01022024 - Just Marla - Mentroship with Desmont Upchurch

The speaker discusses her experience as a judge at an event where high school students presented business plans. She highlights the importance of having mentors for these young entrepreneurs. She shares a specific case of a black female student who lacked confidence and professional attire during her presentation. The speaker emphasizes the need for mentors who understand the unique challenges faced by minority students. She also touches on the societal pressures that discourage black women from being assertive and embracing their natural hair. The speaker suggests that students should have the freedom to choose their own mentors based on their personal definitions of success. She concludes by discussing the need for society to challenge and overcome stereotypes and biases. So, welcome. This is Jess Marla. Jess Marla, and I am here today with my friend, Mr. Desmond Upchurch. How are you? I am doing great. Thank you for having me. Good. This is my buddy. We call him Church. Desmond Upchurch. So, today we're doing a podcast and we are talking about mentorship. And I just threw this in off the cuff. This is no planning and we didn't have this laid out, but I'm going to tell you what happened, Church, and then you can just have a conversation with me about this. Okay. So, I had the opportunity to be a judge at an event with some young people and it was high schoolers, individual schools, and each school had either an individual or a team to represent a business that this individual or team planned out. So, the school, the people who did it, they created a mini, like a micro enterprise. So, the kids, they had to do the business plan, the mission and vision statement. They had to do the financial. They had to do the profit and margin law. They had to do the statement of even the ethical piece. Like, why do you want to do this? You just trying to make money or you want to save the world? What do you want to do? They had to do the advertising, the marketing. It was so profound, like for some kids to be doing it. It was really, really exciting. And, you know, grown people don't get that into it. You know, we go set up an LLC online and be like, hey, y'all, I started my business. And they had to make an ad. Hey, if you put 5% of such and such into my business, this is what you're going to get back, blah, blah, blah. I was, I'm going to tell you, I was thoroughly impressed. Now, these young people all had a mentor to help them get through the process. They all had people to help them get through the presentation. So, you're presenting to professionals. You're presenting to business people, maybe, or people who have maybe worked a long time in certain careers. But more than anything, you're presenting to Xers, boomers, silent generation. You're presenting to people who been around a little bit. They got a different philosophy than most millennials and Zs. And, you know, young people. Right. I saw where I feel like there could have been some different mentoring with some specific group. There was a particular person who I kept saying, who is her mentor? What happened here? Because she had a great idea. Right. She was not able to meet the point. Point. And her appearance was way off. The people who are judging with me, one woman even said, you got to speak up. You got to be assertive. You got to be bold and loud. You are good. Your product is good. You got to own it. And she was correct. Like, you're trying to sell me something. And now, the young woman who was giving the presentation, she was speaking in a good cadence. She was engaging at one point, even offered the open hand. You know, the, hey, do you understand what I'm saying? But her voice was very low. Like, almost. And very, oh, and hyperventilating. And, oh, and blah, blah, blah. And, get some water? Yes. You get some water? Yes. And so, the young girl is, you know, like, oh, okay. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. And I'm just sitting there listening. And so, what I asked her was about the financials, because she didn't list them. And she said that, during the presentation, she said, I don't have my financials listed because my mentor and I were not able to see how we could do it because it looks like my packaging costs too much. And so, we have to see how we can change that. So, I don't have that listed. But the product itself, you know, doesn't cost that much. But I do make it in bulk and blah, blah, blah. And she went on. So, I asked her in the end, do you know how much you pay and what you spend? And she said, well, yeah, I spend anywhere between 50 and 70 and, you know, so forth. And I said, well, you should have at least given us that, because you do know something about it. And you just said, you know, that it's the packaging that's costing you. And so, always tell what you can tell, because that shows us that you did put in, you know, some effort into the cost and the pricing. You just didn't let it slide. It was what you do know. Don't just leave it blank. And so, you know, she was thankful and appreciative