Moving from survival to purpose might seem daunting, but it's achievable. Hear from Dr. Qiana Leary and Demond Martin as they share their powerful journeys and insights at Essence Festival of Culture 2026.
Dr. Leary's book, "Beautiful Burdens," was born from personal adversity and a period of forced stillness. Discover how she transformed pain into purpose, offering a guide for navigating life's challenges.
Demond Martin's "Friends of the Good" explores the profound impact of relationships on our success. Learn how to cultivate a supportive circle that pushes and pulls you toward your goals.
Dive into the core of emotional intelligence with Dr. Leary, who breaks down its four essential competencies: self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, and relationship management. Understand how these skills are crucial for navigating grief and difficult times.
This inspiring session is a must-watch for anyone seeking to find their purpose and build resilience.
#EssenceFestival #PurposeDriven #EmotionalIntelligence #AuthorTalk
Dr. Leary's book, "Beautiful Burdens," was born from personal adversity and a period of forced stillness. Discover how she transformed pain into purpose, offering a guide for navigating life's challenges.
Demond Martin's "Friends of the Good" explores the profound impact of relationships on our success. Learn how to cultivate a supportive circle that pushes and pulls you toward your goals.
Dive into the core of emotional intelligence with Dr. Leary, who breaks down its four essential competencies: self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, and relationship management. Understand how these skills are crucial for navigating grief and difficult times.
This inspiring session is a must-watch for anyone seeking to find their purpose and build resilience.
#EssenceFestival #PurposeDriven #EmotionalIntelligence #AuthorTalk
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00:07and everyone hear me hi good morning thank you for being here welcome to New Orleans
00:12the essence festival of culture 2026 and welcome to essence authors so I'll jump right in we're
00:21talking about moving from survival to purpose and Dr. Q and Damon Damon Damon Damon Damon we talked
00:32about this backstage I'm sorry your work focuses on the relationships that have aided you in your
00:43journey helped you in your journey and Dr. Q your book centers on how to improve your emotional
00:50intelligence and how to in handling hard times challenging times in life I'd like to know what
00:57inspired both of your books so I'll start first well good morning essence come on talk back to me
01:05good morning good morning we're all here beautiful we're here for the culture so super happy to be
01:10here I will say that this is a reunion for me so in 2024 I was scheduled to speak here
01:18at essence
01:18and right before I was scheduled to speak I had a post-surgery nightmare I was down for 90 days
01:24I
01:25couldn't walk and I lost my entire independence my sutures unraveled and so I had a large war wound
01:33as they said then I had to have a nurse come in and take care of me for 90 days
01:37and in those 90 days
01:38I sat and I journaled and that's what developed was the book the book beautiful burdens and what I
01:46decided to do was instead of cry the woe is me it was more like whoa this is me and
01:52so I turned that
01:54pain into purpose and that is what motivated the book beautiful burdens
02:01it's so wonderful to be here and I just met these two young ladies and and feel like they're already
02:07family so that that's it's beautiful but it's beautiful to be here in New Orleans with all you
02:12incredible people you know friends of the good was written because you know I I lived this improbable
02:20but possible life where grew up in poverty had a heroin addict as a stepfather lived in a trailer
02:27in rural North Carolina and then got just an exceptional set of breaks where my first job out
02:34of college was assistant to the White House chief of staff and the Clinton administration went to
02:39Harvard business school spent 21 years at one of the large largest hedge funds in the world and
02:44that allowed my wife and I to become philanthropists and we also went through
02:48extraordinary pain having a family member be suicidal for three and a half years and through
02:54every one of those steps in my life there's been extraordinary people that have pulled me that
02:59have pushed me that have helped me along that journey and you know I think everybody in this room
03:05you know has goals right does everybody have goals here in this room but one of the questions that
03:11you know we should all be asking ourselves are who are the actual people that are going to help us
03:16achieve those goals and oftentimes we we ignore the fact that the people that are in our circles
03:22actually shape our lives and so friends of the good challenges us all to think about who is pushing
03:30and pulling us who should be not in our lives and who should be thank you okay so Dr. Q
03:39it's easy
