Transcript
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US Army retired Sergeant Major.
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Published author.
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Public speaker on the topic of leadership Sergeant Roy, are you ready?
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I am ready.
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All right, let's get into it.
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Urban Christian Veterans provides a safe place for Christian Veterans of color.
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All right, let's get into it.
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Challenges All of those factors being combined makes for a unique and sometimes difficult life experience that is seldom talked about in public forums.
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Thank you for tuning in to the Urban Christian Veterans Podcast.
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Here's your host, D Allen Rose.
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Thank you, erin, for that wonderful introduction.
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This is D Allen Rose and you are listening to the Urban Christian Veterans Podcast, so first let me just say thank you so much for taking the time to chat with me today.
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I really appreciate it.
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I know there's so many other things you could be doing right now, but just thank you so much for spending time with me today.
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Actually, it's my pleasure.
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Thank you for the opportunity to be here with your viewers on your show my pleasure.
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Absolutely so.
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Before we get started, could you tell the audience a little bit about yourself?
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Oh sure.
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Well, my name is Sergeant Major Roy Lewis.
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I am a Army retired veteran of 36 years in the military.
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I left the I probably would have stayed forever, but when you're older than a colonel they had to kick me out.
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But I left at the rank of Sergeant Major and I have served for, like I said, 36 years.
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I'm married to my wife, wendy of 42 years, a good Army wife.
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Two children, two adult children.
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I have a son and a daughter.
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My son is currently serving on active duty in Vincenza, italy, and my daughter is married to her husband in Oklahoma City, with three of my grandchildren.
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So we got six all together and I have, like I said, I've, served in the military 36 years.
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I've also retired from the corporate America as well, from Bank of America, where I was a project manager, software test engineer there, and also an ordained minister too.
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I've got a chance to get into the ministry as well.
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So I got my hands in a few things and doing that.
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So I got my hands on a few things and doing that, but the most thing I'm really enjoying right now is that I'm going out on the road as a public speaker on the topic of leadership and, to be more specific, intentional leadership.
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Right on intentional leadership.
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So, all those years ago, what was your reason for joining the military to begin with?
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Oh, that's a great question.
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Well, I have to admit, though, most people come in the military at the age of 18.
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But I did two years of college.
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I was a believe it or not music and theater major, and I still enjoy music.
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I'm a musician as well.
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But I did two years and went to New York I'm from New York, originally from New York, and try to do my thing in New York and things weren't going so well.
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So I remember, turning to my wife, I married my college sweetheart and I remember telling her I said I'm going to go check the military out.
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What do you think?
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And she said you know like?
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She said, hey, whatever you want to do and actually you know, that's the last thing I know I remember I was on a bus headed to Fort Dix, new Jersey, basic training, and I thought I had totally signed my life away.
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So for me it was.
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I had no job skills other than you know just what I learned in college.
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So for me it was an opportunity to pick up some, some job skills and some skills that I could use on the outside.
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So what I signed up for?
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I was a supply guy.
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So logistics, we call ourselves loggies, or whatever quartermaster we call ourselves Loggies or whatever Quartermaster.
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So I was signed up in there and got in there and that was my introduction to the military.
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And the funny thing about it is that where I'm from in New York, nobody's never heard of my hometown, but my town is called Highland Falls, new York, and those that are listening anybody that's ever been to visit the great West Point Military Academy you have to go through my town to go through the front gate.
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So everybody in that little town works at West Point.
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My parents both my parents worked at the academy.
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So my perception of the military was that.
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And growing up I didn't have anything to do with it because I grew up around the academy my whole entire life.
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But I joined the military just to do something different, to learn something different.
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Wow, west Point huh, you grew up outside of West Point, yeah, yeah.
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We went to pick my dad up from work one time and I remember these uh bus of freshmen got off the bus and these upperclassmen came out of nowhere and these poor kids were like shaking in their boots and they, these uh upperclassmen, were just yelling and screaming at them and I'm like, oh my gosh, who would ever sign up for this?
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This is ridiculous.
