He's saying, I can't breathe. He's asking for his mother. You know, he can't, get off of him, man. He can't breathe. Can't breathe. You're killing him. He's urinating. You know, so I think that particular scene could be a watershed moment like Emmett Till was. In which people are just like, enough is enough. And we may get into some, some really, some major shifts in policing. Because hiring, you have to really get into the psychology of these guys.

• 25:34Speaker 01

  I mean, what, what background do they have? You gotta, you can't, these guys are trained. I mean, you have to have a greater training to be a barber.

• 25:43Lewis Howes?

  That's what I heard.

• 25:44Speaker 01

  Than to be a police officer with a gun.

• 25:46Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 25:47Speaker 01

  You know, so it has to be psychological training, there has to be sensitivity training, and I'm not talking about a two-week little class. You have to really bring up to, up to, up to bear.

• 25:57Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, and I know, I know there's, you know, there's a, I can only imagine the anxiety and stress of being a police officer as well.

• 26:04Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 26:04Lewis Howes?

  Of, when there are pretty bad people who come at you and punch you and bring on a knife where you need to react and respond.

• 26:11Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 26:12Lewis Howes?

  This is not that time when you can see there's no offense happening against you. There's nothing you need to defend yourself against to do something like this. Do you feel like it's more? The uprising against the lack of justice after something like this happens? Or just the act of it happening?

• 26:29Speaker 01

  I think it's a combination of systemic racism that people feel for a long time and the lack of justice.

• 26:35Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 26:35Speaker 01

  Those two combined.

• 26:36Lewis Howes?

  It's just like, oh, he was fired and that's it.

• 26:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 26:39Lewis Howes?

  Right? It's not, there's no justice beyond that, right?

• 26:41Speaker 01

  Yeah. So I think it becomes a powder keg.

• 26:44Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 26:45Speaker 01

  And seeing somebody helpless wasn't like, I mean, you've seen situations where, and this is egregious as well, where the man is running away and he gets shot in the back and killed. Terrible. Matter of fact, that police officer is doing 20 years.

• 26:59Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 26:59Speaker 01

  That was, that was like one time, one out of two, three times where somebody actually was convicted. He got 20. So you see the buildup of that, but yeah. Lack of justice and then just the, you know, this, you know, let me just say this. Yes, some of these psychological research projects have shown that by the time a young black boy, seven years old, you know, he has experienced the nuance of racism so many times that he builds up a kind of a psychological antibody. It's like, it's like a little shell. It's like a

• 27:39Lewis Howes?

  An armor.

• 27:39Speaker 01

  An armor that just kind of starts building and building and building. By the time the individual is seven, then he goes into teen, he has a thing. He doesn't even know what it is consciously. It has a thing to survive in the world, you know? And so

• 27:53Lewis Howes?

  You already have to survive in the world as a human.

• 27:55Speaker 01

  Right.

• 27:55Lewis Howes?

  Now you have to survive plus be aware of this racial injustice happening all the time.

• 27:59Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 28:00Lewis Howes?

  It's funny because in December 2019, I kept thinking to myself, wow, isn't 2020 a great number? The year for, the year for perfect vision, the year for clarity, the year to be able to see.

• 28:12Speaker 01

  It's like we're getting it.

• 28:13Lewis Howes?

  Right? Isn't it? I mean, it's like, I don't think this is the best way to see it, but if this is the way to see it, then I'm, I'm happy that people are opening their eyes. Like you said, lifting the veil.

• 28:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 28:23Lewis Howes?

  What is the The importance of healing work on the inside versus healing work on the outside.

• 28:30Speaker 01

  Yeah, there, there, there, it has to be both. So there's a conversation that I have with people of color. A conversation that I have with white people. People of color, I teach them to not see themselves as victims. To begin to heal their wounds and the scar tissue within themselves. To come to a sense of empowerment. Go to some deep levels of forgiveness. So you're not carrying the, the thought forms of resentment, animosity. This is deep work, though. It's not like I'm gonna go forgive, you know? And, and so that you begin to see yourself as, as an African American or a Mexican or whatever, Latino, whatever the case may be. But beyond that, you are this eternal being.

• 29:15Speaker 01

  You're a spiritual being, having this human incarnation. That's great work. To the, to, to, to the white brothers and sisters, I teach them about compassion. Compassion allows you to see something. You walk in somebody else's moccasins. When you went to that, we went to prison to visit your brother. You look, you were a little kid, but you looked around and you said, something's odd about this. Why is everybody in here black? You know? You start to see things from somebody else's perspective, you know? So instead of just turning a blind eye, oh, they're complaining again. Oh, they're pointing the finger again. Oh, you know, they're making excuses again. You know, you have a level of compassion. You do some research.

• 29:58Speaker 01

  You know, what is the, what is the history of this? So there's two conversations. And then there's a conversation we all have together about what you brought up at the very beginning. You know, about love and compassion and building a kind and just global society. It has to be built on love. It's not gonna be built just on law itself. Just as we've had laws against slavery. We've had laws against Jim Crow. We had laws against segregation. We have those laws. Sometimes they're enforced, sometimes they're not. But unless in our heart of hearts, we come to an awareness of what love is. And it has nothing to do with the color of skin. It has something to do with who we are, spiritual beings.

