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For the Beautiful SoulZ: Walking to End Homelessness ft. Gordon Wayne
10 Plays2 years ago
Welcome to another episode!! Today I'm joined by Gordon Wayne! Gordon personally experienced homelessness. He lived in his car as he attended community college. His memories of that traumatic time he says ensures he "will never stop fighting beside those who must persevere without shelter." He walked from his home state of Virginia to Georgia to attend Law School at the University of Georgia. He is raising money for the National Alliance to End Homelessness and spreading awareness of solutions to homelessness.
Support his fundraiser: https://www.gofundme.com/f/UPLIFT-beautiful-souls-escaping-homelessness
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Follow Gordon on his socials:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/gordoncwayne/
Check out his takeover on @EndingHomelessness - https://youtu.be/smrsBPbBPsg?si=ZaxI0yeRFjBlEvAo
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Transcript
Introduction of Gordon Wayne and his journey
00:00:06
Speaker
Hello, welcome or welcome back to the Feel Your Feelings podcast.
00:00:10
Speaker
I'm your host, Victoria Macanjola, and today I am joined by Gordon Wayne.
00:00:15
Speaker
Okay, so guys, Gordon is a law student at the University of Georgia, and I...
00:00:24
Speaker
found out about him while watching TV at home with my parents.
00:00:27
Speaker
We were watching ABC World News tonight and Gordon, I saw your story.
00:00:32
Speaker
You were like featured as the person of the week.
00:00:35
Speaker
And so you walked, you walked from your hometown in Caroline County, Virginia to law school at the university of Georgia in Athens.
00:00:44
Speaker
And first of all, I was shook.
00:00:45
Speaker
I was like, this guy walked that distance and
00:00:51
Speaker
And basically your message at the end to keep going really resonated with me.
00:00:54
Speaker
And so I was like, I have to reach out to him and have him on my podcast.
00:00:58
Speaker
So first and foremost, thank you for being here.
Gordon's mission to empower the powerless
00:01:00
Speaker
And how are you feeling?
00:01:03
Speaker
Well, thank you for having me and helping me to spread our message of belief in others.
00:01:09
Speaker
And I'm doing pretty well.
00:01:11
Speaker
I've been busy with a lot of work recently.
00:01:17
Speaker
And I actually just visited the hospital last week.
00:01:20
Speaker
Okay.
00:01:21
Speaker
I'm doing a lot of catching up, but I'm feeling good and healthy.
00:01:25
Speaker
And now I'm back like I never left.
00:01:28
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:01:29
Speaker
I can see you.
00:01:29
Speaker
I see all the books behind you.
00:01:31
Speaker
I see you got your suit on.
00:01:33
Speaker
So you're ready to go.
00:01:34
Speaker
You're very studious.
00:01:35
Speaker
So I appreciate this hustle that you have.
00:01:38
Speaker
So I know you're in law school right now.
00:01:40
Speaker
So what made you want to study law?
00:01:43
Speaker
Yeah, so I believe having the legal background will be able to
00:01:50
Speaker
Like the reason why I'm here is to work towards ending homelessness.
00:01:52
Speaker
And I want to empower those who are powerless, be the voice of those who don't have a voice.
00:01:58
Speaker
Yeah.
00:01:59
Speaker
And I think that's something that lawyers may not typically do, but it's something that lawyers certainly have the capacity to do if they choose to.
00:02:08
Speaker
And that's 100% what I'm going to choose to do.
00:02:13
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:02:13
Speaker
And so, okay.
00:02:14
Speaker
Another aspect of your story is I saw that you were living in your car
00:02:19
Speaker
in your hometown in Virginia and you decided to walk.
00:02:23
Speaker
So this wasn't your first trip walking.
Experiencing homelessness and fundraising for education
00:02:25
Speaker
You had walked to your college, Boston College for undergrad from Virginia to Boston.
00:02:32
Speaker
So like, can you kind of like walk me through your journey a little bit of how you got from like, you know, living in your car to like,
00:02:39
Speaker
walking to to your university?
00:02:42
Speaker
Yeah, most definitely.
00:02:43
Speaker
So going out of high school, I didn't really have a place to go.
