This year, many Americans are going to be hit with some harsh financial realities brought on by these uncertain times.

Joining us to talk about ways to overcome some of the challenges we will be facing is Dr.

Quu Amawasi.

Dr.

Quu, welcome to Black Novo.

Hey, it's always good to be here, Brother James.

So we talk about coming together often but in these times how important is it for us to really come together?

Yeah.

I think what we have to understand is this.

Our strength has always been in our togetherness and that's why it's always been tried to be keep us separated.

So you say how important is it?

It's going to be important to be together on three levels.

We have to be together.

One within ourselves.

Then you say well what does that mean?

Then you got to be right within your family then right within your community.

Because see if you're not right within yourself, you can't get right with within anybody.

So you say, "How do I join?"

Because I'm healthy.

I understand my strength.

I understand my challenges.

So now when I connect with other people, we know what the conglomerate is.

And when you start to do that together, that's when you start to have power when you have that group of people.

And as you said, we're facing unchallenging times.

And the best thing that we know in life is to have somebody to lean on.

So, you know, I've been trying to bring members of my family together for quite some time, ever since uh co and you know, we start off real strong.

Yeah.

And then it starts to fade off again.

How do you overcome those challenges when it starts to fade off?

Yeah.

You know, I think that's the perfect thing.

You said we came together.

So, that means somebody had to say we need some organization.

We got to get together.

And so now what we have to say is we can do this initially, but how do we sustain this?

And it's just like any business.

What do we do?

We have regular agendas, regular business meetings.

We have people who's going to call.

We have action items.

So when we come back, it's something to do.

Usually when the momentum fades is because people get together and they say, "Why are we together?

What are we doing?"

So it has to be something where we see a end product.

It has to be a ROI, a return on investment of our time.

Now, it doesn't have to necessarily be the matriarch or the family that brings us together, right?

It doesn't have to be the matriarch, but it has to be somebody who's the glue.

And when you start thinking about bringing people together, what brings us together?

Fun, food, festival.

So when we start saying, "Hey, we're going to come together to watch the Packer again.

We're going to come together for the Super Bowl.

We can come together for events like that."

But now when we're together, we say, "Listen, we've had our fun, but how are we going to make sure everybody is together?"

Because it's all funny games until somebody is hurt and nobody knows.

And they say, "Well, why didn't anybody tell me?"

So this is a time where we get together to just make sure we understand where everybody is at.

Because as you said, not only we going to have financial times, we're going to have emotional times that's unstable.

And sometimes there's an embarrassment to say, "I need help."

But if we already have a setup where we say you ain't got to be embarrassed, we're all here to be able to chip in.

It's easier to be able to talk.

So being pre-warwn, being forearmmed could be something that could save a life on many levels.

You're correct on the mental aspect because we talk about it, but we really don't talk about it.

So when you're trying to cry out for help or you I shouldn't say cry out, but when you're seeking help, what what does that how should that sound?

What what should you do if you need some help?

Well, yeah.

No, I think it's just like you say how we got to be careful and tiptoe with how we say it and what not like that.

What we got to be able to say is I need help.

But you know what's also better is when I can look at you because I love you, James, and I say something right, James.

I know something.

I don't wait for you to tell me I'm looking.

But that creates that closeness.

Again, those meetings together.

So now I know what's going on with you from a normal dayto day.

So when something shifts, I can be the one to come tell you if you don't feel strong enough.

But two, once somebody tell you, don't make them pay for it later.

you know, such and such had this, you know, what you name it like that.

So, why am I going to trust you?

Why am I do that?

I need to know that it's a safe space, but it's also not just a safe space, but a space that can help me.

I want to know that you care, but also what can we do?

And we know collectively, again, it's not with one person, but the collective that can usually change and move the needle.

Do you believe this that black men still have a hard time sharing their feelings and and admitting that they have some issues and they need to Well, you know, we've been talking about this for years.

Uh how how do we improve that or open up that conversation?

So, this is the question.

I said yes kind of jokingly while you were saying it, but the thing is it's on a continuum.

It's not a yes or no.

It's a yes and we're getting better.

It's clearly better than it was 20 years ago.

So the question is we have to keep doing it so people understand you know what it is okay not to be okay.

It's okay to say I need help.

In fact it's a sign of strength to to say that I need help.

So once we get keep that momentum going it gets easier and easier with each generation.

So if we look at our grandparents generation versus our father's generation force us and now to our children and things of that nature and grandchildren even you can see that the talk on mental health is different.

So then it becomes like hey what can I do?

What can I say?

And it's not about mental health.

It's just there's a problem and for every problem there's a solution.

How do we again your word collectively come together so one person doesn't have to do it.

If you're if you need to move man we can all collectively get together and put some couches and things of that nature.

Just like we do things in a physical sense we have to learn how to do those in an emotional and a mental manner.

Also financially we are expecting things to get really rough.

I don't think people understand or realize how rough things are going to get.

Can you talk a little bit about that?

Yeah.

You know, this is one of those things.

It's a X factor.

You know, we look at COVID just in 2020.

And so, if history doesn't repeat itself, but it kind of rhymes.

You say, "Well, what happened right after the the bird flu in 1919?"

Well, we had the Great Depression in 1929, and we saw how that, right?

People say, "Oh, that would never happen again in this generation."

But we're seeing things closer and closer and closer.

And you never believe it's going to happen until it falls out.

So, what we have to do again being pre-warn is to be pre to be forewarned is to be forearmmed.

So, what do we do?

we start to be more smarter in our decision-making.

We be smarter in the things that we purchase and buy and it's so hard from a capitalistic society.

But again, it goes into the village.

What are those things that we never considered?

You know what?

I have a sister and I have a mother.

And this is going to seem odd to everybody.

But what if we didn't all have three houses, but we had one big house?

You know what?

If we said, you know what we're going to do?

We're going to come together for big meals instead of everybody going to McDonald's and Burger King and Chick-fil-A and Chipotle and whatnot, but we're going to come together collectively.

And that money that we would be spending out, we're going to do home-cooked meals, which again brings us the collectiveness, but then brings a realistic financial saving, but also eating better helps us in a health standpoint.

So, it has a holistic healing, bringing together and to your original point, financial savings.

Yeah.

But that that's the key, coming together, realizing that we're better collectively than we are separately and making sure that that works.

And Dr.

Quo, um, you got to come back and so we could continue this conversation.

I really would love to.

Thank you.

No, thank you.

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