Intergenerational Trauma

Introduction to Intergenerational Trauma 0:00

Well, welcome back to Better Black Health, sponsored by Genetic Sequence Multivitamins for African Americans. You can find those at sequence multivitamins.com. We're really happy to be having kind of a dark discussion today. I know I'm going to laugh all through it because you have to laugh at these things. The American Psychological Association defined it as a phenomenon in which descendants of a person who has experienced a terrifying event like slavery shows adverse emotional and behavioral reactions to the event.

similar to themselves. So we are descendants of slaves and are we really still carrying some of the baggage associated with slavery? That's the question. Is it, oh man, it ended over 150 years ago. Why are we still talking about it? Well, that's what we're gonna talk about today. Today we have Xavier Allen as an educator, mathematician, learning coach, math coach, professor, my goodness. Welcome, Mr. Allen. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Hall. Good to be here. Excellent. We're going to have a discussion.

He assists hundreds of people finding their confidence, their genius, and skills to empower themselves. People kind of help. You just help people all over the place, huh? That's my purpose. That's it. Right, right. And you said the community, people in the community are interdependent, right? Yes. Tell us a little bit about that. You know, community, you know, as we know, it comes from coming together, communing. There's all kinds of communities. When we talk about community, you know, where we live, a lot of times based on cultural lines, it's a group of people who are, who share similar experiences, similar values, and hopefully similar goals.

And then based on that, they create similar experiences that they wanna go through together to try and achieve, you know, to certain qualities of life. Right. So how, tell me how that relates to this intergenerational trauma.

How Trauma Passes Through Families 2:06

Tell me, tell me a little bit of what you think about that. So, you know, you can't, you can't exist without someone bringing you here and someone assisting in how you grow and develop. You know, we are all, no one person does it alone, as I like to say, you know, and so whatever your degree of success, you know, whether you're a really notable celebrity or just a person, you know, your day to day, The things we accomplish come from people who have influenced us, people who work with us, people that we work with and then we change as a result of that.

So when we talk about intergenerational, each generation, mother and father to daughter and son and on and on, they pass on the things they've experienced either overtly through very clear lessons and conversation or implicitly through you know, the way they interact, the emotions they share, how they interact, things they don't share. So all of us, we are all the sum of all of our experiences. And then when we're, you know, developing our young, that influences what we do with them. So when we talk about, you know, really great things that happened in our lives, you know, you had a really awesome mother and father, your upbringing was just a joy.

You look back on it with fondness. That comes across when you're raising your children and you're helping them navigate their early years or their growing years. Similarly, if you really missed out on some things, if you had trauma, if you had violence, if you had molestation, loneliness, rejection, those things create dysfunction within ourselves. And then that becomes a part of how we view parenting, how we view our children, how we raise them as well. And so do do so you're saying and some of that is like we've had people with, you know, it grew up to be criminals.

They're they're really a lot of them are lashing out because of a dysfunctional childhood. Absolutely. Absolutely. You know, many, many people don't want to hear that. You know, a lot of times when we're a victim of crime. So I, you know, I live in Cleveland from Cleveland. Um, it's been many of my years in East Cleveland, Cleveland proper for those listeners who are not familiar areas to inner city. Uh, and like a lot of cities, there are issues with that come with poverty and dysfunctions, a lot of crime or whatnot.

People very rarely want to hear that the perpetrator, you know, there's reasons why they did this. You know, a lot of times we want to fear vengeance and you know, they hurt my baby or hurt my loved one. But the fact is very few people just go out and say, I want to hurt people badly. You know, there's a saying hurt people hurt people. And so, you know, when those different hurts are not addressed, they start mushrooming into much bigger and deeper problems. You know, there's a there's a friend of mine, a psychiatrist friend of mine shared a fact with me that it's been well known for many years now in psychology that when a trauma occurs within a family, If this is not addressed and dealt with, it can take up to seven generations for that thing to work itself out of the family line.