00:02:49
Speaker
And so I bought a car with all the money I had, only had $6.25 left over after for a month.
00:02:56
Speaker
Wow.
00:02:57
Speaker
And so during that time, I felt a lot of depression and isolation.
00:03:01
Speaker
Didn't really know what my purpose on this earth was.
00:03:05
Speaker
Yeah.
00:03:06
Speaker
But after some
00:03:10
Speaker
some real deep soul searching.
00:03:12
Speaker
I realized that I knew I still had a positive contribution to give to the world and all the people in it.
00:03:19
Speaker
I didn't know what it was yet, but I resolved to give everything I had to better myself and those around me.
00:03:28
Speaker
And so I started working 60 hour weeks at my job.
00:03:33
Speaker
I enrolled in community college while still working full time.
00:03:38
Speaker
Once the summer finished up.
00:03:40
Speaker
And after, so a year later, I got word that I'd been accepted to Boston College on a full scholarship.
00:03:49
Speaker
Wow, congratulations.
00:03:51
Speaker
Thank you.
00:03:51
Speaker
And so I felt incredible relief.
00:03:55
Speaker
But after a few minutes of just thinking, I realized.
00:03:59
Speaker
Dang, how am I going to get there?
00:04:02
Speaker
But that too, but first what I realized was all the other people out there who would still be going through what I'm still going through at that time.
00:04:12
Speaker
And that while I knew I was going to have a stable shelter to sleep in, fresh food to eat.
00:04:20
Speaker
I knew there were going to be so many people out there who still weren't going to have the opportunity to not only have those things, but to reach their full potential.
00:04:31
Speaker
And so...
Challenges and support during the walk
00:04:32
Speaker
I wanted to do something to serve them, but I didn't really know what it was for a while.
00:04:39
Speaker
But then near the end of July, finally I got the idea and it all just clicked out once to walk to Boston and to promote a fundraiser for the National Alliance to End Homelessness through my social media.
00:04:54
Speaker
And so two weeks later, I was on my way.
00:04:58
Speaker
I definitely had no idea what I had signed up for.
00:05:03
Speaker
It was quite the challenge to say the least.
00:05:06
Speaker
I had blisters all over my feet.
00:05:09
Speaker
I wasn't able to walk as far as I had.
00:05:12
Speaker
I thought I could do like 50 miles a day.
00:05:15
Speaker
And you arrived after 16 days, am I right?
00:05:18
Speaker
Yeah, 16 days.
00:05:19
Speaker
Wow.
00:05:21
Speaker
Wow.
00:05:21
Speaker
I still averaged 36 miles a day.
00:05:23
Speaker
Yeah.
00:05:24
Speaker
But like I was...
00:05:28
Speaker
I was broken by the end of that.
00:05:29
Speaker
Yeah.
00:05:30
Speaker
To say the least.
00:05:31
Speaker
Like my back.
00:05:32
Speaker
I'm sure you had to have some good shoes on too, by the way.
00:05:34
Speaker
Like.
00:05:36
Speaker
Yeah.
00:05:37
Speaker
Swap out my shoes.
00:05:39
Speaker
Literally.
00:05:40
Speaker
Because I was wearing boots.
00:05:43
Speaker
Yeah.
00:05:44
Speaker
They were not conducive to taking care of my feet.
00:05:46
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:05:47
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:05:48
Speaker
And I'm curious to know what you went through specifically, like while walking, you know,
00:05:54
Speaker
in the different terrain and different weather and everything.
00:05:56
Speaker
But I'm more so curious to know, like, what did your family think around that time of you like walking to school?
00:06:03
Speaker
Yeah.
00:06:05
Speaker
Did you have their support?
00:06:07
Speaker
Yeah.
00:06:10
Speaker
But my sister, so I have a twin sister.
00:06:13
Speaker
Wow.
00:06:15
Speaker
I have a sister also.
00:06:16
Speaker
We're not twins, but she's, we're a year apart.
00:06:19
Speaker
Yeah, that's pretty close.
00:06:20
Speaker
Yeah, I'm sure y'all went through a lot of the same stuff together.
00:06:23
Speaker
Yeah.
