Jonathan L. Allen: The Courage to Live Truthfully.

What does it cost to live truthfully?

Jonathan L. Allen has spent his life asking that question. Raised in the church and ordained as a minister at a young age, he eventually faced a decision that would reshape his faith, his relationships, and the future he thought he was meant to live. Choosing authenticity came with real consequences—but it also opened the door to a life rooted in purpose rather than fear.

In this episode of At the Podium, Jonathan and Patrick Huey explore faith, identity, courage, and the ongoing work of becoming more fully ourselves. They discuss Leadership Brainery's mission to expand access to graduate education, the importance of representation and leadership, the freedom that comes from living truthfully, and why "coming home" is less about a place than learning to live in alignment with who you are.

Whether you're navigating change, questioning your purpose, or simply searching for the courage to live more honestly, this conversation is an invitation to consider what becomes possible when fear no longer gets the final word.

Listen. Reflect. Become.

👍 Like and Share
📝 Subscribe
💬 Review below to support the channel

At the Podium on IG
Patrick on IG

PodMatch
PodMatch Automatically Matches Ideal Podcast Guests and Hosts For Interviews

For more information contact Patrick at patrick@patrickhueyleadership.com

Transcript

Patrick 0:00

Did you know at the time when you came out the cost of that to your career and to some of your family relationships?

SPEAKER_01 0:08

Yes. That's what took me so long. Because I was navigating that forever. And that's what kept me from coming out for so long is that I was trying to reconcile all of that. I was afraid that if I came out, my career would be gone, that no one would love me, my family would turn on me, my friends would as well. And guess what? Some of that did happen. And that's what I was afraid of. But I finally got to a place where I said to myself, I'm willing to accept all of the risks and consequences of me being me, then to continue to live hell on earth. When God loves me and is blessing me. So I finally got to a place where I'm like, well, God, the least that can come out of this is that my reconciliation with truth will give me the liberation that I need, no matter the consequence.

Patrick 1:08

My guest today is Jonathan L. Allen, a leader whose work sits at the intersection of education, public service, and faith. He is the co-founder and director of development of Leadership Brainery, a Boston-based organization expanding access to graduate education and leadership pathways for communities too often pushed to the margins. But Jonathan's relationship to leadership began long before his current work. Raised in the church in Lufkin, Texas, he began preaching at 11 and was ordained as a minister by 20. That grounding has carried him into public life as well. In 2019, Jonathan ran for Boston City Council on a platform centered on information justice, believing leadership requires proximity, risk, and the courage to be seen. Most recently, he's the creator of the Five P's, a framework for purposeful public speaking designed to help people speak with clarity and confidence in boardrooms and public spaces. This is at the podium, and I'm Patrick Huey. Today, we're talking about achievement, faith, identity, and about what it means to continue serving, shepherding, and advocating for others, even when doing so requires the loss of a former life. But before we begin, make sure you like, subscribe, and comment below to support my channel. Jonathan, welcome back to At the Podium.

SPEAKER_01 2:48

Patrick, thank you so much. Oh my goodness. And the intro, Mike, you got I got killed.

Patrick 2:56

Well, that's your life, my friend. That is your life. It's just reflect here's the mirror.

SPEAKER_01 3:01

Wow. Wow. Well, let's do this. I'm excited to be here and I appreciate you so much for inviting me and for your leadership and everything that you do.

Patrick 3:08

Thank you so much, Jonathan. I want to start today with a quote from Cicely Banks, who I'm sure you know. She is a senior lecturer at Boston University School of Law, of which you are an esteemed graduate of that program. Yes. And what she said about you is remarkable. She said, I think he is absolutely fearless. Jonathan runs with his passions, and if he sees a need, he runs to help. And when he does, he has the empathy, the emotional intelligence, the smarts, and the skills to execute. What do you think? Oh wow. What do you think when she says that about you?