• 30:40Speaker 01

  Then you, you, you can only have an enlightened society with enlightened people. You can only have a loving society with loving people. And so laws are important. I want laws. I wanna be able to say, it's illegal for you to lynch me. You know? I want that law. But there has to be something else as well, and that's the shifting of our consciousness. And that's deep work. That's why agape exists. That's why spiritual centers exist, why we have self empowerment. In order to go in and take full responsibility for our own life, our own perceptions, our own opinions. What opinion am I holding that's not congruent with the truth of humanity's excellence?

• 31:23Lewis Howes?

  This is not an overnight read one book. You're it. You've got the healing you need. This is years, decades of the work, is what I'm hearing you say. It's not a, you know, when I have gone through healing of deep things from my childhood, even doing workshops and a few months of therapy, or what you may be, was helpful, but it still takes years of, okay, there's triggers and you have to constantly remind yourself and have compassion and forgive and let go of that pain and frustration.

• 31:57Speaker 01

  It becomes a way of life.

• 31:58Lewis Howes?

  It needs to be.

• 31:59Speaker 01

  It's not just a weekend seminar. It's like, this is how I live my life. You know, I have a level of introspection, where I take responsibility for what's going on in here. You know, and I do, I work with it. You know, that's called becoming aware, you know, becoming conscious. And then I have a way of living where I'm doing that on a regular basis. You can call it prayer, you can call it meditation, you can call it fellowshiping with progressive, high-minded people, you know.

• 32:29Lewis Howes?

  How, I mean, here's a question I'd ask about people who, people who say to themselves, you know what, I'm a, I'm a stay-at-home mom, I've got a couple of kids, I'm a, I'm going through so many challenges in my life right now. I just lost my job, I've got no money, I don't have, I've got so many problems in my own life that problems about racial injustice, or problems about women's rights, or problems about gay rights, all these other rights, I've got so much going on in my own life, I don't have time to think about it, to educate myself, to ask these questions. What would you say to people who think like that, who are just so overwhelmed with their own life?

• 33:08Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 33:09Lewis Howes?

  That maybe they're like?

• 33:10Speaker 01

  I would say that many people are like that. They're just, they're just in a little bit of struggle from day to day just to survive. So I understand that survival ethic. And I think that if an individual, one, established an intention. If you establish an intention, to this day, I'm intending to become a better version of myself. I'm intending to understand what's going on. Doesn't mean you have to run out tomorrow and jump in a protest or write a petition. But if you establish an intention, something's gonna come to you, based on that intention. Now, most people, as I've taught over the years, suffer from an intention deficit disorder.

• 33:50Speaker 01

  They don't have any intention, so they just kinda react every day to things that are going on, to stay in survival mode. But if a person wakes up and actually has an intention, the universe by law will begin to bring into that person's life a way to fulfill that intention. A book may show up, a neighbor may start having a conversation with them about something. You know, they may see a special on television, they may hear us on this podcast, you know, and then say, hmm, I never thought about it that way. Let me, let me think about that, you know. But to have no intention means that you're just up for grabs

• 34:31Speaker 01

  at whatever the popular emotional mental contagion is that's going throughout the world. We're, we're not here to live an unintentional life. So, so during this time in human history, we want people to establish an intention. I wanna learn more about this. I wanna become a better person. I wanna be on the right side of history. Just, that's a good intention right there. Yeah. I wanna be on the right side of history. When all this goes down, I wanna be the one to say, you know what? When I, before I left the planet, I helped build a better society. It may have been just with my neighbors around my neighborhood. Doesn't mean I have to go out, you know, in, into the whole world and protest.

• 35:16Speaker 01

  Maybe it's just the conversations I'm having with the lady across the street, you know, that, and we get into a dialogue and suddenly... Oh, that's a way of looking at it. Oh, my God, I need to, need to think about that.

• 35:29Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, the moment to moment's intention, the reflection of those moments. If, you know, how should people, in your opinion, address protesting and in the moment reactions?

• 35:42Speaker 01

  There's two levels. In one, the protest, the peaceful protests that have happened, is a proclamation that, one, this has been going on too long, and that, two, something must be done finally. And America has always, through the First Amendment, given us, everyone, the opportunity to speak. So that should not be quelched at all. Then there are those who have nefarious ideas using the protest, using the protest to lewd, using the protest to steal the narrative, to go into some kind of anarchy, you know. I saw a video of someone that I know

• 36:27Speaker 01

  trying to stopping this, this white guy in this black outfit. He was a white guy and a white girl spraying Black Lives Matter onto this business. And they're saying, you're white. You have to ask me if you can put that up there. Don't do that in my name. We're not here to destroy anything. Did you see that?

• 36:47Lewis Howes?

  I saw, yes.

• 36:47Speaker 01

  Yeah, and so there's two levels.

• 36:50Lewis Howes?

  She's saying, we're here peacefully protesting. These people are vandalizing. It's not us.

• 36:55Speaker 01

  It's not us. So, so on the one level, the protests keep the medal, keep the pedal to the metal. It's like, we're not going to forget, you know, let's see justice. Not only see justice in this one case. Well, let's begin to see individual police departments look at their policies. I mean, this, this particular guy had like 18, I don't know if they're fractions. You know, you know, listen. If you're on the job and you pat a girl on the butt, there's a zero tolerance to that. You're fired the next day. It's not like, oh, okay, don't do it again. Not today.