00:06:25
Speaker
But so she was going through a lot of personal issues at the time.
00:06:31
Speaker
She was transferring schools and she was just having having some personal issues.
00:06:38
Speaker
Yeah.
00:06:39
Speaker
I don't want to get too deep into that.
00:06:41
Speaker
But she was just taken aback by what I was doing.
00:06:46
Speaker
But at the same time, she wasn't that surprised.
00:06:51
Speaker
Yeah, that's a really good question.
00:06:53
Speaker
Yeah, for sure.
00:06:55
Speaker
I mean, because I try to put myself in other people's shoes as well.
00:06:58
Speaker
If I told my parents, like, hey, I want to walk to California.
00:07:04
Speaker
I'm going to USC, you guys, in Southern California, and I'm here in Dallas.
00:07:08
Speaker
So, of course, they would look at me like, are you kidding me?
00:07:11
Speaker
Like, you're female, you're young, you're like, you know, all these different things would come up, you know.
00:07:17
Speaker
But...
00:07:18
Speaker
You know, every family is unique and different in that way.
00:07:21
Speaker
But going back to like the your actual journey.
00:07:26
Speaker
So you had to walk.
00:07:28
Speaker
So for the second part.
00:07:30
Speaker
So after you walk to Boston, now you're in law school and you walked to Athens, Georgia, and you walk through Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina.
00:07:41
Speaker
And on ABC World News, you had to walk day and night on train tracks, through the mud and different weather situations.
00:07:49
Speaker
Like, what was that like?
00:07:50
Speaker
Like, what was a day like for you walking?
00:07:55
Speaker
Yeah, well, so this time I knew what I was getting myself into.
00:07:59
Speaker
Yeah.
00:07:59
Speaker
Yeah.
00:08:01
Speaker
And one thing I knew would be a significant challenge was the heat.
00:08:04
Speaker
Like in the middle of July.
00:08:06
Speaker
It's hot in the South.
00:08:07
Speaker
Yeah.
00:08:07
Speaker
Maybe the hottest month.
00:08:09
Speaker
July.
00:08:10
Speaker
Oh my gosh.
00:08:11
Speaker
Yeah.
00:08:12
Speaker
And so pretty early on, I realized that walking that night would actually be better for me because there's less traffic.
00:08:22
Speaker
It was like 70 degrees most nights, which is about a pretty perfect temperature, I would say.
00:08:28
Speaker
Mm-hmm.
00:08:30
Speaker
And like all the, there's an increased risk of cars not seeing me at all.
00:08:37
Speaker
Like I said earlier, there's less cars coming past me.
00:08:43
Speaker
And one other change was that there was much less of a shoulder for me to walk on.
00:08:51
Speaker
There were some times where I was literally walking on the road, like within the lanes that the course drive on because there was no shoulder for me to walk on.
00:09:05
Speaker
And so for the weather, both times I was actually very blessed with the weather.
00:09:13
Speaker
Like on the way to Boston, I think there were like two or three days where there was heavy rain out of 21.
00:09:19
Speaker
That's not very bad.
00:09:21
Speaker
And then on the way down here, there was even less rain.
00:09:28
Speaker
I think it rained once or twice.
00:09:33
Speaker
And since I was walking that night,
00:09:36
Speaker
it was never too hot unless I had to walk too long into the day.
00:09:41
Speaker
So there were two days where I walked 38 miles.
00:09:44
Speaker
On those days, I was starting to feel the heat near the end of the journey.
00:09:50
Speaker
But because it was near the end, I knew I just had to push through and get to my resting point for the day.
00:09:58
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:09:59
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:10:00
Speaker
Like, did you have on reflecting gear?
00:10:02
Speaker
Because I know you said you were walking at night.
00:10:05
Speaker
Did you have any on your shoes, on your clothes or your backpack?
00:10:09
Speaker
Yeah, I had a vest on, which it was partially covered with my GoPro camera that
00:10:17
Speaker
Side note, I was, so on this journey, I was recording a series for the National Last Stand Homelessness.
00:10:22
Speaker
That's on their YouTube channel.
00:10:24
Speaker
Okay.