SPEAKER_01 3:54

Well, Cecily is amazing. I'm so grateful that she said it. And I think I remember when Cecily said that in an article when I was running for city council, I think, is when someone had reached out to her for a quote. And the fact that she said that in that way, I think she's accurate. I think that is what I intend, how I intend to show up. Um, very purpose-driven, very intentional, um, uh, very, um, as I hope, always intelligent around the emotional dynamics at play in our relationships and interactions. Um, and then, of course, with always a commitment and effort to try and get things done. I'm not the type of person that wants to just say I thought about a thing, but that a thing got done. If I see a problem, how can we solve it? And not just how do I solve it, but how do we solve it together is really my mindset. Um, and I think that's exactly the spirit in which um um Cecily even yielded that. So I'm so grateful. Cecily taught me contracts drafting in law school. And oh my God, it's one of my most amazing classes to be a part of. And she also was one of the early-on board members of Leadership Brainery and really helped um us to get connected with some really important people and institutions to invest in our work. So I was grateful for select for Cecily.

Patrick 5:14

You know, Jonathan, it's interesting as I was thinking about our conversation today. It's very easy to look at your accomplishments, some of which I went through in that opening. And I was like, how do I make this conversation not feel like a highlight reel for your work, which is important? And I think today I want to talk about what you've built and what the future holds. But I thought today we would start somewhere else in your story. So when I was looking at your life and your work, and Cecily's comment about fearlessness, A, is a theme that is recurrent through your life. You have always had that ability to look in the face of the uncertain and move forward. And it took me back to you starting out as a preacher at 11 years old in Loughkin, Texas. And then you're ordained at 20. And then by 25, you made the decision to come out as gay. This is a decision that placed significant roadblocks in front of your ministry and reshaped the life that you thought you were going to live. So that perhaps is the true leadership moment, the beginning of the leadership moment. But before we talk about leadership today, institutions that you work with, the impact that you're having, I want to begin with formation and with your inner life and with the courage it took for you to tell the truth when you probably knew the truth would change everything. So I wanted to start with when did you actually first realize that you were gay?

SPEAKER_01 6:56

I'd say and thank you for this grounding and just you know where we're starting in this conversation. I'd say that I always knew, although I certainly did not accept and was raised to believe that you know, gay people, same-sex loving people were not in God's will or walking in God's will. That was the the general framing that I understood growing up. And so any thoughts or attractions, certainly things was happening. I was experimenting and exploring as a kid and growing up. And, you know, if you know, you know. If if that's been your journey in particular, I know there are people who don't have that story, and it's been in their adult life that they've come to some place where they realize they have uh an attraction to the same sex. But that's not my story. I've had the attraction most of my life, um, even during those seasons in which I might have suppressed it more than others, then ultimately finally getting to a place where um I made a decision to love me. But that took time. And so I first of all don't want people to think that any courage or quote unquote fearlessness that I have mustered has been overnight or automatic or default. It's always and always is a process. Before I came out, so to speak, I was already in years worth of dialogue with God and myself about who I am and what my beliefs were. So I already have been wrestling and working through things before I finally told my family. And then, you know, and really publicly speaking, Patrick, I just changed my status on Facebook from being single to being in a relationship with Derek. That happened my first year of law school. After I got into Boston, I was way more, um, I felt safer, I guess, at that time. But I'd already done a lot of the work and gotten to a place where I had told my family, my mom and my brother, and one of my um some of my close cousins and so forth and friends. And so really, when I changed my relationship status um to being in a relationship with Derek, that really is what set things off more publicly around me coming out. And then the year after that, I proposed to Derek, and then that went viral and and then just really took our public profile to the next level as a couple in particular. But yeah, I was a very active minister, um, a very active evangelist. I was traveling around many places preaching the gospel. Um, I was, I grew up as a childhood preacher at that as a um youth minister. And so I was always directly involved with thinking about young people, my colleagues, my peers, like the same young people that were in my youth ministry were going to school with me. I would have to go sit in the same classrooms with some of these young people. And so it also created this dynamic in my life where I was having to figure out how do I show up not only in the church, but in school, in the community, in public, because my my life had already at that age um become public in some ways. I was already expected to behave and act a certain way inside and outside of the church, and therefore inside and outside of my own home. My father was, you know, at the same church. My parents had separated when I was a little younger. So there were seasons where, you know, I was staying with my mother versus seasons where I was full-time staying with my father once I got into high school, which is really where um, you know, things really took off for me in terms of stepping into my somebodyess and really beginning um to cultivate that leadership inside of me. I know I've said a lot, so you can bring me in um if needed, because you know I'll I'll get carried away and go.