My goodness. Seven generations? That's 20 years as a generation. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Wow. Wow. Look at African-Americans. You know, like you said, slavery was a barge in 1865. which we all know that's just a technicality because it continued through sharecropping and Jim Crow and so on and so forth. So you think about all the different atrocities that we endured, not just one trauma, but a multitude every day and not having the mental health, the healing that was necessary. Those things got passed on and passed down.

Right. And so one of the things they talked about was self-esteem.

Self-Esteem, Colorism, and Early Messaging 5:57

And there was a big study that looked at little black children and showing them dolls, black dolls, white dolls on YouTube. And a crazy high number of them said the white doll is good, the black doll is bad. And they had learned that very early, two, three, four years old, that they're somehow inferior. They would attribute good, bad things to the people, to those dolls, right? And then we think about colorism and featurism where they say, you know, that we do, you know, someone's beautiful if they have more white features.

When I was in school, they said, oh, you have good hair, right? I used to hear that. good hair I mean that that's because my hair is is is is you know straighter that made it good that means you know someone who doesn't have good hair they you know so that and I've heard that very very early on you know and then that was something that that I didn't I never liked that you know what I'm saying I know different hair but that's something that that that we sort of have and we get that very early on and that affects really our ability to be successful doesn't it man absolutely man that's actually I mean that's a great example of how something crosses generational lines you know um when we talk about you know like like most many black families we familiar with folks saying I think I just heard Chris rocks in his last special how black folks were like how dark is that baby you know You know, let me see, let me see if that child's here.

Ooh, that child got some kinky hair. You know that? All right, man. I just saw Chris Rocks thinking that. Woo. Talk about trauma, boy. Yeah. Yeah, man. Yeah. He went all, he, he didn't make anything better. What was your take on that? I know this is all, what was your take on that, Chris Rock? My feeling on- Just Chris Rock and Will Smith, his latest one was, I can't remember the name of it, but it's three addresses. Selective Outrage, that's the name of it. Selective Outrage, which we see, and we can do a whole other thing on Selective Outrage, because I think he's absolutely right as far as Selective Outrage, for sure.

What did you think about that show? I'm gonna tell you man, there were some pieces I heard that were cringe worthy. However, my opinion is I love comics, I love artists because when they're doing it right, they make us go to uncomfortable places. And Chris, he said, one, I thought he handled getting slapped in the face on the Oscars really well. And he went a whole year without saying it. He's only human, so I mean, if you haven't seen this special, you can tell when he starts talking about it, it really affected him.

But to your bigger question, I think it's necessary for it to put conversation out there. Because for us to, going back to this thing about interdependency, we have to grow, us as individuals, but also us as a society, us as a human race. And we're only gonna grow by being forced to have tough conversations. The trauma that you and I are talking about today, a lot of this stuff lives because people don't really want to deal with it. There's a reason we got a phrase in our language called keep it in the closet, coming out the closet, because we all want to throw stuff away and just pretend it wasn't there.

And the key to health, and you say, well, what is what we're talking about to do with health is education. This is the key to improving your health, no matter what it is, whether it's math or history, you know, I mean, education, all those things contribute to your health. And so people, you know, I'll say people who have a PhD or MD live longer.

Chris Rock, Selective Outrage, and Tough Conversations 10:03

overall the people who have a master's degree and they live longer than people who have a college degree and they live longer than people who have a high school diploma and they live longer than people with the GED, you know what I'm saying? Isn't that something? They live longer than people who don't have a GED. Isn't that something? That's just amazing, but it's just so when you educate yourself no matter how or whatever age it is, it's key and there are people who are uneducated and 25 and think they're done.

I'm a complete, you can't tell me nothing. You know what I mean, right? Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And boy, you're done learning already. I'm 60 and still learning, still a work in progress, right? And so life is your entire life, you're learning and bettering yourself and trying to figure out things so we can do something. We're not just talking about this to wring our hands. We're talking about this because it's a problem. And like you say, as you work through it, as you become aware of a problem, you can address it.

