Welcome home,

Yes, I am.

Despite the lies I've been told, I still am.

Yes, it may seem a bit bold, but I am.

Welcome home, Cojourners. I'm glad you're here. I'm Dr. Taylor Bryant, licensed psychologist, ordained minister, and sacred artists. Here to facilitate the journey as you come home to yourself. We'd like to start today with a reading as we do most of our episodes,

and this will be an excerpt from the poem, Morning Song and Evening Walk by Sonia Sanchez.

Tonight, in need of you and God, I move imperfect through this ancient city. Quiet, no one hears. No one feels the tears

of multitudes. The silence thickens. I have lost the shore of your kind seasons. Who will hear my voice, nasal against distinguished actors?

Oh, I am tired of voices without sound. I will rest on this ground full of mass hymns.

It was a time to be born, forced forward a time to wander inside drums, the good times with

eyes like stars, and soldiers without medals or weapons, but honor, yes, it was a time.

Something moves out of the flames. Call it spirit or apparition till no fire or body or ash remain.

We breathe out and smell the world again.

I, I, I, I, I, I, O, I, I O, I, I ye, I, I mean, men, men, a woman, woman.

Yes.

Sonia Sanchez, if you are not familiar with her work,

please look it up, read her and listen to her voice

as she reads her own work.

So very powerful as we consider the power of voice, the necessity of voice, and being tuned into the reality that the power of life and death

lies in the tongue, that it makes a difference what we speak

and what we hear. So considering that reality, our theme on today is silencing the inner critic.

Silencing the inner critic. So many times we are bombarded with outside messages

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