YouSaid · the spoken record

Nicole Avant

lines on the record: 50
first: 2023-12-11
most recent: 2023-12-11
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“Can't banish evil, we can't hide from misery. We all inevitably endure trauma and pain. So how do we go on and move forward? We have to learn to swim through trauma so that we don't drown. We have to live and live fully for all those who can't. We must always choose the joy, choose to swim, choose to not go down with the ship.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah. And Ted, he opened the door and I looked at him. I said, yes? He said, yes. And I went in and I went downstairs and I got his New York Times. I did. I went downstairs. I got the New York Times. I opened it for him. And I placed it next to him on his bed and he looked like an angel, just like he was sleeping. And then my friend Laura had, the night before had brought fresh cut gardenia. And she said, I don't know. Something told me that Clarence might like this. And it'll remind him of the South. So I put more Gardenia on his heart. I put the New York Times with him. And I said, okay.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And the night he passed, it was midnight. It's about 12 15 and I looked at Ted very diligently and I said, okay, I've just said everything I needed to say. And Ted was with him. He was with him till he took his last breath. He was playing the music. Ted did his prayers over him and held his hand. And I knew when I woke up.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Just, I knew. I was, oh no, I thought I was going to walk in the room and find him in the bed asleep and gone. I went in the room and I'm looking for him, but I hear him, you know, and he was moaning, but not like as if he was in pain, but he couldn't speak. I said, Daddy, I'm not leaving your side. I'm calling the paramedics right now. Everything is going to be okay. About half a block away. I said, sir, excuse me, do you mind? I just want to play some music for my dad. And I put on Frank Sinatra hand to God, his feet start going. And he goes right his rhythm. He was on rhythm. It's changed in the brain, but his life force is here. Yeah. And then, you know, he was in the hospital just a few days. And then they said, you can take him home. And you can do everything we're doing here at home. He just probably won't be the same. And I just knew it was his exit. You know, we all are going to exit.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Thank God every day that I felt God's grace in the house and I thought this is exactly what Clarence deserves, which is really what I was praying for. Like, oh Lord, please, when he goes, let it be gentle. You know, he had a stroke. I got him to the hospital, and I have to tell you, it was a little re-traumatizing for me because I went back to Cedars. And I found him though. I'm the one who found him. He didn't fall, thank God. He was trying to pull his, he was like almost mid-stroke because he didn't come down for breakfast. So I left everything out for him. I got his New York Times that he read every day. I put that out, put his cereal out, I put the juice out. I put everything out for him. And when I came back and I looked down the hallway and I could see the chair in the same spot. Everything was untouched. My heart.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“But you still grieve, but it's a different thing. I am so grateful that my father got to pass at home. In his room with his things, with dignity, it was so profoundly different and peaceful because it wasn't out of my control. It was in my home.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Is your dearest best friend. He is just a Teddy was the rock that I absolutely needed. He was the friend I needed. He was the husband I needed. He was gentle. With me, he was very gentle because he didn't know what was coming. I mean, there were some days where the things that came out of me, it was just the rage and the things that I would say. And he would just”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Taken away something And you're not going to take it from my dad. You're not going to take it from me, no more. Just no more. I'm not giving that to you.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yes, to go into that space and to bring If I went into his energy and his space and tried to figure it out and tried to what happened and this and that, then I would not show up for my father as the daughter that he needed. In that moment And I was not going to give this fool anything. Are you not going to take anything? Anything away from me You've already took a lake”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Was dipped in tar, and every day I was washing it, every single day I'd go under and start washing it again because it was a daily practice, believe me, every time he even came across my mind. He is not mine to deal with. I can't even go into it because I really was so afraid of what it would do.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“The other side of it. And you know what? They're never going away. We all want them to go away. They're never going away. You will have the opposite. You will just, it's part of life.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Reconcile That's the thing. You know what? Throughout scripture, that's all we read in any scripture is opposing energies. It's Star Wars opposing energies. Everything is, you write, its life is filled with That the other side of whatever you're looking at.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I'm still grieving. I'm in repair. I might be in repair for the rest of my life. My heart was. Ripped apart. I have had stitches. There's a scar. I'm still, you can, I'm a very happy person and I can also grieve at the same time. I'm a very positive person and I could also be sad. I am a problem solver and I can also feel broken. You don't have to.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Can we focus on her life and her service? And her devotion and her dedication, can we focus on that? And I'm telling you, Oprah, my energy started to shift. I actually stood up. I remember walking over to the bed and I sat on the bed. I said, okay, okay. He goes, every time you go there, every time you want to go into that pit of hell, you've got to think of Jackie. You've got to think of... Loving her life, honoring her life.