So a few years ago, I was facilitating a workshop inside of a level-three men's prison right here in California. Oftentimes, we had about 70 participants. Men serving sentences anywhere between three to 38 years. As we began our workshop, like any good workshop, start with an activity. The activity that we started with is known as Cross the Line. You might be familiar with it, but the way it works is I ask a question and if it resonates, then a participant steps forward and cross the line. The question that I asked was to step forward and cross the line if you were currently serving a sentence for a crime that you committed that took you 60 seconds or less. An overwhelming amount of participants took a step forward. And not just one of the trainings, but in every one of them.
Wow. I was astonished. In less than 60 seconds, these men had lost so many years of their lives. And they’ve also created victims, and they've impacted their own families and communities. All because they couldn't pause and were most likely acting in alignment with what they think it is to be a real man.
See, I grew up right here in Inglewood, and Inglewood, like many cities across the country, has been impacted by that invisible, yet potent misconception of masculinity and what it means to be a real man. Culturally, we perpetuate this through music, entertainment. All influencing how men and boys view masculinity and what it means to be a real man. Now sadly, I’ve lost too many of my own loved ones due to this misconception. Folks fueled by anger, jealousy and a lack of self-accountability. It was the murder of my two best friends and my cousin, Robert Gary Jackson Jr., Trayvon Williams, Tyrone Tucker Jr., that really propelled me to become a healthy manhood and masculinity advocate and to go on to found the Giant's Den leadership network for aspiring Black men and boys, where we foster emotionally intelligent leaders who are also actively engaged in their communities.
But this ain't how it started. Before I was known for this work, before I found my passion for supporting Black men and boys, I was known and celebrated for my aggression on the football field and also known for these hands. I was the guy who wanted to fight once folks started making one too many jokes. In fact, I often wanted to fight whenever I felt disrespected, which is OK in my community. Because in my community it was OK, and it was celebrated for young men to have short fuses and to be emotionally immature. I was taught that disrespect needed to be responded to with violence. That's how real men dealt with it. And to walk away or try to talk through a situation made you scared or weak and could lead to a shameful reputation.
So I followed suit. When I was 20 years old, I took a two-hour drive in the middle of the night to get into a fight because I had felt disrespected. But in my reflection, I recognized that it wasn't disrespect that I was feeling. It was insecurity. Because two hours is a long time to stay mad, you know what I mean? You have to really be working at this mad stuff. So how does one sustain anger for a two-hour ride? I'm telling myself one-sided stories that justify what I'm about to do. Adding fuel to my fire. Letting my anger boil because the narrative that I'm sharing is allowing me to feel like I'm justified.
So I take this two-hour drive in the middle of the night. I get into the fight, and I was doing what I thought it meant to be a real man. But the consequences of that night actually led me to a felony assault charge. A felony. And that wasn't the worst part. I wasn't able to see my daughter for the next three and a half years. Not because I was tough. I got a felony because I had my feelings hurt, and I didn't have the emotional management skills to respond differently at the time.
See, our community doesn't teach men and boys conflict resolution skills. In fact, when I came up, I learned conflict escalation skills, how to pop off. Right? And I understand all the things that happened in our past and in the community and the world that has led to these conditions and those valuable lessons that weren't taught to many of us. But after bumping my head, after doing my work, I've realized the importance of men having actual emotional management skills. Having emotional management skills not only to be a nice person but to avoid life-altering situations like going down that treacherous path of mass incarceration, substance abuse, domestic violence, estranged family relationships, and statistically speaking, dying early.
But I want to give some tools that could have been a game changer for me in my situation. And if you're someone who is still currently being impacted and influenced by that invisible yet potent misconception of manhood and masculinity, hopefully it can help you to avoid some of these life-altering situations as well.
The first thing I recognize is -- I ask, guys, how are you doing? "They say, I'm cool, straight. You know, another day." Not often having the language to pinpoint an actual emotion. So what you see up here is the feelings wheel. You can Google this, you can find it anywhere. But the feelings wheel actually gives us some language to identify and pinpoint where we might be in our emotions. I'll ask you how you're doing. Somebody might say, "Oh, this is what happened to me today." That is a story, and that is not a feeling, right? So wanting to really provide a tool so we can say, "I'm feeling depressed," "I'm feeling angry," "I'm feeling happy," "I'm ecstatic," "I'm overwhelmed."
There's a tool that was created by BEAM, which is the Black Emotional and Mental Health collective that really helps with de-escalation. And this tool is a strategy called P.A.U.S.E. Now P.A.U.S.E. is an acronym. And I'll break down each letter for you. And hopefully it sticks and it's something that you can share with your communities as well.
The first letter is P. Pay attention. Think about a time that you were angry. Might have been recently, might have been a while ago. But what were the type of thoughts that consumed your mind? Were they positive, or were they negative? Most likely they were negative, which kind of sustains your anger. How was your body feeling? Were you tense in your shoulders? Were you forgetting to take that deep breath? Was your heart rate sped up? These are all signs that our bodies are sharing with us to let us know that we're in an escalated state. What story, what narrative are we sharing with ourselves? Because what we’re thinking impacts how we’re feeling, and how we feel impact how we behave. But if we don't have the language to identify how we're feeling, it can be hard to avoid that behavior that can really shift our lives. So pay attention.
The next one is to assess what's actually activating you. What is this, was it a tone of voice? Do you feel like you weren't being heard? What is it that was said, done, what is it about the environment that is activating you? You might call it a trigger. Do you know what your triggers are? Do you know the environments, the people, the things that activate you? That's a great place to start. Because if we know what activates us, maybe we can avoid those life-altering situations.
The next letter is U. Understand. Understand the roots of our feelings. In my life, I recognized ... That there's a voice in my head often judging me, telling me what to do, leading me. And somewhere along my journey, I recognized that that's not actually my voice. So whose voice is it that's guiding you and your decisions? Is that a parent? Is that a teacher? Is it an older sibling? Is it a bully from third grade? What is the root of this feeling? Where is it coming from? What values of yours might feel like they're being compromised in this moment? Because if we can identify the root, we can get to the actual cause of this and we're not so susceptible to popping off. Alright?
Next letter is S. Set boundaries, separate yourself, ensure safety. I know sometimes, I don't want to walk away, we're going to handle this right now. I've never known that to be the best idea. To be calm, to be cool, to walk away into a safe environment so that you're ensuring safety for everyone, that's what a real man does. It's not only about me sharing with you how I'm feeling and what I'm doing and trying to convey my perspective, but it's also about ensuring safety for everyone who's in this space. And that might mean stepping away and coming back when cooler heads prevail.
The last one is E. To empathize. How are other people experiencing me? What point were they trying to get across? How am I contributing to escalating this entire situation? Because the truth of the matter is, when there's disagreements, there's misunderstanding. And if we can just pause ... and try to consider what the other people are trying to convey to us, it can avoid a lot of those life-altering situations.
Being a real man isn't about dominating others. Being a real man isn't about ... proving to other folks that we are what we naturally are. But a real man takes time to think about the impacts of their decisions, to think about the folks who are being impacted by their words, their thoughts, their behaviors. A real man takes a pause.
Thank you.
(Applause)
