Nicki Minaj Exposes the Dark Truth About the Music Industry (EP 200)

- It was like constant spiritual warfare. - The bad guy (beep) found dressed at the devil. - In Nigeria, Christians are being targeted, driven from their homes and killed. - I felt like I bought a knife to a gun fight. - Oh my gosh, what did I sign up for? - You think the music scene is very demonically organized? - I started feeling like everyone wanted to like stake their claim into human beings, like they were property. - Is the Illuminati real? - It definitely is a group of people that have made things very difficult for me. Has it been a spiritual warfare? Absolutely. - From your relationship with God, you only care about is God pleased with me. - Who is Jesus to you now? - Jesus is. - Hey, before we get into today's episode, I wanna share two quick things with you. First, if these videos have meant anything to you, if they've encouraged your faith or helped you see the gospel a little bit more clearly, I just wanna ask you to subscribe. A lot of people tune in every single week and haven't hit the button yet. It only takes two seconds and it helps us keep putting these conversations in front of people who need them. And the second thing, this one I've honestly been really excited to say, I'm officially announcing our ministry's biggest live event to date open heaven live podcast tour. It's happening November 8th this year at the Pavilion at Toyota Music Factory in Irving, Texas. This is gonna be a night centered around worship, faith, real conversations and genuine community. I believe God is going to move it a powerful way and I would love for you to be in the room. Tickets are on sale right now. You can head to bricecropper.org/tour or just click the link in the description below. And please, only get your tickets through my official site or that link below. I recommend not buying from random resellers online. I believe this is going to be a really special night and I hope to see you there. All right, let's get into the episode. What's going on guys? Welcome back to our 200th episode of the Bricecropper podcast on Bryson today. We have a very incredible special guest. I'm super honored that she is sitting down with us. We have Nicki Minaj with us. - Hello. - Thank you for joining us. - Thank you for having me. I'm happy to be here. - Okay, so before you became one of the most recognizable voices in music, hundreds of millions of people know who you are. Who is Nicki Minaj? - Prior to being Nicki Minaj, I was just a fun kid. I was interested in pretty much everything inquisitive. I was loud. I would say I was a bossy little kid. - I like it. - Yeah, I would say I was kind of bossy, but always a big dreamer. You know, it's so funny because always like, when you're a kid and you're loud, it's always like a good thing. I feel like I gravitate towards like the loud kids growing up. You know, I feel like that's such a good thing. So you know, sometimes when you grow up, people are like, oh, you can't be loud, but I like the loud people growing up. That's just a good personality aspect. Now, when you were growing up before publicly, you said that life was hard growing up as a kid. Can you tell me a little bit about what life was like growing up for you? - In Trinidad, it was difficult. Well, first of all, I didn't feel that it was hard during the process. Like because up until I was about five years old, I lived in a house with many of my relatives in Trinidad. And we just got used to so many people in and out all the time. So grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, everyone, it didn't seem like it was a small space until we went back after years later. But I would say it was a volatile environment. One of my cousins, he would have episodes of just being violent. And so he would come back every now and then and we would have to, like my grandmother would tell all the children to get in one room and pray when he came to the United States. It was another sort of a fun, but volatile times life because just there was a lot of domestic fight where we would have to call the police and stuff to calm things down. So as a child, I would say, but interestingly enough around that neighborhood where I grew up, it wasn't out of the norm. You'd be surprised, like at that time cops were driving up and down all day every day. So we just started getting accustomed to that. We thought that that was normal. We didn't realize that that shouldn't have been happening and parents shouldn't fight to the point where police have to be called. But that was a big part of my growing up. - So it was a normal thing for violence in the area. Where did you grow up in the States when you met? - I grew up in South Side, Jamaica, Queens, New York. - Okay, and so how did that shape you as a kid? - It shaped me as a kid. Maybe it probably made me grow up a little too fast to try to have to decipher what was going on and also a lack of control, feeling a sense of control because you're a child and you can't control these adults, but they're obviously affecting you in your life. And you can't really speak your mind as a child, even though you're seeing what's going on and you have an opinion. So I would say it made me probably just have lots of thoughts that I would later sit with. And also I remember being a kid and thinking what I would never do and things that I would do and how I would be different when I became an adult. - Well, that's powerful because you can put it, for example, extract this example out. You can put someone in a home