03:42to tap into your emotional intelligence if you have it when things are going well right things are kind
03:49of going your way but what advice or what tips can you share with us about how to tap into
03:56your emotional
03:57intelligence during challenging times good question um first I like to see a show of hands who can tell
04:03me the four competencies of emotional intelligence anyone know all four wonderful I'm a teacher at heart
04:11so I'm going to educate you the first competency is self-awareness that is I'm feeling angry right now
04:17the next competency is self-management and that is
04:23no drugs no drugs no drugs repeat no drones are allowed inside the convention center
04:36I thought she was saying no drugs no drums no drones none of them none of those the D's
04:43none of the D's and so I'll go I'll start again though so the first one is self-awareness
04:47um and that self-awareness is like wow I am really mad right now the next one is then self
04:53-management
04:54because I'm mad I'm going to take a breather before I snap on somebody
04:59important notice no drones are allowed no drones allowed at the convention center
05:08something something is somebody don't want y'all to get these four so let me run them real quick
05:11self-awareness then there's self-management then the next one is social awareness that's when you're
05:17looking around the room and you're like oh my friend is sad oh my my boyfriend is not feeling
05:23himself today then there's relationship management now that I know he's not feeling himself let me have
05:29a conversation with him to see like what's really going on when we're not aware of those four
05:34competencies is really difficult to navigate grief and it's really difficult to navigate trying times
05:39and so the more that we practice because practice never makes perfect it makes permanent
05:44the more you practice the more permanent that muscle can be so that you can say hmm I'm having a
05:50self-awareness moment now so that I can self-manage and really what this book does is every single
05:55chapter I tell you a little bit about my own grief and which of those competencies I'm kind of
06:01navigating through so that you can start practicing how to navigate through those and I would say when
06:06you're going through a really really hard time whether it's a breakup whether it's a loss of a loved
06:13one whether it's finances that are building up in your um in your your your your bills the first one
06:20is
06:20to self-aware have self-awareness how are you feeling own it sit in it and then you can move
06:28to step
06:29two with just self-management thank you so mr martin mr martin just gonna say mr martin how does
06:38someone find friends of the good when they feel isolated because I think intuitively you feel like
06:46you lean on your friends when you're going through a challenge but I think most of us actually retract and
06:52we want to isolate when we're going through something like oh I'm in my feelings I don't want to go
06:58out I
06:58don't want to go to brunch so what's something so you know you have these great friends right you
07:04found this village this circle how do you actually lean on them when you should well I mean the reality
07:10is this has been deemed a time of loneliness and despair and there are so many people that are isolated
07:19and and alone um and um the other thing that I would say to just that ties into to dr
07:25q's um statements
07:26is that um no one is spared um we we all um are going to go through some form of
07:34tragedy you're going
07:35to have loss you're going to have um a death of someone that you you love um you're going to
07:40have
07:40disappointment in your life and um what is key is that you have a circle of people around you that
07:47can
07:47support you in those things and that you've assessed um before those times get hard that you
07:53have people that you can count on um but uh oftentimes when people go into depression uh and deal with
08:00anxiety they tend to isolate um the key thing is to try to tap into your network and your community
08:07whether it be a church group or or even you know just texting someone who's in your circle
08:13and say how you doing um and and almost force yourself to to be in community and you'll see
08:20that you're feeling just a little bit better just by being I feel good sitting here and so being with
08:27quality people and um and and having them be part of your life is I think one of the most
08:32essential
08:33elements the the last thing that I would say is that um you know uh your most curated version of
08:40yourself um is tends to be the most lonely version of yourself uh what do I mean by that when
08:47when
08:47you're trying to uh keep the wall um of the people that that love and care for you um uh
08:53care about you
08:54um up instead of being vulnerable about what's actually really going on in your life just letting
09:01people know hey I'm actually feeling lonely I'm feeling sad um the people who truly care about you
09:07will actually reach out and say hey let's go let's go get some coffee let's go play basketball let's go