• 37:35Lewis Howes?

  He's got a pink slip today, yeah.

• 37:37Speaker 01

  Not today. You're, you're gone, you know. So, so if an officer who's to enforce the law.

• 37:44Speaker 01

  To enforce the law, has eighteen complaints and still able to carry a gun. There's something wrong with

• 37:52Lewis Howes?

  The system.

• 37:52Speaker 01

  With the system, you see. So I think that some of the protest is about that, not just about that officer. But let's look at the system and begin to create a uniform way of hiring, training, and then pulling out the bad apples. Because I know a lot of really beautiful police officers.

• 38:10Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 38:11Speaker 01

  I have police officer friends.

• 38:12Lewis Howes?

  Big hearts that care about humanity.

• 38:13Speaker 01

  Black, white, Asian, Latin, I mean, you know, so it's not a condemnation on police officers. But the system itself allows for the bad apples and the bad actors to stay and to affect other people, you know. Sometimes, you know, you may have a, somebody's coming in all one idyllic, I want to protect and serve my neighborhood, and then he gets involved with some, some bad apples. And after a while, in order for him to, to stay in the club, he has to go along with the program, you know. So, yeah, the, the system needs to be changed.

• 38:51Lewis Howes?

  I mean, for those that want to help, you know, you, you're saying white people need to make the change. We're the ones that need to make the change, right? Black people have been the ones pointing at the, the problem. We're the ones that need to be allies in educating ourselves and being a stand for equality.

• 39:08Speaker 01

  Right.

• 39:09Lewis Howes?

  What do you think is the right balance for white people in their lives to say, okay, I want to champion this, I'm going to stand up for this because I believe in equality, I believe in equal rights, I don't want to see my brothers and sisters have unfair

• 39:23Speaker 01

  Right.

• 39:24Lewis Howes?

  Things happen in the world. What is the balance between advocating, fighting, marching, protesting, standing up, posting on social media, dialoguing with their friends, calling governors, signing petition, what, I mean, is it?

• 39:39Speaker 01

  All of that is, all of that is, is, is, is helpful.

• 39:44Speaker 01

  When you said our black brothers and sisters, first of all, that's the context. You know, we're all living in this fabric of society. So it's not just what's happening to black people. That's important, yes. But this is our society. There has to be a context that we're all in this together. Yes. So if something is happening to brother over there, that's my society, that's my neighborhood, that's my city. You know, so I have to ask myself, this is, people have to ask the sincere question, what is it that's mine to do? Everyone has gifts, talents, and capacities. Everyone can't do everything, but everyone can do something. So perhaps the woman that you talked about, that stay-at-home mom, she's taking care of her kids, she's trying to survive.

• 40:29Speaker 01

  Perhaps what she can do is actually pick up the phone and call her, her councilman, and her congressman, and her senator, or text them, or email them, and say, you know what? I think what I saw was unjust, I'd like to see justice. You know, perhaps that's what she can do. Right. Perhaps someone else, like you were talking about millennials earlier, they have the energy to go out. March all night? In March, you know what I mean? And, and, and the beautiful thing about millennials are this, because of the, because of music, and because of social media. Dance. Dance. Millennials, a lot of them, not all, you know, like you said, we don't, we don't generalize. They, they don't have a, they, the racism and the homophobia,

• 41:13Speaker 01

  it's not a big thing to many millennials, that's just, you know, you know, that's my girlfriend, you know, that's my, you know, they don't, they, they've come a lot. So they have to take leadership. They're more open-minded. They're way, way more open-minded than people that grew up in the 50s. You know? So I, I would say everybody can't do everything, but everybody can do something. So everyone has to be sincere with themselves and say, what is it that's mine to do? You know, you have a podcast. You're, you're opening up your podcast to have this dialogue. Hopefully, one thing that we say may make somebody go, hmm, hmm.

• 41:51Speaker 01

  Hmm, let me see what I can do, you know. So, everybody has something. There's no one that doesn't have anything.

• 41:58Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 41:58Speaker 01

  You know, again, from the neighbor across the street to a petition, to writing a congressperson, to being on the streets, to some of my security people who are on the streets, stopping people from looting. I mean, they can do that because they're very strong martial artists, you know, ex-sheriffs. I mean, they can handle themselves in the street. You know, so their job, they went out at night and stopped people from looting. They saved eight businesses.

• 42:27Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 42:27Speaker 01

  Eight that were about to be burned. You know, they were able to stop that. That's what they could do, and that's what they did. Now, the woman staying at home, I wouldn't ask her to do that.

• 42:37Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 42:37Speaker 01

  You better stay at home.

• 42:39Lewis Howes?

  Do your part.

• 42:40Speaker 01

  Do your part.

• 42:40Lewis Howes?

  The skills and talents you have.

• 42:42Speaker 01

  Right.

• 42:42Lewis Howes?

  One of the things I'm hearing from all people is, who is leading this charge? Is there a leader organizing like the actual steps that we can do? Like, action as opposed to?

