Imagine If...YOU Create Your Value

[Applause]

imagine

if we lived in a world where everyone

knows their value

seriously i want you to imagine our

society learning to recognize

that black trans lives matter

that folks living with disabilities are

more valuable

than we have ever created space for them

to be

and that immigrants have always been the

key ingredient

that gives america the flavor it so

desperately needs

but often leaves out unfortunately we

live

in a capitalistic society that uses

very deliberate marketing strategies to

make you

feel less valuable than others who seem

to have something that you don’t

charles baudelaire famously posed that

the greatest trick of the devil

was convincing the world he didn’t exist

but i would argue the greatest trick

was convincing people they have no value

and getting an entire society

to dehumanize and devalue each other

it’s heartbreaking for me to hear about

a parent

who would harm or worse yet kill their

own child for being different

or to hear about the suicide rates

especially

amongst lgbtq plus youth it bothers me

so much

because i’m a survivor of a suicide

attempt

i was only 15 years old and had already

received messages

loud and clear from my church and from

my own family

that my life was not worth living

but oh how wrong they were and what a

grave mistake

i would have made if i had succeeded at

taking my own life

i wouldn’t be here today talking to you

right now

the ripple effect that is my life would

not have traveled around the world

and touched as many people as i know

that it has

and this is where i am adamant about the

fact

that i’m not special well that’s not

true

i am pretty special but so are you

the only difference is how prepared you

might be to take on life’s

challenges and how how you process some

of the very inevitable pain

because hurt people hurt people but a

healed person can have the ability

to heal an entire community

so that’s what i did i had to heal

myself first

before i could truly be of any use to

anybody else

so one day as i was sitting in front of

my altar chanting

and crying because i had just received

news that my mother’s health was failing

and that she could possibly fall into a

coma

and i remember my first thought being i

could care less

if she lives or dies that thought alone

made me cry even more

i resented my mother for breaking my

heart

i mean it was her and at her request

that i attempted

suicide in the first place you kill

yourself

or i’ll kill myself was the ultimatum

she gave me

fortunately i found a practice a

spiritual practice in buddhism

that helped me find the compassion and

patience for a woman who had not shown

the same to me

truth be told we were both in need of

healing

so i packed up my life in los angeles

and i moved back in with my parents

in racine wisconsin to help take care of

my mom

and at that time i was able to transfer

my job from working at the apple store

to working for the apple store online

and from home

i worked the late night ship and during

the day i drove my mom to her doctor’s

appointments

i picked up her prescription medications

i helped run errands and sometimes

i even helped cook although i’ll fully

admit

i’m never going to be anyone’s julia

child

i’m telling you it was not easy some

days we ended up in

full-on warfare between me and my

parents conversations and

arguments spanning from their

disappointment in me being a trans woman

to the fact that i never finished

college like my brother who was the

psychiatrist a military officer an

fbi agent yeah a pair of overachievers

my brother and i are it just took me a

little longer

to get here i had to take a few more

detours and i learned that detours

might seem inconvenient but nonetheless

they’re actually in a very important

part of the journey

in 2011 i thought i had lost out on the

opportunity to go after my dream of

becoming an actor

because i had packed up everything to

move back home and take care of my mom

what i didn’t know is that life was

giving me an experience

that i could tap into years later

when i was acting out candy ferocity’s

final conversations

with her parents in the fx hit series

pose

but first i was going to have to go

through a lot

i was going to have to struggle a lot i

moved

a lot but it was maya angelou’s words

that gave

me comfort when she said that each of us

has the right and the responsibility to

assess the road

which lies ahead and those over which we

have traveled

and if the future road looms ominous or

unpromising

and the roads back on inviting then we

need to gather our resolve

and carrying only the necessary baggage

step

off that road into another direction and

if the new choice is

also unpalatable without embarrassment

we must be ready to change that as well

so i eventually realized that my

seemingly unstable life was preparing me

to be able to pick up and go wherever

and whenever

life was asking me to i had to build a

life condition to be able to withstand

and overcome the challenges

i learned that buddhahood meant not only

being able to be unswayed by

difficulties or hardships but being able

to use them

as fuel for purifying and strengthening

one’s own life

we buddhists call it turning pain into

medicine

soon after my mom recovered and was able

to return to work herself

and i heard about a job opportunity in

chicago to develop a job

program specifically for black and brown

trans people

i came highly recommended by several