00:10:24
Speaker
Okay.
00:10:25
Speaker
That was really awesome.
00:10:26
Speaker
Yeah.
00:10:26
Speaker
To try to educate the public on homelessness.
00:10:28
Speaker
Yeah.
00:10:29
Speaker
Through the journey.
00:10:31
Speaker
And I had a headlamp on.
00:10:32
Speaker
The headlamp was the main attention drawing.
00:10:37
Speaker
Mm-hmm.
00:10:40
Speaker
piece of equipment I had for cars to be able to see.
00:10:43
Speaker
Yeah.
00:10:44
Speaker
That's, that's wild to me.
00:10:46
Speaker
To me, that's wild.
00:10:47
Speaker
Like, did you, did you ever find like people to be kind to you on your journey to
Stories of kindness and national attention
00:10:56
Speaker
Georgia?
00:10:56
Speaker
Because I noticed, you know,
00:10:59
Speaker
you're a young man and you're walking and you know you probably see different things on your on your way maybe people talk to you were people nice to you did they ask you questions about what you were doing did you ever feel unsafe on your way there great question by the way thanks and so after i tell you about this i want to tell you
00:11:21
Speaker
something on my journey to boston too okay but so there were a lot of times people were honking at me um there were sometimes like i remember the last day there was this big 18 wheeler yeah blaring his horn for like 10 or 15 seconds and he gave me absolutely no space whatsoever i thought he was gonna hit me like i i actually had to get off the road most of the time i tried to stay on my ground and just stay in my lane
00:11:49
Speaker
um there were a few times it seemed uneasy for sure um people just like gesturing out to me like what are you doing um because they obviously don't road rage yeah i've experienced some road rage for sure but it's not too surprising any anything on the road gets people mad so yeah um there were definitely some some good moments um like i remember
00:12:18
Speaker
um so there's this time in virginia near damville um this guy he pulls up to me he's he's a he's a southern guy he has a thick accent and he's like you need a lift jack and then i was like i was like no no i'm good like i sort of i explained him what i was doing really quick and i kept going and like 15 minutes later he pulls back up and
00:12:45
Speaker
He has a bunch of snacks for me, a Gatorade, which I was out of water on that day.
00:12:51
Speaker
He was an angel.
00:12:52
Speaker
Yeah.
00:12:54
Speaker
That's a good thing.
00:12:54
Speaker
I thought that story was about to go left or something.
00:12:58
Speaker
Like he flashed a weapon or something.
00:13:00
Speaker
So, you know, God forbid.
00:13:02
Speaker
That would have been good.
00:13:03
Speaker
Right.
00:13:04
Speaker
Exactly.
00:13:06
Speaker
That's good that you encountered.
00:13:08
Speaker
There was this other time in South Carolina.
00:13:09
Speaker
It's like 4 a.m.
00:13:13
Speaker
I walked through like...
00:13:14
Speaker
15 or 16 miles in a row.
00:13:16
Speaker
Yeah.
00:13:17
Speaker
So I took a break at this gas station.
00:13:19
Speaker
I was just sitting outside and there were two separate people who came up to me and asked me what I was doing.
00:13:25
Speaker
So I gave them a quick rundown and then they both just gave me money.
00:13:31
Speaker
Like I didn't even ask or anything.
00:13:35
Speaker
Gave me a total of like 60 or $70 just out of nowhere.
00:13:39
Speaker
That I was able to later donate to the fundraiser.
00:13:43
Speaker
completely unexpected, but very kind to say.
00:13:48
Speaker
Hi there, how are you feeling?
00:13:50
Speaker
It's me, Victoria, host of the podcast.
00:13:52
Speaker
And when I first started podcasting, I was super scared and nervous about the way I sounded, the way I looked, the way people would receive me.
00:14:01
Speaker
But using Zencaster has been a really helpful way for me to become more confident and express myself as a creator.
00:14:08
Speaker
So with Zencaster, you can record up to 4K quality and video, regardless of your audio and performance.
00:14:15
Speaker
That's fantastic.
00:14:16
Speaker
So getting...
00:14:43
Speaker
into the Boston story.