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Of the even intention of forgiving. And I intended said, oh, you know, somebody is going to call you. And so it was a restricted number. And I thought it was, I go, hello. And he says, is this Nicole? I'm like, yes, who is this? And he said, this is Bishop TD Jakes. And I said, oh, my gosh, I'm on the floor. And he covered me with such wisdom and grace and strength. He said, you know, how are you feeling? And that's like, well, I'm obviously angry and I'm, you know, furious and all these things. And he said, okay, are you going to focus on those feelings or can we focus on the 81 years? Your mother lived”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“You a different kind of woman because I think it's really difficult to go straight to mercy when your mother's shot in cold blood in her own home. It is the hardest thing and there were definitely days where I stepped out of the mercy.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I played this scenario for nine months. It's almost, it was a crazy thing to say, but it's true. It didn't give me nightmares, but every night before I went to sleep, my brain would replay it, and then I'd fall asleep. But I had to be there. Go through it every single night, and then finally one day I said, You have to take this from me because I'm not doing this. I'm not thinking about this anymore. I don't know what is going on, but I know no doctor could take this away. I don't want pills to take this away. Something I don't want to think about this before I go to sleep. A week later, it's you know more No more. But nine months was a long time.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Again, it is the random acts of kindness of other people not thinking about themselves, but fulfilling a need of the moment”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I had some slides. He said it was freezing. It was freezing. And thank God our neighbors came out. And she gave him a sweatshirt, and then she ran out, and the police were saying, everybody, get back into your houses. And she was determined. But again, a person determined with kindness gave”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And my father, God bless his soul, said he walked down the hall and it was quiet, but he felt a breeze and he didn't understand where the breeze was coming from because he had broken in to that. So he had walked by. And then you said, and your mom was Just laying there, he said, I remember a lot of blood. And she was breathing heavily, he said. She was determined because she was very jacky. She was breathing heavily like I'm. Going to get through this, and then the next thing he remembers was being in the, he left the driveway, went to the street, and was being questioned. And what I loved is when I got to the hospital, I had seen... I had seen these slippers on him. And he said, oh, oh, I didn't have anything on barely. I was barely dressed. I had a t-shirt on.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“You know, at that point, then I hadn't read everything else, but all I know is that my dad, he said, something got him up because he's a very sound sleeper. I could drop a stack of books. He doesn't wake up. But my mom, you could drop a feather and she'd wake up.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So he showed up at the house. He was on the opposite side of actually where they were sleeping. So he did not break in near their bedrooms or anything like that, but he got in on the side of the house, you know, got into the backyard, broke a window and a sliding glass door, which was next to the kitchen where my mom was usually up at three, sometimes 2.33 in the morning. They had a very brief encounter apparently, and she was running towards the front door to run out. And he had a rifle. And, you know, when you have a right and you shoot around, you know, one bullet doesn't come out, a bunch of bullets. And one pierced through her back, she was down, but she was able to open the door.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I did not know that. I had a good friend call me and say, don't Google, don't look at his face, don't look at anything. Don't look at the name. Don't look at anything. Yeah. And I, every time it's creeped in, I've pushed it back. I'll tell you the hardest thing for me, and this is a part of trauma that I... Never knew, even though I wasn't there. I replayed for at least nine months. what had happened the incident it was so strange”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And I love when people said, I really don't know what to say in this moment. I don't know the right words, but I want you to know that I love you and I'm here for you.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Showing up at your door. People showing up on my door to your house. She looked at me and she said, I need you to really look at me. And she held my hands, and she said, do you understand what has happened? I said, yes, yes. She goes, Nicole, your mother was murdered. Do you understand this? And when she said the words, I remember my back just like, oh, yes, she said, this is heavy. I mean, this is real. And I'm here. And we're going to be here for you. And I don't know how we're going to walk through this, but I'm going to be by your side. And everybody showed up. Yeah.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It taught me that we So much more than we think we are. The compassion that showed up for me through phone calls, through texts, through letters.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yes, it's interesting. I used it for everything if I was afraid of a new situation or a new job or anytime I felt afraid my grandmother would say you have to call upon a strength that's out of this world that's from the divine. It's much stronger and it's much more powerful. And if you tap into that energy. It will carry you through whatever situation.