Patrick 11:03

I know you will. That's why I love having you on. How did you feel living with that duality inside of you before you made a public proclamation?

SPEAKER_01 11:13

At first, it was, I gotta get this feeling that I'm having out. No, I'm not gay, and I'm not claiming I'm gay. I'm not accepting I'm gay, and we're gonna fix this. God is going to purge this out of me and deliver me from it. So, you know, I would go um to church, and I would, when it was altar call time, I would go to the altar and I would get, you know, anointed and I would lay before the altar crying, asking God to get the gay out of me. They didn't know that that's what I was praying for or what I was crying about or hollering about. But that was a part of what I was absolutely navigating and journeying and trying to process as a young teenager. And I mean, it got so bad. Sometimes you would even drink some anointed oil. Um, if anybody don't know what anointed oil is, it's basically olive oil that you pray over and we call it consecrating it. And it is through that process and experience more endowed and anointed so that when you apply it, it helps activate that faith and the results that you are looking for or seeking. Um so, nevertheless, I would drink some of that as a way to um hopefully help push some of that out of me, but it only got worse. It never, I didn't um, yeah, it didn't stop. I only became more attracted. And so eventually um I went to theology school after I graduated from Gramlin, which is where I went to undergrad. And I thought I was going to theology school to become a better preacher because I was taken off. I was doing my thing. I'm like, okay, I'm about to be this national, international evangelist. And so I was investing in my capacity that way. But I got to theology school and it gave me the space to wrestle with and answer or ask and answer questions that I had not always been given permission to ask in the church. In fact, many people who grew up in the church are taught to not question God, to not ask God questions. Um, and so theology school kind of flipped that perspective on its head and it forced me to ask God questions. In fact, theology means the study of God. It reflects on the question, who is God? That's theology. So by its very nature, I was put in an environment where I had to ask God some questions. And some of those questions centered around, who am I? Um, God, do you love me or not? Is something wrong with me because of these desires that I have and these experiences that I'm starting to have? Um, and and what does that say about my calling and the impact that people are evidently saying I'm having on their lives as I'm out here preaching and leading in different respects? Theology school also got gave me the space to dig into history and social context and start understanding a little bit more about the formation of religions as a whole. And so much of what I learned, first and foremost, was there that there is a thread that has gone through most religious formations, one that is in quest or seeking or search for answers to things that feel greater and bigger than we have the capacity as humans to conceive. But often a through line of love and justice, I found. But yes, from a historical standpoint, one thing that I also uncovered is the role of humans, men in particular, who are seeking power and control of others and the way that that has also been used to formalize religions and sustain them over time. And so once I begin to reconcile a lot of that stuff, I said, Well, Lord, if human beings have been disinvolved in determining how people live, and it's not, it's seemingly, from my understanding, not all about what you have and haven't said, then surely I can't be running around here hating myself because somebody who don't have the best intentions for me have told me that I'm unworthy. That I'm not valuable. And so there begin to rise up in me a sense of somebody, especially as I learned about the fact that me as an African-American man whose ancestors were stolen from the continent of Africa, brought over to America, and only introduced to Christianity through that perspective and that journey to begin with. And then the history of how black people in America began to evolve and morph our relationship with Christianity and thereby God through this angle. There was a time when we heard the scriptures because we wasn't reading them at first because we wasn't even allowed to read, right? So we heard the scriptures preached to us selectively that said, slaves, obey your masters. So the context of the selective application and interpretation of not only the scriptures but of the religious doctrine, enough for me says, come on here. You got to get to know God beyond this stuff. You gotta find worth and value in yourself beyond this stuff, because this stuff has been influenced and tainted a little bit too much by human hands.

Patrick 16:39

And what did you find when you started to explore God beyond the sort of greeting card ways many people interact with scripture, biblical understanding, and history?

SPEAKER_01 16:51

Let me say this. If God is the creator and we all living things are God's creation, then the best way to get to know more about God is to spend more time with what God has made. All living things, the air we breathe, the animals we encounter, the water we drink, the encounters we have with other humans from all different backgrounds and perspectives and experiences, that is how we get to know God. And if we spend time earnestly doing so, we then form a radically different perspective of who God is. One that is accepting and more just and more loving than our human capacity can even conceive.