situation, let's say like they grew up with, maybe alcoholism is popular in someone's family. And either that person goes, "Oh, I never wanna do that thing ever again." And so they take the pivot or they kind of accidentally absorb that behavior, but you said, "No, I'm gonna take a stand and not absorb that behavior," which is really powerful. Well, the behavior that I was specifically thinking that I didn't wanna do was I didn't want to be submissive. I wanted to be a woman that put my foot down because even when I was a child, after the fighting, I would want my mother to leave sometimes. So she would tell us a lot of times that she was gonna leave after the fighting and we'd be like, "Okay, great." But then she would either leave and come back. We would have to come back or she just wouldn't. So I would always promise myself when I became an adult that I would be assertive. - Wow, so when you say, so I guess what you described makes me wonder, did you witness or maybe experience yourself like a lot of manipulation growing up and that's kind of you were like. - Well, I just thought that I didn't see adults keeping their word. And so it just drove me to want to be someone that kept my word. - Now, you mentioned earlier that when you were growing up, your grandma would put you in the room and you guys would kneel and pray to God. - We wouldn't kneel and pray, we wouldn't kneel, we would all be standing up. We would just be in one room standing up like, "Oh, you know, praying together." - Okay, and that was a very young part of your life. So how has that kind of played a role in your faith today knowing at a young age kind of that habit of going, I'm, we pray to God. Even, I mean, in that time it was a bad situation, but that habit being built so young, how has that affected your faith now? - It affected everything because it always instilled in me that there was something bigger than me, bigger than my fears and that if my grandmother was saying, was telling us to do this thing, then it must work. So of course it increased my faith. - Now, you know, you're in a season now where, which is super encouraging, you're fighting the current in many different ways, which a lot of people, it's very, very easy to not want to fight the current. A lot of people actually just go with emotion because they're afraid of feedback from any angle on whatever it may be. And as of lately, you've been talking about how Jesus has been a cornerstone to you. How has Jesus been given you strength in the season of doing exactly what you say you want to do, stand in firm and being a woman of your word? - What a relationship with the God does, is it changes the worldly system. And the world tells people that they should care about their validation. Like they teach people that they should care about the world's validation of what they do and who they are. But when you have a relationship with God, you only care about is God pleased with me. I know that if the Lord told me to do something, I know he's going to equip me with what I need to do it, come with me. So when I see all of these people that don't agree with me, it truly does not matter to me. Sometimes I wish it could matter so that I can be in their shoes and see like and try to be a normal person, but doesn't well, I'm thinking about is what God already told me. And I know he's going to fulfill his promises to me. If the Lord puts something on my heart, he's going to also clear the path for me to do it. He's not just going to tell me to do something and then leave me stranded. He's going to create a way for me to be able to be victorious when I do it. So when I do something, I already know I'm going to win because I'm not the one that decided to do it. The Lord told me to do it. So he'll see me through. - That's fire, that's fire. See, that's like one of the hardest things for me. There's a passage in Luke chapter 8 where Jesus is like, "Hey, we're going to go to the other side of the lake." He tells them that that's where they're going to go and then they get on the boat and he falls asleep and the biggest storm arises. And like most of those dudes were fishermen. So if those guys thought that they were going to die, that had to be probably a super intense storm. And I react a lot of times as they do where I'm like, "Where the heck are you going? What's going on?" You know, I'm freaking out right now. Or it's hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel. And then he wakes up from the big nap and calms me. He's like, "Why do you have no faith in me?" - Right, right. - I feel like that is something that I'm so encouraged by 'cause I'm even just thinking about stuff in the past few weeks of my life where yeah, I feel like God spoke clearly on something, but me personally, I'm so logically hardwired that sometimes like the faith aspect of trusting God 'cause God's not always logic. He's not always able to speak to you, so he just does whatever he wants. And that is always something that I have a hard time with. So I'm deeply encouraged by that. - I'm glad you said that. I'm glad you shared that. Because imagine how many people feel like that. I mean, we all feel like that at times. Of course, I've felt like that where it's like logically, God, what are you telling me to do because this doesn't make too much sense and I'm trying to figure it out with my logical mind. But so I want people to know it's not easy. It's not something that's easy that if you don't do it like you're bad or wrong, it just means that your faith is still being built, you know? It's