of that. The young lady didn't know that I've seen her in her classroom study before, because I've been in her school before. She didn't recognize me. And I've seen her power. I've seen her speak. I've seen her be assertive, as the woman said. And so, for her to be acting that way, I was like, what is she doing? Why is she doing this? And then, even with the samples she gave us, she just had like these four samples, and she sat them down. It's like, you can try them. And then it was like, we all had to try the same. Like, it's body butter. What if, you know, she should have had a scoop for us to each scoop out, instead of us all putting our hands in the same thing. And then she took them. She didn't leave us any samples. I said, a mentor should have, you know, done a little bit different. Did not have professional attire on. And oftentimes, our young people don't have the finances to purchase that type of stuff. But what we were taught is, you can never go wrong with a pair of Goodwill or Salvation Army, whatever, black pants and a white shirt. Always black pants and a white shirt, no matter what. Well, what I found out, and what I feel in this, when you talk about the boomers, we believe mentorship is one way in the way that we receive it. However, it should be actually the, I believe that the kids should be able to pick their mentors. Because every individual that you think is successful is not, that's what it says, is not our children's idea of success. So, therefore, our kids should pick their mentors. So, it sounds as if you would have been a great mentor for that person, versus the person that has. However, whoever put the program together, felt in their infinite wisdom that the people that they selected were the best mentors for these individuals. Or maybe our people need to have, because this program has a mentor assigned to every school. So, maybe the person that they put in the school has to have training for all demographics. Because here's where I'm going to go. That young woman was a black female. So, I'm a black professional middle-aged female who's been through a whole lot in a professional world, multiple sectors. The person who trained her has no clue. The women sitting at the table with me, two Caucasian women, one having a very distinct accent. So, I'm not sure where she was from, but she told her, very good information, be assertive, be bold, be loud, own your products, you have great stuff. You did a fantastic job. That little black girl knows she can't be loud. Absolutely. Because what's she going to be told? She's a loud black woman. Yeah. And that's not acceptable. She already knows that at 16, 17, whatever she is. And when I told you I've seen her power, this girl has a big, beautiful afro, gorgeous hair. It's phenomenal. And I've seen her speak up. She was so mean. Oh, no, miss, I don't agree with you. Let me tell you, when you have, and she went blah, blah, blah, so well spoken, solid in her execution. She wasn't loud and bodacious and nasty. Very, very direct and assertive. Not aggressive at all. Her presentation, it's not like a mouth. Do you believe it's because she may have been intimidated? No, I believe she was coached that way. Because, or even if she wasn't coached that way, in her mind, the society is telling black women, be quiet, don't overdo it. Don't, because when I saw her, oh, for the presentation, she had this thing tied around her head, some kind of earth thing. And I was like, what's that on her head? But when she came back into the room to look for something, she had her afro out. And I said, that is who you are. Your hair is beautiful. She said, oh, thank you. Totally different person. I said, why did you wear your hair? Oh, I wanted to look more professional. Who told her her hair wasn't professional? See what I'm saying? But in Ralph Ellington's book, Invisible Me, there's a scene in there where he is on a college campus and he walks into a bar. And African-Americans, the music, the loud attitude, the things that we do in our culture, just having a great time. He talks about a white man walking into the bar, and the bartender says, hey, y'all act right. And everybody proceeds to not be what they normally are. Right. Because how they are isn't right. So that is perpetuating child abuse today, subconsciously, whether we know it or not. And maybe she felt like acting, her hair being out, was not professional. She told me, because that's what she said, oh, I need to be more professional. So she tied this scarf around her head. I'm like, well, what's professional about that? Trying to hide who she is. And who she is is quite amazing. But in this society, do we not have to hide a little bit about who we are? And what W.E.B. Du Bois says, African-Americans have this too, that you have to be something one way and not reveal who you are the other way. And we're doing that in 2024. Everybody, I believe. So even, we're talking about Sean Connery. Billionaire. He's talking about cutting off his locks. Why? He says he's just embarrassed. I believe, even as a billionaire, your hair beats you to