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yes. And my father slumped over to me, just fell onto my shoulder, and Ted said, I sat up straight, like an arrow, just sat up. And all of a sudden, I do remember saying, okay, hold on. Okay, this is what we're going to do. This is what we're going to do. Ares, please take Alex out of the room. Make sure he's okay. Because it was so primal that my father, I was just so, I'm looking at my father like, he's two months shy of 91 years old. He could not comprehend how could he? And then as I was walking to the car, I felt my body. Start shaking in away that I felt that my knees were going to buckle, it was dark. And I remember clicking to open the car door and I almost didn't want to open the door. For some reason, I thought if I opened the door, that means it's really real that I'm driving away.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Alex was sitting at the end, his girlfriend, my father, me, and Ted. The doctor says, I'm sorry to let you know that she did not pull through. And he wasn't really saying it. Finally, Ted said, can you please tell us, can you please say, is she alive? Did she make it? And he said, I'm sorry, she is not here. She did not make it. Alex wailed. I mean, wailed.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I'm strong in the Lord and in the power of his might. I said it a thousand times, I am strong in the Lord and in the power of his might over and over and over again because I really felt like a house was on top of me and I could not. I couldn't even think of how am I going to function? I kept asking myself that, how are you going to function when the doctors came in and told us, I remember clearly Alex was at the end. Alex, your brother, my brother.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Never got to see her. So the last time I saw her was on Thanksgiving. I never saw her again. So we didn't get to go in the room. I mean, I think it was Obviously, very messy, and the police officer there who rode with her, God bless him. He said, you know, I've seen this happen, unfortunately, in my line of work. And I've seen this happen to very young people, and they're out. It was your mom is a very, very strong woman because she made it here. She was alive. She was breathing. You know, she loved being alive. My mom loved being alive. He told me that it was actually a really good blessing that he gave me. It was a beautiful kind of healing balm that it was something that I was able to get into the car when we were driving home and I was just thinking to myself and the words your mother was very strong. Helped me a lot.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I was surprised. Okay. It just came to me, and I thought, okay, I'm going to go with this thought. It was so honestly it felt as if a house had landed on me. Everything was just heavy and it was dark. Energetically dark, this act of violence, this active cruelty upon someone like Jackie. I just thought I can't hate this man because I can't. I can't have my life consumed. Because I was so furious. I mean, fury was coming through my body. I said to someone yesterday, I didn't know I had veins where I had them. They were popping out.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“He goes, Nicole, I have no details. Get to the hospital. I got in my car and I drove, and I drove down 6th Street and I just started talking to her. I said, mom, I don't even understand what this means. I don't know how you've been shot, why you've been shot, where you've been shot. But I'm coming. I'm on my way and I don't know how bad it is Know if it's too much, you don't have to stay. I don't know what's happening, I just don't know what's happening.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Said, Nicole, you have to get up and you have to get to Cedar Sinai. You have to get to the hospital. I go, what? What's wrong? I thought it was, what? He goes, your mother's been shot. And I, not knowing what Tygo, what are you talking about? Wait, where were they? Were they out? What? Yes. What do you mean she's been shot? Where was she? What?”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I guess subconsciously, I just woke up because I had my phone off on our vibrant and I couldn't hear anything. And I noticed I just happened to look at the phone. I had seen so many miscalls from my brother Alex. I thought, what? And I didn't even look at the time. And then as I'm getting up to call him, the phone rings and it's Ted. And thank God he was in town. He was on a work retreat, but not far away. And he said, Nicole, I said, what is going on? Why is Alex come? What is going on? He said, Nicole, you have to get up. And he was very calm.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Like, oh, mom, you and this sweet potato pie. And I thought it was funny, but it was a little sarcasm. And hand to God, I felt the Holy Spirit say, do not send that text. Don't send that text. Don't say that. She's not going to think it's funny And so delete, delete, delete. And then I said, Oh, hi, mom, and I softened it and I put her favorite emoji. She loved the little happy face with the three heart. And she wrote right back and I was writing a bath and she said, okay, think you'll be happy. Was it? I was going to go buy the house in nine hours. I was going to go see her.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It was a sweet potato pie. Sweet potato And my mom, the last Thanksgiving I had with her, which was the last time I saw her, she was so particular about what I wanted for dessert. What am I bringing? I said, mommy, we have plenty of desserts. Just bring yourself, bring a bottle of wine. No, no, no. I'm bringing a dessert. I said, okay, sweet potato pie. That's what I'd like. Okay, so she brings one. We have a million other desserts, as we all do. My father took leftovers home and packed the sweet potato pie that my mother had packed for me. So it ended up back at her house. And I'm telling you, Oprah, from that moment, she called me every day about the sweet potato pie. So her last text of me that night was Nicole, your sweet potato pie is waiting for you. And truth be told, I was typing her back and I was being a little sarcastic.