00:14:46
Speaker
So crazily enough, the start to all this media attention was just someone's kind act.
00:14:53
Speaker
So I remember I was walking in Maryland.
00:14:57
Speaker
I was near the border of Pennsylvania.
00:15:01
Speaker
And on this day, I was walking 45 miles.
00:15:04
Speaker
So that was more than I ever walked on this trip because that was insane that I was doing that much.
00:15:12
Speaker
To put it in perspective, that's like 16 hours straight with no breaks.
00:15:17
Speaker
Were you tracking your mileage, by the way, like on a watch or on your phone?
00:15:23
Speaker
How were you tracking your miles?
00:15:27
Speaker
Like, so one key thing to keep in mind is like battery conservation.
00:15:32
Speaker
Yeah.
00:15:34
Speaker
So like initially on the first journey, I had like my run on
00:15:41
Speaker
like thing tracking me but it was killing my phone so after that i've i relied on like the steps app in the phone and just using google maps to see like how far i was going right um because it was much more energy efficient yeah but so anyway on this day yeah
00:16:05
Speaker
it's getting really rough my blisters were already brutal by this point so every step is hurting and um it's starting to get super dark out and this is back when i didn't have any reflective gear or any headlamp anything like that and so i remember just screaming out to the heavens like just begging for help i still had at least three hours left yeah um
00:16:34
Speaker
And then like 15 or 20 minutes later, this middle-aged couple pulls up and they asked me if I need a ride.
00:16:43
Speaker
I told them no, obviously.
00:16:45
Speaker
And then, but they really seemed like they want to help.
00:16:48
Speaker
Apparently they had seen me earlier in the day on their, on their way to go on a date, like maybe five or six hours earlier.
00:16:57
Speaker
And so seeing me again, just compelled them to stop.
00:17:00
Speaker
And so on, they went,
00:17:03
Speaker
They went out and got me some McDonald's.
00:17:06
Speaker
They went and bought my hotel room for the night, which.
00:17:10
Speaker
Wow.
00:17:12
Speaker
And then they reached out to local news.
00:17:15
Speaker
It was the York station, York Fox station in Pennsylvania.
00:17:19
Speaker
Cause I was near the border.
00:17:22
Speaker
And so the next day I got interviewed by them.
00:17:25
Speaker
And then that's the interview that ABC world news saw.
00:17:29
Speaker
Okay.
00:17:30
Speaker
Um, which led to their coverage.
00:17:36
Speaker
and so many other people hearing my story like you so yeah hearing our story yes this this mission is much greater than just me and
00:17:49
Speaker
I was only able to finish because other people were behind me and I could feel their spirit with me.
00:17:54
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:17:55
Speaker
That part of the story of your story really stuck with me that it being like larger than you.
Impact of fundraising and personal experiences with homelessness
00:18:01
Speaker
And I noticed that your so your GoFundMe for the National Alliance to End Homelessness raised over one hundred and ninety four thousand dollars.
00:18:10
Speaker
So first of all, congratulations.
00:18:11
Speaker
Like that's that's an incredible accomplishment.
00:18:15
Speaker
We're actually over $200,000 now.
00:18:16
Speaker
Right.
00:18:17
Speaker
I was going to ask, what's the update on it now?
00:18:19
Speaker
Because this was in September, end of September.
00:18:24
Speaker
Still doing good?
00:18:25
Speaker
So it's two separate GoFundMes.
00:18:29
Speaker
So let me calculate how much we're at right now.
00:18:35
Speaker
We're at $207,000 total.
00:18:38
Speaker
Amazing.
00:18:39
Speaker
Amazing.
00:18:40
Speaker
Way more money than I've ever seen.
00:18:41
Speaker
Yeah.
00:18:42
Speaker
And when...
00:18:44
Speaker
I remember when I first started going to Boston, I was just hoping to raise whatever amount I spent on the journey.
00:18:50
Speaker
And we've definitely exceeded that.
00:18:53
Speaker
So it's a major success.
00:18:55
Speaker
But at the same time, looking at the entire issue, it's only a drop in the bucket.
00:19:01
Speaker
And I know there's still a lot of work left to be done.
