Fatima Bey: 0:04

This is MindShift Power Podcast, the number one critically acclaimed podcast where we have raw, unfiltered conversations that shape tomorrow. I'm your host, fatima Bey, the MindShifter, and welcome everyone. We have today with us Lawrence C Harris. He is a youth empowerment speaker from Philadelphia, pennsylvania, here in the US, and you've heard from him before. This man is a powerhouse of knowledge and he is only 19 years old and I absolutely love it. So here today we're here to talk about something a little different. As a youth empowerment speaker, many of Lawrence's peers really genuinely talk to him, send him messages and have heart-to-heart conversations with him. So he's here representing his peers so that we as adults can hear the pulse of American youth. So, lawrence, your peers feel very comfortable talking to you. Yes, yes.

法蒂瑪先生：1:14

And we're going to talk about just four things that are probably the biggest that Lawrence hears from his peers, so I will let you take it away from there, lawrence.

Lawrence C. Harris: 1:27

Thank you. I often like to tell people that well, this is actually what you say very often is that real change happens where real conversations begin, and sometimes those real conversations are hard to admit. And these are four very hard to admit truths I hear constantly. I feel like I can't talk to anyone without being judged. I don't even know what's wrong with me. I pretend everything's okay, but I know it's not. I love him too much to leave, even when he cheats. I'm going to give you all a moment to let that sink in. These are the words of young teenagers 15, 17, 18. These are the feelings of the people you go to class with. The people on your sports team, the people in your after-school club could be the person sitting next to you and you never know it, because it's very rare that people feel safe enough to open up. And there are much harder things that people experience thoughts that go through their head believing that they don't even know how to love themselves. But we can sit all day and talk about the problem. We can sit all day and talk about how painful this is, but in order to begin the healing, we need solutions. What can we do If you're a teenager?

Lawrence C. Harris: 3:06

What can you do to help yourself? If you have a friend, what can you do to help them? Or maybe it's your child. Maybe it's the person who you coach and you're their football coach. Maybe you're a summer camp counselor and you notice there's a kid who always seems a bit down. What can you do? What are some suggestions you can make to them? Firstly, encourage them to journal.

Lawrence C. Harris: 3:33

Often we, as young people, don't understand ourselves because we've never been given the freedom or the opportunity to do so. Because if you just take an honest look around opportunity to do so, because if you just take an honest look around, there are so many things that take us out of our self-understanding. Oh, I need to look good for people on social media. I need to look good to impress the people in my class. What are my family going to think of me? What if my grades are too low? What about all these things that are telling me what I should and should not be, what the news is telling me I should be, what music is telling me I should be, what the movies are telling me I should be?

Lawrence C. Harris: 4:13

But journaling allows people to sit down and have the safety and the comfort to just write on the page, because the page don't judge you. The journal doesn't judge you. It allows you the freedom to just say what you want to say. Get it out and it'll listen. It's there for you. It helps you to understand yourself, and maybe you don't know how to say it. You don't know how to tell somebody what you're feeling. You just don't know the words. But when you sit and think about it and you write it down, it helps you to find the words. It helps you to find the strength to tell somebody what's going on.

Lawrence C. Harris: 4:54

Another great one that you can do simply go outside. If you lock yourself into a room all day and there's trash everywhere and there's dirty clothes and you're stressed out and your room is dark, it's going to make it harder for you to feel safe. It's going to make it harder for you to feel like there's opportunity in the world and that life is beautiful because you haven't stepped outside and seen how beautiful the world is. Yes, there are things that go on in the world. Yes, there is issues with the safety of your city or politics. You can even make it that big. Yes, there are world tragedies. Yes, there's war, but there is also a blue sky. There is also a blue sky. There is also green grass. There is also things to be appreciative of, and I know it's hard to find the beauty when you feel like the world falling apart. I know it's hard to find a reason to get out of bed in the morning. I know it's hard to find a reason to love yourself when you feel like everyone and everything is holding you back yourself, when you feel like everyone and everything is holding you back. But you have the power to step outside that door, take a deep breath and say I'm alive. You have the power to do that.