just like a muscle. Eventually when you keep on working that muscle out, you're gonna be able to lift things that you never could lift before. That's how faith is with me. So yeah, you start panicking less. You stop trying to fix things and you stop over thinking. That's a, I have always done like a lot of overthinking about just things in general. - Oh, same. - But you eventually you start realizing, okay, I can overthink 'cause this is the way my brain works. But I have to give it to God. And once you give it to God, you have to put it down. You have to put it down and leave it there. And if you have to, you know, continue reading the scripture or, you know, playing your music, well, just doing something fun. To distract yourself, you have to just breathe and put it down, give it to him and trust that he's going to work it out for you. And you know what I realize every time in my life that I've ever tried to fix things myself, tried to help God every single time I learned a lesson again and again, that he didn't need help. (laughing) He did not need help, you know, as long as, you know, you're doing your part in terms of just like trusting and having faith and of course faith without works is dead. You know, so you have to, you know, use your discernment on how much to give on any situation. But God doesn't need your help outside of prayer. You know, outside of prayer and praise, don't try to do it yourself because you will do it wrong and then you'll have to do it again. - It's not like we're doing God a favor, you know? - Right. - That's awesome. You mentioned the prayer, like the prayer and praise. How has, compared to, you know, that situation you said growing up, you guys would pray, compared to now, the position that you're in, what does your prayer life look like right now? - I do believe in prayer without ceasing. - Come on. - It's hard to say my prayer life because I believe you're always praying, you know, like I'm talking about every day, I mean, I'm talking about all day about every single thing. So it's not even something that I think about. But in terms of actual taking time, like reading the scripture and reading your Bible and learning more and fasting and stuff like that, I think I can definitely add more time. I think you could always improve on that. - Yeah. - But every day, I pray every single day. There's no day that I don't pray. And now I've been, for the last couple of months, I've actually been trying to learn a scripture every day, like at least read a new scripture every day. And this may really help me because so many of the stories that I've been reading in the Bible, I mean, they're so, they're so simple to understand and to apply to everyday life. And I kept on thinking that what I was going to read it, that it would be so far fetched and the language would be so difficult. And instead, I'm reading it and I'm like happy. And I'm like, why didn't I do this before? You know, that's all I keep thinking is why didn't I equip myself with these things both earlier in my life? - Dang, there's like a, there's some like psychological study out there that says, even the person that reads, like four times or more a week in the Bible, like their anxiety decreases the significant amount and like their trust and God increases a ton. And all of these, like, you know, whether it's, not just mental health, but whether it's this mental health struggle or this struggle in their life, it decreases significantly. - Yes. - And that's, I love the constant prayer thing. I love, whenever my, for some reason, whenever I'm around some sort of body of water, like if I'm in nature, like at the beach, or for me, like I have, I just, you just hear him clearly, you know, and his voice is still in calm and it's such a special encouragement. Did you, did you grow up in church when you were younger? - What happened was once we came to the States, things were a little bit crazy, but my father turned to addiction. But then, but he was an electrician in Trinidad. So event, so after some time, which was a true blessing, we met some, like older women, they started inviting my parents to church and my parents started going. And my father's life completely changed. He stopped drinking for a time. He started going to church. And what ended up happening is, because of the constant prayer and faith and going to church, and we were being church like three times a week, and all the elders of the church would be praying for him, all the time, just praying for us in general. But because of that, he ended up going and getting a great job with MTA with transit. And he was an electrician with them and he ended up starting, he started earning a lot of money just by his trade, and his electrician trade that he had since he was, probably, you know, early 20s in Trinidad, but he had had that when he came, but without God in it, he wasn't able to, you know, get himself straight long enough to get the right job. Soon as he gave his life to Christ, next thing you know, all of the things that had been taken away from him by the devil and, you know, by the enemy, all those things were given back onto him, but bigger and better than we could have even imagined. It was a major shift for us as a family. But yeah, we were going to church for many years, and we were going to church in Brooklyn. And eventually I just loved church so much. I started going to church by myself. Like I was the only, like once I became a teenager, and even my young 20s after high school, I was like the only person in my age that would pop up in the