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And, uh, I didn't want any part of that.
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So that was my impression of the military.
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Well, it's interesting.
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You say you were part of supply and logistics and my recollection from being in is you guys were the go-to.
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You can get your hands on.
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Yeah, we're calling it like in a better lack of words we're the drug dealers.
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You know we make all the drug dealers.
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You know that's it deals yeah, you're slinging, you're slinging that stuff, yeah so yeah no, that was cool.
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I mean, uh, I learned to respect and, and you know, I guess the word maybe even a little adoration for supply when it came especially in on on deployments and campaigns, various combat, whatever those were the guys.
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Yeah, they called us.
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We're responsible for beans, bullets and mail.
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There it is Exactly.
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Okay so.
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I know you're part of that mafia.
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I got you.
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That's it, man.
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We're the master all the way, and you know, it's funny though I don't know about you, d Rose, but it's funny though I don't know about you, d rose, but it's funny though, when I look back on my who I am as a person like my.
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My parents said you know, my dad said you always been somewhat of a quartermaster, I was always the one that had the extra this or the extra that, and he just said you just kind of fell right into that mos.
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That was like perfect for you because, uh, I was somewhat of a of a supply guy.
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I guess you know keeping up with stuff.
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That's good man, that's good, I bet you have some stories, but anyway, yeah.
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I bet you do so.
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So if you had a chance to do it over, would you do it again?
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Oh, absolutely I would.
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The only thing I would change I probably would have went in straight from from high school.
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And the reason why I say that is because nowadays, college and when I get a chance to talk to a lot of young people about pursuing college or the military or whatever when they get to that place where they have to make a choice on where they're going to start out, place where they have to make a choice on where they're going to start out, colleges is sometimes, I think, somewhat of a ripoff in a way, because I'll give you an example of what I'm talking about.
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I went to school for music music and theater and when I got there to school, I thought they were supposed to be preparing me to go out and make a living to do this thing.
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They were supposed to be preparing me to go out and make a living to do this thing.
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And when I got up there don't get me wrong I was good.
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I was the man on campus.
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However, during one of the summer breaks, I went to New York City to try to audition and do a lot of different things, and that's when I had my reality check.
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I went to an audition and I saw kids that were like 10 times above talented than I was, and I was like blown away.
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And I'm kind of glad I went through that because it opened my eyes that when I went back to college it's kind of like you go there and, yeah, they give you classes, they give give you that, but they don't really prepare you for where you are to go and to do a job or do that career.
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So that was where I was disillusioned when, after I had that moment, I went back to school and I barely I barely finished college because I I had a reality check put it to speak, uh, so to speak.
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And then when I joined the military, it's kind of like it was kind of the boost that I really needed to build my confidence up.
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Because, as you know as all you vets that are listening out there, when you go to boot camp you come in they tear you down.
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You know they take everything.
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You start from ground zero and I think it's the best motivational course in the world.
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You know they start you from ground zero and I think it's the best motivational course in the world.
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They start you from ground zero and you find out really fast what you're made of.
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They challenge you at every level.
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You're challenged mentally, you're challenged physically and you find out if you have heart for this thing.
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And I went through that and I came out on the other end.
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I've learned some things about myself.
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I didn't even know that I had the fortitude and the resilience to get up.
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And I can tell you, d-rose, there were days I was like I called my wife the first time I got phone privileges.
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I called my wife.
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I remember we went on a run.
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I told her.
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I said I was never a runner.
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I.
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You know, I'll never forget it, Joe, Sergeant V is.
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He took us out and he said all you fast runners get over here.
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So I call myself getting in the fast group, I get the fast group and he ran us into the ground and I call my wife.
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The next day I said I am not going to make this thing, I am not going to make it.
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And she said you'll be okay, we're getting ready to go get pizza.
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Bye, she hung up and, oh my goodness, and the next day I get in the B group, the slower group, and Joe Sardinia said no, if you were in my group yesterday, you're going to run in this group today.
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And I tell you, I went kicking and screaming but he made a runner out of me.
