For teenagers and the parents who love them!

Welcome back.

Welcome.

I'm honored to have this week Rico Sharp join us. Rico was born to a teenage mother who lost both of her parents as a child and then struggled to raise 3 sons. Rico faced many obstacles along the way, including running away from home at the age of 13. He lived his teenage years as a big-time drug dealer. He was at one point homeless, eating out of trash cans. Addicted to powder cocaine and marijuana. He had a drug overdose, was beaten by 10 guys and left for dead, was arrested 19 times and sent to prison 3 times. Today, Rico is a pastor, motivational speaker, and mentor. He firmly believes in the power of positive thinking and personal growth. As a motivational speaker, his passion is to change lives by sharing his own hard-fought journey. While in prison for the 3rd time, Rico became self-motivated and re-enrolled in educational and vocational courses to gain interpersonal life skills. He never lost sight of his goals and continued to work diligently to turn his life around. For 3 decades as a pastor and entrepreneur, Rico has offered life-changing tools to empower people to reach their goals. A family man at heart for over 33 years, Rico understands unique obstacles we all encounter along our paths. Today, he is living proof that with faith, perseverance, and hard work, anyone can overcome any challenges in life. Let's welcome Rico Sharp. Welcome.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much, Coach Bernard. Thank you for having me on The Mindset Show. It is an honor and a privilege to be able to join you today.

We are honored to have you. You have quite the story and an important story to tell. So, uh, I am so glad you were able to join us and, uh, have a conversation.

Absolutely. I'm looking forward to it.

All right. Well, one of the first questions I kind of have for you is, you know, it's important to talk about what the mindset is that turns people around, helps them transform. But I'm also always interested in what is it that allows some of those decisions to happen in the first place, right? What is that kind of mindset when they're young that leads them, you know, leads you to make some of those decisions? Do you want to speak to us about that?

Absolutely. For a lot of people, particularly in the inner-city community, or for those who were raised in a household with only one parent, a lot of our teenagers are experiencing fatherlessness. Many don't have the role model in their home to exemplify for them what a positive life should look like. And when particularly a young man doesn't have a father figure or a mentor figure or someone that can step up and take that role or responsibility in their life, then they tend to search for a father figure or a role model in other places. Like in the streets, like in gangs, like in drug dealers and people that are committing crimes. So that's where a young man begins to deviate during an early age and find himself becoming conformed to a pattern that would eventually lead him down a dark path or into a prison system, or even in many cases, sometimes the grave at a very early age.

Yeah, sadly, that, that, that is the case, uh, far too often. Um, I've had, uh, a few former students, uh, and I've always worked with kids on the fringes who've found those early graves. Um, so yeah, it's, uh, it's a tragedy when that happens. How are you able to avoid that, uh, early grave yourself. And now, you did say in the introduction I have, right, it was, it was your third time in prison when things began to change. What was— why the third time? Why wasn't it the first or the second time? What, what was different there that third time that helps you make those changes?

When you're living in the street, Coach, There are many times that you find yourself convincing yourself that there is a right way to do wrong. You go through the system, you go through what is considered to be a habitual pattern, thinking that if you tweak some things or alter some things, that you can be successful in doing wrong or committing crimes or living a criminal lifestyle. It is oftentimes later in life That someone have bumped their heads enough time to finally wake up and realize that no matter what I do, if I don't change, then changing my strategies or changing my plans is not enough. That's what happened with me. It actually took for me to be in prison on that 3rd time facing 22 years in prison before I finally realized there's no right way to So was there one person?

Was there one moment? Was it a combination of things that finally kind of got you to make that real realization? Did it, you know, was it from within or did somebody from outside kind of help you wake up, so to speak?

It was personally Just an eye-opening moment for me standing before the judge and hearing the judge say to me that, I label you as a threat to society. You don't need to be out in society. You need to be locked up. And it's when I heard those words that I realized the gravity of how serious The judge were at that time speaking to me. It was at that moment that I discovered that if I don't make a change and make it now, I will spend the rest of my life in prison. Yeah, I had some time to reflect. I had some time to sit back and to get my thoughts together with a clear mind that was not being negatively influenced by The other people that I associated myself with and from the environment that also was part of the manipulating of my mindset. Because I grew up in the streets, and when you're living in the streets, you become conformed to the streets. But when I got incarcerated again on that third time on my trip to prison, Then I realized I can no longer be a product of my environment. I need to discover who I really am and claim my own identity and begin to focus on living a purpose-driven life instead of a power-driven life.

