IRL Take Aways: Taraji P. Henson

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Angie Martinez in Real Life Podcast. This episode and conversation
is powered by I Do Say Hello Everybody. It is
another addition to Angie Martinez IRL. This is Takeaways, our
takeaway audio only episodes where we talk about some of
our interview episodes and we reflect on what our takeaways

(00:20):
were from them and man, this episode, I mean, none
of us could have anticipated what Taraji p Henson would share.
So if you haven't seen the episode or listen to
the full Taragi p episode, I'm just gonna give you
a little clip of this part here. I thought I
was happy, but the things that I thought I'm gonna
get emotional, I don't want to. The things that I

(00:42):
thought was making me happy, they don't. They don't cut
it anymore. And so I'm in a place where what
does that look like? And I'm kind of spinning because
I don't know the things that made me happy before,
Like you know, when I was going to get married
and I didn't workout. It's not that it's not marriage,

(01:02):
it's not a man, it's not. So it's for me
to tap into find my happiness. And to be quite
honest with you, Angie, I haven't been happy like purely
happy in a long time. Oh, give me your hand,
I haven't. I'm sorry. Oh it was intense, by the way.
I'm joined today by Brittany who was my show producer,

(01:24):
Ashley dear Young Queen, our digital consultant, and Candice Marie
Bembo are one of our favorite journalists. First of all,
I love to Argie. She's an icon. She is a
legend at this point. Her body of work speaks for itself.
So I didn't know what was going to happen when
we sat down across from each other. I knew it
would be entertaining to Rogie is always entertaining. I didn't know,

(01:46):
as her friend, where she was in her life. I
didn't know. I mean, I know she had challenges like
we all do, but I didn't know that she had
planned to share some of them in this way. But
I was so grateful for it, especially when I saw
the reaction when I especially when I saw how many
people needed to hear someone say that, Hey, I'm not
that happy right now in my life. Yeah, I'm acknowledging it,
and I'm going to do something about it. And there's

(02:06):
something even more powerful about seeing someone that you think
should be happy. Yeah, admit that they're not happy. Yeah, right,
Like it's one thing for me to maybe be at
home not happy with my job and my man pissing
me off, and maybe rent do that I don't really
want to pay. But it's another thing to see somebody
who looks like she has it all together, who's not

(02:28):
worried about financial responsibilities. Say, no, I got those same
worries even when she fed that life is spiritual warfare
and that you know, she has to every day fight
for her joy. I think so many people could relate
to that and maybe never had the language to put

(02:49):
it in that kind of frame and framework and terminology,
but could be like, yeah, like it is a battle
every day to choose happy and and somedays battle exactly. Yeah. No,
I love that. I love the freeness and I love
that it was She made it feel like it wasn't

(03:11):
crazy that she was sharing that. She made it feel like, yeah,
I'm not good, but it's okay, and I'm a cry
and I'm a cry and angree, do not edit any
of this out. Because she's very aware of her gift
and her voice, and she's very aware how how she
uses it can affect other people, and so um, you know,
I admire that and respect that that she was willing

(03:32):
to put herself in her own vulnerability out there on
the line because she knows that by doing that it
will could it could potentially affect other people. And then
in fact it did. I saw it, did it really did.
I thank you guys. By the way, everybody who's commented
and shared don't take for I don't take for granted
any of that. You know, sometimes you might see a
whole bunch of comments and you think, what is my

(03:53):
comment matter? It matters? It does? We read them all.
I appreciate them all, and it's not just for us.
Sometimes other people who are inside the comments need to
know that they're not alone in feeling the things that
they're feeling. So as much as you guys share, we
don't take any of that for granted. And there was
a lot of sharing on this episode. It made it
made for me. I saw the community that I ral

(04:15):
had episode right. There are a few episodes where you
can kind of really see people rally behind the messaging
behind it. Kelly Roland was one. This Taragi episode was another.
Candice and everything that happened along with that Ashanti episode
was another right, there are just some moments where like
people need it. This was a moment I think also too.

(04:37):
We put it out right before the end of the year,
right as everybody was going into the new year. To
days are a hard time for a lot of people.
It's so funny because you know that was off schedules.
It was like, Okay, our episode is not supposed to
drop till next week. But something in my spirit was
just like, no drop it right now people because people

(04:58):
need it, and people that I think they did, they did. Yeah, yeah,
I think they did. But then you know, you do
that and you don't know you and then so then
when people do resonate to it, um, it was nice
to see, like you said, the community, the community was present.
And then I also think you said it kind of
at the beginning of this that you didn't know Taraji

(05:18):
was going through that. As a viewer, it was so
beautiful to watch your friendship on camera, to see you
were learning it as we the viewer was learning it
and at the same time trying to be there for
your friend. There was a moment where even you were
kind of like forget the rest that's going on, Like

(05:38):
you need a second and she was like no, yeah,
she was like no, I want people to see and
it's it's just it restored kind of that faith I
think in people that those that we lean on most
don't even know our deepest for sure, they don't even
know the deepest things of what we're going through. By
the way, Nila just walked in Nile Simone, DJ Nil Simone,
Young Naila, she actually you loved the Taragi episode. That

(06:01):
makes me so happy. I mean, I really liked me.
Y'all talked about being your best self versus like being
the best, because I feel like that's a conversation that
a lot of people have these days on social media.
You can be like I'm the best anything. But the
way you guys really pulled through that. Yes, and then
she said that, um, you gotta be careful who you're worshiping.