Patrick 17:34

Did you know at the time when you came out the cost of that to your career and to some of your family relationships?

SPEAKER_01 17:44

Yes. That's what took me so long. Because I was navigating that forever. I was afraid that if I came out, my career would be gone, that no one would love me, my family would turn on me, my friends would as well, and guess what? Some of that did happen, and that's what I was afraid of. But I finally got to a place where I said to myself, I'm willing to accept all of the risks and consequences of me being me, then to continue to live live hell on earth. Why would I do that? Why would I spend the rest of my time on this earth being miserable when God loves me and is blessing me. So I finally got to a place where I'm like, well, God, the least that can come out of this is that my reconciliation with truth will give me the liberation that I need, no matter the consequence.

[Ad] PodMatch

Patrick 19:16

It's interesting because I think if we go back to this idea of fearlessness, and I I I

(Cont.) Jonathan L. Allen: The Courage to Live Truthfully.

Patrick 19:23

don't want to minimize that word because I feel like we live in a time when people are full of fear, and that the the leadership moment perhaps is your ability to move past the fear and into the risk. And you have talked about leadership being a risk and about proximity. And I wonder for you where does that fearlessness come from inside of you? Where does that capacity come from inside of you?

SPEAKER_01 19:51

Oh my goodness, my family. Um, my grandmothers, my parents, um, the things that they've overcome, the way I've seen them show up in society and community and at home and beyond in a very unbridled manner. My grandmothers, my mom's mom and my dad's mom are both ministers. I grew up with them both heavy in the church, very heavy in the community. They are fireballs. They they no, there's no room they walk in, my mom's mom, and you not feel her gentle care and um the conviction in which she walks. There's no way you encounter my dad's mom. She walks in a room and everybody like, we gotta get together. Pastor AJ in the room, right? She's loud and strong, and uh, nothing can sit still in her presence. My dad is a very um blunt, direct individual. You laugh at many things he says, but they were not intended to be jokes. Um and but he's very serious. He has a way about being real. Um that is who he is. And so I take on that kind of keep it real mentality. My mom is very real and direct. She don't play, she's a boss. She's so incredible. And I get that drive that she has. Um, I'm so blessed that I have that um from her as well. So you see, these people, my mom, my dad, my grandmothers, have really been the anchors and the drivers. I mean, then there's my former pastor and mentor, Pastor William O'Neal, who passed away about a decade or more ago. And he, with his nickname was Keep It Real O'Neill. So I had one of the first people in my life when I was going to ministry. He was the person that on a Wednesday night Bible study was like Jonathan. I'm 11 years old at the time, maybe 10. Jonathan, you're gonna preach soon. Um, and and begin to help um groom me in that way and train me up to do so. He saw something in me, believed in me, and poured into me and that lit a fire at a very early age. Um, you know, to be in elementary school already, preaching sermons from the pulpit and actually getting refined development. I wasn't just running around mimicking people, which is, you know, you see some young preachers that way where really what they're doing is just kind of mimicking, and then you get the social media videos of them doing so. But no, I was in actual ministerial training and processes. I went to classes, I was taught pulpit etiquette, how to sit on a pulpit, how to stand at a podium, um, or what was appropriate, what wasn't. I was taught how to structure a sermon, um, how to do my research when I I was in elementary school, going into middle school. That's the wavelength I was on. That's what I was doing.

Patrick 22:34

When you think about this trajectory of your life and the and the work that you've been doing, you and I met maybe five years ago and during my time in Boston, towards the beginning stages of leadership brainery. We talked about before the call is in its eighth year of existence, which is incredible. I want to talk to you specifically about leadership brainery, because I feel like leadership brainery sits at the center of enormous cultural, political, and educational tension in the world today. And this may be a redundant question, but I want to know how you and Derek keep going in the face of these incredible obstacles that are being placed in front of the work that you're doing by the current social context and constructs that we're existing in today.