00:19:04
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:19:05
Speaker
And I actually haven't shared this, like,
00:19:09
Speaker
I guess publicly with anyone, but like my family had experienced houselessness for a while.
00:19:15
Speaker
So we lost our home back when we were living in Houston.
00:19:20
Speaker
And so we had to move up to the Dallas area to stay with family for a while.
00:19:25
Speaker
And just living with my auntie, my uncle, this is while I was in high school.
00:19:29
Speaker
So I got like pulled out of high school my senior year and lived with family members.
00:19:34
Speaker
And even before that, we were just kind of living in...
00:19:39
Speaker
different hotel situations and that was probably my earliest experience with houselessness, I guess.
00:19:57
Speaker
It's crazy I'm even talking about this, but I feel more compelled to talk about it.
00:20:03
Speaker
But yeah, it was a difficult period for me.
00:20:06
Speaker
In my family, I was like a teenager.
00:20:08
Speaker
We're in a stable home situation now, thank goodness.
00:20:11
Speaker
But I still look back to those days and just I'm really grateful for how far that I've come.
00:20:19
Speaker
So I guess how, when you look back on your journey, how do you feel about it?
00:20:27
Speaker
Like, do you feel like grateful?
00:20:29
Speaker
Are you proud of where you're at now?
00:20:31
Speaker
Or do you feel like, well, more needs to be done?
00:20:35
Speaker
It's definitely a combination of the two.
00:20:37
Speaker
Yeah.
00:20:39
Speaker
Like on one hand, it's hard to believe that I'm in law school.
00:20:44
Speaker
Like just thinking back to where I was, it definitely seemed out of reach.
00:20:49
Speaker
Even community college at one point seemed like it was unattainable.
00:20:58
Speaker
But on the other hand, I just know that there's so many other people out there who can do what I'm doing right now.
00:21:05
Speaker
and I want to give them the opportunity to make that happen.
00:21:11
Speaker
And so until everyone has opportunities that I have been so blessed to have, which wouldn't have been possible without great people in my life, like my Germana Community College advisor or all the wonderful people I met up at Boston College and all the great people down here at the University of Georgia.
00:21:34
Speaker
I still feel like I haven't done anything until I'm part of what makes that possible for everyone else.
00:21:44
Speaker
Well, I'll tell you what you told me and the masses is to keep going, right?
00:21:49
Speaker
You know?
00:21:50
Speaker
So just got to keep going, got to keep pushing.
00:21:54
Speaker
So yeah, thank you for sharing that with me.
00:21:56
Speaker
I definitely resonate with your cause.
00:21:59
Speaker
And also with mental health,
00:22:02
Speaker
this whole podcast being about mental health, you know?
Mental health and core beliefs of Gen Z
00:22:07
Speaker
Yeah, I guess with that, what is one thing that you think is impacting Gen Z's mental health at the moment?
00:22:17
Speaker
Another great question.
00:22:21
Speaker
I'm trying to ask all my guests about that nowadays to incorporate more of the mental health theme into this podcast.
00:22:30
Speaker
I think...
00:22:31
Speaker
we're exposed to so much information, information.
00:22:35
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:22:38
Speaker
We don't really know what to listen to and can be overwhelming to say the least.
00:22:43
Speaker
And I think that's why it's important to have like for everyone to have their own core beliefs to help shape like how we respond to all the information that comes towards us.
00:22:57
Speaker
Like to have specific goals in mind.
00:22:59
Speaker
Like for example, mine,
00:23:01
Speaker
My three goals that I've lived by ever since I turned 18 were for number one, to make a significant positive impact on the world.
00:23:11
Speaker
Number two, to create a loving family.
00:23:17
Speaker
And number three, which personally I don't believe I'll ever achieve, but I think the best goals that we can have are ones that we can always strive towards is,
00:23:28
Speaker
to deserve to go to heaven, which I already failed, but put my best foot forward and do my best.
00:23:41
Speaker
Yeah.
00:23:41
Speaker
We can always do our best.
00:23:43
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely.
00:23:45
Speaker
So I have some more questions for you for the speed round.
00:23:49
Speaker
So I think you'll really like these.
00:23:50
Speaker
So let me know if you're ready for them.