• 42:54Speaker 01

  There's no hierarchy at this.

• 42:55Lewis Howes?

  People are peacefully marching, people are rioting, people are doing this, people are posting. We're only one week out of this happening still.

• 43:04Speaker 01

  Right.

• 43:04Lewis Howes?

  So, I think there's a lot of confusion for people. And just also, three months locked indoors, it's like this anger and resentment and frustration. It's like, now we're just getting out.

• 43:14Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:14Lewis Howes?

  And unleashing all the energy of three months inside.

• 43:17Speaker 01

  Right, right, right, right, right. I think that that's the next step. Like, right now, you have the anger of the unheard, the protest for justice. Now, there has to be strategy. There are some people that have strategy. I mean, they're not necessarily on the news. But there are people in the legal aspect of life that are working on strategy and have been working on strategy, have been doing things to try to push the needle forward.

• 43:46Lewis Howes?

  For decades.

• 43:46Speaker 01

  Bad Jones. I mean, there's a lot of people doing work. You know, and I think.

• 43:53Speaker 01

  Good news is that that work will probably speed up. The bad news is that there are people that are impatient, saying, "What you've been doing hasn't been working because here, another person has been killed." So, I think that we have to be more vocal with the strategy and with the plan. And we have to look at Justice Department, we have to look at the prison industrial system. You have to look at the sick care system, masquerading as a healthcare system. That again, is run on greed. If a poor person goes to the hospital, he's not gonna get the same treatment as a person who has the greatest insurance in the world. Right. You know, so all these systems are up for change. So many systems to put energy behind to try to change, right?

• 44:36Speaker 01

  And all based on profit motive, not necessarily humanity. So, again, the veil is lifted. So now we see it all. When COVID came through, it revealed that the most vulnerable people in our society have the least access to the resources. We knew, we knew it, but COVID revealed it. Yes. You know, so we- Forty million unemployment, you know, all this stuff, yeah. It's all, it's all there. So, I think that if everybody asked, "What is it that I can do?" And then, very importantly, we have to be able to articulate, this is where strategy comes in. You have to be able to articulate what the kind and just global society looks like.

• 45:22Speaker 01

  What the system, what the ideal looks like. Then you begin to strategize as to how to get there. So right now, there's a lot of dialogue about what isn't working. There's no justice here, the most vulnerable aren't taken care of. So you have to move from that to, what does it look like to take care of the most vulnerable? What does it look like to have a real healthcare system? What does it look like to have a real justice system? So that has to be articulated. Without vision, people perish. So if you don't have a vision of where you're walking, then you're just kinda walking in circles. You know, so you have all these different steps. There are people who are visionary, people who can articulate the vision, people who are good at strategy, people who are good at doing the work. Execution, yeah.

• 46:06Speaker 01

  You know, all, everybody's important. Yes. Everybody's important.

• 46:11Lewis Howes?

  So I want to go back to these three questions that white people are, you know, asking in general. I'm afraid I don't know enough. I'm afraid to say the wrong things and offend people.

• 46:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 46:24Lewis Howes?

  And I don't know what steps to take.

• 46:26Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 46:27Lewis Howes?

  For me, if I could end this today, like as a man of white privilege of never going through this injustice, like I don't want this to happen. So I want to know what I could do if I could do it today. And I think a lot of white people, I don't want to speak in general terms, but a lot of people, white people I know, they don't want this either. So, you know, it's like, you know, it's almost a feeling of like, we're ready to do the work. Now, like, once we figure out the right strategy, we'll execute.

• 46:57Speaker 01

  Well, here's the deal. You know, you're talking about white privilege. That's a big step.

• 47:03Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 47:04Speaker 01

  Primarily because it's never been, it's never been acknowledged before.

• 47:08Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 47:08Speaker 01

  You know, I was having a conversation with a woman in Agape about it. You know, she kind of knew about it, but at the same time, it wasn't blatant.

• 47:15Lewis Howes?

  A white woman.

• 47:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 47:16Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 47:17Speaker 01

  And then something happened. Her son, well, let's say borrowed her and her husband's car in the middle of the night. They were asleep and he snuck into the garage, stole the car, went and picked up his boys.

• 47:28Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, did something in round town.

• 47:29Speaker 01

  Yeah, and got pulled over by the police. And they said, go home.

• 47:34Lewis Howes?

  Ooh.

• 47:35Speaker 01

  They said, you got a license? He's like 14, 15 years old. He said, no, sir. He said, you don't have a license? He says, no. Whose car is this? My dad's. Oh, and he looked in the backseat.

• 47:43Lewis Howes?

  What are you guys doing, smoking weed?

• 47:44Speaker 01

  Two white guys in the backseat. Was there a white guy in the front? He says, you guys go home right now. Now, if that would have been four black guys, that would have been, they would have been, they had their first record, fingerprints, in jail, you know. So I told her, this is a really good opportunity, a teaching moment, for you to teach your son about white privilege. That if he would have been a black guy, driving and gotten pulled over, it would have been a totally different scenario. So she's taken, she is starting conversations with white women about white privilege. She is still compelled to do that, you know.

• 48:19Lewis Howes?