the room. And a billionaire doesn't want his hair to beat him to the room. Whether that's right or wrong, some of them you're not even invited to, and you don't know you're not invited to, just because of that. Should it matter to you as a person? If I'm a billionaire, do I need to be in some room? Um, I don't have a billion to tell you. However, I do say, I don't want to be excluded from the room because I don't know who I am. Because maybe that's, I mean, maybe that is a way of, because if you don't know the room exists, and you don't know that you're not invited to the room because you're in your element. People will walk around you all day. And you think the world is, I'm living the best life. And the truth is, you're not even close to what you could, because you're not going to change. And what I, and one of my mentors always told me, to get to the place you're going, you can't be the person you are today. You're going to have to, you're going to have to change, whether that's develop education. But when in Rome, do as the Romans. And when you make as much money as the Romans, you can do whatever you want to. When you teach the Romans, you can do whatever you want to. I think as a young student coming up, she just doesn't feel comfortable in the fact that it's time to teach the Romans. You are being taught. You are in Rome, when it comes to business, you do as the Romans. Romans say that hairstyle is not ideal for form. Yeah, I think that she could have been taught differently. Now, the attire, differently. She's Black. She can't do what other people do. She cannot present the way she's presented. It was so obvious that she was not cared for. That was a big problem. Even, like I said, the woman telling her, be loud. She wasn't telling her to be boisterous, but at least raise your voice so we're not straining to hear you. Absolutely. Right? Have all the parts to your presentation. As a mentor, I'm never going to let you not have the parts to your presentation. I think that it's okay. Because if I don't know how to do the work, oh, you know what? I don't really know how to present this because we don't have enough information. Let's go get someone in Econ to show us what to do. You don't let them not have the information. Then it says in there that you were to make an ask. If you don't know your money, how are you going to ask me for money? It's things like that. Now, who goes back over that scoring with her so that she knows really what happened? Someone's not telling her, oh, yeah, girl, you just got third place because you're Black, and making her a victim. So now I'm going to have a problem with that. Because it wasn't because she's Black. It's because y'all didn't do the work. You didn't do the work, but then go back in the circle. I still kind of feel like y'all didn't give her the best treatment because you don't know how to mentor someone Black. So I'm like up and down like this. Because it does matter. It shouldn't, but you have to know how to mentor Black girls in the business world. Especially if they're going to leave where we are, which is this general Midwest area, and sometimes people, they can handle average or mediocre. If she's going to take that greatness anywhere outside of this area, she'll be eaten alive. So she cannot be like the, oh, that doesn't matter kind of people. It matters. Now, let me say this. Now, I heard you get to be the keynote speaker. I did. Because the keynote speaker that they requested didn't prepare properly or had the wrong date or something like that. So now the people who select these individuals to be mentors for our kids, doesn't sound like they know how to pick the proper keynote speaker because I'm almost certain that they didn't pay you as well as they would have paid that keynote speaker. Yeah, I don't know what that keynote speaker would pay, but I do know he had to fly from somewhere he was flying in from somewhere. So that's an expense. And I'm pretty sure you did a well-prepared job versus with the last minute note that you had to do it versus that individual. And as a Black woman, I'm pretty sure they didn't have a Black woman coming in. It was a male. And I'm almost certain that they gave. So do you believe you're a powerful Black woman? You're a voice for it? You can use your style and your brand. But you still, do you believe that they paid you equally for the individual that they had? I don't know, because I still haven't seen the W-9. All of it just happened. So I'll find out. I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt. And I'm going to go out on a limb to say, absolutely. That's the society we live in, and that's a shame. Equal work should give you equal pay. Absolutely. It's not a tip, because you were the one in the jam. Absolutely. And, Grant, we're going to give them the benefit of the doubt, but I believe some of that pay, they looked at who you are, and they came up with a number. And I assure you, your counterpart, they felt like you probably had a bigger number. I just think that's the society we live in. Unfortunately, it should be. Yeah. I hope it's