church by myself. I would sit there and listen to the word, and I loved it. And I think that's what really made me stand out from everyone else because my faith was so unshakable because I would be getting that food, you know, that spiritual food. I would be getting that every week, so I was pretty unstoppable. So anything I wanted, I got, you know, like, I was making a lot of money at my age, you know, and I was able to buy this really expensive car at the age of 19 years old. And people were like, oh, you're going to, you're not going to be able to keep that car. My mother was like, you're not going to be able to keep that car, you're not going to be able to keep up the payments. And I never miss one payment. I ended up having it until I became famous. - Wow, wow. - Yeah, so anyway, what I'm saying is I would be going to meetings and I wouldn't, I wouldn't always get the job or get what I wanted. But I mean that I would push myself. I had a lot of drive. So even if I was told no about something, I would just keep one going because I never believe in taking no front answer. And I always believed in where there's a will this way. I've lived my life like that forever. So it made me always have like an edge up over competition at that time. So even though it was really tough at one point 'cause I was like, well, maybe this is not going to happen at a certain point in my life. Maybe my career isn't going to work. And the Lord told me to give it one more try. And I told my mother that I would give it one more try for one more year. And it happened, you know, I was discovered by a little Wayne. Thank God. And then the rest is basically history. You know, there was some ups and downs in there. If I hadn't been going to church and if I hadn't been already praying and fasting and, you know, applying all the those things that I had learned in my real life, I would not have made it at all, you know? Yeah. Did you ever have a season in life where you strayed away or drifted away from the faith and came back? Once my career started taking off, first of all, I stopped going to church. Not because I wanted to go to, I mean, I still wanted to go, but it was all of a sudden I was working on Friday nights and Saturday nights. So the last thing I could do was wake up one Sunday mornings to go to church like I used to. And in fact, I used to go to church on Wednesdays and Fridays and Sundays. But once I started working, it wasn't even something that like made any sense. I was just like, oh, okay, well, I'm not, I moved to California and I never went, I never once went to a church once I moved to California. And the other thing is that people don't talk about and people don't really understand is, your relationship with God is a very private intimate thing. And when you go to church, you wanna feel like you're in a moment by yourself. No matter how many people are in the church, you wanna feel like it's just you and God. What happens when you become famous is you're going to church. If you go to a church, people will stare at you. And so it takes away that feeling of just you and God. It takes that away and puts you, it makes you feel like you're on display. How can you truly give what you wanna give but what you would normally give if you feel like you're on display? So a lot of people that become famous, I think they stop going to church because they don't feel that they can be anonymous anymore. You know, you just wanna feel like, you don't wanna feel like your stage name when you're in church. You wanna just feel like it's you, the actual person. But it's kind of difficult to do that when phones, when these cell phones come out, You can't really get that privacy. So even though that's not an excuse not to go to church, but it was something that really made me not wanna go. I didn't feel comfortable to go. - No, I mean, I couldn't even imagine what it'd be like going into church. And I mean, if that were me, it would probably make me bitter. Not necessarily a God, probably bitter at people. You know, bitter unintentionally. It would make me feel frustrated. Not even just for your relationship with God, but I can't even imagine, you know, sitting in church where you're gathering to worship Jesus and you're not doing anything wrong, but then people are looking at you instead of Jesus and they're like, "Well, what's going on?" And you're trying to focus, and then that's distracting. So I can't even imagine what that was like. I mean, do you, with your relationship with Jesus now, how has that solitude with Jesus really helped fuel you, fuel your spiritual journey now and things like that? - It keeps me grounded. I believe that being grounded is such an important trait for everybody, no matter what you do. The minute you start feeling like you're bigger than the program type of vibe, I just think that's the beginning of the end, you know, for people. I think it's so important to keep your humility. I don't think it's possible to be close to God without humility. So whenever you feel like, "Well, this is what I do." Whenever I feel like I'm losing my humility, I take a step back and I pray and I try to center, because no matter what I have, no matter what I have, I know that it can be taken away. I strongly believe that gratitude, humility, and staying grounded are things that have helped me and that help everyone, you know? And it keeps you closer to God. I had a pastor that used to tell me, you wanna stay under the radar, where God's wings are covering you, you know? And she would be like, "How do you do