SPEAKER_01 23:27

I appreciate the question. And it is hard. It is difficult, not just for us, but for so many who are working to help folks with their backs against the wall, as Dr. Howard Thurman would frame it. I think that Patrick, first and foremost, and mainly we just understand our obligation to contribute to the collective change in progress, right? There were people that came before us that put their lives on the line, that stuck their necks out, that saw problems and then tried to come up with creative and innovative solutions to solve them. That's all that we're doing. We're doing our part. And if every single person who passes through their lifetime do what they can to contribute to the collective progression over time, that's how we get better. And so we understand that. So and we are committed to that. And so that's how we keep going. But it's also the incredible students that we get to serve and the type of impact they go out and get to make. It's like, how do you not keep going when you have young leaders who are getting into our nation's top masters and doctoral degree programs and are killing it? And then they're going out into communities and into the workforce and they're killing it. They're opening up doors for others, helping think about how resources are being allocated, decisions are being made. They're trailblazing into influential positions and roles. How do you stop when that is the result of your work? We're just so fortunate that we get to do what we do. It is unfortunate that we've come to do it because of systemic imbalances and inequities and biases and just downright dehumanization. It's unfortunate that that is why we've had to do the work, why we've come to doing the work. But it is our pleasure, it is our honor to be able to contribute to our collective progression in this way. And to see our young people just go out here and soar, that gives us the motivation to keep going when the going gets tough. And then lastly, I'll say God keep on blessing. The miracles keep on coming. So right when we feel like giving up, because we have those moments when we do, a miracle happens. Whether that's an unexpected donation that is that is significant enough to help sustain us a little while longer, whether that is a student got accepted, and it reminds us of our why. The miracles keep reminding us every single day of every step that we've taken up until this point and why we can't give up now. Because it's all adding up, it's all working together for our good.

Patrick 26:06

I love that the miracles keep showing up. The miracles keep showing up. How are you keeping students tied to this program? How are you keeping universities tied to this program right now?

SPEAKER_01 26:21

The difficulty, let me say, with the universities is that many of them are backpedaling and are moving differently. And so we did this year experience a drop all the way down to zero in the university investment and leadership brainery this fiscal year. Many of the universities saying that they just legally cannot work with an organization that is helping disadvantaged folk get into their programs. Much of that was preemptive and out of fear of certain administration policies and politics. And so we are experiencing a lot of shift, even on the corporate side, where we have corporate sponsors who have withdrawn or backpaddled their support. And it's similarly because of DI rollbacks, which is so unnecessary and unfortunate and is a major distraction and detraction to not just our work, but to everything that is happening in terms of organization, community mobilization to uplift our communities. But to our students, we are one trying to keep them abreast of the different changes and shifts that are happening, but always and consistently reminding them of their sense of somebody, reminding them that they matter, reminding them how brilliant they are, and reminding them that we need them, not just leadership branding, but we you. We all need them in our societies, being our doctors and our lawyers and our professors and our dentists and our therapists and our financial advisors. And the list goes on of the various occupations that either require that you have a master's or doctoral level degree or some type of certification, um, or those that even preference it, private equity and wealth management, venture capital, and all of those other um fields where people do access crazy wealth oper wealth generating opportunities, but where we obviously see it has been held for a very specific few, and especially those few being white men, uh white straight men in particular.

Patrick 28:24

What is the impact if that representation decreases? Because one thing that's come up on this show over and over and over again, and in my conversation with Derek, who we'll talk about in just a minute, is that representation matters, that when you look up to see someone who looks like you or who represents what you represent in the world, it's powerful and meaningful. That's just on this on the social side, on the cultural side. I want you to answer that too, but I also want to talk about what are the real implications if our higher educations become less open, less welcoming, less embracing of cultures that are perhaps a derivative of or quite separate from the dominant culture in a society.

SPEAKER_01 29:13

I'll say, of course, we know that the more that our young people see examples of them represented in the places that they haven't even fixed their imaginations on, that they know that what's possible, more probable for them. So that's why it's powerful when the young girls see astronaut Mae Jimison, Dr. May Jameson as an example of what's possible as the first black woman being in space, right? They need to see those examples and they need to see them early, as early as possible. So that's uh that. But what happens when um we are not reflected there? What happens is that decision making doesn't prioritize the whole. It prioritizes a few, it prioritizes a slice and it creates the cast, it creates the satisfication because people then start looking out for themselves. And when they look out for themselves, part of looking out for yourself means that you also got to do something to push somebody else down or somebody else back for you to be ahead. At least that is the what we would say the assumption that oppressive intentions have taken on. That's not necessarily the case. For you to win, you don't necessarily have to beat somebody else up. And I think that scarcity mindset is what's farming us. Um, that fear um that has been created. I say that fear that has been fabricated. There is nothing to be afraid of. Even when there are real dangers lurking and present, there is nothing to be afraid of. And the more that we allow ourselves to be afraid and even fearful of the big, dangerous, nasty things that are set up to intimidate us, if we allow fear to seek in for those things, they win.