not. They'll never let you know. People never let you know their decision. Yeah. You know, it always comes out. And I would say, don't look for it. Don't look for it. But that's what happens, is I never do. I never look for this stuff. It just comes up. I'm like, how do I find out? I'm like, oh, man, I don't even be wanting to know. People will say stuff like, oh, no, I'm just trying to help. And here, well, just let me show you what they said. Here. I'm like, you want me to read it, really, what somebody else said about me? Okay. Here you go. I'm like, oh, wow, they said that about me? Oh. And you can never unsee it. That sucks. I really love this person, and they're saying this about me. And you're telling me because you really love everybody, and you just want me to know. And I'm like, dang, this sucks. Got to get rid of them, too, huh? Right. Right. Right. And they don't even know it's coming. Yeah, you don't even know it's coming. Like, oh, man, this sucks. But oh, well, moving along. Absolutely. Such is life. I don't be looking for it. And it's okay. It really is. Because ultimately, when you know your purpose, and that's what I'm always talking about, church, being purpose-driven. When you've done what you know you're supposed to do, and there's no malice and nobody's worried about all that. Because if people grow from being in your presence, and you grow from being in theirs, even those silly stuff like that. I'm so old now. If I was younger, oh, my God. I can't believe. Oh, thank you. Nobody's using anybody because you've learned from them, too. Be quiet. Be quiet. That's why people are tripping now on these pastors. See, I told you, they on TV, and God's exposing it all. Shut up. Don't act like you wasn't praising the Lord and shouting when they was in their highlight and all. Don't act like you never got anything positive from that person. Stop. You know, that's my thing. That's what I don't like. So, I get something positive from you. I don't care how whatever happens or exposure and all that. If it's done, it's done. Let it be and move on. How many billion people in the world? What are we up to? Ooh, seven, eight billion. Yeah. How many people? That's a lot of people. You're going to run into so many people in your lifetime. As long as you don't have malice, that's my thing, people doing stuff maliciously. Now, those are the ones that I might have to see. Right. Right. You shouldn't have to. This world is just, I mean, and a lot of people don't get the opportunity to leave their city, let alone their state. If you get the pleasure to leave country, you'll realize there are a lot of good people. Yeah. There are a lot of good people. I don't care what country you go to, they have people who are just trying to get by like everybody else. That's what I'm saying. It's beautiful. And when you go to so many different countries too, you see so many people so happy for the next day that this little stuff we go through is so mediocre. It's so- It's so light. And I'm sorry, you said I said, what about you? What did I say? What? No, I didn't. But if you think I did, I'm sorry. Did you know that so-and-so didn't have no bread last night? You don't even be like, okay, I said it. Did you want me to say it? I said it. Okay. Did you know so-and-so got bed bugs? And he did, physically. And you be thinking about something so different. Right. On so many levels. And when you talk about young Black girls, I'm finding out that there are a lot of young Black girls that are hurting. Ooh. Hurting. Go there. So when you say, and for me, and I'm using me for this. I am in my own small world that because I'm in my own small world, I think everybody is kind of in my world. You got them all in there with you. Yeah, everybody's in here with me. And then when I go and I hear locally that young Black boys are struggling, and I say, in 2024? Who's that? Young Black boys. Struggling. 40%. Mentally. And I'm like, why? Do you know? And then it gets to this comparison. I came through the crack epidemic, and I made it through. What are you complaining about? It's not even there. But their struggle is something completely different. Okay. And because I'm not fully immersed in their struggle, I dismiss their struggle. Ooh. And that's some of their struggle, is being different. And so you were talking about, they're getting struggles with social media. And I'm like, just cut it off. And I move on with my life. But this is their whole life. That's their life. So you just told them to cut their life off. They can't do it. And I think I'm doing them a favor by saying, it ain't that serious. And I dismiss their true emotional feelings. Yep. And now they don't trust me. They're not vulnerable enough as a young man to be vulnerable with me. Because if I dismiss that, and they're taking it seriously, then I won't even understand the complexity of what they're really going through. Wow. Yeah. And for you to even say that, okay, to take time to analyze that about yourself, that's huge. Applause. I'll learn how to hit that applause button. All right. Applause. Because how