Yeah. You just mentioned that you heard the judge say that you need to be locked up, that you weren't safe or what have you to be out on the streets. And it's amazing to me, sometimes one little line, one comment can be all it takes, you know.

Yeah.

And as parents, as coaches, as, as, uh, mentors, as whoever, it's never to give up with, you know, keep delivering that message because you never know when That is finally going to hit home. I had a student not too long ago who we were really questioning whether he belonged in the program I had going on, and we're having serious conversations about, no, this really is not the right fit, he's not in the right place. And he turned it around like that, and we were trying to figure out how'd that happen. And his mom said, She had a conversation with him that she said, you know, so-and-so, who was a student that— that this student used to go, oh man, he's a terrible student, you know, he's awful, he's a bully, he's all these things that he never wanted to be. And she said, you're him. And that was, that was the— that was a wake-up call. Now, There's a lot more work to do, but that was the trigger that got it started. So you never know, right? You never know. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

Now, um, I think it was on your website, maybe. Um, I saw you had a son at— when you were in prison, right?

That is correct. That is correct.

How did that factor into that change and all that?

Before I had a son in prison, I also had a daughter that was born that I was not able to be a part of her life because of my years of being incarcerated. I began to reflect back on how that when I was a little boy growing up, raised by my mother and my father was not in the household with me, I remember how painful that was for me. I remember how much of a void that created in my life. I remember promising myself when I was a teenage boy that one day when I grow older and have kids, I am not going to do to my children what my father did in my life, which was to abandon me when I was about 6 years of age. When I was in prison and realized that I had a daughter born and a son was being born while I was in prison, It hit me like a ton of bricks falling on my head that I am doing the same exact thing to my children that I promised I would not do, which of course was what my father did to me. And that also helped me to realize that this past life of living aimlessly and ruthlessly, that has to end and it has to end now. And I had to cleave to a greater purpose and realized that I can no longer live a self-centered life that's all about me and the things that I want. I have people now that is relying on me, that needs a father in their life, that if I'm not going to be there for them, they could particularly become a product of my own lascivious lifestyle, and I didn't want that.

Yeah, that, that's marvelous. It's, uh, it's wonderful that you were able to see that, right? That, that all came back to you. And, uh, it's— it kind of reminds me of that, uh, you know, I call them those, um, Ebenezer Scrooge moments where you are— your past comes back up and—

Exactly.

You know, it can— sometimes it can really do good things for you. Sometimes it can haunt you a little bit if you don't, you deal with a negative thing the right way, but it can have a way of kind of putting you back on that, on the right path too. Um, yeah, so, uh, yeah, that's very—

Yeah, you know, uh, Coach, it's— there's a such thing that I call, uh, generational bondage and generational dysfunction, and it's where when a father, uh, passes on to his sons or daughters his lifestyle, his weaknesses, his struggles, his addictions, his negativity. And the old saying is, the apple don't fall too far from the tree. And I found myself becoming my dad. I like this commercial by Progressive Insurance where they show people becoming their parents.

Yeah.

And it is a humorous commercial, but there's a lot of truth to it. And it was at that moment that I realized I was becoming my dad, and I didn't want to become him. I didn't, I didn't want his weaknesses. I didn't want his, his negativity. I didn't want his dysfunction. I certainly didn't want his curse. And so I had to make a decision to break the cycle so it wouldn't be inherited into the life of my children.

Well, you know, decisions, right? I— some of the work I do I talk about 5 stages that I got to take people through to kind of, um, reset or change their mindset. And one, you gotta be in a place to take responsibility. That means take responsibility for your time, the labels, your memories, uh, all these types of things. Then you gotta clean up your past.

Exactly.

And cleaning up your past is what's often overlooked, um, but it It has a profound impact. You know, some of these beliefs that we had handed down to us from observation, from modeling, from, you know, um, direct, like, this is what we believe in this family kind of thing. And, um, families are, families are complicated, you know, to say the least. Right.

And, uh, exactly. Exactly.

When, when I do a family component, we've got to look at some of those unwritten rules that get passed down too that may or may not be supportive, right? They may not be the best rules to be operating by, and we've got to own that and learn how to kind of move on from that. So, it sounds like that's what happened to you, right?