Patrick 30:59

That is a powerful distinction between danger and fear.

SPEAKER_01 31:07

Two different things. Yes, they they live around each other, they might be neighbors, but they don't have the same address, they are not the same thing, and we have not been given the spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.

Patrick 31:23

You have started a new company. And I laughed when when when I reached out to you, I laughed because I was like, Derek and Jonathan started Leadership Rainery. Now Derek has Forever Young Spaws, Jonathan has five the five Ps. And I was like, these two men are emblematic of the future of how identity and work will exist in the world, where we sort of move past the use of this term, the multi-hyphenate. I don't even think multi-hyphenate is actually the act, the actual word. I think it is I choose to express what I choose to express when I choose when I choose to express. And my life is not circumscribed by tradition, belief, these things that don't really matter. Because I think as our institutions have failed and started to fail, people have started to understand it's it's up to me to build the life that I want to have. And it doesn't have to look like one thing. I look at you and Derek, and it makes me smile because I'm like, this is the future of how it looks for people. That you have many different things that feed your identity and feed your finances and feed your mission.

SPEAKER_01 32:45

I I appreciate that, Patrick. And I think that first let me echo the multi-hyphenate thing. Um, and you know, I do like to classify myself as multidimensional. Um and and I think multidimensional because I appreciate um uh Gary Zukoff and the seat of the soul, um, and the time I spent really unpacking um that. I really do believe that it's important to lead our lives from the compass of the soul. Um, and what I am reminded of, I've been alive 35 years now. Now I was born in 1990. Come on. And the reality is the constant in my in my life is me and my journey with God. That's my constant. I mean, we you didn't know me 20 years ago, right? So there was a group of people in my life who were closer to me and more active in my life at that time who knew Jonathan in a certain way, and they knew me as Minister Jonathan. And then I go to law school, and now everybody who's meeting me in that area of my life is meeting me as law student Jonathan. Then the people who interact with me through Leadership Brainery meet me as co-founder of Leadership Brainery, the guy that's helping young people get into graduate school. When I was at Gramlin, people knew me as student body president, but I know who I've always been. And so the five Ps, for example, around purposeful public speaking is taking my over 25 years of professional public speaking experience. And so I'm saying, hey, let me reframe and repackage for you who I've always been. And I got some gems that I can drop that can help you continue to think about how you live your life and you show up in the world and leverage your voice with more clarity and confidence as a way to get things done and influence the masses. And then I distilled them down to these five Ps purpose, passion, preparation, practice, and presence. And that these five Ps are cornerstone, are game-changing for helping a person clarify what they've been put on this earth to be, um, unlocking the passion that they need to drive that mission forward. And so that's how I've gotten here. So the name of my company is JA Speaks, um, or um doing business as JA Speaking Company, um, LLC, which manages my own public speaking. So if you want to book me to be a keynote speaker or to moderate a conversation or to come facilitate a workshop, um, and then of course, I've now built and launched my online public speaking course, the five piece for purpose purposeful public speaking. So I've taken the time to put all of that knowledge in one place for you to go and get. So that's what I'm doing with Jay Speaks, and I'm excited about how it is going to allow me, one, to show up more in the world, but also how I'll be able to help some other people along the way.

Patrick 35:41

Jonathan. Okay, so you and Derek have been together for a very long time.

SPEAKER_01 35:48

Um 2012 messed up with four. This is year 14 for us.

Patrick 35:54

So, and you've lived a very public relationship to some capacity. I know there's a difference.

SPEAKER_01 36:01

Yeah, but it was about you know, about six years into it, we was DL, we was undercover with it.

Patrick 36:07

But you guys did something this year that I think that I when I saw it, I was so happy about it. You guys bought a house.