00:23:52
Speaker
Let's go.
00:23:54
Speaker
Okay, so you can answer in like one or two word sentences, you know, short and sweet.
00:24:00
Speaker
Okay, so first question for you is, what's the last song that you listened to?
00:24:06
Speaker
Let me find it.
00:24:07
Speaker
You can check.
00:24:14
Speaker
The last song I listened to was Free Bird.
00:24:24
Speaker
By?
00:24:25
Speaker
I actually was listening to that song like on repeat when I was getting close to the end of a day.
00:24:32
Speaker
Who's it by?
00:24:34
Speaker
It's by Lynyrd Skynyrd.
00:24:36
Speaker
Interesting.
00:24:36
Speaker
It has a sick guitar riff on it.
00:24:39
Speaker
It's from back in the 60s, I think.
00:24:43
Speaker
Okay.
00:24:44
Speaker
But it's like a nine minute long song.
00:24:46
Speaker
So I knew I listened to it three times.
00:24:49
Speaker
It would take up 30 minutes, which is a mile and a half.
00:24:53
Speaker
Nice.
00:24:55
Speaker
that would be a really good motivating.
00:24:57
Speaker
Oh, I know that it's only one or two.
00:24:59
Speaker
No, it's fine.
00:24:59
Speaker
It's fine.
00:25:00
Speaker
I actually like hearing more, you know, more about it.
00:25:04
Speaker
So that's cool.
00:25:05
Speaker
That's cool.
00:25:06
Speaker
Okay.
00:25:07
Speaker
I finished this sentence.
00:25:08
Speaker
I truly believe that.
00:25:17
Speaker
I truly believe that everyone is a good person deserves
00:25:24
Speaker
every opportunity to succeed.
00:25:27
Speaker
I love that.
00:25:29
Speaker
My favorite book is.
00:25:34
Speaker
These are good.
00:25:35
Speaker
There's a lot of them behind you now.
00:25:40
Speaker
Unbroken.
00:25:41
Speaker
No, they also made a movie about it.
00:25:44
Speaker
I think I've heard of that.
00:25:46
Speaker
Who's who's author?
00:25:50
Speaker
I don't know.
00:25:54
Speaker
But it's about, oh, it's Laura Hillenbrand.
00:25:59
Speaker
Interesting.
00:26:01
Speaker
But it's a story about resilience.
00:26:04
Speaker
Okay.
00:26:05
Speaker
It sounds familiar.
00:26:07
Speaker
Like maybe, like, was it a war movie?
00:26:10
Speaker
It was about a World War II.
00:26:11
Speaker
Okay.
00:26:12
Speaker
Okay.
00:26:12
Speaker
Yeah.
00:26:13
Speaker
That's like the first thing that came to mind.
00:26:15
Speaker
He was initially an Olympian and then he was a prisoner of war in the Japanese camp.
00:26:22
Speaker
Okay.
00:26:23
Speaker
Wow.
00:26:25
Speaker
In two words, I would tell my younger self too.
00:26:31
Speaker
Keep going.
00:26:33
Speaker
I love that.
00:26:35
Speaker
I love that.
00:26:36
Speaker
Okay.
00:26:36
Speaker
And my last question for you is right now, I feel.
00:26:40
Speaker
I feel inspired.
00:26:47
Speaker
Love that.
00:26:47
Speaker
Keep that energy.
00:26:48
Speaker
Keep that same energy.
00:26:49
Speaker
I love that.
00:26:50
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:26:52
Speaker
And I feel really blessed to have been able to chat with you today, Gordon.
00:26:55
Speaker
So thank you so much for taking the time out to be on my podcast and for talking to me.
00:27:00
Speaker
Of course.
00:27:00
Speaker
I appreciate you.
00:27:01
Speaker
And one thing I'd just like to add.
Embracing failure and growth
00:27:03
Speaker
Go ahead.
00:27:05
Speaker
Just thinking about Gen Z. Yeah.
00:27:08
Speaker
Like, I think we need to accept failure and see it as an opportunity to learn and to grow.
00:27:15
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:27:17
Speaker
Failure can include just making the wrong decision and also just going through something tough that you might not be responsible for at all.