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But I think the day where the light bulb came on was Joe Sargent Jenkins and you know everybody at this event remembers all these guys' names because they were so impactful.
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But Joe Sargent Jenkins, we went on a run and I've never heard of somebody call cadence like that in my life.
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Oh my goodness, man, it's like we were dancing out there.
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He was like he was just like he had us out there.
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It was like a party, but we were running at the same time and I remember we came back into the company and he said congratulations, young man, you run five miles.
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And I started kind of like tearing up and he said, lewis, what's wrong with you?
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I said, sergeant, I have never done this before in my life.
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And he just said, well, get used to it, you're going to do it for the rest of your life.
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And he was right and he motivated me.
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I never and I guess you know and you know what it does to you.
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It just really just makes you you.
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They make you look at yourself, they make you dig down deep and pull your real self out.
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So, yeah, I would do it again.
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I don't care.
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You know, it's interesting something that you said you mentioned about how college being a rip off Right being a ripoff right, and here's the thing.
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You know, you might've noticed this, but there was a time.
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I think it's a ripoff now, but I think it's partially our fault, and here's why I say it.
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Tell me if you agree.
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A few years ago, I got the opportunity to work a C-level position at a college and I noticed, I mean, the light bulb went off for me.
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And here's what happened In order for me to get that job, I had to go.
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I went and got my degree before, actually two degrees, bachelor, master's, whatever.
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So it qualified me for this position, which I was grateful for.
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But then, as I'm in there and I'm witnessing, you know I'm, I'm walking around campus and I to all these corporations, right and so, but I say partially our fault, and I'm talking particularly in our community, right, there was a time where we used to send kids to college to become educated.
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Something shifted and then it became go to school so you can get a job, Right, different mindset.
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So now kids are coming with this mindset of you got to go to school in order to get a good job and the education piece went away.
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It wasn't about whether or not you were educated, it was can you become a good human resource for these corporations?
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And what?
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What made the light bulb go off for me was I saw how these college professors their job, you know, especially for tenure and research and all that other stuff there they, they had sort of a quota right, I need to do so much research to bring in funding from outside for these corporate entities and the corporate entities in turn would give these young students internships.
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So it was like a transaction.
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The education didn't matter.
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What mattered was the bottom line for the school and that college professor trying to get his tenure and that college professor trying to get his tenure.
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Meanwhile, you got all these human resources and oh, by the way, instead of teaching the kids to be more educated, you're making a more human resource.
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But I guess in our community the goal for a lot of kids were go get a good job, but in other communities, get educated so you can go create jobs right and so, and then this cycle goes on and on you, if you attend these high school graduations, lord, you hear these, these parents talking about oh, we made it to the finish line, you know like.
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Or oh we next step is college so you can get that good job one day.
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But you don't really hear get that education so that you can learn how to create jobs.
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In other words, you're the boss Instead of go make sure you're a good employee for that other boss so and I can go on and on.
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Man, I don't know if you can see behind me I got some things hanging on the wall and I'm like yeah, but as I look back on it, uh, you know the ripoff aspect of it, yeah, and I ain't mean to go all off like that, but you, you touched the nerve just then.
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It was um, I, we're.
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We're very close at age and I can safely assume you know, uh, when I say this, that you know uh, we're the generation that came out of, like our parents and our grandparents, coming out of the, the post civil rights movement and and for some families it may be even true for your family, especially a lot of black families at that time, if you're over 50, over 60, and it may be true even today that I know for my family.
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I was the first person to go to college in my family and my dad grew up in, even though I grew up in New York in the 60s there was a mass migration up north for work.
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So in my town in New York, even though I'm from New York, I'm not a, I'm not born in the, I was born in New York, but in my town all the black families were either from Georgia, north Carolina, south Carolina, florida and, in my family's case, alabama.
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Everybody was from the South and when we started growing up and got ready to go to college, most of the kids of my age in our generation we were the first ones to go to college, and my dad didn't go to college.
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My dad barely finished high school, okay, and my mom, she's a high school graduate but she went to college later on.