that?" Humility, prayer and humility. So when I would feel myself coming out of that, or if I would allow someone to trigger me, or if I would allow anger to get the best of me, it would remind me, "Oh, I came out of the covering. I have to humble myself again and get back in that protective shield where God is protecting me, because you can't do both." And obviously as a rapper, you write really like, you know, Braggadocia's lyrics and everything is about me, me, me, me, me. And what I have, and you know, you can't go to God like that, 'cause it would, I mean, I would imagine it would be very crazy for God for you to go to God, being cocky and arrogant, telling Him who you are and what you got. You know, I would imagine that that would be pretty crazy to God. - Yeah, that'd be pretty crazy. - And like what? - So when I think of that, I think, okay, I've gotten out of his covering. I have to humble myself. Remember that I have everything because of him. And then I'll start feeling grounded again. And once I feel grounded, then I think better, I make better decisions, I'm happier, you know? So that's what a constant relationship with God does for me. It keeps me aligned, keeps me having to realign myself, because you know, we're not perfect. Sometimes you have to realign yourself a hundred times a day. - Yeah. - But it's worth it, you know? - Jesus is my Lord and Savior, my best friend, my provider, my physician, Lord of Lord's King of Kings, the Alpha and the Omega. That is who he is to me. - Hey, quick break. Let me tell you about today's sponsor, Upside. Gas, groceries, and eating out are three things we all know add up fast. 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To find out how much you could earn, download the free upside app, and use promo code Bryce to get an extra 25 cents back for every gallon on your first tank of gas. That's an extra 25 cents back for every gallon on your first tank of gas using promo code Bryce. All right, now back to the episode. All right, I gotta ask this because this is on my mind, 'cause the thing I'm the most encouraged about you is you fighting the current. I love people that stand their ground. Like I think that's incredible, absolutely. And I know you have been in some powerful rooms and powerful places growing up in many aspects of your life. I mean, I got so many questions on this, but being just in general in the music scene for a second, do you think that the music scene as a whole, just a broad statement? Do you think the music scene is very demonically organized? Is there a lot of crazy stuff that happens in there? Can you kind of tell me a little bit about that? - Well, it sure isn't driving people to God. It's definitely isn't making people want God more because it focuses on the worship of material things. And we all play a part and I've played a part in it, of course. It's not healthy, over time, it's not healthy mentally and for the soul emotionally. I mean, look at all the young people right now that have to grow up in the Instagram era where everyone is editing and photoshopping and everyone thinks the other person looks like that in real life. For these children, I can't imagine. I always think about this. I say these kids are so strong because I cannot imagine having to have dealt with this while I was growing up and while you're changing, your body, your face, everything about you and changing. And then you have to constantly compare yourself to other people. And what does that do to the self-esteem of these young people? - Yeah. - That's what I care about. Like I care about long-term, what is this doing to these young people that have to now grow up in this world? Post selfies and post Instagram and post, you know, the photoshop era, you know, what is that doing, you know? And I guess I feel a sense of responsibility to a lot of the times because a lot of the stuff that I was wrapping about, you know, I was so young too, I didn't realize that there are young people listening to it and how it could probably make them make certain decisions that wasn't, you know, really thought out. Now if I could do it all over again, I would have changed a lot of things that I said because I just don't like the idea of thinking that these people will now grow up wanting to change themselves as opposed to loving themselves, you know? Like as opposed to seeing how beautiful they are and realizing how much they have to offer the world just the way they are. That's what I think, that's what I think is very demonic about the industry as a whole, is that it makes people feel that they're never enough. And if you feel like you're never enough, how can you be happy? - Yeah, yeah. There's a, my pastor from back at home used this analogy one time about how, you know, you could go to Macy's and buy a fur coat for like $120. And then if nobody thinks that that coat is valuable for paying $120 for, it'll be at TJ Maxx the next week for 1999. It's because like people didn't think that was worth paying for. And so many people see themselves that way through the comparison game. Like I think maybe a hundred years ago, people I think were marrying within a five mile radius of where they grew up. - Right, right. - And now like adulterious skyrocketed because there's, and it's like the options. - You feel like you have all these options, yes. - And it's so heartbreaking. Yeah, and so there's this, my pastor would always say, well, what's the price tag that God puts on your life? And I had never heard of phrase that way and he just said, God puts his own life as the price tag on your life, willing to die for you. And I think that's so powerful. 