Welcome to another episode of Lurie Breaks It Down, a podcast where we dig deeply to connect the dots on the issues that shape our world.

I'm Lurie Daniel Favors, author, activist, attorney, and the host of the Lurie Daniel Favors show on Sirius XM's Urban View, Channel 126. If you like what you're about to hear, go ahead and give us five stars and then tell everybody that you know. And if you don't like it, just, child, keep it to yourself and pray our strength. Okay, thank you so much. Also, don't forget to check out my YouTube page, Lurie Daniel Favor's Media, where you should subscribe, like, and share because then you'll get notified when I post videos from my show, which I do just about every single day and when I go live with my YouTube audience. Lots to get to today. And, of course, as we do every single day that's ending in why,

when we are on these airwaves, we also have a ritual that we use before we get started.

And the reason we have this ritual is because, as I've said, we are here in Black Talklandia.

Black Talklandia is not easy, right? This show is all shot, no chaser. And so because of that,

we want to make sure that we are rooted

and grounded in as much of an emotional sense of wellness as we possibly can be before we get to

the serious work that we have to do so we have a ritual on this show oh and by by serious work

i mean the serious work of learning what these issues are so that we can

understand how we as a people can make this world a better place, right? That's a heavy calling.

And so in addition to that heavy calling and the fact that we just trying to figure out how to

navigate life because life be life, we realize that we need to be intentional about the

emotional state of being that we are in before we try to tackle the big issues of the

world or the big issues of our individual lives. So we have a ritual on this show that allows

us to really center ourselves and get rooted in a sense of joy, gratitude, and appreciation.

And the reason we get rooted in joy, gratitude and appreciation, I mean, in addition to everything

I just said, is because we have learned from lived experience and the science has confirmed

for us that when we are rooted in gratitude, for example, we cannot simultaneously be trapped

by fear. There's a weird biochemical thing that happens with our emotions and our hormones,

and if you are grounding

yourself in gratitude, grounding yourself in appreciation, you cannot be restricted by fear and

loneliness and depression. And that is really important. Not to say it's a catch-all or a cure-all,

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