many people our age also get them, this key is data. Nobody gets it. What? Oh, I'm about to change my mind. I know. And then so we perpetuate the crazy cycle of nobody's listening to anyone. Right. So much respect, because there's too many of us in our age groups that just ain't caring. Whatever. Hey, I survived crack because mine was worse than yours. No, it was different. Right. It was different. And we can get to the point that the things that we've all gone through is different. And we got to respect the difference. We can start talking to people differently. And when you say that, it's hard to be different. I believe a woman's struggle and a man's struggle is completely different. I don't think it's the human struggle at that point. So I would say, and I've told this story before. I knew I was growing when I was in the military. And I was coming from, I was coming to visit my son. And I had to pick him up. He was in North Carolina with my son's mother, with his mother. I was coming from Hawaii. I called when I was in Hawaii to say, hey, I will be there this time. Is it okay for me to pick up my son? His mother said, yeah, yeah, you can pick him up. I flew from Hawaii to Atlanta. I got in Atlanta. So anybody who ever took that flight, that's a 10-hour flight. It's rough. Took 10 to 10 and a half. We landed in Atlanta, did the layover, and I landed in Durham. We land there. I get off the plane. I've been on the plane. I've been traveling for, let's call it, 16 hours. And when I land, I'm supposed to go pick him up. He is three hours away from where I met him in Durham. So I have to go three hours, pick him up, drive three hours, pick him up, and then drive back. So that's another six hours on this journey, just so I could spend two days with him. And I'm going to be there for a week. But he has to be at school on Monday. I land on a Friday. I go pick him up. All this for a week? I call. Once I land in Raleigh, Durham, I'm getting a runner call in. I say, hey, I'm sorry. Coming up to pick him up. And she says, you have to ask my boyfriend, can you pick him up? I'm trying to tell you, at that moment, I put the phone on mute and said all the words I want to say in life. Okay. And I unmuted that phone. Humbled my pride. I said, okay, I'm going to talk to your boy. You did it. I did that. And anybody, I'm telling you. Because y'all know you a little bit. You did that. I did that. How old were you? 32. I did it. And I tell you, I would. Anybody who will tell you ain't no way. I'm telling you, I humbled myself. Because it wasn't about me. It's about my son. I already told him I was going to come and get him. He is expecting me to come and get him. I'm not going to allow her to ruin that, even though she's trying to, what I felt like, cut my leg. So what I end up doing is I asked her. I said, okay. She put him on the phone. My first time talking to him. I said, for some reason, she told me I had to ask you if I could come pick up my son. I'm asking another man to pick up my child. And not a husband. Not a husband. That's boring. Oh, my goodness. I tell you, I was hot. I'm going to tell you what my man said to me. He don't even know what's going on. He said, you want me to meet you halfway? Oh, my man. Absolutely. He met me halfway. He said, we can't work like this together. But had I blown up, I wouldn't even give him the opportunity. To say, oh, of course you can pick up your son. Why wouldn't you? And wouldn't even know that he halfway didn't do. He halfway. He already, he's halfway. He met me halfway to come pick him back up. I said, my man, can I get your phone number? Can I just call you? Hello? You know what? And a lot of times, that's what we need. We need that in-between person. But as men, we don't give the other. We assume that's that being vulnerable. We assume as men that that's disrespectful and that man won't understand. But if we humble ourselves, and that's what I knew I was growing. Humility. I humbled myself and I allowed my man to and he surprised me. Humility. But guess what? He maybe was having to deal with something on his side with the mother of maybe his child. Or what did he go through with his mom and his dad? We don't know people's stories. You know? We don't know why he was probably like, hey, I ain't gonna never let nobody go through something like this. I'm not gonna have issues. I'm gonna make sure that somebody trying to feed their kid is always going to be able to do it. We just don't know. And I don't like it. Well, when I got his number, when I got his number, when I came back in time another time, he said, we're not dating anymore. What happened? You made this so much easier for me. And so he was just like, they're not dating anymore. So but it's just these stories that I think if we have to grow as men so that we can help our young people. Because it is a power struggle for us dealing with women. It's a power struggle. And a lot of the things is I think me and our young boys are not learning the art of being responsible. And it is an art. It is an art. Absolutely. And it's a part of this, going back to