  For white people who, I mean, We, in general, again, there's been other challenges we've faced, right? People have their own challenges, but we've never had to face these types of challenges. We've gotten off, we've, you know, let, had to pass, we've had all these different things where we don't fear for our lives if we get in trouble, that we're gonna get shot and killed. We don't have that type of fear. And it's, I think it's hard for people to have perspective unless they see it like they're seeing it now.

• 48:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 48:50Lewis Howes?

  So, but they still, I mean, if you haven't felt it, how do you gain that perspective? If you're never like, well...

• 48:56Speaker 01

  You gotta, you gotta, you gotta, you gotta do what Jane Fonda said. You really gotta be interested in study. And you have to say to people of color, I don't, you can say, I don't wanna offend.

• 49:06Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 49:07Speaker 01

  But I do wanna be educated.

• 49:08Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 49:09Speaker 01

  I do wanna have this conversation. I mean, you called me.

• 49:12Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 49:12Speaker 01

  And said, hey, I wanna have a conversation. You know, let's have this conversation. You know, I wasn't offended. They said, yeah, let's have it, you know? Uh, and I think, people are nervous, but you know what? We have to get over that.

• 49:24Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 49:25Speaker 01

  That, that skittishness. You know, I'll tell you an experience. I was in, um, South Africa. I've been many times, but I was there before Nelson Mandela was president, elected. And they'd called me over to lead vision process throughout the country because they'd been fighting against apartheid for so long that they had lost the vision of how they wanted their society to be. This is what some of the people who were bringing me over saying. So I went over with about a number of my spiritual practitioners, small choir. And I was doing the vision process around the nation. And we were in Soweto. Our choir practicing with the Soweto choir. That was during the time Soweto was listed as the most violent city in the world. Okay?

• 50:07Speaker 01

  And all of a sudden, the assistant choir director comes into the room and says, "Quick, get all the white people out of here. The rebels are coming to get them." And my people started laughing, cause you know, it was an integrated choir. My choir's integrated. And I, and they started laughing. I said, "He's serious." I said, "Everybody get on the bus." So everybody got on the bus. I said, white folks, get under the seat. No way. Yeah. Black people sit on the seat. So the white people are hiding under the seat. The black people are sitting on the seat, so nobody could see them under there. You know, had their blankets over their legs and everything. And it's very tense, so I got up to the front and got in the microphone. I had to break the ice a little bit. So I said, listen, if they come in here looking for the white people,

• 50:50Speaker 01

  I'm gonna say, these white people belong to me. Oh, my goodness. So everybody started laughing, you know. And we, we driving out of Suetto in busloads of these individuals coming with guns and all kinds of stuff were coming into Suetto. We were going out. So, all that, because he was black people in the bus. So they, you know, we got out, got back to the hotel and processed all night. The white people had never had a direct experience of being a minority. Never had a direct experience of their life being on the line. This is how black people had been living for decades. Right. You know what I mean? And, and it changed many of them. I mean, they still go to Agape now. And it shifted their perspective because they had a direct experience

• 51:35Speaker 01

  of what it felt like to be the other and to have your life threatened. So I wouldn't advocate that for everybody, but... Maybe a simulated training at school of life history. I, I thought about that over the years, you know. Like, having people just move through the experience. Have men move through the experience of harassment. Right. Of what it feels like. You know, have, have, have white people move through the experience of what it feels like. To, you know you're not gonna be hired. You know, move through the experience of, you're gonna be fired first when it's time to be fired. Right. Move through the experience of a police officer. You know, you, you're, you're driving and you, you're probably gonna be pulled over if you're driving at night and you're the only one, you know. Or, or whatever. But, but I think that, that's what compassion is.

• 52:20Speaker 01

  Compassion is...

• 52:23Speaker 01

  You know, part of compassion is being able to walk in the moccasins of another person. You know, and, and so it can be done mentally, viscerally, emotionally, you know. How would you feel if, it's really like this, how would you feel if, if George Floyd was your brother?

• 52:45Speaker 01

  That was your dad, he had two children, you know.

• 52:50Speaker 01

  That was you, you know, you have to, people have to get a sense of that. That birth compassion, you know, so I would say, one, don't be afraid of having the conversation. This is the time to have the conversation, you know, and you have to, you don't have to complete everything in one conversation.

• 53:09Lewis Howes?

  Right, right.

• 53:09Speaker 01

  But if you just open the door, then that becomes territory that you can talk about. Cause before you might only be talking about sports, or you might only be talking about that latest movie that you saw on Netflix, or whatever. Now, that territory is open, and if I see Louis, I see so and so. We can, we can talk about it, we can have conversation and have greater insights.

• 53:33Lewis Howes?

  I think one of the things that I've seen in the last week, since all this, all this has come about on social media is, I think people afraid to, people who are afraid, who are on the right side to speak up for being judged, one way or another, for saying the wrong things, for people being shamed for doing it the wrong way, or I feel like certain people feel judged, like, no matter what I do or say, I'm gonna get attacked. And I think you need to overcome, like, it's gonna happen.

• 54:06Speaker 01

  It's gonna, it's gonna happen.

• 54:07Lewis Howes?