SPEAKER_01 36:15

Yes, Rose Cottage.

Patrick 36:17

And I wonder how that has a shifted your relationship, because you do work together, so that's a whole other thing we could talk about. But how that idea of permanence and that idea of place has changed your relationship and changed you.

SPEAKER_01 36:36

My goodness. First of all, the name of our home is Rose Cottage. Um, we did not know that name until after we moved in and learned the history um that is connected to our home, being it was the original home of abolitionists. And uh, and that spirit and mission of people who've lived in his home continued. I mean, obviously, and now look at us, we're here still carrying on um the liberation movement. But for this to be our first home at that is mind-blowing. Just mind-blowing. When I talked about miracles, that's what I mean. Even us being in his home is indeed a miracle. But it's also the evidence of manifestation. Derek and I took a sabbatical two years ago. We took two months to recalibrate because we were burnt out. We were also, you know, navigating some things, even in our own relationship. We took that time and came back home. And Derek was very adamant, like, we uh we need a home. We need a home. And it was like, we ain't got no money from the home. But, you know, we started looking up the home, home buying process and some of the assistance programs that they have for first-time home buyers and everything. And then we, you know, we hit a roadblock even with those programs, um, which made it even difficult for us to even um see buying a home in the near future. Long story short, without divulging too many details here, y'all. Um God blessed us with a miracle, a life-changing miracle enough that we were able to buy this home um much faster than we had anticipated. And here we are now. We're selling in. We're learning so much about homeownership.

Patrick 38:20

It's it's a whole other world.

SPEAKER_01 38:22

Oh, you know what? Everybody wants to celebrate your glory, but they don't know your story. Um, and so it's a big responsibility, obviously, but such a huge blessing. Um, we are in Roxbury, uh historic African-American community of Boston. So much legacy, so much history. Malcolm X used to live around the corner. In my own home, we learned that one of the previous owners, um, the legendary Dr. Erna Ballantine Bryant, hosted a fundraiser for Coretta Scott King here after um Dr. Martin Luther King was assassinated to continue to invest in sustaining the movement and supporting their family. And that's just here. And they're in the history of this place and this whole city beyond just Roxbury is so immense. So for us to also be homeowners in Boston is really extraordinary and so powerful. And obviously, for our families, um, not just me and Derek, um, but when we think about where we come from, this is a major shift in the trajectory of our family. We don't have kids. We've been having a lot of conversations about if we should have kids or not. And when I see other people with their kids, I'd be like, hell no, y'all can keep that. Uh, you know, but you know, I I have my days where I'm feeling like I want to be somebody's father. So we will see. We I'm very open to it. I'm not closed door to it, but um I'm definitely probably not pressed, uh, especially when I be on them airplanes and all y'all kids be doing all that crying. And I'm like, Lord, come on, I do not. And I plan on taking more flights. Um, so a whole bunch of that, you know. But and um right now we have um two casts, ebony and platinum. And uh unfortunately our um tortoise, Frankie of 10 years, just passed away earlier this week. Um, and so we are, you know, navigating that. Rest in peace, Frankie. Um, but that's what our home looks like right now, and we'll we'll see where we go. But it's such a beautiful place. Built in 1845, a gothic revival cottage. Um one of a kind, one of the very few left in the entire nation. Um, and so for us, Soccupation's history is really powerful.

Patrick 40:36

It's beautiful the synergy that you bought a house and have a home with Derek and the cats, um, and formerly Frankie. This season of the show, I'm talking about what it means to return home. Because for me, this has been a year of returning home. On the spur of the moment to get in my car from Los Angeles and drive back to Texas. There was no plan, and what it's unfolding has been quite extraordinary. But I wonder for you, what does that mean, returning home in this season of your life?