'Cause identity is the hardest thing to understand about Jesus in my opinion, right? That's like everything, you know, when I'm struggling or I'm getting in my head or I'm the overthinker, or you know, I have so much respect for you saying, yeah, I don't care what people think about me online. And I'm like, man, the tiniest thing can get under my skin and make me upset or hurt my feelings or make me go, well, wait a second, that's not what I meant or wait, you don't know my heart or what you don't understand or I didn't mean it, you know, and then I start to stutter in and falling, in my head and the gosh, the comparison thing is awful. You're also very young. When I was your age, I would not have been able to do this. Like I want to make it clear that I think that young people right now are so strong mentally. Like it's like you guys have no choice but to be strong. It's quite natural for someone to put a young person. And when I say young, I mean, even in their 20s, it's quite natural for things to get under their skin. You haven't had a lot of things to compare things to. You haven't had a lot of times where you're like, "Oh, I'm not, this is gonna end. I'm not gonna stress that." No, this is the first moments for you guys in a lot of areas of your life. Like you've never seen what happens after social media or after certain relationships or certain lessons. So you're going through it in real time. I get it. I can't say just don't care about stuff. I remember people used to tell me, close people are very close to me. They would say, "If I was in your shoes, oh my God, you're so lucky." This was when I first got an industry. They would be like, "You're so lucky. If I was you, I would never complain about anything. I wish I had your life." And they used to tell me that they would not care about comments on the internet. And I knew that to be a lie. And two people, two people that were very close to me had it happen to them and nearly had mental breakdowns. The same two people that were telling me, "Oh, I wouldn't care if I was in your shoes." When they got a little attention of the internet and it wasn't good stuff and it was starting to be attacks and the same attacks that I had to endure every day, they got a tiny taste of what I had to endure every day and they were ready to jump off a freaking cliff. So I'm not the type of person that's going to judge someone and say, "Oh no, you know, you should care. You shouldn't care." Or my way is the right way. No, I'm the type of person that's saying, it's okay and it's understandable that you haven't mastered these things yet. You're very young. You will master it though. You absolutely will. And talking about it and having other people see and hear because faith comes by hearing, these little conversations, it's going to help other young people. It's gonna, and that's why we have to speak about things like this. We have to let them realize they're not the only ones doubting themselves, they're not the only ones hurting or feeling agitated, wanting to respond to everything. They're not the only ones. But in the long one, it doesn't benefit anyone to lash out an anger. It benefits everyone to think things through first. And trust me, I have had to deal with a lot of decisions that I made an anger, like trust me. So I've learned, so when I say these things, I'm saying it because of first-hand knowledge, first-hand experience. But I just, I can honestly say that lashing on an anger never got me anything. It never benefited me. So then you start thinking, okay, let me pray on this. Because that's the only way you're going to defeat whatever it is in your life that is weighing you down, is through prayer. And eventually, and it's, you know what's interesting? Whenever something's going on in my life, and I feel like a little like, to the point where I'm fed up or whatever it is, however I might feel, I'll read a scripture in the Bible, and it'll be something clear as day, to tell me what not to do and what to do. It's like as soon as you ask God for a sign, and you open that Bible, he gives you a sign. You'll read something and you'll be like, oh my God, this applies to me right now. This applies to exactly what I'm going to right now. - Yeah, I would love your advice on this, just through everything you're saying. So whenever I read the Bible, I'm like, okay, Jesus loves everyone equally, but he obviously has levels of trust, 'cause he has the, he has the 12 disciples, and then he has Peter, James, and John, and then he has John, the one whom he loved. And you've been in a lot of powerful rooms around a lot of people just in general growing up, career wise, everything. How do you know, how do you navigate to know who to trust and who not to trust? - That's a great question because it brings a lot of pain and sadness, betrayal. Betrayal is very difficult to overcome. I wish I could say I have like some sure remedy that works. You know what, I have to be honest that just discernment, you don't know who you can trust as the truth, you only can feel them out, you know? You can feel them out and you can ask the Lord to reveal them, reveal their hearts, reveal their motives. And he will send you, he will send you signs. I don't trust as much as I used to. You know, as you get older, you start realizing, oh, hey, this person didn't deserve my time and this person didn't deserve my trust and this person didn't deserve my love. You just have to get a lot very guarded and protect