That's exactly what happened. That's exactly what happened. Every family have their struggles. There's no perfect family. Oftentimes we look at a family and we look at fatherhood and we look at parenting and we like to compare our families to other families or try to model our family after other families. And the truth is that every family has its struggles. Every family has their times of challenges. And oftentimes things are dealt with behind closed doors before it becomes public and notarized. Unfortunately, there are some, such as was in my case, that it doesn't get dealt with behind closed doors and it becomes something that everybody eventually publicly finds out about.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's, you know, it's dynamics that are profound, really. You know, the impact that family and friends and all that have on on the directions we have and, and being able to, uh, um, when the family unit really isn't quite what it should be, to try to repair that or move on from that can be, can be quite a, quite a challenge. Now, yeah, you are a pastor, so—

I am.

Talk to me a little bit about faith because I, I have What I say is everybody has faith. You cannot live life without faith. The question is—

Exactly.

What do you put your faith in? And is what you put it in really worthy of having it? Like, we may or may not have faith in ourselves. We may or may not have faith in other people or institutions or a higher power. So when did, when did your faith begin to shift from whatever it had been Obviously, as a pastor, you have a religious faith as well. So you want to share that journey?

Absolutely. I think my mom— I always like to give her the credit because one of the things that she did, being a young teenager herself, parenting 3 kids, is she made us go to church. She took us to church with her, and that allowed for me to get biblical principles instilled within my heart as a young boy. Even though I went astray, that seed was planted, and over the years, that seed began to germinate. And I remember I was incarcerated in the Seminole County Jail, and I had felt lost, and I felt basically I was at my wit's end, and I could hear her voice saying to me, to always look to God. I got on my knees that time, and I was still incarcerated, headed to prison for the 3rd time, and I asked God for help and for strength to be able to break the cycle that I had been in throughout my teenage years. It was during my incarceration where I began to focus interpersonally and rediscovered my faith. Eventually, after my release, I started going into the jails and prisons, operating as a volunteer chaplain, going into the inner-city communities on the street corners, into crack houses, and helping people who were bound by drugs to get off of drugs. I even started transitional housing for men that were being released from prisons and jail that had no family to go to and did not want to go back to the street life. Eventually, in the year 2000, I started a church in my home with my wife and I and grew it to a 3,000-member church. My faith was rediscovered during my incarceration. And there's something that I learned at that time, Chuck, and that is that people need to believe in someone greater than themselves. And my faith was in God as I know him to be the Creator. And I know that there are people— Who have higher powers and believe in the universe and whatever they choose to believe in, they have to have faith that they can draw strength from that source of power. But I also discovered that not only was it necessary for me to have faith in the Creator as I knew him, but also to have faith in myself that I could actually make this change. You see, I had been in a habitual pattern for so many years and had been incarcerated so many times that it was difficult to believe that I could make a change because there were prior times that I told myself that I was going to stop and I was going to change, and I didn't do it. I didn't follow through. But I needed to rediscover that I have the interpersonal strength to make the changes that I needed to make. Truth of the matter is, Coach, that regardless of believing in God or the universe or a higher power or whoever you choose to believe in, just believing in a higher power is not enough. You have to also believe in yourself and know and have the confidence that you can do whatever is necessary to get your life on track and to live a life of fulfillment. And that was a defining moment for me.

Yeah, the, uh, the confidence piece, you know, it's really— I just, just wrote a book on confidence for teens, so it's, um, yeah, that's kind of a, a big thing with me, right? And Yeah. Really, yes, it does stem from, from repeated successes, right? You get more confident as you do something well over and over. That's, that's definitely true. But the really unshakable confidence, from what I've been able to gather from research and personal experience, comes when you know deep down that your personal worth is not connected to any specific outcome out there.

Right.

Your worth is not connected to that. It's unique. It's given to you. And this is where you and I seem to have the same belief. It's given to you by God, right? We're made in the image of God.

Absolutely.

So, um, when you have that kind of belief, you, you know, sometimes this probably is not a good analogy, but it's kind of like people who are really good at poker are ones who, who have nothing to lose, right? They, they have, you know, then they can do well. And when you have that belief that That, you know, I, I made the image of God. He loves me for who I am. And yes, I make mistakes, but I'm going to get back on it. That kind of confidence is just, it's unshakable, you know? It is.

It is.

It's not always easy to develop, but it's—

That's right.

When you get there, it's really something special.

It's life-changing.

So When you go to schools, when you do your mentoring, you do all this stuff, what are some of the key takeaways, important messages you would have for parents? There's 2 things I want for the parents who may be hearing this is one, like what might be some of those warning signs that somebody's, a teenager's mindset really isn't in a good place? What are some of the things they should be looking for? And then— What do you tell them that they can do about it when they see it?