SPEAKER_01 41:06

I appreciate the question. And, you know, as a fellow Texas native, you know, I think a lot about what it means for me to embody my culture, um, certainly as a southerner, um, living in New England, um, certainly even as a person of faith, and that being everything that I've always known. And even though I'm not um preaching in the church anymore, I'm not on anybody's active ministerial roster, although I am, I we do belong to Myrtle Baptist Church, Pastor Brandon Crowley, who is phenomenal, so incredible, um, and a gay man himself and very proud about it, which is so powerful and inspiring, always speaking truth to power. Um, so I am a part of that community and have people like that in my life. I I'm also in search of that selling within my own spirit of home and what it means for me. And I begin to embrace home, returning to it, being a place within, um, and uh and finding home within me, wherever I go. Wherever I go, being within me. And some ways that I'm trying to live that more out loud is through different symbols like cowboy boots, wear my cowboy boots more frequently. My father's a big cowboy boot wearer. I know, at least certainly growing up, he always wore cowboy boots. And so when I see them things on my feet, it makes me feel like a Texan. It makes me feel like a southerner. It reminds me of my family. Um, you know, returning home also is, you know, there was a time in my life where I do feel like I was even more fearless. There was a time in my life where I felt like I was even more unbridled and authentic. And so returning home for me is also getting back to that place of having that unbridled confidence of knowing more of who I am and not second guessing it, taking more and more risk on myself. Because growing up as a young, as a young kid, I was definitely that. And I still have that character and I still have that personality, but I do deal with way more insecurity today than I did growing up. And I and some of that has come from the process of me coming out, the process of losing family and friends and having to recalibrate my sense of worth in the midst of that, of those losses. Um, it's it's come with the shifts and the ebb and flow in the world around what we say in society is valuable. We see that with how in 2020 with George Floyd, everybody was all up in the air about and and excited about supporting black people, and we're starting to see that trip that recede and go backwards. And so sometimes it takes a jab at your self-esteem when the public is having conversations about your worth and your dignity. Amen. That does something to you when you have to experience that as a black person, but when you have to also experience it as a as a queer person. You're seeing your identities being debated on the main stage. Like that, that does something to a person. And so I have realized the ways in which that has impacted me even subconsciously. And so getting home, returning home for me is about. Unlearning all of the things that have told me that I'm not worthy of dignity and respect.

Patrick 44:38

I feel you. I feel you. And I think the way you articulated it is quite profound. But I also think a part of that recalibration and that researching is something that I've been living through for a few years. And I've learned to come to it from a place of peace and silence. And also to understand that that moment is the moment when life is preparing you for something else. That cannot be on your radar, even the thing that you've been praying for and manifesting, but it will be birthed into the world in a different kind of way. It's not learning to feel comfortable in those spaces of recalibration. And it is only exacerbated and accelerated by the questioning of your identity and your worth based upon your skin color or who you choose to build a life with. But I think that's a bit essential work of being human. What you're describing.

SPEAKER_01 45:43

It's necessary. It's so necessary and it is continuous. So I think, you know, I'm also reminding myself to detach from the outcome. I'm a big fan of the law of detachment. And I think it's so important that we be able to detach from the outcome of anything. And in doing so, that is how we free ourselves up to receive the thing. But it obviously requires deep belief in the thing, um, also being possible, and that you, in fact, already have it. It already is possessed by you. And I think that has um been really game-changing for me, um, certainly, to navigate these times, to navigate my identity, to navigate my circumstances as well, um, but ultimately um to continue to purge myself of the junk that clutters our sense and our compass and our understanding of what we know is true. Deep within home is what you know is true.

Patrick 46:53

Jonathan, thank you. Thank you so much for your time today. I appreciate you always and always just so proud of what you are doing there in Boston and in the broader world because it's it's necessary. We need the fearless people right now.

SPEAKER_01 47:08

We need it. They will save us and we will save us. Um, we will save us. But that's why leadership is so important. That's why we do what we do at leadership, brainer, because we understand that if we can invest in our leaders, that our leaders have a responsibility for impacting the masses. So we cannot forget about making sure that our leaders are good. Um, and that as much as we want our leaders to take care of us, we also got to take care of our leaders. That's right. Um, because they have a responsibility. And if we're gonna hold them accountable the way that we hold them accountable, then we got to do our part um and not just expect a lot. We also gotta invest a lot.

Patrick 47:44

Invest. Invest. Thank you, Jonathan.

SPEAKER_01 47:48

Thank you, Patrick, and congratulations on another season, my friend.

Patrick 47:52

Thank you, thank you. More to come. Yeah. To those of you who are watching or listening, remember we all have a voice. We all will lead a legacy. And the journey home is how we learn to embody both. Thank you, Jonathan. Thank you.