Perception, Representation, and Self-Worth

How do our five senses craft our reality and shape our identity? Join me, Jermaine, on this solo episode of Uploaded and Unfiltered, where I break down the profound impact that perception and representation have on our lives. We'll explore how the simple act of seeing ourselves accurately portrayed in media can significantly influence our self-worth and identity, particularly for marginalized communities. I'll also share the spark behind my coaching business, which aims to support black content creators facing mental health challenges like anxiety and depression, fostering a healthier mindset that enhances creativity and content quality.

Chapters

• 0:06 The Power of Perception and Representation
• 14:51 Navigating Mental Health and Content Creation

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:06

Welcome. Welcome back to another episode of Uploaded and Unfiltered, the podcast, where I, your host Jermaine, interviews another content creator in regards to their journey thus far. As I've made it to the year mark and listened to a few of my episodes, I don't think I've fully laid out the vision and the purpose of Uploaded and Unfiltered, so I wanted to go into a few topics today on the solo episode, and by the end of the episode, you'll know exactly where my mindset is in regards to the coaching business that I will be starting and the content that I want to make going forward and why I do what I do. So, before we get started, go ahead and get some of the dream, get some popcorn, settle in and, if you haven't already, go ahead and subscribe to the podcast and leave me a comment. If you have any thoughts on the subject matters that I'm about to provide you with, go ahead and send a message to the podcast. You can either send a text message, you can send an email, you can respond on Spotify. There's a plethora of ways to do it, so go ahead and check them out. As you can tell from the title, the name of this episode is Perception, representation and Self-Worth, and over the last few months, probably my entire life, these concepts have been popping up in my head and I had to get them out. So this is the first time, outside of my wife, that I've actually talked about these things, so hopefully they come through and make some sense.

Speaker 1: 1:38

So, without further ado, let's go ahead and jump into the first subject, which is perception. So before we can dive into the subject, of course we need to know what perception means. Perception is our mind processing data, slash input from our senses, and it shapes what we call reality. So again, I'll say that one more time Perception is our mind processing input from our senses and it shapes what we call reality. When it comes to reality, everybody's reality is slightly different, slightly skewed. It is because of our perception, the way our mind is processing the things that are happening to us, that we are getting data from, from the five senses, the way our mind starts to unravel that information, attaching it to different things, maybe attaching it to past events that happen in our lives. Those things are what's creating how we view the world. So we get perception here. Everything that's coming in, we are processing it. Everything we come into contact with influences our senses, everything which, in turn, influences our senses, everything which in turns influences our sense of reality, which in turn influences the creation of our identity. So who we think we are, who we see ourselves to be, is based on our five senses, and everything in the world influences our five senses. Do you see where I'm going with here? Everything that we're taking in from media, from relationships, all of those things are influencing who we think we are.

Speaker 1: 3:13

And that's why we roll right into the second part of this topic representation. This is why I believe representation matters so much, because if we are consuming content that is not representing us, our ideals, who we look like, who we say we are in our core, we're seeing somebody else's perception of who they think we are on a constant basis. That is causing harm to our self-worth, that's causing harm to the creation of our identity, especially when you're young. When you're young and you don't have any concept of the real world, quote and you're just watching cartoons and you're watching movies, those things influence who you think you are as a child, and I remember distinctly there were no. To my knowledge, of course, it was Black Panther, but at the time I didn't know there was any black comic book hero. So being a comic book hero was out of the question. Doesn't having no representation mean that somebody is going to think that something's not possible? Of course not, but having representation makes those things that we think are not possible a hell of a lot easier to think about. If we see examples of it on TV, we see examples of it in the news. That is why representation is very important. So not only are you helping build a self-identity for black boys and girls, but you're also breaking negative stereotypes.

Speaker 1: 4:48

We all hear stereotypes. Hell, some of us believe that these stereotypes are real, but they're only someone's perception that became very popular and has now become part of our reality. Does that mean it's true? No, it doesn't, but it's part of our collective reality because enough people believed in it, enough people had that perception of that stereotype and now it's a real thing. That is why I decided to start up my own coaching business to help black content creators with their mental health, help content creators get through those spouts of depression or anxiety, because all of those feelings, all of those things, all of those the stubbornness, the anger, the anxiety they're all perceptions of reality that we can change. That is why mental health matters. That is why talking about how you feel and processing those feelings and becoming unstuck matters, because those things we think are affecting our self-identity are affecting our self-worth.

Speaker 1: 6:02

If we want to become great, if we want to become those content creators that we know that we want to be, we need to tackle our mental health, because I fully believe that the content that we create is content that is coming from a place inside of us, and the cleaner and more positive that place is, the more clear our head is, the better. The content will be Simple as that. So, while we're ingesting all of this media and content telling us that we're one thing and and content telling us that we're one thing, and the news telling us that we're one thing, and we're only seeing one version of us represented on tv, the way that we combat that is being very present and aware of the content that we are ingesting. When we're ingesting it, we have to be critically thinking. While we're watching movies, while we're playing video games, while we're playing video games, while we're listening to music, we need to be aware of what we're listening to and say, ok, what are they trying to say? It took me a while to understand that and I thought at first that this knowledge was something that was to be gained with time, and it's not. This knowledge that I have is to be gained with your perception.