people in the community

but unfortunately i wasn’t a licensed

clinical psychologist

or a social worker nor did i have a

bachelor’s degree

which was what they preferred but it was

my experience

that if i could get the interview i

could get the job

and i did while staying with my parents

in racine wisconsin i would get up at 6

00 a.m every day

and i would drive an hour and a half

each way sometimes even longer depending

on traffic

most times i was the first one in the

office

and even though it wasn’t my

responsibility i would make sure

to put on a pot of coffee so that it was

ready whenever my co-workers arrived

i would then sit down at my desk and

start to prepare

for the work i would be doing with my

clients that day

it was hard work but it was rewarding i

was able to provide career coaching for

cis and trans people who were coming out

of incarceration

or recently diagnosed with hiv

struggling with homelessness or drug

addiction

i mean none of these were easy cases

and the nonprofit that i worked for they

just got used to sort of ushering folks

into this

safety and sanitation certification

program

so that they can work in some kitchen

somewhere

but it was my job to help them discover

the value already there in their lived

and work experiences

and identify any and all transferable

skills

i even help some sex workers recognize

they have better customer service skills

than my cable company most importantly

i didn’t underestimate them i tried my

best

to think outside the box and use

technology to serve my community

but i ran into so much resistance from

my superiors

who often worked against me storming

into my office

unplugging my computer from my desk

because it wasn’t a

a company issue computer or watching me

struggle

to carry supplies while they sipped

their coffees in protest

because they didn’t initially approve of

my programs and methods

but when my methods proved to be

successful

of course they took credit for it as if

they’d been supportive all along

i had urged them to let me teach

computer skills everything from mavis

beacon type and child the basics

to using gmail to graphic design and

coding

but they told me that teaching these

types of computer classes

would be over the heads of the people we

served

that gave me the motivation i needed to

quit

and that’s when i founded transtax

social enterprises

i was told by the ceo at the time of

that company that

i needed to understand that they didn’t

get into this work for the love of the

trans community

they did so because they recognized the

services they were offering

weren’t accessible to trans people

so when i quit i told them that i would

be starting my own organization

and that i would be doing so for the

love of the trans community

i wanted to show trans people but also

prove to myself that we are worth

far more than the scraps that are handed

to us

i was tired of people underestimating me

and the communities i come from so i

told them

keep that 34 000 salary and i set out to

show

that i was worth 10 times that

now of course my parents were

disappointed yet again that i was

quitting

a perfectly good job with benefits

but as my mother auntie bestie bevvy

smith says

who walks away from a job that pays well

a bona fide good thing

i’ll tell you who someone looking for a

great

thing an inspiring thing

a creative thing a feeling of

freedom a new dream

and i had the audacity to think that a

black

trans woman’s dreams mattered too

i had a vision that i’m determined

to bring into fruition one where trans

people

are able to put down their armor and

return to their field of dreams

a few years later that same company now

under new leadership

asked me to come back and be a speaker

at their annual fundraiser

now had cover 19 not cancel

all my in-person speaking engagements

they would have paid me

almost what my salary used to be for

one hour of my time now

that is something i can only attribute

to me finally recognizing my value

it took almost 10 years to get my mother

to finally see me

and prepare her for the moment in 2019

when we would stand together in our

truth on

tv on the oprah winfrey network where

she

bravely admitted to the world that she

asked me to commit suicide

she shared how she hated that because of

what her religion had taught her

that she had missed out on so much in my

life

it was so important for those women to

see how my mother had gone from point a

to point b she admitted that

candy’s mother own pose reminded her of

how she used to be

but that she was grateful that she was

able to learn

and do better before it was too late

it’s definitely not perfect but as i

said on that stage my mother and i

now have a happy healthy healed

relationship my mom

eventually saw that her child is a gift

to her and to this world

as all children are especially

queer and trans kids

so i want us all to imagine

a world in which we teach every person

that they have intrinsic value that

regardless of how they

do in traditional school settings that

life has its own curriculum in store for

all of us that can be curated and

customized

with respect to your own inherent skills

when you realize that there is no

comparison to you you find less of a

desire to compete

with others where competition is not

warranted

when we’re able to recognize our own

intrinsic value

then we’re able to see the value in

other people

no matter what their gender sexual

orientation

or abilities are yeah

imagine that

you