Lawrence C. Harris: 6:13

And when you do decide you want to speak to somebody maybe it's a friend, a family member, a counselor and say, hey, I'm feeling really sad and I don't know what to do, slowly but surely you open up. You don't need to go right into the deep end and tell them about the most painful things you're going through at home. You don't need to go right into the deep end and tell them that you're having thoughts of hurting yourself and hurting other people. You can start on the surface and, layer by layer, go deeper. You can say I'm feeling really stressed out today and they're going to ask well, why are you stressed out? I'm stressed out because my family member did something to me, or somebody said something to me in class, or people are bullying me online and then you go deeper and deeper and then you show them the hard things Because it's easier to dip your toes into the pool than dive head first.

Lawrence C. Harris: 7:08

You don't have to dive head first into your deepest traumas and your pain and your sorrow. You can let them in slowly because it gives you the power to decide who you let in. It gives you the power to decide who you let have that access and when you see that they're not judging you, it helps you to trust them. It helps you to trust people and know that they're not just pretending to care. They actually do. No matter how hard it feels, there are people who genuinely care about you. It's just our mind starts playing tricks on us and makes it hard for us to see it, and in that process it's not going to be easy.

Lawrence C. Harris: 7:52

You're going to have to come face to face and admit that maybe the reason why you have trouble leaving your boyfriend, who keeps cheating on you, is because growing up, that's what your dad did to your mom. That's what your uncle did to your aunt, that's what your uncle did to your aunt, that's what your friends' boyfriends do to them, and because you know it's bad for you, but it's familiar. Unfortunately, we often go to the thing that is familiar, even if we know it's bad for us. You know that man is bad for you, but it's familiar, you understand this. You know what's in front of you and it's like you start to think that, oh, it's not that bad, but you see it right in front of you. You start to make excuses. You start to make excuses for people for mistreating you, and I'm not saying that you go tell everybody that, oh, it's my way or no way.

勞倫斯·C·哈里斯：8:45

不，你需要夠愛自己，才能知道什麼時候有人對你不好，然後離開。不是因為你生他們的氣，不是因為他們不好，而是因為你愛自己。你越愛自己，就越願意對那些對你不好的人說“不”，對那份一直不尊重你的工作說“不”，對那些試圖強迫你做你不想做的事情的人說“不”，對那個派對說“不”，對那種酒說“不”，對那種物質說“不”，對那個壞習慣說“不”。我知道說起來容易做起來難，但就像我一直告訴別人的那樣，如果說起來容易做起來難，那就值得去做。鼓起勇氣告訴別人你很痛苦，說來容易做來難。告訴別人“嘿，我厭倦了待在這裡”，說起來容易做起來難。告訴別人“嘿，我不喜歡你這樣對待我”，說起來容易做起來難。告訴某人，嘿，我不喜歡我們繼續保持這種壞習慣。

Lawrence C. Harris: 9:50

It's easier said than done, but if you don't do it you might end up with an addiction. If you don't do it, you're going to end up having people take advantage of you. If you don't do it, you might even end up dead because you didn't let somebody know that I'm having these thoughts of hurting myself, I'm having these thoughts of hurting somebody else. If you don't let it out, it's just going to build and build and build and inflate yourself like a balloon and then you'll just pop. You might pop and hurt yourself.

勞倫斯·C·哈里斯：10:20

You might pop and hurt somebody who you didn't mean to. You might pop and start self-sabotaging your relationships. You might pop and hurt somebody who you didn't mean to. You might pop and start self-sabotaging your relationships. You might pop and self-sabotage that job. You might pop and self-sabotage your education, but at the end of the day you don't even know who these people are. You don't know if that person met you in class, what they're going through. So before you say something mean to somebody, before you say that somebody is emotional or they're irrational or oh, they're just being dramatic, you need to think you don't know, unless they tell you. So give everybody the love and respect and care that you want, because you don't know what they're going through.

Fatima Bey: 11:07

I'm going to say I almost forgot for a second that this is my show. I was just a member in your audience.