your peace. And then just noticing the patterns and dealing with them and if you keep seeing at the same pattern from someone, stop brushing it off. You know, because so often I did that like trying to see the good in people when the facts were right there screaming at me. But now I'm just like, you know what? No, I'm gonna base this on their patterns. What is it that they're showing me with their actions, not through their words? - Yeah. - And then, you know, it's, you know, it's eventually, there's a lot of trust there if there needs to be. But most of the time, it's just a little at a time and gradually and never doing the most immediately, just allowing yourself to be still, not rushing into things. I definitely try not to rush into any kind of business relationships, you know? I try to just take it easy. So, and eventually the discernment kicks in. You can sort of start, you can just sort of feel like, hmm, is this person, does this person have good motives or not so great motives? Some of the times people come around you, they don't even know what motives they have. They don't even know why they want to be around here. You know, a lot of, there are a lot of predators in this industry, you know, that thing that artists are stupid. So, especially artists, you have to have your guard up. I know when I first came in this industry, I thought it was just all happy and fun and I was just like this fun-loving person. Now, I'm like, okay, this is serious. And I have to take this serious. I have to take my life serious. I have to take these relationships serious. So, that's what I've been doing. But really, there's no method. I just say discernment. Like, one day I'll just wake up and I'll feel something about someone strongly and I'll just know, their time is up. - Wow, yeah, I'm one of those people that, and this is like a strength and a weakness. I'm just like, doors are wide open with trust. You know, people are like, are you the kind of person that lets the trust build or use someone that like gives trust and let's be broken? And I'm like, I'm definitely that second option. And that can be hurtful. And so, when you said that I don't rush into things, I'm like, I'm really bad at that. I think patience is the thing that I need to work on the most. And I don't, for me, I don't mean that necessarily in a business side. I just mean like in general. I'm like, head first into something and then it'll come to bite me and I'm like, you got me kidding me. And you would think that I'd learn after about five times making the wrong decision and I don't. So, I think that's really encouraging. - It's also a great way to be like an optimistic person, a trusting person, a caring person. It's a blessing to be that way. Honestly, because so few people, I like that anymore. I definitely think I was like that for most of my life as well. I don't know. I think you eventually, you'll know if you have to completely shut it down. But for now, if that works for you, if that keeps you happy, then go for it. - Yeah. Yeah, sometimes I'm like, man, I like that about myself 'cause sometimes it's rewarding. You're like, I really do trust. I'm glad I trusted this person. - Of course. - And then other times you're like, wow, that did me a really dirty right there. And I feel like, what is it? Gold and Retriever? You know, the Gold and Retriever is always happy. And you could leave the Gold and Retriever for three days and come back and it's like, as if that's the first time seeing you. I don't know if that makes sense. But yeah, I just think that's something that I have a hard time with. But you mentioned. - Well, maybe there's a reason why you are like that. Maybe there's a, and look what you're doing with your life now. That there was probably a purpose put on your life. You know, you'll attract certain people that probably wouldn't have normally come to God that will see God in you and see themselves in you. And that, you know, because you are that way, you'll probably make a lot of people feel comfortable as well. People who probably. wouldn't have normally felt kind of people who probably wouldn't have wanted to go to church. So maybe God has made you like that for a specific reason. I wouldn't be up on yourself too much about it for now. Thank you for saying that. That actually means a lot. Thank you. You're welcome. When you were in the industry, I would say in the rise of your career and even at, yeah, just as you're going across your career in the industry, what did you ever just feel like the industry wasn't, wasn't what you thought it was? Yes. Was it like right away that you realized that or did it take a little while to realize? I think it took a little while because in the beginning and it was pretty much, it was a lot of fun. Honestly, it was, we had so much fun rooting for each other. I thought that that's how it would always be. I thought everyone just roots for each other and really wants each other to win and you know, I just thought the camaraderie was how it was supposed to be. So it was a beautiful experience in the beginning. I started realizing people are really vindictive in this industry that if you don't, in other words, like I started realizing that if you don't get money with one person or a specific people, they don't want you to get money at all. And that's when I started realizing like, oh my gosh, what did I sign up for? Because I didn't know that these people would be so territorial over people, you know, that they don't even know that they don't have any claims to. But that's what it