00:27:27
Speaker
But it's going through those painful situations that really force us to grow, that allow us to become the best version of ourselves.
00:27:38
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:27:38
Speaker
I love that you said that because I consider myself a perfectionist, a perfectionist in progress.
00:27:46
Speaker
So I'm taking classes at USC and one of my classes, she asked us, our professor asked us what our goals were for the class.
00:27:53
Speaker
And I said to embrace failure.
00:27:56
Speaker
And like literally it's like not putting too much pressure on myself if I don't know something, if I don't feel like I'm good enough or like smart enough or whatever it is, like just...
00:28:08
Speaker
It's okay.
00:28:09
Speaker
Like embrace failure.
00:28:10
Speaker
You've done this before.
00:28:11
Speaker
You can do it again.
00:28:12
Speaker
So I love that you said that.
00:28:14
Speaker
So thank you for sharing that.
00:28:16
Speaker
Where can my, no, go ahead.
00:28:18
Speaker
It means we're taking risks.
00:28:21
Speaker
Yeah.
00:28:22
Speaker
Yeah.
00:28:23
Speaker
It's so uncomfortable.
00:28:25
Speaker
It's so uncomfortable, but there is growth.
00:28:27
Speaker
Like,
00:28:28
Speaker
through the failure.
00:28:28
Speaker
So it's something I'm still, yeah, I'm still learning that, still learning that.
00:28:35
Speaker
So, I mean, if you want to be a true perfectionist, you should be found.
00:28:39
Speaker
Yeah.
00:28:39
Speaker
That's a good one.
00:28:40
Speaker
That's you're just dropping gems.
00:28:42
Speaker
Like, yeah.
00:28:44
Speaker
Where can my listeners find you?
Connecting with Gordon and supporting his cause
00:28:46
Speaker
And also how can they support your GoFundMe for the national, national Alliance to End Homelessness?
00:28:55
Speaker
yeah so go fund me is still up i'll keep it up for the rest of the year um it's called uplift let me make sure i get exactly yeah beautiful souls okay and i'll link i'll link it in the description as well all right i want to make sure i get them yeah so there there's two of them one of them is like expired by now um
00:29:23
Speaker
because that was the one from 2020 when I walked in the seat.
00:29:27
Speaker
Oh, okay.
00:29:28
Speaker
Uplift Beautiful Souls Escaping Homelessness.
00:29:33
Speaker
I'm like writing that down too so I don't forget.
00:29:35
Speaker
Uplift Beautiful Souls Escaping Homelessness.
00:29:42
Speaker
Okay.
00:29:43
Speaker
Yes.
00:29:43
Speaker
Okay.
00:29:44
Speaker
And then you can follow me on Instagram.
00:29:47
Speaker
It's just my name, Gordon C. Wayne.
00:29:50
Speaker
I post it every day on the journey.
00:29:53
Speaker
And some people said it was inspiring to them, which I appreciated.
00:30:00
Speaker
And then I'd also check out the YouTube series where I tried to, like along with the walk, make it educational so people understood more about homelessness and the response.
00:30:14
Speaker
Homelessness prevention advocates are embarking on.
00:30:20
Speaker
What's the name of your YouTube page?
00:30:23
Speaker
But it's not mine.
00:30:23
Speaker
It's the National Lives and Homelessness.
00:30:26
Speaker
Oh, okay.
00:30:26
Speaker
Got you.
00:30:27
Speaker
Got you.
00:30:28
Speaker
And there's a series.
00:30:30
Speaker
Okay.
00:30:31
Speaker
Awesome.
00:30:33
Speaker
Okay.
00:30:33
Speaker
Well, I'm going to link all of that.
00:30:34
Speaker
Yeah, please.
00:30:36
Speaker
Send me links.
00:30:37
Speaker
And I'm going to link all of them in the description.
00:30:40
Speaker
But, yeah, thank you so much for joining me.
00:30:43
Speaker
I wish you nothing but the best in your journey in law school and fighting for this cause.
00:30:54
Speaker
Don't forget to be a kind person, you guys.
00:30:55
Speaker
You feel me?