the word for the day, mentorship. Absolutely. If you don't have it, if you're prideful and no one can tell you anything, if you and with mentoring, I just read this in some of my notes from 2009, I believe it was. I was looking at some notes from our pastor in Michigan, and he was going through the steps of mentoring. And I was looking to see, it was like awesome timing when I found this old notebook, you know, have I really been mentoring effectively and appropriately? Because sometimes, you know, we're just not good for everybody, right? And so I'm like, did I do this, this, this, and that? And I found this notebook. Man, okay. Yeah. This is awesome. Okay. And giving me some reminders, you know, areas where I can improve, areas where, you know what, you did nail that. Good job. So sometimes we need that encouragement. But one thing he said, with mentoring, more is caught than taught. A lot of it is just people being around you, right? And so a lot of stuff you can sit down and one on one, or somebody will pick up the phone, hey, I got this particular project. Can you help me see through? Oh, yeah, sure. More is caught than taught though. That right there showed your son a whole lot. Look at these two men working together for my benefit. Right. If he doesn't take that to heart, and all the way through his life, shame on him. But that was huge. Right. More is caught than taught. And then literally the next day, I was reading, I can't even think of the author right now. But it was the same comment. More is caught than taught. When you're around people that are solid in their foundation like that and humble, more is going to be caught than taught. You're going to be in the presence of people who you can see like, oh, I like how that kind of handled that. I like how they did that. That was good. Or you'll find out something about someone. Like they kept something. They knew somebody treated them bad or whatever. You find out five, six years later. Hey, you knew all the time that that person did that and you didn't say anything or you didn't. I didn't need to. I didn't need to. Look at them. Look at what's going on. It's them. A whole lot of stuff that I have in my back pocket, in the back of my head, up under my mattress, under my pillowcase. I don't need to pull none of it out. It will disintegrate there. A lot of it is disintegrated slowly, one thing at a time. If it's a card I ever need to play, it will stay. When you talk about mentorship and when I was getting my time in the Army, the Army had a rule of what they always say, because you always have to be responsible. You're responsible for your soldiers on and off duty. It's one of the hardest lessons that we have to learn as soldiers. I can be in my house doing the right thing with my family. If my soldier, it was the weirdest thing, if my soldier, young, by himself, he goes out that weekend, he gets caught drinking and driving, I get in trouble. Right. And I'm like, how is that? And that's the learning lesson that we find. You had caught a checker. Well, because you are a direct reflection of your leadership. So, he shouldn't want to get in trouble because you already caught him. And that's the struggle when you start becoming an NCO in the military. They say, everything that happens or failed to happen is your fault. And I took that same thing and put it in my marriage. My wife is a direct reflection of me. So, if I'm out here messing up, then she can't be out here as a woman. She can't be her best image because her husband out here acting a fool. And I can't be my best image if my wife is out here acting a fool. And I think our young men are missing that because you're out here and you don't have, nobody wants you to be their mentor. So, no woman wants you, really. And the woman that do want you, you're not the best for her because you're not the best version of yourself. So, you are the direct reflection of your leadership. So, it makes you, you are very responsible because everybody's watching, but you represent somebody. I represent somebody. My parents, my mother, my father, they put into me. So, when I'm out and about, my character has to be beyond approach because those individuals before me, even our ancestors. But what if you don't know your ancestors? New podcast, start over. Start over. Absolutely. Start over because what if you don't know your ancestors? What if you find out that your ancestors were, you know, wretched and trash and how do you change that image, right? What do you take from that and say, well, they were this, but now I'm going to be that? What do you do with that? What if you don't know who your father is or these family secrets, right? And now I found out that my father really isn't my father and it was the guy who comes over every Tuesday to play cards and here he is, my father. And then, you know, it's too much. It's too much in these communities. And then we have all of this drama going on and you want me to carry on an image of something that I know nothing about and the little bit that I do is just wretched, church. So I would say this. What? I