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. We got a lot to get to. and of course before we get to any of it we have a ritual on this show and this ritual is pretty

important especially on a day like today audience. We got a lot to get to. And of course, before we get to any of it, we have a ritual on

this show. And this ritual is pretty important, especially on a day like today, when the news is

newsin. And in a moment, like the moment we find ourselves in. And we call this ritual a moment of

gratitude. And we do this every day because, yes, Black Talklandia conversations on this show are

pretty heavy. And yes, we are living lives

that as human beings and the planet right now are also dealing with a whole lot of circumstances.

And so we never want to approach the stories that we're going to talk about. We never want to

approach any decisions we have to make in our own lives from a position of feeling emotionally defeated.

We always want to make sure that before

we do the heavy work of figuring out how to change our lives or how to change the world, we are

tapping into emotions that are going to allow us to rest in a sense of joy, gratitude, and appreciation.

And we know that those emotions are important because we have seen through our lived experience

and the science has confirmed, for example, that when you are rooted in gratitude, you cannot also be trapped by fear.

It's biochemically impossible for your body to occupy a space of gratitude and appreciation

while being stuck by fear. It's a beautiful thing. You cannot, for example, be trapped by loneliness

and depression when you are rooted in joy, right?

And so we want to make sure that we are curating the emotional environment that is going to be most advantageous for us before we get into the heavy work of Black Talklandia conversation.

So, as I said, the ritual is called a moment of gratitude and it is pretty simple.

So simple, in fact fact it goes a little something

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