Lawrence C. Harris: 11:12

謝謝你，因為那真的是發自內心。我見過一些人，他們原本前途光明，但最終卻和錯誤的人約會。他們十幾歲就生了孩子。他們最終成了癮君子。他們最終進了監獄，因為他們只是不願意談論這件事。

Fatima Bey: 11:43

Yes, and you just said so so much. And I want to point out for a moment to those listening specifically to adults for this portion. You just heard a boatload of wisdom coming from a 19 year old. A 19 year old, and there are people in their fifties that still haven't gotten a clue about some of the things that he just said. It's not about age, it's about maturity, which is not equivalent to age, and he is living proof of what I talk about all the time. Just because someone is young doesn't mean that they don't have wisdom and that they don't know anything and that we should treat them like oh, you're just a little kid. What I just heard was not a little kid. What I just heard was someone that's hard to believe that he's only 19. Now, lawrence, could you tell me what those four issues were again? Let's review them. Could you just say the whole lot and let's go back to what those four were again.

Lawrence C. Harris: 12:40

Those four were. I feel like I can't talk to anyone without being judged. I don't even know what's wrong with me. I pretend everything's okay, but I know it's not. I love him too much to leave, even when he cheats on me All right, I'm going to reword some of that.

Fatima Bey: 13:00

那麼，我們回到「我不知道自己怎麼了」這個問題。好吧，我要重新表達一下。那麼，我們回到「我不知道自己怎麼了」這個問題。這個問題讓我很困擾，因為我知道它有多真實。很多同儕都覺得自己很蠢，覺得自己有問題，但通常情況下並沒有。他們只是不符合我們社會要求的那個愚蠢的小框框而已。

勞倫斯·C·哈里斯：13:26

是的，這非常明顯，不僅對我個人，對我認識的很多人也是如此。因為想想看，我是一個生活在美國的黑人，所以人們會期待，哦，他一定喜歡籃球或橄欖球，或者他一定對某件事感興趣，或者他一定抽煙，或者這個或那個。但後來人們遇到我，就會感到震驚。他們會說，等等，你不打籃球，你不抽煙，你喜歡釣魚，什麼？我的一生都是這樣的。

勞倫斯·C·哈里斯：14:07

I've never fit into the box. And what you just mentioned there is that the box is like this stupid construct that is meant to limit us, because it's not that. Oh, I don't fit in. No, you're not meant to, you're not meant to trap yourself in these four walls that people go through life thinking that, oh, if I don't dress this way, no one's going to like me.

勞倫斯·C·哈里斯：14:35

如果我不是六尺五吋高，月薪不是一百萬美元，女人就不會喜歡我。我只有五尺六吋。我月薪遠不及一百萬美元，我甚至沒有車。哦，如果我不穿2號的衣服，男人也不會喜歡我。有些男人喜歡世上每一種顏色、形狀和尺寸。但是當我們開始思考這個問題，期待著我們需要成為什麼樣的人時，我們就會忘記那種等待。也許那樣的話，你說話時隨機發出的沙啞聲會對你很有好處，如果你是個喜劇演員的話。等等，你小時候就喜歡講笑話，但周遭的人卻沒有跟你一樣的幽默感。你只需要找到你的人，並意識到這個盒子並不需要困住你。

Fatima Bey: 15:32

I say this all the time, and I did an episode a few weeks ago, I think I called it breaking the jeans that we put on you. You have to go back and look. But I talked about the fact that we need to stop buying into the bullshit, stop buying into believing everything we're told, believing that our society says well, you have to fit into this way, you have to go to college this exact way, you have to do this. No, we don't, at least not in this country. We have freedom, we have choice, and we need to start questioning everything that we've been taught, because a lot of what we've been taught is absolute bullshit and it fits in for others, but it doesn't fit in for us, and part of that is finding out who we are as people. Right?