Speaker 1: 7:16

Once you are aware of how our self-identity is created, once you understand that what we believe to be true will be our reflection of life. If you're constantly beating yourself up for missing opportunities, your life is going to feel like that. Your life is going to feel joyless and hard, like everything. You had to work hard as hell to get something, and I don't believe that to be the case. I believe, if you look at opportunities, if you look at your failed attempts as learning lessons, that's like half the battle. You have to go in to different situations knowing that failure could happen, but failure is not a bad word, it's not a negative word. I know our perception of that word is negative and bad, but it's not. It's how you learn. It's how you become great at whatever craft. You're doing so in order to get our self-worth in a place that's going to allow us to create amazing content and to allow us to represent who we are as a culture, as people, to other people who look like us, who might not have the same perception of us as life, who might not know that they don't have to be angry all the time, who might not know that they are capable of whatever they put their mind to. In order to get to that place, we need to clear our own mental blocks. We have to get rid of our own stuff and that's why I am doing what I do. That's why the podcast exists, so we can get more faces out there to let other people know that, hey, I'm doing it, you can do it. And also to talk about the mental side of content creation, to talk about the mental side of being Black.

Speaker 1: 9:02

The perception, at least in the United States, in the media is not the perception I want left before I die. This perception has been around since I've been a kid and because I was always questioning it, it never became part of my identity. I never let it sink in. I was always a little aware of, hey, some of the stuff I'm listening to might affect how I behave. And over the weekend I kind of witnessed that firsthand for myself. I went back and listened to some old music I used to listen to in high school and college and that music instantly I felt the same anger and turmoil, those feelings I used to have when I was listening to the music and it was all for now. I don't even remember what I was angry for. It only lasted a little bit and after I was like why am I angry? There's, my life is not in danger. Why am I angry right now? And so I calmed down. But for some people, being angry all the time is a reality. But again, our reality is our perception, and our perception is controlled by the way our mind processes the data that comes in from the five senses.

Speaker 1: 10:13

And I'm here to tell you now, if you have any type of thing that you realize, man, I need to go see a therapist for this. My mental is not right, but you've been afraid to go to a therapist because maybe they don't look like you, or maybe you just don't want to get into your feelings. You don't want to feel it, to heal it Definitely hit me up. Rrt rapid resolution therapy is a modality that I'm learning, that I'm this close to just having perfected and more perfection will come over time that allows me to help people with their stucknesses by fixing their mind. We don't need to talk about your childhood. We don't have to talk about your childhood. We don't have to talk about any horrible instances that happened to you. You come in, you tell me how you've been feeling, we determine how you should be feeling, we get you there and then you're gone One to two sessions. That is something that I've been passionate about since I left the corporate world, because our happiness, our success, our dreams all come down to our mental, our mindset, how we feel about ourselves. Once you master that, there is no challenge that you can't conquer period. So if you want to feel like that, if you want to get on the same level that I'm on and get to the point of clarity and understanding and taking challenges on with excitement and passion, hit me up, send me an email, send me a DM, let me know what's going on. We'll schedule some time and we'll get it done.

Speaker 1: 11:54

I've been sitting on these skills for far too long. I've been seeing people hurt for far too long and now I guess I got to the point where it's starting to weigh on me. Hey, are you sitting back here with all this knowledge? You're not saying anything? That's fucked up. I'm fixing that now.

Speaker 1: 12:14

I'm excited to see where my business radiant reflection goes, and I named it radiant reflection, because I want the content that we make to be a reflection of what's inside of us, and I want what's inside of us to be pure, radiant, clean, clear. I want people to walk in their true, authentic selves and not worry about what people think. If you have trouble getting on camera, you're worried, nervous hit me up. I got you One session. We're done. I can't wait. I'm excited Like I have not been this excited about it's work. But it's what I am passionate about Helping people get through their mental blocks to live better lives. Because I've seen it firsthand. People beat themselves up over what I deem to be stupid shit. It's all mentally. It's fake, it's not real. Like they're upset about oh, so-and-so, didn't call me back. Who gives a fuck? So-and-so, didn't invite me to their X, y and Z. And Like you're angry right now.

Speaker 1: 13:25

Angry anger should be an emotion that is resided, for if your life is in danger, if your life is in danger, get angry. It's going to make you stronger. It's going to make you dumber. You're not going to be as good at critical thinking as you are if you're not angry. But if you want to be angry, choose those moments. Being angry in the parking lot of a Wendy's is crazy, Unless, again, your life is in danger. Okay, being angry in the middle of the night, nobody's in the house and you're just being angry is okay. That's dumb, unless your life's in danger.

Speaker 1: 14:07

Yeah, I got high hopes. I have intentions for this business to do amazing things. I cannot wait to start helping people, for those who need that help, that need that push. But yeah, in order to start creating a better self-worth, in order to rewrite our perceptions, we need to start questioning everything. We need to start questioning the intent of the content that we're watching. We need to start questioning the intent of the people that we talk to, because the only person who's going to worry about your mental health is you. Nobody can do anything to help that but you. We have control of our own mental health and it's time to start taking control of it.

Speaker 1: 14:51

So with that, I'm going to sign off for the night. Thank you for listening. I hope you got some gems or information out of here and if you have any questions, of course, hit me up, shoot me an email, hit me in the DMs and, as always, like if you need help with a stuckness, there's some anxiety that you've been dealing with that you haven't had any luck with. If there's some anger that you're trying to get unstuck, hit me up. I got you. Other than that, I will talk to y'all later. As always, protect your mental, keep creating content, and I'll see you in the next one. Peace.