Isn't that right? That's absolutely right. I think it's a massive failure on our society, on how we deal with education. When I came through school and began being a high school teacher back in the mid-90s, you know, I came out with a certain mentality. No one said it, but what was insinuated was that I was gonna go in these rooms, open these kids' heads up, these young adults, and drop knowledge in, and they're gonna just be fine. And however, what I've learned, thank goodness, from being around, you know, really master teachers over my career, is that teaching is a craft, man, and you really gotta start getting to know people, and learning how people think, how they develop, how their emotions play with their logic, And education is a whole different thing.

You know, so where I'm a mathematician and I teach math, but really what I'm teaching people is how to empower themselves. I'm teaching them how to think, how to think about themselves and equipping them to do whatever comes down the line. And so as I grew as an educator, I began to see that, you know, there's, there's not this imaginary separation I thought existed between what happens in class and what happens in life. You, every time I'm, Spending time with a person, I'm addressing that whole person.

And if I can help them be more empowered with how they use their mind, every decision they make about themselves leads to a healthier life and healthier person. Because our health is a reflection of our choices. And then we live these lives according to these choices. So you can't separate health from how you work, how you love, how you play. All these things are tied into your well-being. well you know it's a it's a you know it's a it's great point because and and everybody's not what everybody can be a doctor everybody can be a good teacher right that's right you know everybody everybody tries though right especially with the internet everybody's trying now man everybody's trying to trying to teach but i i you know i go in the classroom and and like it's like you know see a doctor you know what i mean so i'm like you know i go to that classroom and Everybody's all draped over the their deaths and they look like they haven't had any sleep and You know, and it's particularly African-american boys, you know the girls usually look half-interested with the boys look like they couldn't be more disinterested and that's I want to inspire and so how do you go into a room like I only I try not to do it very often but I do get us to do it how do you go in a room like that and teach and I want to talk about that a little bit here, man, because we're talking about trauma across people.

We're talking about health choices.

Education as a Path to Health and Empowerment 13:51

And when I'm dealing with these young men, because you figure 13 through 18, that's a young man. It's going to take years to become a man, but that's a young man. Puberty has started. He's a young man. These young people, when you start When you go into a room to work, you have to have your ears open. You have two eyes, two ears. That means you need to be taking in data, observing. Twice the rate at which you're talking and trying to put something in. And you'll see that these young men, they are hiding.

They're hiding from feelings. They're hiding from vulnerability. You see that many of these young people, they're confused. They don't know how to be, how to be a young man, how to be a young woman. They don't know how to be a scholar. How do I deal with this world that's coming at me? You see a lot of posturing. You see, when you listen to them, you hear at home there are adults who these young people, they can tell these adults don't know really much further how much further to help them. They may come from very loving families, doctor, but many of these parents, it breaks my heart how many parents say to me, tell me what to do with my child.

And they should be the authority on their child. How many parents say to me, I don't know what else to do. with a 14-year-old boy. You know, you got four more years with this guy. You tell me, you got a dead end now? So you meet these young people. Being honest, right? They don't know what to do. Yeah, they don't. They don't. Well, listen, I'm going to go a layer deeper. Simple answer, though, right? Yeah. A layer deeper with it is how many people, most people who have children were people who liked having sex.

They were out. They were dating, kicking, they were humping. Oh, baby, we pregnant. And, you know, maybe they're responsible, but they weren't family planning. So they got thrust into this before they were ready. You know what I mean? But these children, you start seeing that they are the result of incomplete or at best insufficient upbringing. And so, but now they're like, well, I got to figure it out. And now they're posturing themselves like the adults they see around them. But a bright light here is when you're in a classroom, that's one of the few times that another person willingly is vulnerable to you.

When I sit in the class, I go in with the expectation, even if I got an attitude, my expectation is you're going to, you know more than me and you're going to give me something, you know, that I need. I may have an arms crossed mentality, but I'm still sitting there. That's the bright light. Cause that means I have to have my skill up or whoever you are as an educator say, okay, Let me not waste this opportunity and try and get that door to crack open just a little bit more and I can start making some progress.