Lawrence C. Harris: 16:43

是的，你剛才提到的事情實際上讓我想起了正確的。美國的每個新聞台都由同樣的三家公司經營。每個新聞台都是同樣的三個組織，95％的食物由同樣的兩家公司運營，而世界上最大的牛肉，雞肉和馬鈴薯生產商是麥當勞。所以，如果我可以讓你，另一個很好的一點是我在麥當勞工作時學到的。所以任何聽過這個的人，你不會想吃麥當勞，麥當勞，麥當勞與醫院有實際合同，說他們不能阻止你吃麥當勞。現在你會想，他們為什麼要這樣做？很簡單，他們無法控制醫院可以說什麼，但他們可以控制我們是否給你錢。所以你只能說我們付錢給你的東西。

Fatima Bey: 17:44

That goes round back to the same point Because I think that's a whole other conversation that I probably will do an episode on but the fact that we are believing what we're told. We're believing that there's something wrong with us because we don't say things a certain way. There's something wrong with us, like you said, because we don't like the same things that the mainstream is supposed to like, and a large part of it, especially for your generation, that wasn't as far present in my generation, is the fact that social media is a major part of your life. It's a part of your existence and has been your entire life. So we had magazines and you have social media, but magazines weren't as intense as what you have today.

法蒂瑪先生：18:25

所以你們的不同之處在於，你們這一代對你們應該成為什麼樣的人有著不同的定義，而很多都是謊言。很多都是謊言，我想鼓勵你們所有人，我知道勞倫斯經常這麼說，或者更早。鼓勵你們所有人，我知道勞倫斯經常這麼說。你不必成為社會要求你成為的人。你需要找到你自己。是的，成為你自己，更有可能的是，這將會打破他們為你設定的模式。很多人一輩子都在痛苦中度過，因為他們試圖融入別人設定的模式，而這些人並沒有創造他們。

Lawrence C. Harris: 19:04

是的，首先，我要告訴你如何弄清楚你是誰，因為「你是誰」這個詞太模糊了，人們到處亂用。我需要找到自己。我需要弄清楚我是誰。你真正需要做的是：你需要停止尋找。你需要去發現，因為你就在你內心深處。

Fatima Bey: 19:28

You got to repeat that about 25,000 more times. Can you say that again? You need to what?

勞倫斯·C·哈里斯：19:34

你需要停止尋找自我，你需要揭開它，因為你就在你內心深處。這樣想吧，如果我看著你，說“讓我看看你”，你會說，“好吧，看我，我指著我自己。這就是我。” 不，不是的。你不是你的身體。因為如果我能說“哦，我是我的身體”，那就意味著我就是所有人，但我不是所有人。好吧，那麼，我是我的思想嗎？好吧，告訴我你在你腦中的位置。你無法指向自己。這意味著你超越了物質。現在我們更接近精神層面或宗教層面。無論你想如何理解，你並非由你的外表定義。你並非由別人對你的看法定義。你其實是由你的言行和信仰定義。你就是這方面的一個很好的例子，我相信這是出埃及記3.14。

Lawrence C. Harris: 20:45

對於那些不熟悉摩西的人來說，長話短說。他登上這座山，看到了上帝，然後說，好吧，我要回到我的人民那裡。我該說是誰派我來的呢？上帝只是說，我是派你來的。現在，你能從中得到的啟示是，如果上帝自己也認同我是。無論你追求什麼，在永恆的現在之後，我就是。在那之後，永恆的我就是。這就是你所宣稱的你，你銘刻在自己身上的東西，而你要真正地、真實地了解自己，就必須扮演一個角色，弄清楚我想成為什麼？當我想到我年輕時的夢想時，是什麼讓我的靈魂燃燒起來？是什麼讓我燃燒起來？是成為搖滾明星嗎？如果你來自一個以鄉村音樂為樂迷的社區，但你想成為搖滾明星。如果那能點燃你的靈魂，那就拿起吉他，去演奏吧。嘗試不同的時尚風格、不同的服裝、不同的髮型，你會發現你真正喜歡的是什麼，這並不是因為你試著去尋找它，而是因為你正在層層探索。

Lawrence C. Harris: 22:12

That's not me. I don't want to be a doctor. My family would tell me, Lawrence, you'd be a doctor, you should be an engineer, you should do this, you should do that. But I don't want to do that. Right, I don't connect with it. I connect with inspiring people, motivating them, giving them something of substance and value that can change their life. This is me.

Lawrence C. Harris: 22:33

And when you are yourself in every room, you go in. That's when you are authentic, you are genuine and the world will bless you for that. But before you get the blessing, people will try to put you back into that box. It's like the real genuine. You cannot fit into the life that you were told you had to be. You were told you have to talk this way, dress this way, look this way.