started feeling like it started feeling like everyone wanted to like stake their claim into human beings, like they were property. And if you didn't abide by their rules or put money in their pocket, they would actively try to stop you from from making money to feed your family from prospering in the industry that you love. So that that's when another a different light bulb went off in my head, like what the heck did I get into? Well, okay, I got I got a lot of questions because that when you say that they would stop you from flourishing in general, are you saying outside of just the music industry like they would try to stop from flourishing in every aspect? If you're in the music industry, that's the way you make money. So everything is kind of the music industry. Yeah. But yeah, it would be like if you had a disagreement with one person, instead of that person just moving on with their lives with their life and you move it on with your life, it would be like one this person would call someone else so that you won't get an opportunity over there. And then that would continue happening. But not just with me, I saw it with a lot of very talented people that they were talented and maybe one particular person or one particular group of people didn't like them. And because of that, they kind of just got, you know, made to be like almost invisible. I started seeing that a lot, like what is going on here? It was like constant spiritual warfare. I wish I would have known sooner that this music industry was such a spiritual experience because I felt like I bought a knife to a gunfight without knowing that without having that information. I feel like, you know, I was ill-equipped for what was ahead and no one had given me a heads up and I had to figure it out when I got there. So did you just constantly feel pressure to, I mean, in those environments when you have one group of people that are kind of in control, essentially, there's a lot of pressure put on anyone that could walk in that room and you were obviously in rooms like that. So were you, were you ever in a season, obviously not now, were you ever in a season where you felt like you had to maybe compromise boundaries or something like that just to stay in the room? Not specifically. With me personally, I don't feel like I ever did compromise for specific things or like in specific rooms. But I feel like overall, it was a compromise on what I knew to be true about, you know, myself. Yeah. Like overall, I think that the music industry was a compromise and is a compromise. But but thank God, I could honestly say that no, I don't feel that I was ever personally made to compromise. Like I feel like everything I did, I did it willingly and I always, I spoke up a lot. Yeah. I spoke up a lot about things and, you know, maybe that's why I was a bit of an outcast because, you know, because they couldn't get me to just go along with whatever, you know, whatever with whatever everyone else was doing most of the time. I had to really believe it in order for me to do it. This is just on the floor of my eye. I just got to ask because that is, I am so intrigued by everything you just said. It's fascinating me right now. Is the Illuminati real? Like, is that, I know people use that label to name like, okay, powerful people. But so take that with a grain of salt, like that label of Illuminati, like as a group. Like, are there actual, is there an actual group of powerful people that kind of control everything? Okay. Let me say, my situation is very, I feel like it's very personal. Like, I feel that there definitely is a group of people that have made things very difficult for me. But I don't know if, you know, I don't know if they're Illuminati. I don't know what they are. I always was looking at it as if this was a personal issue that one person didn't really like me and they happened to me in a powerful position. And they were able to use their influence to make people go against me and that because, you know, they couldn't get certain money with me that, you know, they wanted the money not to come to me. I never looked at it as if it was like an entire secret society against me. But who knows, you know, it could be. It could have been who knows. But however, it definitely has been spiritual. Now, who, what they call themselves and what they proclaim to be only they could tell you that. Yeah. But is it, has it been a, you know, spiritual warfare? Absolutely. If, if anything ever happened, I'd slide for you. I just want you to know that I would totally slide. You said you haven't, you want to be able to encourage and uplift young people in a manner. But you've done that the entire time to me when we sat here. So I think the world of you, I think you're fun. I think you're awesome. Thank you. I had an awesome time hanging out with you. Did all. Thank you. You will. I would love to pray for you before we close. Is that cool? Yes, of course. Let's do it. Jesus, thank you so much for today, God. And thank you for Nicky. And thank you for our time to get there. Lord, did you just continue to bless her and continue to speak to her like you already do? God, you have given her such profound wisdom already. Would you just continue to increase set in her life? God protect her and be with her and continue to send incredible individuals around her to uplift her and encourage her, sharpen her and be in her corner. Not because they want anything from her, but because they just love her as a human being. So God, we love you. We thank you in Jesus name. Amen. Jesus name. Amen.