  You're gonna be judged for, oh, you're just doing this to do it, or do you really care, or you put the wrong hashtag, or you, it's like, you don't actually, you aren't really educated. I think you just gotta be willing to say, I'm gonna get judged, you're gonna be, people are not gonna like you, people are gonna be upset at you, you're gonna offend people, you're gonna hurt people, and I think going back to your point of intention, it's like, if you have the right intention, and you know you're doing the work, and you're doing your best, you say, hey, I'm trying to figure this out, like, I'm gonna make mistakes, but I wanna be on the right side, so let me know if I can be better.

• 54:40Speaker 01

  Right.

• 54:41Lewis Howes?

  I think you gotta take that approach.

• 54:43Speaker 01

  Absolutely, it's called courage. It's not fun to get criticized constantly. There are haters out there. If you go on your social media and write through with "blue," they're gonna say, "Blue? Green! No, it's green!" Right. Yeah, there's always haters that are looking for an argument and looking to put somebody down. They're there. They're there. It's gonna happen. It's gonna happen. They have a low level of self-esteem. Many of them aren't doing anything with their own life. There are haters there. So, yes, if you try anything new, you're gonna be hated. Yeah. You know, I've said over the years that mediocrity attacks excellence. Ooh. That's what it does. Mediocrity always attacks excellence.

• 55:27Speaker 01

  So if you start walking towards excellence, mediocrity's gonna rise up and say, "What the hell? Who do you think you are? Why do you think you can have a big podcast? How do you think you can change? What are you doing? You can't do that. You came from this kind of... No, no." You know, mediocrity is gonna attack it, but you keep on going. And then after a while, mediocrity and the haters create a level of resistance that allow you to go higher. You know, that's what life is, you know? Whenever negative energy is coming at you, if you lift your vibration, you actually use it to go beyond. So at the end of the day, you thank the haters. You elevated me. Yeah, you elevated me. You brought deep forgiveness in my heart. You made me pray when I didn't feel like it.

• 56:11Speaker 01

  You made me finalize my vision when I was being lazy. You made me learn how to articulate better. Because of your hate coming in my direction, you chiseled me into a better person. Whereas if it would have been just an open door with no challenge. Because we're not here to live a challenge-free life. Challenges make us strong. So the haters are just part of the challenge. So we can't just sit back and say, "Oh, well..." That's like saying, "Well, when I get over my fear, then I'm gonna do something." No, no, no, no, no. You're not trying to get over your fear. You walk in the direction and then fear becomes excitement. And then excitement becomes enthusiasm. But it doesn't change unless you're actually walking in the direction.

• 56:52Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 56:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 56:53Lewis Howes?

  What's a mantra all human beings could have?

• 56:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 56:56Lewis Howes?

  In this time of like getting back to intention.

• 57:00Speaker 01

  Okay, the mantra and the affirmation first have to come from context. Context, our context determines our perception. So our context must be, I am here to contribute to a kind and just global society.

• 57:11Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 57:12Speaker 01

  You know, so that's the context. Yeah, I'm not, my context isn't, I'm just trying to get rich. Or I'm just, I'm just trying to be successful. That's within a context of, I am here to participate and help create a kind and just global society. So if I have that context, then I can say, um, let me be an instrument of peace.

• 57:34Lewis Howes?

  Hmm, that could be the mantra.

• 57:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, let me be an instrument of compassion. Let me be an instrument of intelligence and joy. Whatever quality is relevant at that particular moment. Today, it would probably be peace and justice. Let me be an instrument of peace and justice, you see. So everybody can say that.

• 57:55Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 57:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 57:56Lewis Howes?

  Imagine white, black, doesn't matter.

• 57:58Speaker 01

  Doesn't matter.

• 57:59Lewis Howes?

  That could be the mantra.

• 58:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 58:00Lewis Howes?

  How can we be comfortable being uncomfortable during this time? Knowing that we're trying to heal and trying to get back to a place of normalcy, but we may never be normal again.

• 58:11Speaker 01

  First of all, we don't want to go back to normal. We don't want to go back to the status quo. The status quo is where systemic racism lives and where injustice lives. So this is an opportunity, this flashpoint is an opportunity to change the normal. And to change the status quo so that peace and justice begins to prevail in all of our institutions. Now, if you're walking in the direction of greatness. You walk in the direction of excellence, you're going to be uncomfortable. If you want to be an Olympic athlete, you gotta get up early in the morning, you gotta work out, you gotta be uncomfortable.

• 58:50Lewis Howes?

  For years.

• 58:50Speaker 01

  For years, periods of time of intensity in order to make those breakthroughs in your mind. Same thing with society. If in fact, we're really going to dismantle racism, it's going to be uncomfortable. It's going to be easy to say, ah, today, I don't, you know, I'm just gonna go to work, I'm gonna get my paycheck, I'm gonna fund my retirement program, I'm gonna go to the baseball game, whenever we can go back to the baseball game. You know, it's easy to do that. But if I really want to be about a kind and just global society, I'm gonna have to be uncomfortable. That means I'm gonna have to sacrifice my time. Sacrifice, the word sacrifice means to make sacred. So I'm gonna have to make sacred my time, which means this period of time,

• 59:35Speaker 01

  I'm gonna make sacred by either having an uncomfortable conversation or calling my congressperson or fill in the blanks. I'm gonna be uncomfortable because no one changes the status quo and remains comfortable.