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So those were the themes, and then I was writing and nothing was really sticking. And then this horrible thing happened to my mom and I called Harper 1 and I said, I don't, how am I going to put out a book, great grace and gratitude after this terrible thing has happened? And I said, oh, and I'm looking at this last text my mother sent me. And I said, and she told me to be happy. She said, okay, think you'll be happy. And when I said that, everybody on the Zoom went, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, what was it? And I said, her last text to me was, okay, think you'll be happy. And right there, they said, That's the title of the book. That's the title of the book.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I actually was writing a book after I did the Black Godfather. I was approached by. A publisher. She said, You know, you have a book in here. Let's think of the themes that ruin the Black Godfather. And I said, okay. And then I came up with grit, they all had grit. They all had grace and they all had gratitude.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Help me. It's the only thing I knew how to do. I just stood there frozen. And I said, oh, I guess this faith stuff is really real. This is what I need to call on it. And I stood there. And I did feel as if it was quicksand. I felt that I was going under fast. My head was spinning, and I thought, no, no, no, I'm going to stay on strong. I'm going to stand strong in my faith. I'm going to call on the divine. I'm going to call on an energy that's higher than mine, that's smarter than mine. And I ask for it to hold me and protect me.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“But they never gave us any pressure to be anything like them. They actually said, if you want to go be a teacher, you want to be a professor, you want to be a professional athlete, you want to be a writer, whatever is in your heart that you want to do.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Very fortunate that both my mother and father. constantly told us You find your own rhythm. They put us in everything so that we would find out what we like”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“She felt that she didn't get to own her individuality at times. I think she reinvented herself in different ways, but never really got to move through the world in the way If she really wanted to. So I don't think she regretted getting married or having children, but I think she thought that's why she was always so hard on me in a good way of please we've opened these doors for you. Please walk through this door and do something cool.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“My superpower was my faith. I mean, she gave me, she gave me my faith in my individuality, but the superpower she gave me was once you know who you really are and where you come from, you know, she always was eternal, eternally based thinking like she thought from an eternal space. For me, it was You must be the best version of you, but there is only one you. You must own your individuality and you must find that.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“She loved art, she loved literature, she loved reading, she loved poetry. She was a writer herself. She dreamt of being an editor. She wanted to be a newspaper editor. Then she wanted to be a book editor. I mean, she had these big dreams that just never really were fulfilled in the way she wanted them to be.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“The reality of what it means to be alive Absolutely. Absolutely. No, this is your arena. That's what you used to say, girl, you're running your race, you're in the arena. What arena? The arena of life. This is your arena. And what you do and what I do in mine is going to be very different than what you do in yours. And my mother's point was, and I'll be damned if you're going to walk in as some spoiled, entitled Brat. I'm not having that.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Nurtured or supported or safe, even until really my mother came into his life. But he is, Clarence is probably the strongest soul I have ever come across in my life. I've never seen anybody like him. Seriously, he moved through every trial and they weren't easy, but he always had the attitude that you have to get up and you have to keep going all the time. No matter what. And he didn't hold grudges what I loved. I kept asking, what about so-and-so? He's like, you know what? Just let it go. It doesn't matter.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“You know, my father and I were talking about this maybe six months ago, and he said, you know, I've always gone from a tragedy to a triumph, tragedy to triumph. Always tragedy to mean. He said, every time I think back in my life, and sometimes we didn't have enough food, sometimes I didn't have a place to lay my head. Sometimes my mother was working for so many families that I was bounced to this, onto your bounce to my grandmother, or bounce to a cousin. So he never really felt.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“In and out of the house. And for a while, you know, I knew they were famous, but I never looked at them as famous people are coming to my house. It was just my parents' friends. Not in Sydney Poitier. A little bit, but it was really, they were such activists in their own way. They were so They were all ministering in their own way. They were all doing something for the greater good. They were talking about how do we move our people forward? How do we continue to open doors? Who do you know in production? Who do you know who's a director? Who can get, you know, who can help Stan Lathan do this? Everybody was looking out for each other, which I loved.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Didn't realize, as you said, I didn't realize when I was younger. What I was born into, what was being passed on to me, what legacy would fall into my lap. And what I would have to carry and what I should be carrying. And my mother was all about legacy. My mother was saying, do you understand that 10 years ago, 20 years ago, 30 years ago, 100 years ago, this didn't exist. Your life as it is right now did not exist for me or your father or his mother or my mother. And she would go on and on. And she would remind me of the importance of you have to honor your ancestors. You have to honor the people who got you to where you are. You can never forget how you got here.”
2023-12-11 · Oprah's Super Soul · Nicole Avant · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source