(06:22):
Let's actually play that clip. I don't want to get
it myself in any trouble, but just look at the
lives of the people who said I'm the greatest and
how it ended. That's all I'm gonna say. God is
the greatest. You feel me that God put you here

(06:42):
to do his work. Check your ego. I don't strive
to be the greatest, because that's serving something else. The
humble man knows that God gave him those talents to
change and shift the world into a better place. But
when you get into me, I, I, I, that's another God. Yeah,

(07:08):
that was a good one. The real life no, well
no pun intended there. That was weird, but the real
life story of how like you went on the vacation,
you wasn't really feeling like your best self, but at
the end you got rejuvenated, and how like sometimes it's
cool to just give people their space, like you can
still be around them, but not. Yeah, a lot of
it's a lot of gyms in there. Is she back
from her trip. She is back from her trip. We

(07:30):
partied at super Bowl together. She was in great spirits
at super Bowl right after Bali. Her trip was amazing,
she said. She by the way she looks rejuvenated. It
looked like she had just a refreshing time and whatever
she needed. And I think what is important and I
hope people took away. It's like, even if it's a

(07:52):
weekend at the spy, or even if if you're telling
your friend can't or your family member, can you take
your kids for a weekend night. Yes, Candice, Yes Candice.
Not everybody could go to Bally for a month. This
is we know not everybody could go to Bally for
a month. But it's that it's that thing that you

(08:12):
tell yourself where like, oh my god, what do I
really need? I need something I need? You said like
take my kids, I need a weekend, I need a day,
I need an afternoon, like really making time for yourself
to serve whatever your needs are. I totally agree and
I hope that we also have. When you watch this,
you also recognize that sometimes it may not just be

(08:34):
your friend reaching out to say can you take them?
It maybe you having to reach out to say, hey,
let me get them for the weekend, let me get
the kids for the weekend. Let's do something. What do
you need? Because all of us may not always be
able to say or articulate what we need or feel
like if we say it, we might be, you know,
burdening our friends or burdening our family. But sometimes we

(08:57):
have to we have to be proactive for to be like, hey,
I got you. And that's Cannice. I recently saw a
post that you put up that was a conversation between
you and your friend about a friend kind of having
some vulnerability and a tough time parenting, saying like, girl,
don't have kids because this is a headache and I'm
so stressed out about it and all of that, and

(09:18):
Cannice kind of put her opinion out there and then
got some feedback from other parents that were like, Hey,
if we can't be honest with our friends, where can
we be honest? This episode, to me was exactly a
reflection of that. If Taraji had nowhere else to say,
I am not fucking happy, it was sitting right down

(09:39):
next to her friend, and we were so blessed to
have the opportunity where the rest of us could could
chime into that real, genuine friendship conversation. We need to
provide more spaces with our friends to be honest and vulnerable,
and I think that's the That's the other piece too,
is like this came at the end of the year,

(10:02):
but it has still been a heavy beginning of twenty
twenty three, right, It has been relentless. And that's this
like heaviness that if you aren't tapped into your friends,
if you aren't connected into your community, to just be
able to say, like look, I'm not good. That's when

(10:23):
things get really really dark, and that's when things can
get really scary. So I'm one of the I think
the one of the things in addition to her bravery
was what does it look like when you just finally
decide I'm just gonna say something? And in that was

(10:43):
the hope that it's not gonna be like this always
Like as as as she was hying, as so as
he was telling her, telling her truth and she was
sharing with Angie, one of the things that you did
know was she might not be happy to day that day,
but she was gonna make sure that she found happiness

(11:05):
and joy in her future. Right. She was going to
own it herself. And I think that that's one of
one of the hopes that we have to take, is
that it may not be right now, but we can
be happy, but we can be happy. There was also
something dope that I thought that she shared on there,

(11:26):
which was so cool, which was an understanding of how
her art helped other people. And so she knew that
when she played certain characters that they had somebody would
feel seen. But then she also knew, and she stepped
on this podcast, yes for sure, that somebody would take
away something that I'm always really I don't know, I'm
always really protective, especially if people I have relationship with,

(11:48):
like I never want them to have like you said that,
that vulnerability hangover type of thing, and so I was
worried about that. But the second I said to her,
I was like, are you sure, and she was like, yeah,
don't don't delete any of this. I knew that it
was intentional, but she wasn't sharing. She was sharing this
with the intention of making sure that other people felt seen.

(12:10):
I don't know. The way she delivered that message was
really just beautiful and brilliant. I'm so grateful she chose
here to do that, and yeah, and I'm grateful to
how it was received. So to everybody who sent a
post and a comment, thank you, and please know that
all your comments are we read every one of them.
I got to do a better job at getting in
the comments, yeah, and responding, because sometimes I just read

(12:32):
them and then I take it away and it's in
my mind I want to do Actually, you have to
hold me accountable to this. I really want to do
a better job at getting in there on it because
I want you guys to know that I see your
comments and they really do mean a lot, and I
want to engage with you more as we build this community.
So I thank you to everybody who shared a comment.
Please comment, Please subscribe, and if you haven't seen the
Taragi episode yet, you can listen to it here or

(12:54):
you could watch it on my YouTube page. Angie Martinez
I r L. Please make sure you subscribe, and like
I said, please make sure you comment. And I'm going
to I today vow. I'm gonna get up in there
with you guys. Um so she follow up? I need
you to go back now. I know we need everybody
saying we need to do a follow up like a
post BOLLI follow up seriously, not even just for Taraji though.

(13:17):
I want to follow up with Kelly and her relationship
with her dad and her kids. Like I want to
follow up but a lot. I know we can't just
do takeaways. We have to do follow ups, right. It's
so funny. I thought about Kelly the other day and
I wonder how her and her dad were coming along.
Great content and like this is I'm so happy you
like it. Top tier. Every Sunday I get my one.

(13:37):
I love that. Thanks guys, Thank you all too for
checking out this episode. We'll be back with some more
takeaways from some of your favorite episodes again. Catch them
on IRL YouTube page and wherever podcasts I heard. We're
out guys, thank you so much