• 59:51Lewis Howes?

  Right, sitting on your couch, watching TV.

• 59:53Speaker 01

  No, eating potato chips and getting fat, no, no. You gotta be uncomfortable, you know, you, you, you know this. You talk to anyone who's made any changes in society, whether they're an inventor, whether they're a dancer, whether they're an athlete, whether they're a business person, they were uncomfortable. They had to do stuff that other people were unwilling to do.

• 1:00:15Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, progress takes pain.

• 1:00:17Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:00:18Lewis Howes?

  It takes pain and...

• 1:00:19Speaker 01

  Sweet pain.

• 1:00:20Lewis Howes?

  Sweet pain.

• 1:00:20Speaker 01

  It was like...

• 1:00:21Lewis Howes?

  Lovely pain.

• 1:00:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, when I'm in the gym and that guy's, it's sweet pain, you know? I'm doing that yoga, I'm holding that posture for, that asana for another thirty seconds. Sweet, you know, so it's the same type of thing. We're not here to live a comfortable life. Matter of fact, the comfort zone is your enemy.

• 1:00:40Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:41Speaker 01

  You know, that's that your enemy is the comfort zone. Because the good that we're seeking is outside of our present paradigm. It's in the realm of the unknown. That's where the good is. So you have a vision, you walk in that direction. What you don't know, you don't know shows up. You realize you didn't know that. You learn it and you keep on moving. So we're not, we're not, we don't, we're not here to make people comfortable.

• 1:01:03Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:04Speaker 01

  We're here to make people great.

• 1:01:05Lewis Howes?

  Love that. Thank you for, for sharing all this. And I think this is a great start to a dialogue for my audience. And I think my audience can, will have a lot of resources for people in the show notes to dive in on more of what our team has been educating ourselves on. But you have an amazing service you provide for people every week at Agape, where they can find here spiritual healing. They can find a community of people to share and create a safe dialogue with. They can learn on how to heal from this, but just lots of things in their life. And right now you guys are doing Zoom, is that right? You're doing live stream Zoom.

• 1:01:43Speaker 01

  Live stream and Zoom.

• 1:01:45Lewis Howes?

  And where, where can we go to be a part of this? I've been there before. It's amazing. And I know a lot of people that go there religiously every week to, to listen to you and the community you bring of, of experts to share. Where, where can we go and, and get a place of healing, of intentional love, of community?

• 1:02:03Speaker 01

  I like that intentional love.

• 1:02:04Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:05Speaker 01

  First of all, on the website, they can go to agapelive.com. Every Sunday, six forty-five, eight thirty, eleven, they can see the services. The first service is a meditation service. I teach meditation.

• 1:02:19Lewis Howes?

  I love this.

• 1:02:19Speaker 01

  Yeah. And then the next two service carries the inspirational message aspect of life. And when they go to the website, beginning Just in just a few days, there's going to be dialogues around, people will be able to express without judgment, whatever it is that they're feeling during this time, whether it's COVID, whether it's racism, police brutality, without judgment, in order to develop a higher dialogue. That's going to be facilitated by one of my practitioners, Ayesha Mason, and others who are trained in having this kind of dialogue. So it's trained people that know how to create a safe space. That's going to be up in just a couple of days. If they go to agaprilive.com, they can get on the Zoom

• 1:03:03Speaker 01

  and actually be a part of that dialogue. The, I just released an app that's going to have a lot, it's free, you know, you can up level if you want, but it's a free app that's going to have inspiration, spiritual practices. They can go to michaelbbeckwith.tv, subscribe to the app, and then go to the App Store, Beckwith Inspires, MBB, and actually get the app. Now, I'm going to be putting things on that on a regular basis. So right on your phone, you'll be able to get whatever the latest practice is, based on whatever's going on in the world at that particular time. On my Instagram Live, you know, I'm having dialogues. I mean, I, stuff's there all the time,

• 1:03:46Speaker 01

  but I've been having dialogues about this issue with people. I have one up there now with Ayana Lebanzat, Kevin Ross, and Ryan Bathay, and Ben Crump came on to talk about what's going on right now. So they go to my Instagram, so there's stuff on Instagram, stuff on my YouTube page, there's stuff on the website, michaelbeckwith.com, they can get the app there. So we're trying to provide as much as we can to keep people inspired and out of fear, because here's the deal.

• 1:04:20Speaker 01

  We talk about the COVID virus, but the bigger virus is the virus of the mind, which is fear. That's the biggest virus. Now we know that the virus is not as deadly as was being taught because thousands of people have had it. You know, when you look at the research that's been done by these universities back in 2019. So that brought the mortality rate really low. So the biggest virus is fear.

• 1:04:46Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:47Speaker 01

  People are dying of fear.

• 1:04:48Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, the F word.

• 1:04:49Speaker 01

  Yeah. So definitely, we want people to wash their hands. We want people to wear masks when necessary. We want people to eat right, build up their immune system. I mean, if your immune system is strong.

• 1:05:03Speaker 01

  I'll just say this. Trying to mandate a bunch of stuff, they need to mandate that people take their vitamin C.