09:12do something double dutch whatever it is um and and that uh can break you out of that cycle
09:19that just reminds me of a quote that I I coined and it's I'm 100 me 100 of the time
09:26and I love what you said about the best version of yourself is the self that can acknowledge
09:33I'm not good right now I'm sad right now I'm lonely right now um so that you can have that
09:39village come
09:40and provide that support I love that I love that I love that too because it's practical
09:45right it's not just a hokey oh go journal go take a bubble bath uh what's a habit that both
09:53of you have
09:54and that you've developed developed over time that has shaped who you are today
09:59um the habit that that I've developed is treating people with dignity and respect
10:08and when when you do that um you know community is not found is built and and you have to
10:16um invest
10:18in relationships uh for those relationships to invest back uh in you and I didn't understand
10:27my grandmother when I was growing up but now I am more seasoned and uh still sexy and uh I
10:35realize
10:35that I have to start my mornings praising Jesus Christ of Nazareth every single day amen um it grounds me
10:44it keeps me focused um I'm corrected in the word um when I am wrong and it gives me the
10:53empowerment
10:53that I need to shake up the earth because I am a shift shaker um and I'm here to do
11:00some damage
11:00with what God has given me to do amen can I just add to that um my my pastor gave
11:07me this daily
11:08confessional um that every morning uh I wake up um and it starts with today is a good day for
11:16this
11:16is the day the Lord has made and that's the first thing that I read and so I'm feeding into
11:21myself
11:21rather than letting you know social media feed into me and that sets the stage for every day
11:28I love both of those responses because let's be honest so many of us the first thing we do when
11:34we wake up in the morning is pick up our phones and look at social media so to wake up
11:41in the morning
11:41to set the tone for your day to thank God and then acknowledge that this is going to be a
11:48good day
11:50love that right okay so what is something there are going to be so many conversations happening this
11:56weekend what's something that you want people to take away if they remember nothing else from this
12:01particular conversation you want them to take home with them and so this is a two-part question
12:07why should they what is something that they need to read in your book that maybe you know we can't
12:15expand on now because of time I think for me um there are pictures in this book of my my
12:22wounds
12:22and I was really um intentional to be vulnerable to let you see how bad I was how down I
12:29was
12:29because I think oftentimes we glamorize our ugly and we glamorize our pain because that it's
12:36unconventional to be honest and tell people that I'm really bad so I wanted people to see that I may
12:42be on essence today but at that moment I was really really bad and I chose I made a choice
12:48to live my
12:49life through the lens of beauty and that's not for the easy that's not that but it's for the courageous
12:56and I'll say this really quickly my my pastor shout out to Dr. Iresha Hilliard of New Light in Houston
13:02Texas she's doing a series right now called uh watch your ear gates and your eye gates and it's really
13:09important that you pay attention to what you consume because it it it manifests in your heart it comes
13:15out of your mouth and then it becomes a part of your life and so as much as I love
13:19watching Love Island
13:20I can't watch that mess right now because it's starting to over consume me it's starting to
13:26take character and who I am and so when you want to live a life that's beautiful and you want
13:31to
13:31overcome those burdens then you have to also be mindful of what is it that you're consuming on a
13:36day-to-day basis and you need to begin to guard your ears and guard your eye gates and I
13:42would say
13:42um you know success resiliency and and even well-being um those are not individual achievements those happen
13:53in community and um you know each of us uh deserve to have quality people in our lives um to
14:04create joy
14:05joy and and friendship and love um and you only do that by um really assessing who are the people
14:13that
14:13are around you and when you have a good assessment of who are the friends of the good in your
14:18life
14:19um you can clearly understand that when those moments come that are tough um that you have people
14:24that are truly there for you but they're also going to celebrate your wins with you as well
14:31thank you both this was an impactful conversation do you all agree yes okay so thank you and enjoy the
14:42rest of the discussions we have lined up later today thank you all thank you all and if this wasn't
14:51clear before both of their books are available for purchase in our yes
15:00and if this wasn't clear before we go to our for purchase in our pleasure
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