That's a very good question, very good point. The first thing I say is to pay attention to the behavioral change because when our kids, our teenagers particularly, begin to drift away, they're drifting away because of some level of influence that they got, whether it was in school, whether it was social media, whether it was through television, whether it was through physical communication and contact with someone that is a part of the family or a neighborhood kid, or rather it is through listening to music that infiltrates their thinking and perverts their judgment. So I think that the first thing to look for is the behavioral change. Oftentimes our kids or teenagers, they won't communicate to us what they're feeling, what they're up against. And how things are beginning to drift in their life, but they will show us in their actions. And the old saying is still true, that is that action speaks louder than words. So I would suggest that the parents take note of the behavioral change. When a person shows you signs, believe those signs. Evaluate those signs and address those signs because those signs are all the proof that you need. If there's smoke, then there's a fire somewhere. And once a parent identifies the behavioral change, then the next thing for the parent to do is to determine that I'm not going to be judgmental, I'm not going to be wrathful, and I'm not coming to condemn my child. What I want to do is to Get on my child's level. Step into their life. Become a part of their world. Make the relationship comfortable enough between the parent and the child that the child feels comfortable enough to open up to the parent and share what they're really up against. My old saying is, people don't care how much you know until they know how much you care. And oftentimes, We assume that our children know how much we love them, but there are times that we get so preoccupied in our own life that we don't take the time to really get into their lives and, and be present. You can live in the house with your children, your children could live in a house with you, and you still be an absentee dad or an absent— absentee mom. In other words, you could be in the same household and not have a relationship. Because you're busy doing your life while they're busy doing their life. You're in one room, they're in another room. You're on the front porch, they're on the back porch, and the only time you see each other is in passing. When you realize that your child has behavioral change, that's the time for you to say, hey, let, let me now come down from off of, uh, just doing my own thing And get inside of my child's mind, my child's life, and find out what they're up against so that I can redirect them before they run into a dead end.

Yeah. You know, I once, a number of years ago, had a student who exhibited some real serious behaviors in school. Um, he had been sent to a, um, school outside, you know, with, with heavy-duty mental health counseling and all that, was coming back to school. And his parents were well-educated, upper middle class. Um, and I, you know, I, I want to be careful not to like necessarily place blame on them, but they also had this belief that You know, they could let the— instead of eat dinner with them, they'd let him go play his video games. They would let him do things. And there was no— for a number of years, there was no connecting, no bonding, no communication. And I don't question their love for him, but he didn't really recognize that. And, uh, you know, it led to lots of problems.

Yeah.

And until that Until that issue got resolved, he was exhibiting, you know, a number of problems. So—

Yeah, and I understand that very clearly. Our children are not as vocal with us as they will be with a classmate or a friend or a buddy or a peer. For us, they speak sign language, and we have to learn how to read the signs, to understand the language, to be able to approach them to help them To avoid what could potentially come later on as a disaster. So they speak sign languages and we have to read the signs.

Yeah, absolutely. I got one other question for you. So we talked about what your kind of advice is for parents and all. So when you are dealing with teenagers now, you know, in a motivational setting, there's So much that you can do, but if you get a mentoring kind of situation with a kid, what are some of those messages you try to do in those 2 contexts? One, as a motivational speaker, and 2, if you have them a little more consistently as a mentor, how do you go about kind of using those 2 venues to get them to begin to wake up?