• 1:05:09Speaker 01

  They need to mandate that they take their vitamin D. They need to mandate that they go outside and take their shoes off and get in the ground so they get new microbes so the immune system starts to work. Because what's dangerous is that people are at home quarantining and they're not getting any new microbes and new germs to fight. The immune system shuts down.

• 1:05:25Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:26Speaker 01

  I know this isn't what we're supposed to be talking about. But anyway, all of that will be on my website. You know, just information on how to stay, how do your immune systems stay strong spiritually, mentally, and physically?

• 1:05:37Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, the answer, you've got a lot of books. I like this one. I like short books because I'm a slow reader, but the answer is you is a good one. Heart Sets and Mindsets for Self-Discovery. You've got tons of resources, tons of books, tons of programming. And again, I love that you lead this weekly meditation for people to get back to a place of peace inside. We talk about healing on the inside. First, you can start to heal the outside.

• 1:05:58Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:05:59Lewis Howes?

  It's hard to make change on the outside if you're not coming back to a place of peace and love and centeredness, which you provide people every single week, live and also through the app. How else can we support you in this mission?

• 1:06:14Speaker 01

  You know what, you support me, you support Agape by actually doing your inner work. If you tune in, and I tell people, if you tune in, you listen, and you actually just take one thing and practice it that week, you will see your life change. We're not here to be a bystander. We're here to be a participant. So if you hear something in this conversation, you say, "Oh, I can do that." You don't have to do everything. But if you take one thing and you actually do it, I tell people, do this for seven days. Then next week, you'll hear something else. Actually, practice it for seven days. Don't just say, "Oh, that was good. I liked the way he said that." Implement. You know, just actually do it. That's how you help. Because what are you doing? You're building a better being. It means you're building a better neighborhood,

• 1:06:59Speaker 01

  a better city, better state, better nation. So I teach, I'm not here to gain followers. I'm here to train spiritual leaders. I'm not looking for followers. This follow back with, no, I'm not, I'm not. That's not my thing. My thing is to train people to be leaders and to realize they have an inner authority within themselves. They could be just as tapped into the wisdom and the guidance and the intelligence that anyone is tapped into. Because this presence that's never an absence doesn't make special people. It makes everyone with equal access to the wisdom and the love and the peace, but you have to participate in it. You have to actually, you know, we can all, we can all be at the ocean

• 1:07:43Speaker 01

  and say, "Oh, we all have access to go and swim it, but if you don't get in, you're not gonna get wet." Exactly. You know, so we all have access. You gotta dive into life. You gotta dive in, man. That's it. So, you know, if they go to the website or Agape's Facebook page, they can see how to support us. It's very, very easy. There's ways to donate, there's ways to keep our ministries going. Sure, sure. All of that, and we definitely are open to that, particularly now during this time. Yeah. And just, we have morning prayer time at 8:00 a.m. Pacific time on the web.

• 1:08:14Lewis Howes?

  Every day?

• 1:08:15Speaker 01

  Every single day. You can go right on Adapi's Facebook page. I have a practitioner leading that every day at 8:00 a.m.

• 1:08:20Lewis Howes?

  Wow, that's cool.

• 1:08:21Speaker 01

  Noon meditation, every day.

• 1:08:23Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 1:08:24Speaker 01

  On the Facebook page. Friday night, community gathering, 5:30 p.m. Pacific time, every Friday. People are tuning in from all around the world. We have youth programs every Sunday, you know. So we're trying to be full service to keep the virus of fear out of people's minds. Come back to hope. Hope goes to faith, and then faith goes to conviction.

• 1:08:50Lewis Howes?

  If you guys want to hear the previous interview we did, which has been one of my favorites on the podcast, I think it was about a year and a half ago we had you on. And if you want to hear Michael's three truths and his answer to the three truths question, his definition of greatness, make sure to go listen to that or watch that on YouTube. Michael, thank you so much for being a leader of love, of faith, of peace during this time, and I hope we can do more. Hopefully, maybe we'll do an Instagram Live here soon after this comes out and talk about this more.

• 1:09:21Speaker 01

  This keep the conversation going. We're just getting started. Thank you for the invitation.

• 1:09:25Lewis Howes?

  Appreciate you, brother. Thanks.

• 1:09:30Lewis Howes?

  I want to give a big thank you to Michael Beckwith for coming on and sharing his wisdom, for giving us some spiritual guidance on how we can approach this time, now and moving forward. I think there's so much more we get to take action on, we get to learn and educate ourselves on. And again, here at the School of Greatness, we want to be a place that is a powerful resource for you to help you on this journey and educate yourself. So thank you again so much for listening and for being here with us on this journey. Remember to go back and check out my first podcast with Reverend Michael Beckwith as well, if you haven't already heard it. And I'd love it if you can join me in doing the work to help reform our society and heal our country. This is just the beginning. We have a lot of work to do.

• 1:10:14Lewis Howes?

  And I'm grateful that you're here on this journey with me. Make sure to stay connected with me on social media as we'll be posting more resources over there as I want to have a dialogue with you and the entire community. And make sure if you have any questions for me directly, please text me 614-350-3960. And I want to leave you with this quote by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. who said, "The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at a time of challenge and controversy." I hope you enjoyed this episode and you're going to take action today in your own way. I'm sending you lots of love and you know what time it is. It's time to go out there and do something great.