Welcome

Welcome home cojourners. I'm glad you're here for

I've been told I still am.

Yes, it may seem a bit bold.

Welcome home, cojourners.

I'm glad you're here for another episode. I'm Dr. Tama Bryant,

here to facilitate your journey back home to yourself. I am so excited for you to be with me for this

episode. And I will start as I often do with a poem. This poem is by Lucille Clifton,

and it's entitled Lazarus. First day. I rose from stiffening into a pen of light,

and a voice calling Lazarus this way, and I floated, or rather swam in a river of sound,

toward what seemed to be forever. I was almost, almost there when I heard behind me,

Lazarus, come forth, and I found myself twisting in the light, for this is the miracle.

Mary, Martha, at my head and at my feet, singing my name was the same voice. Yes. Oh, my goodness. I love the work of Lucille Clifton,

and I believe we can all imagine times in our lives when we were going in one direction,

perhaps toward our own destruction and and something within us or someone

around us reminded us of our name, of our purpose, of our possibility, reminded us that we

had the power, the capacity, the calling to come forth. And so I hope on today that you will

journey with me with the topic, how to persist. Perseverance. How to persist. And so the very word persistence and the word perseverance speak to the reality of

obstacles. It means to go forward despite discouragement, despite setbacks, despite challenges. And I just believe if you are listening on

today, that you can relate to the need to be able to push past the difficulty, to push past the challenges to persist, that anything in life you would

like to achieve, whether around your wellness, your vocation, your calling, your gifts,

your relationships, they will not be accomplished without struggle, without challenge, without the

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