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They graduated high school and but she went to college later on.
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But they graduated high school and went on and just worked.
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So their knowledge of college, they don't even have a clue of what that is and the impact of college and what it should be and stuff like that.
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So that's what we were dealing with.
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I remember my mom saying to me like you know, I don't care.
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You know, and I told her I wanted to study music and theater.
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She said I don't really, I don't care, as long as you're out of the house, you're going to college.
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That was just her explanation of that.
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So that's what we're, that's the handicap that we're working with.
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But nowadays and I'm really happy because we're seeing a new renaissance in the black community now where the fathers now and the mothers and the grandparents, they have somewhat some education, some college right now and they're not from that era of the post civil you know, civil rights movement- you know like, for instance, like my dad.
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He you know the old film of the marchers marching to Montgomery with the firemen spraying the marchers.
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Well, my father was there, he grew up in that stuff.
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But we're dealing with now the black generations.
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Now you've got some college grads in there, you got folks that have gone to college, that have done that kind of thing.
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So now they're a little bit more educated, because it's not, you're right, growing up it was all about getting a job.
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It was always about getting that one job that, you know, they couldn't see past that, it was just working.
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It was no such thing as being entrepreneurial.
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You know, starting a job, a business creating something.
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You know, starting a job, a business creating something.
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I remember the first time that I saw a Black professional and what I mean by Black professional was a person that was not a singer or an athlete or anything like that.
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This person was a business owner and that was a rarity.
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I was just fascinated because I, you know, I started having thoughts of like.
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You know, I didn't know black people could do that.
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I didn't Wow, is that possible?
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Is that a reality?
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You know, I thought that was only something that non-black folks did, that.
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So, yeah, I could see that, you know so.
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But however, right now we have the greatest opportunity and you kind of hit me, you kind of got me fired up a little bit, because that's the thing that we need to start doing now.
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We've got to start coming out of that, out of that, that way of thinking.
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Now, you know, especially with the black culture, because one of the things like even at the election, I know we, especially with the black culture, because one of the things like even at the election, I know we're in an election year, but as I got older and older, I realized the way that our culture and the people in our culture were controlled is that the way you control poor people is you give them things or give them the impression that you're giving them things no-transcript.
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So you know, that's the thing now that universities and I'm kind of glad they're under the gun these days because they've been smoking that thing for a long time charging people exuberant amounts of money for tuition and the fact that you're going to college does not guarantee you a job, does not guarantee you a job.
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But, to echo what you're saying, knowledge, education, how to be educated to maybe create jobs, how to create a business, how to create something that is yours, that you can, that you have the talents, man.
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And I remember I know I'm going a little bit along on my answer but I remember I wrote a letter to BET, the Black Entertainment Network, and I wrote a nasty gram to them and I said I said, how is it when I turn on your station, when I turn on your station, I don't see black doctors and lawyers and businessmen?
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I don't see that.
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I see athletes, I see rappers, I see singers and I can tell you, d Rose, I grew up in a sports town and you know you were someone.
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If you could play basketball, if you could play football, if you could play any type of sport, you were someone.
00:22:11.771 --> 00:22:16.492
But I was asking BET, what about us kids that don't play sports?
00:22:16.492 --> 00:22:21.827
You may not play a sport, but you may have a good sense for business.
00:22:21.827 --> 00:22:29.202
You may have a good sense for good sense for business.
00:22:29.202 --> 00:22:30.788
You may have a good sense for, uh, running, uh, inventing something.
00:22:30.788 --> 00:22:32.753
You know that you get a product or something like that.
00:22:32.753 --> 00:22:35.962
But these type of kids more or any kids were always pushed to the side.
00:22:35.962 --> 00:22:46.862
It was always an uphill climb and they always, the attention was always put on the, the athlete, the singer, the, the actress or the actor or whatever like that, and I thought it was a travesty.
00:22:46.862 --> 00:22:49.627
Well, long story short, they didn't write me back.
00:22:51.050 --> 00:22:53.262
They didn't write me back, but I thought it was a fair question.