Lawrence C. Harris: 23:03

但是當你開始做真實的自己時，這就像規則在考驗你。它說，喔不，回來吧。外面太危險了。嘗試家人都沒做過的職業想法太危險了。太危險了，自己創業吧。自己創業太危險了。想怎麼弄髮型都太危險了。太危險了，跟我們回來吧。你不能回去，因為如果你回去，你就會意識到你剛才在夢遊。但現在你的眼睛已經睜開，你看到了真相，人們會叫你瘋子，他們會叫你怪胎，但在一天結束的時候，當你與自己聯繫在一起，你真心實意地愛自己，無論你是誰，無論你是什麼。這就像是永恆的幸福。它把你從中解放出來，是的，你可能還是有點在意別人對你的看法，但你不是它的囚犯。

Fatima Bey: 24:01

Yes, and a prisoner. We don't want anyone to be Well.

Lawrence C. Harris: 24:07

Lawrence I. It's like you. It's like a prisoner mentally, but the irony is that you have the key. You can turn the key. It's just once you unlock that door, it ain't no going back. You got a whole lot of friends in the prison cell. You got a whole lot of people who spend their whole life trapped in the box. But when you decide I'm going to leave the box, you have to wander out into the wilderness and then find people who had the same courage to be themselves in a world where most people are like I'm gonna just stay here where it's safe, even though the safety is actually an illusion, because you're safe inside of a prison cell.

Fatima Bey: 24:53

我喜歡你關於「跳出框框」的說法。我覺得這句話概括了你所說的一切，大部分都概括了。勞倫斯，我的話很少，這對我來說很難做到，但你說了這麼多，而且很有力量。我希望你的一些同齡人，當他們聽到這些時，能夠真正銘記在心，哪怕只是你所說的點點滴滴，因為它可以改變思維模式，從而改變你的想法，正如我的標語所說，改變思維是有力量的。勞倫斯，再次感謝你的到來。我期待看到你展翅高飛，飛向更高的境界。我期待看到你展翅高飛，飛向更高的境界。這終將發生。所以，再次感謝你的到來，我很感激你。我很感激你來到節目中，與我們的年輕人交流，也讓成年人聽到你的聲音。

勞倫斯·C·哈里斯：25:50

I appreciate being here too, and if anybody wants to see more of my content, you can find my YouTube, tiktok, instagram. All of them are Lawrence C Empowers. Website is lawrencecharriscom. Books are on Amazon.

法蒂瑪先生：26:09

他的訊息將會出現在節目筆記或播客描述中。

勞倫斯·C·哈里斯：26:13

Oh yeah, and you just remind me of the last thing I meant to say too. Oh yeah, and you just remind me of the last thing I meant to say too. If you happen to be a podcast host, an event coordinator, you are a school principal or you know one, which you definitely do. You know your cousin or your aunt or your niece or nephew is a school principal. Email me, lawrence, at Lawrence C Harris dot com If you're in America.

法蒂瑪先生：26:42

I will come, and now for a mind shifting moment. I want you to take a moment to think about a lot of the wisdom that you heard come out of this young man who is only 19. For the adults listening, especially you, this young man is living proof that our youth are not wasted, that they're not all lost. In fact, there's a whole reservoir of wisdom in the ones we're ignoring. Just because they're young doesn't mean they're inexperienced or that they lack wisdom. Today's youth are dealing with a world you didn't. You did not grow up in. The world they're growing up in. They have a lot more experience than you think they do.

Fatima Bey: 27:26

Take the time to listen to our youth, want to solve a problem for our youth, or involving our youth. It starts with listening. You can't solve a problem you don't understand. It starts with listening. You can't solve a problem you don't understand and, trust me, you don't understand because you're not in it the way they are. Rewind this episode. Go back, listen again, because he gave you a whole cash bag of wisdom, and I don't care how old you are. So much of what he said. Many of us still haven't learned yet At 30 and 50 years old. Go back and listen to the wisdom of a 19-year-old. You've been listening to MindShift Power Podcast. For complete show notes on this episode and to join our global movement, find us at FatimaBaycom. Until next time. Always remember there's power in shifting your thinking.