And that's back to really some of your community, that the teacher has to feel a responsibility that if I help this young guy, he's going to raise up the community, right? Absolutely, absolutely. And be responsible. And there's so many people that will say, you know, I had a dysfunctional home, but I had a teacher who became a mentor who I you know, hung around even after I was out of their class. You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Looking for advice because they knew they, they knew they needed it.

They knew that person made them feel special and maybe they didn't get that anywhere else. But it's a, you know, it's, it's just a, it's just, you know, I don't know. But how, so how do you use that education to try to help people increase their wellness and their health? The short answer is to get them to be self-reflective. You know, the goal with, with, with my teaching is to get people to start looking at themselves and looking at themselves as a, as a huge amount of potential versus all these flaws.

So like when you talk to a lot of young, you know, teenagers, even adults, even if I've teached the causal, I see what adults a lot, even seniors, there's a lot of negative self-talk. They see themselves as this mountain of failures, this sequence of disappointments. The most important thing is getting people to see themselves in their possibilities. When we crack that door open, then we can start talking about strategies, start talking about, you know, processes and objectives. It's important also to, you know, I'm seeing the big picture.

You set little goals. People need to start getting victories. And the world we live in, Dr. Hall, is really overwhelming. You know, if you think about it, this is 2023. I remember being in high school or even middle school in the 80s and 90s, in the 80s. us daydreaming, how, wouldn't it be cool if I could just have a phone, I could call you, I could see your face, and remember this?

Reaching Disengaged Students 18:30

The world has moved so swiftly, and our growth as human beings, psychologically, emotionally, has not moved that fast. Yeah, man, so we're overwhelmed, and you see the overwhelm in a lot of people, and people feel, I think a lot of people compare themselves to what they see the progress in society, and they don't see the progress themselves, and they feel like, I should be doing more. Well, I think that, you know, the social media has got this thing where, you know, you were talking about how people are down on themselves, but what you see on social media are people that are super up on themselves.

And I see that as even more of a sign of insecurity. You know, I just got a new car. I just... you know i'm so beautiful like all this stuff and um you know it's like why do you have to do that if you're beautiful you don't need to brag about being beautiful everybody sees it right yeah they're looking for that affirmation right you know right and but it's um you know it's it's so then if you feel like i'm not beautiful or i'm not smart it's just accentuates that right and it makes people help be more on down so they really quietly Like you said, just a big mound of flaws, right?

I'm not this enough. I'm not smart enough. I'm not this. I'm not a good parent. I'm not a good cook. It will make you want to go jump off a bridge. And that's why we have all this depression, right? Man, let me tell you something. And this doesn't bode well for us. We got to do something about this. But almost without fail, when I get one of these teenagers just to the side, one on one, and I start eye contact, talking to them, saying, I see you. I see you, you have value. How you doing? What's going on?

Dr. Hall, man, the number of young people, girl and boy, eyes welling up, ready to start tearing, someone crying, the amount of hurt they're carrying, 10 minutes ago, they might've been the most braggadocious, big mouth, you know, and it's all a show. And so, I mean, you know, I don't, like I said, we're not really dealing with the fact that, man, no one, very few people are what they seem, man, you know, and if we, I do it in my classroom, you do it in your practice, but more of us in this community, we have to make it a priority to tell people, you are fine where you are here.

Let me help you have more, more confidence in who you are today, but also give you skills so you can do something that's more meaningful to you, some change that's more meaningful. Let's not pretend, you know, I'll talk to the young girls, young boys, you know, I'm not worried about all your weave and all that. If you want to wear that cool, that's fine. I don't knock your style, but I see you as a real person. I talk to them about who you are here. I see how you think. I see how you interact with your friends.

When we start elevating these very human aspects of what they do and the value they bring, then it opens the door for them to start saying, hey, maybe I can add value. And so we want people who, you know, we're trying to send every kid to college. We want them to get these careers. We want America to be great, and it's at a third. You can't have that. if folks feel empty, because they're not gonna pursue that. So I have students who are failing algebra one right now, and they know all the reasons why they should be doing their work, but they're so depressed, they just every day make that same bad decision.

