The Promised Land Antonio Saunders

Despite living in an era of unparalleled connectivity, we’re arguably more disconnected than ever. Some of the very means of keeping us together—traditional ones such as churches, neighborhoods, schools, and television, and emerging ones like social media, apps, and the gig economy—have served to expose how far apart we are becoming, and in some situations, have always been. The differences we’re seeing in gender, political views, racial identities, sexuality, and sometimes all of these at once, have drawn battle lines. As a result, we need not only new conversations but an entirely new destination. If we continue in this fashion, we might find ourselves in such a societal moral drift that we’ll never recover.

 

With “The Promised Land” we’ll begin re-sowing the connections that we’ve started to lose. We’ll take what now feels wildly disparate—the white opioid crisis and the black crack epidemic; the notion of one God, made partisan; men confronting and healing their internal #Metoo stories—and bringing us back to one nation where all our stories can reunite. We’re not just a podcast or a conversation; we’re a destination.
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The common advice when you are searching for a therapist is “try two or three” to fine one that fits. I had a short list of the attributes I wanted in someone to whom I would eventually reveal all of life's darkest moments, but to my surprise, I got someone I that wouldn’t have made the list. In the episode, my therapist Kelly and I discuss the early days of forming our relationship, the treatments I underwent, and how we show up for each other across many lines of connection and difference.
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Five years ago, I came into therapy thinking it would be a fleeting exercise in recounting my traumatic childhood and the resulting issues we still navigate today. It became much more, a core ritual to my existence, as I uncovered and reset the unconscious patterns of all the facets of my life. In this episode, I bring you into a routine appointment as I discuss the realities of supporting my family while making more room for me.
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He was the most revered man in the drug empire. Drug Lords are a necessary evil. They steal to give. In this episode, Eric Gardener is untouchable; he is your typical vigilante who steals and destroys to prosper the weak and vulnerable. White America went into the American dream and locked the door to economic freedom and prosperity, leaving drug lords with the dual roles of destroying the community and saving it at the same time. In this episode we meet Jesse, who is on the run from the police. We follow him as he navigates a world of drugs, crime, imprisonment, and pain.
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Underground drug markets are male-dominated, but women have an advantage in the cartel economy, using their femininity to remain inconspicuous in a variety of situations. As drug lords worked their way from corner boy to Frank Lucas status, women became more involved. In this episode, we meet Margaret, a shy, unassuming girl until she met a guy and fell in love. The cartel ecosystem entangled Margaret, her kids, and her life in a web of street cops, the court system, and child welfare services. Where did 1980s women end up in life? What are they doing now? What do they think about the growing role of women in drug culture?
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Crack users had two options: get clean or go to jail. When the government walked away, two dynamic women working in drug harm reduction work, started an underground treatment program deemed illegal—they kept it running by navigating legal loopholes. Thelma and Louise, much like the fictional characters, are two friends who become partners in starting controversial clean needle exchanges to support users instead of telling them to quit. The shift of paradigm made the user the expert with one simple statement: “I can never be clean because I was never dirty.”
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