would say this. The thing that makes you you or the thing that makes us homosapiens and not just animals is the ability to change course or the ability to make a different decision, right? Birds fly south for the winter. Birds fly south for the winter. Why can't they fly? They're just doing everything. They're just doing instinctively. You don't have to do that. Your bloodline can come from pure failure and you can decide to change that. A bird can't decide to change it. That's what we do, right? That's what makes being, that's what makes this life so great. You can change it. You can make a different decision and say, no, I'm going to go in a different direction. That's something that you got to do once you make that decision. Absolutely. There's consequences whether good or bad. There you go. Okay. Because sometimes people be like, I made a decision and it ain't worth. Boy, you ain't. You gotta do the work. Just because you woke up and said today is the day. Prayer without work is dead. Dead. Thank you. So yes, but you're correct. You can make some decisions. We don't have to make some decisions, but that whole sense of the mentorship and the responsibility and, you know, this is a good conversation. So let me go back to my start in order to conclude. My start is, so what do I do with the situation with this young woman? I see some very key points in how I believe I can add value to what happened with her, but also with her mentor. I think that's the training in diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging for that department. They need to know, because here's the thing, in any, anywhere you go, the world is only, right now we're only at about 14 percent population of Black Americans, not Africans, Caribbean, and so forth. Afro-American, indigenous to the state. Yes. About 14-ish percent. So if I'm at an organization, and that's worldwide, so I mean, American-wide, right? So if I'm in a place where not a lot of Black people are, I'm probably not even going to have that many. So if I'm at an organization, and it's only four or five Black folks, and that organization is spread across an entire state, well, there's probably enough Black people working where these kids are. So they're not going to have a Black mentor. Right. They need somebody, however, who is culturally humble and trained in these areas. So that they're thinking, thinking, thinking, oh, okay, Black, young, female, natural hair, whatever they live, economic. They don't need somebody saying, oh, none of that matters. It's 2024. That doesn't matter. You don't need that. If the person is able differently, if the person has, you know, eyesight differently, if they work with an aide, if they have an IEP, whatever the situation, you've got to be working with them according to who they are and the level of belonging that you would want to have and a level of excellence on outcome. I don't care what this student is, where this student is coming from. The level of excellence on outcome is necessary. I need every one of these brackets completed. Don't have my child doing a project and you don't complete all of them. As a parent, me, I would have been stopped. How come all the brackets? That's just me being me as a parent. Don't send my kid with your stuff half done. So, and I know we're concluding. My question is, why does, why is it necessary for us as Black individuals that we always have to step up to tell them they're wrong? Where is the safe place that we can stop giving our money to these individuals who don't have our best interests in mind and a safe place that we have that we don't always have to, it feels as if we always have to educate our masters in how to better treat us, instead of having a safe place that we have that understanding. Even in school. Correct. Right, right. But we're trying to tell parents to go fight, to continue to fight and change the behavior of a system that is perpetually broken. Correct. But yet, we're not getting these like-minded individuals together to say, let's just open up our own school. And we have some groups of African Americans opening up their own schools. But I'm telling you, we're opening up schools about like we're opening up churches. Everybody wants one. Everybody's getting one. We have several churches with a school or a charter school ability. Yet, we're not coming together to make one big school. Everybody wants to be, not to be derogatory. We have too many chiefs. Nobody wants to be followed. So I should say, we have too many people who are trying to be the leader and nobody wants to be followed. So if we bring our resources together and stop trying to one-up each other, I think it'll be better for our group as a whole. As you're talking about a Black community, I would say that. But I think that demographically, in just like this region where we are, you have to fight so many things with epigenetics. It's like so many people don't even know that they have this bitterness towards each other that's going on. So they realize that and have a real hard core self-exploration and understanding who they really are