And they only turn that corner when one by one they start seeing, I got value, maybe I can do something with my life, you know what I mean? And if I can take it back to this thing about intergenerational trauma, It's almost as if they're at a breaking point. Everything that's been dumped down is too heavy for them. Because when you listen to them, many of them can't even articulate why they feel so down. But they know, I'm not happy at home. I'm not happy here. I feel empty. And just giving a kid a hug, a teenager a hug, you know what I'm saying?

Say, no, I'm gonna listen. Man, you get an emotional outlining and whatnot. So these are the kind of things I'm seeing on a daily basis. That's right. And so what as parents and potential parents or, you know, and, you know, the adults in other people's lives, people who have nieces and nephews and stuff. What can we do? I mean, does that help when they, you kind of say, you know, kind of reflect back, you know, I see you're caring so much. And then they, does that, is that productive? It is, man.

It requires a lot of repetition. You know, people, you know, my mom, bless her, you know, she felt like she yelled at once and we were supposed to get it. And if I ain't getting it, I got in trouble the next time, you know what I mean? Well, we know better now. It requires a lot of representation. So it is productive, but it's a message that has to be said over and over to that young person.

Self-Reflection, Authenticity, and Escapism 23:09

I cannot emphasize enough how important it is to walk your talk. You gotta be the message that you wanna send. So if I'm telling this young person about letting go of things they can't control, being more positive, they gotta see me doing it. I'm talking about dealing with tough things and accepting your human frailty. I also need to be transparent as I'm seeing it. One thing is I share with my students, and I don't know if I ever shared it with you, but before I became who I am today, I went away to college, man, and I went away on a full ride.

But like a lot of you, I didn't have any goals. I just wanted to get away from home. I got to college. I pledged my fraternity, Kappa Alpha Psi, and then proceeded to party my butt off. And within a year, I lost my full ride scholarship. Within three more years, I had flunked out of college. And I hit rock bottom. And it was only at that point that I then begin rebuilding myself in a very real way. And so when I'm with my students, I tell my friends, I let them know, I feel more class than you've ever taken yet.

You know what I mean? And that authenticity, that willingness to be totally open with all my failures and stuff and still say, I know I'm great. I know I'm a genius and you are too. They haven't seen that and heard that. For folks who are listeners and want to help their young people, you got to be that message. Be authentic and be honorable and say, you know, I got problems too, right? A lot of people don't want to admit that they have problems. I confess to people who have hypertension, I have hypertension, I take pills every day.

It's not a bragging point. The bragging point is to have a normal blood pressure. And I think that helps. But people want to put up this facade of invulnerability. And even doing that is an added weight on your vulnerability, right? Absolutely, man. A lot of people are trying to escape. I'm sure you see a lot of escapism, right? A lot of people, they're trying to escape through, you know, alcohol, through weed, through sex, you know, whatever. And I see it in the young people too. I see it in adult students at the college.

And only when you start facing up to your stuff, you know, and you help people you love see the importance of dealing with it. And it's not as bad as I thought it was going to be. Then we start making some progress, you know. But a lot of what we're presenting as success is still escapism. We're traveling, we're doing this, we're buying that. It's just a different type, but it just has a better social currency than the person who smokes crack over here. But you're still trying to escape facing, hey, how do I really feel today?

You know what I'm saying? What am I really giving? Right. And we have all that baggage on top of living in a community that can be very racist, right? Yes. So, you know, they were talking about racial battle fatigue, right? But that's a social phenomenon which a person experienced chronic racial discrimination and they develop physiologic, psychological, and emotional strain due to the excessive amount of energy expended on race-related stressors. You know, people following you at the store, police stopping you disproportionately.

all those things, so we've got, it just seems like it's too much for us to rise above, doesn't it? It does, man, but you know, it's a funny thing, my grandparents used to always say, just keep living, right, when we were little. They tried to explain, they didn't even explain, they just, you just keep living. You don't know it all when you were young. I knew everything when I was 20, right? Right, right. Well, I believe it was Fannie Lou Hamer used to say, I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired.