00:22:53.262 --> 00:23:00.803
And now, as a mentor, I'm a senior guy and I know we're going to go into it later on in the show.
00:23:00.803 --> 00:23:07.786
But when I talk to young people, which is my favorite thing to do I started out in the youth ministry, which is my favorite.
00:23:07.786 --> 00:23:13.884
I know call me crazy, but I love teenagers I challenged them at every point.
00:23:13.884 --> 00:23:15.769
What are you going to do?
00:23:15.769 --> 00:23:18.501
You were put on this planet to do something unique.
00:23:18.501 --> 00:23:22.286
You can't say I just want to get a job.
00:23:22.286 --> 00:23:23.146
That's not an answer.
00:23:23.146 --> 00:23:24.709
I want to make lots of money.
00:23:24.709 --> 00:23:25.750
That's not an answer.
00:23:25.750 --> 00:23:27.913
What do you do Well?
00:23:27.913 --> 00:23:32.807
When you, when I, when you pull the cover off of you and I look inside you, what do you do well?
00:23:32.807 --> 00:23:40.405
And and if you think about it long enough, you give them a chance to think about it they come back and they say, oh, I do this thing Well.
00:23:40.405 --> 00:23:43.450
Or I do this thing Well, okay, let's go get it.
00:23:44.551 --> 00:23:47.174
Right, that's awesome, man.
00:23:47.174 --> 00:23:55.313
Now that I'm older, you mentioned, I guess, keeping controlling Black people, giving them something.
00:23:55.313 --> 00:24:02.327
I'll say that in my earlier years, when I went to college wasn't early, I went to school late.
00:24:02.855 --> 00:24:09.669
Right, but anyway when I, when I got my first couple of degrees, I did it based on student loans.
00:24:09.669 --> 00:24:23.538
And then I had that epiphany and it was like, ok, you know, if I had it to do over and wanted to become educated in something that I was passionate about, I would not have gone to school for these things.
00:24:23.538 --> 00:24:34.628
I went to school for these things because I needed a job, but now that I'm older, I want to become educated in what I want to do.
00:24:34.628 --> 00:24:37.656
So now I must be a glutton for punishment.
00:24:37.656 --> 00:25:04.486
But I'm in school again at this age, right, and so and you know, just a side story I I'm, I'm not ordained by, I'm a minister, and what happened for me was I decided I wanted to go to school to become educated in religion, and so I'm paying out of pocket.
00:25:05.915 --> 00:25:21.661
There's no student loan, and so you know that's what I'm doing and the whole, I guess, looking at it from a different perspective now, saying I'm doing this for me so that I can become educated.
00:25:21.661 --> 00:25:35.987
It goes back to what I was saying, what we were talking about before in terms of the ripoff thing, because the school, the way that it is structured, is almost pushing you to want to get a job, meaning I'm in there and you know that you have to do this introduction or whatever.
00:25:35.987 --> 00:25:49.186
Like when I went through and got my Master of Divinity, it was OK, introduce yourself, blah, blah, blah, and tell us what job you're trying to get later, like I'm not here for a job, right up here, because I want to become more educated.
00:25:49.186 --> 00:25:55.077
And then here I am in my doctoral program Same thing.
00:25:55.318 --> 00:25:56.663
What are your future plans?
00:25:56.663 --> 00:25:58.781
What job do you try?
00:25:58.781 --> 00:26:01.835
You know I'm'm like why does it have to be about a job?
00:26:01.835 --> 00:26:03.357
Whatever happened to educate.
00:26:03.357 --> 00:26:08.275
I'm trying to become educated, and so even the school is structured that way.
00:26:08.275 --> 00:26:18.625
The institution is structured to assume that everybody and they even pressure you right, because it's part of the assignment you get graded on it tell me what job you're trying to get.
00:26:18.625 --> 00:26:33.926
Like no job, I'm just, I'm here to become educated and so, and then you know, I'm probably just as old as some of these professors and I'm trying to talk to them when I'm like man to man, look man you know like stop trying to push me to a job.
