 The boomers I was watching I was watching a movie on the planet trying to figure out what to watch And of course, there's like a million different movies and you don't want to watch any of them I was watching a forest gump because I haven't seen that since I was like 12 years old and What is it other than a movie about boomers being able to like recapture what it was like for them to be youthful We're gonna we're gonna inject Tom Hanks into you know the the hippie beatnik movement into the Vietnam War and we're Gonna do all this and we're just gonna relive our glory days and all this other kind of stuff how much of what we see in Hollywood or anything is The Pedestalization of youth whether that was boomer youth energy and them trying to recapture who they were or this glorification and sanctification of this adolescence of this worship of the self as worship of the self and everything else What was the last time you heard a song that came out? that wasn't about partying or Wop or it wasn't some email thing about how girls don't like me anymore or anything else like that What was the last time you heard anything that would actually inspired any sort of nobility in you? How comfortable would you feel right now? If you were told to beat your chest and in unison with other men seeing a battle him Could you do that without feeling self-conscious because that's weird because we don't do stuff like that anymore I hate to admit that I would feel self-conscious Part of me would feel that way and another part of me would again be in tears of the nobility of finally being in an environment in Which that was acceptable We need elders that have actually grown up and become elders that can welcome The others into the next stage in the next phase of the tribe and of the different phase of life We don't have that We don't we don't have it in our government. We don't have it in our culture. We don't have it in our churches We don't have it. So guess what we get to do we get to build it We get to do that ourselves. I have no idea How to be an elder and a patriarch that can welcome in the men that are going through this mid-life crisis this middle-aged thing I'm not even middle-aged yet. I'm 36. I'm still waiting to go through that door myself And I know I'm gonna have to go through that door on my own or with like-minded friends And we're gonna have to storm whatever's on the other side of that together and build our own castle So that we can do it ourselves because there's nothing there anymore But the ruins of what our other civilizations have built for us But I'm going through that door and I want other men to go through that door with me that are willing to Do it and build what we want and what God wants for us on the other side, but you know what door I am through I'm through the door of adolescence. I'm through the door of notch counts I'm through the door of partying or whatever else I don't need that and I am at a stage where I can invite my son and Initiate him to come through that door and then it's my Responsibility to continue to grow and to develop and to get better and better so that I can go through that door So that by the time I am over here I can bring my son through again and I can help him as he brings his son through that first door and Build that legacy again and again and again. I Want men in my life. I want you to have men in your lives that will put on masks and Dress up and rip your sons out of their mother's arms and terrify them and Force them into the initiation so that they can become men I want you to have that in your lives. I want that I'm grateful that I have a couple men that I know will do something like that for me Even if they're a little bit uncomfortable about it at first But I know that they can catch the vision of it And I want to be able to to storm through this last door and be able to build something out and do it there, too We're going to face opposition as we do this There are going to be so many roadblocks and so many problems And that's what makes it fun. That's what makes it worthwhile That's the whole initiation of all of it an initiation. Is it supposed to be easy? Yeah, we're supposed to have mentors and elders that can bring us through it and we don't have that Too bad that just means it's going to be all that more powerful and impactful when we get to do that ourselves when we get to become the black father the President the presider the patriarch Because to be honest, yes, we've got four kids and a fifth on the way I'm not a patriarch yet. I don't have that kind of legacy. My oldest is eight years old I'm a dad. I'm a father and I do I take that very seriously, but I have not earned my stripes I'm not earned the right to call myself a patriarch yet I'm a prospecting patriarch or a potential patriarch or something of that effect, but I'm not Because I won't know if I've earned the right to that title Until I know what kind of men my daughters marry