And to your comments, to the point you just laid out that data, I've realized now I'm at a point where I've reached that I'm tired of being tired. So the advice I would give to folks who are listening is that when we talk about race and racism, there is no convenient time for anybody. You gotta deal with that right then, you know what I'm saying? And so even in the classroom, everywhere I work, I don't pull any punches. I'm respectful and I make sure I, even when I'm saying difficult things, I say it with love.

Racial Battle Fatigue and Black Resilience 27:30

So people know I love you and I want you to be strong. I want you to be empowered, but I'm not going to sugarcoat and just cause it might be something you don't want to hear. So, you know, my colleagues, you know, I've got white colleagues, we talk that talk, you know, I'll explain, you know, that's this, this is racist or this is systemic, or, you know, you may be missing this because you don't have to see this, you know, I'll talk to my black students and I'll explain like, yeah, all that's true, but you got to own this, your responsibility.

You got to be accountable, you know, One thing that I've realized is that I had to go through a process where when you're black in America, you may first be totally oblivious to it. Then you start hearing about it. No, it can't be that bad. And then you start digging into the history like you get angry. You're mad. Well, what I've learned is important to keep on going past those points. Keep going beyond because a lot of us think black in America means knowing all the bad stuff that happened to us.

But the reality, Dr. Hall, is that if you really want to be a strong and power black person, you got to look at how did we deal with all this stuff? Look at the other side of the coin. So yeah, there were lynchings, there was rapes, murders of infants, and yada, yada, yada. But the folks who survived, what were they thinking? What were they feeling? How did they continue on and continue these amazing, humane, you know, success oriented people, because that's where the gold is. That's where the treasure is.

Not looking at the atrocities, but how do we respond to it? And when you keep digging into your history, then you've reached a point of peace, because I know my value now as a black man. Can't nobody take this from me now. You know my value on planet Earth. Anywhere I go, I'm not insecure ever again. And that comes from continuing to pass at night. So now I can teach not only black, but white students or any students. And it'd be very authentic, where when I first started, I feel kind of like, I'm teaching these little white kids, you know what I'm saying?

White people, yeah. And I had all this stuff in the back of my head, all that bitterness or whatever. But that piece, so for anyone who's listening, I encourage, man, you need to follow the authentic, the information, so you get to a point of peace. And for folks who are not black, the same thing, you know, I've told colleagues, white colleagues, one of the best things you can do for young black children is, push them to learn their culture. You know what I'm saying? You can't do it but say they need to know their culture because we live in a world where cultures matter.

Every group comes out of a cultural base. That's part of the beauty of the human family. And we're the only ones who don't know our cultural base, tend to reject it and keep trying to go to other, it's like trying to move into everybody else's house and not enjoying your house and just being a good neighbor. Right, right. And we come from a very, Strong cultural base, you know, like we're living we're living this, you know, I mean it's and with with all the things we've talked about african-americans have the lowest suicide rate Yeah, always depression lowest anxiety rate.

There's a lot of depression and suicide You know what? I mean there is but it's lower than other racial ethnic groups. Can I say something to that? Yeah. Oh you know, something that was controversial before my time, but I think Jimmy the Greek made mention of this. But, uh, I mean, we, we, we were engineered, man. We were the strongest of us survived. Right. For worse. I mean, I tell my children every night when I tuck them in, like you, we're the children of the ones who made it. And I, you have, I think we got to deal with that.

That side of our experience in this, in the slave trade is that all the people who swans who say, I can't make it no more, you know, for whatever reason, God bless their spirit. But once you say, I'm going to make it through, I don't know what's coming, but I got to survive with their children. So that kind of strength and, you know, physiologically, but also psychologically exists in our community. It is. And that's multi-generational. That's intergenerational. Absolutely. Absolutely. We've got this baggage.

