Yusef-Andre Wiley reflects on his journey from gang involvement to servant leadership in Oakland. He argues that integrity requires constant work to shed cultural biases and racial stereotypes, and that genuine leadership means aligning your actions with justice and human rights.
Chapters
So it's another day, um, for me, uh, in Oakland, California, the Bay Area. How's everyone today? I appreciate the support as always. Every time I visit the Bay Area, it's truly a blessing, and the people here are always so great and hospitable towards me. And the work that we're doing with the Timeless Group. Interesting, you know, the things that we go through as human beings through this process of transformation and human change, just becoming pro-social and leaving bad habits and turning away from ill-gotten gains and bad conduct, you know, many of us being ex-gang members, drug dealers, you name it, anything that allowed us to so-called heighten our reputation in the streets. We did it. So when you look at those things, when you analyze all of the harm, all of the wrong that we've done as a people, and you consider that level of harm and that level of disgrace, if you would, then you begin to realize and understand this concept of integrity. It's like, wow, integrity. This is a subject, integrity, that it really takes some time for us to reach through this process of transformation. And we find ourselves slipping. A lot as it relates to this level, because we reach levels of integrity. How, how important is it to maintain this level of integrity in our dealings with individuals? Now we have to make sure that everything we're doing is defined or can be defined as praiseworthy, virtuous conduct. Our attitude towards people is all related to this. And I find it in our cultures, we still fall short. It could be something as simple as, and I'm not reducing it, but driving down the street in your car and being ran off the road potentially by a erratic driver. If we make the statement, all doggone Mexicans, are these crazy Asians. What are they doing in this country anyway? They shouldn't be allowed to— they shouldn't be allowed to drive. But yet you're a person that stands in front of the people and encourage good conduct and human rights and civil rights and all of these things. We advocate for justice, but yet these things often still come out of our mouth. And I know even myself have been guilty of that. And it takes some training. It really takes some training. And as we continue to increase our level of integrity, I believe that this can be extricated from us. We literally have to remove this thinking and this feeling from ourselves, things that we've picked up in our culture or subcultures. So if we're really gonna ever become at that level of true genuine leadership, that servant leadership, we really have to examine our level of integrity. That's just my thought for the day. Enjoy. Peace.