Yeah. I always approach a teen on a friendship basis to let them know that I am not here to criticize you. I'm here to energize you. I'm here to be your friend. I believe in you. I'm part of your team. I'm your fan club. And I want them to know that I come with good intentions because if they feel like you're coming to judge them or to criticize them, they're going to put up the roadblocks and they're not going to let you in. When I'm in, when I'm able to gain their assurance that I'm there as a friend to offer some advice that can help them, then I begin to share with them a few pointers. Number one, you have to love yourself more than you basically have been taught by the environment or social media would portray. Because oftentimes people, or teenagers rather, they emulate what they see on social media. We call it influence. They're influenced by negative people, negative stereotypes, and the list goes on. So I teach them to love yourself. Love yourself more than the way you see people loving themselves on television or on social media or in schools or in movies or what have you, or in rap music, wherever you're getting your influence from. I teach them to forgive themselves. I teach them that you need to forgive yourself for letting you down and for upsetting your parents and for disappointing yourself. Forgive yourself for any temporary failure you may have. If you failed the SSAT test, if you failed your GED test, if you dropped out of high school, if you didn't graduate, whatever you did that set you back, if you walked off a job because you got angry, Forgive yourself for that. Release that. Not hold that against yourself. Then I teach them to be their best friend. Never be more of a friend to someone else than you are to yourself, and never allow for someone else to be more of a friend to you than you are to yourself. You have to accept you, believe in you, and support you, and always be there for you, because there are going to be times when your parents are not going to be there to, to help you along the way, and you're going to need to be that friend to yourself, that— that knows that no matter what I go through, I'm not going to betray me. I'm not going to give up on me, and I'm not going to destroy me. I also share with them that you have to like you. You have to like the person that you are. You have to look in the mirror and say, this is who I am. I like the guy or I like the girl that I see in the mirror. And I'm going to live with this person, and I owe myself a great life. I'm going to have fun. I'm going to do recreational things that I enjoy. I'm going to be fine with being me. And if I have to be by myself for a certain period of my time, I'm going to be fine with that. I like me. I'm fond of me. And then you have to protect you. You have to protect you from people who want to hurt you, people who want to mislead you and misguide you. You have to defend you and protect you from things that will throw you off course in life and protect you from suicidal thoughts and protect you from drugs and alcohol and protect you from criminal activity. I said to the kids that I shared with yesterday, I said, take out your phone, please. And teenagers like to take pictures of themselves. I said, take out your phone, take a selfie of yourself. And make this promise to yourself. Hold up that phone, take that selfie, and say, I promise me. And they did it. And I said, what are you saying when you say, I promise me? You're saying to yourself that as a teenager, I promise that I'm going to protect me. I promise that I'm going to love me. I promise me that I'm going to defend me. I promise me that I'm going to believe in me. I promise me that I'm going to forgive me. I promise me that I'm going to like me. I promise me that I'm going to give myself the best chance at life. I promise me that I'm going to work hard at being successful. I promise me that I'm not going to give in to a criminal lifestyle. I promise me that I'm not going to commit suicide. I promise me that I'm not going to put drugs and alcohol in my body. I promise me that I'm going to please my parents and do what I can to make myself a great life. And when you talk to teenagers like that, you're showing them, I care about you, and I believe in you, and you are worth my time. You are worth me investing my energy into, and I am on your side. I am on your team, and I will see you at your finish line. That's how I approach teenagers.

Yeah, they, uh, they need to hear that, that message. You know, you talk about loving yourself and, right, the Great Commandment, love your neighbor as you love yourself. And that my What I often say is that is what we see, because a lot of people don't love themselves, and therefore they treat others with that contempt that they have for themselves. And until you begin to switch that love inside of yourself, you will continue to treat others as you feel about yourself, right?

Exactly, exactly.

You know that That's kind of where it all begins. So I love your message and I love what you're doing. Uh, what's the best way— I'm going to put your— you have a website, so let me put that, um, um, up on your thing there. So ricosharp.org, right?

Yes, sir.

So, um, is there any other way if somebody wants to get in touch with you? They can go to the website. Is there—

yeah.

Facebook or LinkedIn? Do you have—

I'm on all social medias under Rico Sharp or Rico Sharp Motivations. And my email and a contact phone number is also on my website. And I would encourage anyone that wants to have me come as a speaker, whether it's in a seminar, a conference, a school, a church, whatever the venue is, I make myself available. I made myself relatable. I made myself affordable. My mission is to make an impact in, in this world with the life that I've been given. And I'm, I'm here. Just, just reach out. I'm here.

Awesome. Thank you so much for joining us. And, uh, I'm sure you, the listener out there, got a lot out of it. There was, uh, so many gems in that conversation. And, you know, the bottom line is wherever you are in your life, it's not— you, you can change, you can transform, right? And it begins with your mindset, it begins with the thinking, uh, but it doesn't matter where you've come from, it only matters where you're going. And you are in control of that aspect. As always, if anybody's interested in learning more or has issues with their own teenagers and are kind of looking for some answers and struggles, uh, you can go to coachchuck360.com. And there I've got all kinds of stuff. You've got my social media, my podcast, uh, you've got, um, my, my blog articles. There's lots of information out there. And I always encourage you too, if you need some help or looking out, Book a discovery call with me. We can have a conversation so I can begin to try to figure out what it is you need. Where are you at? Where's your teenager at? What do I offer? How can I?