But we also have this greatness that has allowed us to be 13% of the population. Yet we've got mayors of the major cities. We've got a vice president. We've got a rock president. We're still 13% of the population. Just go to the major cities and see what black people are doing. They're doing amazing things. And look at rap. man, look at it. Yeah, hip hop culture worldwide. You know, a lot of people in America don't realize a lot of these young artists, they are 100,000 there's even millionaires because of the global revenue.

Culture, Wellness, and Closing Remarks 32:00

Like, so if folks that you haven't even heard of Dr. Hall, who are performing and traveling around Europe and Asia, and they're making really nice coin, you know, so yeah, and that's our culture, you know, and in fact, when you Even when you bring up the impact of our culture, you know, one of the things that we have not fully dealt with is that every culture on the planet is influenced by African history, you know, in a very positive way, because African civilization were the first civilizations.

And we now know beyond any doubt, archaeologically proven Africans went all over the globe, shared their philosophies and their learnings and everything with all these other people who were at earlier stages of learning. but help them come along. So everyone is influenced. So you find our prayer, where we go, what's happening there resonates with us as well. And we resonate with them. Right. And we've got to reach in and keep hugging that. Right. Not just the innovators, it's just across the board because that's really where we need to be and we have to kind of resist against this oppression.

The thing that makes us not want to go to school, not want to better ourselves. We have to look at the data, look at the history, learn it, embrace it for its good and for its bad and then move on. And that stuff makes you not want to make healthy choices too if I can tie it back to that because A lot of us use food as an escapism, right? A lot of these teenagers and even trash food, but when you start feeling a lot more genuine about your value, your beauty, and you're like, hey, you want to take care of this vessel, now you in.

It's easy to exercise and eat well. You're like, I got some things I want to do. Right, right, right. That's outstanding. Well, listen, Mr. Xavier, Alan, if someone wanted to, I know you're a coach, a career coach, professional coach, you know, if someone wanted to reach out to you there in Northeast Ohio, or even digitally, have any way for someone to reach out for you? Absolutely. Anytime. I'm on social, all platforms, IG, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and they all have the same handle. S-E-A-N-X-A-V-R, the Sean XAVR.

And they can find me on all those platforms. And they can even email me at that same handle at gmail.com. I'm easy to find. Excellent, excellent. Listen, we really, really appreciate it. Again, this episode was brought to you by Genetic Sequence, multivitamins for African Americans. Have you heard of them? I have. I have heard of them, actually, yeah. Looking forward to getting on that subscription, because what I read on the website, man, I was like, oh, this is about time, man. Something's geared towards my genetics.

So yeah, absolutely. I appreciate it. I appreciate it. Thank you, man. So the website is sequence multivitamins.com. They have versions for men, women, and men and women over 50. And so we encourage you to go to the website, learn about it, because nutrition is the key. I mean, a diet is best, but if you don't have the time to get the perfect diet, you take a multivitamin with a meal, and it kind of helps fool your body into thinking that you're eating something more healthy than you were. I got to tell you real quick before you.

I got to tell your listeners, because they can't see you, man. But if y'all can see Dr. Hall, this cat don't look like he's over 50, man, if he wasn't for that. The salt and pepper hair, man. I don't have the discipline to dye my hair. That's the problem. I'm vain. I would dye it if I had the discipline, but I'd have the black hair with the gray coming in. This guy's a picture of Dorian Gray, man. Not a wrinkle anywhere. It's still hard to get up in the morning, I'll tell you. Your parents and grandparents, keep living, boy.

I tell you, it's not easy. All we can do is the best we can. But anyway, I really appreciate you coming. We may even have to have you come back and we can kind of explore some of these other things and maybe get back to see what Chris Rock and Will Smith. Yeah, yeah. So much we did unpack. I appreciate you having me, Dr. Hall, man. Anytime, man. This is something I'm passionate about. I really want people to be empowered and just get out here, man, start really living their best lives, man. So anytime, man, I'd love to get back.

Thank you. I appreciate it. Very good. Take care. You too.