and maybe why they make some of the decisions that they make. That it might be a way of coming. But I would say, until then, if you want to start a school and get 100 kids in it to learn about themselves in a different way, then do it. But most of the charter schools here, or the Montessori schools, they start off with six students. Then the next year they have 12. Then the next year... Well, that's how Montessori would be. But those even still are not acrocentric. True. What I'm saying is, isn't it a way that we can create our own schools and start off with six students? Oh, yeah. And then it grows? Yeah. But everybody has a school yet... Who is everybody? I'm definitely not going to name names, but I know five people right now, African-American, Black. They own schools, hey? They have charter schools. They have the charters, the charter schools, and they have schools. Yeah, here. In Michigan or in Indiana? Elkhart, South Virginia. I know one in Elkhart, one in South Virginia. Nope, I know two in South Virginia. Because I've sent people to schools in South Virginia. I've sent them to all schools. Grow them. Get them in. But they also aren't for everyone, too. So, that's why there are a multitude of options for schools. Every school isn't for everyone. We can say, hey, let's combine and make a big school. So, it's not for everyone. But is the Black struggle our struggle for everyone? Or is everyone... Do we have different Black people who have a different Black struggle? Now, financial is different. So, when it comes to education, academically, when you're talking about children, every school is... No, that is a different struggle. Every school is not going to work for everyone, especially when you're starting a school, because that's a whole different ballgame. So, starting a school, then you've got a few kids, limited resources, not enough people to deal with the behaviors that might be there, because where are these kids coming from? If it's a specific charter, is this school designated for this type of learning? Can everybody bang up? Is this school designated only for this type of learning? Can everybody bang up? A lot of people starting schools, they have such very specific criteria. It could never go. So, academically, it gets really different and weird, because they'll start stuff just like our counterparts have started sending people out. So, yeah, I think when we talk about struggle in general, though, I don't want to do stuff just because it's a struggle. How come we ain't doing stuff coming together as a building, a nation, because we want to learn about history, and learn about science, and economy, and learn about next steps to advancement as a nation, not as who ain't that, who ain't that then, who's down over the years, who ain't down, all the struggling people come together. Okay, everybody's got to struggle. We're all here as a nation, because we love each other, and we're going to learn today about our roots. That's all we're here for today. No struggle, we don't want to hear nothing about it right now. We came to talk about who's against it. We came to talk about massive movements. But the first thing they'll want to tell you is, that's how I burned it down, uh, Black Wall Street. We ain't talking about that today. We're talking about commencement. That's all. Yeah. And why you need some black pants and a white shirt. In fact, everybody who comes to class today, you need to appear in black pants and a white shirt. That's it. We can do it one thing at a time. Right, right. Focus on that. Yeah, so that's where we are. It's just Marla. I'm just here with some conversation, and today the topic was mentoring with my friend Desmond Upchurch, and he will be back. Yeah. He will be back a lot, because we have a lot of good conversations. Thank you for having me. I appreciate it. And we're going to sign out of here today, and I want to encourage everyone to be a mentor. I don't know how to mentor nobody. I don't want to talk to these kids. Go mentor an adult. Go mentor an elder person. Mentoring is a reciprocal relationship. You should be learning from your mentee, as well as guiding them in a specific situation. Typically, mentoring starts off with, let's put a fire out. Something's going on where, hey, there's a need, and I'm going to help you, and then we're going to backtrack, and we're going to say, did you see how we did that? What was going on that we got here? Let's fix that. And then you go from there, before you know it, you know, this relationship develops. Let's do more of that, as opposed to nitpicking on people, as opposed to, I ain't talking to them. They've been doing the same thing for 50 years. If they've been doing the same thing for 50 years, you might need to talk to them, you know, so we can stop some of these perpetual cycles. So, consider mentoring. Think about who's mentored you through your life, but also think about areas where you struggle. I bet you will find that there was no mentor there. Probably the areas where you didn't have a mentor. So, we're going to sign out. Have a great rest of the day.