The southern belle for Real Housewives of Atlanta covers the latest issues of Rolling Out Magazine. The mother of two discusses raising her children, the black lives matter movement, and her many jobs. Check out some excerpts from the interview below.
So, you grew up in a lot of structure. Being in the entertainment world as an attorney and as a reality star can be a very demanding and even chaotic. How do you make those two things fit?
I never had any intentions on being an entertainment attorney. I think this was truly my calling. My main goal was always to help someone, and I’ve always been very connected with Black men. When you look at the structure of the entertainment world and its leadership, there are not a lot of people that look like us. When I first got into the industry, that’s what resonated with most of my clients. They were the people that no one wanted. People didn’t understand them. They had issues that the majority of attorneys did not want to deal with. So, I found out what my niche was: helping people who most thought could not be rehabilitated. And I really made it my duty to show that just because someone has an issue doesn’t mean that they can’t be successful.
That’s an emotional undertaking. How do you handle cases when it seems like you want success more than the person you’re fighting for?
When people see that you believe in them, and that you have their best at heart, sometimes that’s enough to turn that around. A lot of these people get in these positions because they’ve be
en rejected. But now they’re coming into contact with someone who’s giving them a clean slate. When you speak life into a dead situation, things grow.
You’re on a show where you can get pulled into situations and it’s not always about “speaking life.” How do you deal with that?
I’m on a show where they speak death all the time. But the way I have conducted myself has set me apart because I really try to think before I speak. I try not to say things that I can’t come back from. I’m always very careful, and just because you’re thinking something doesn’t mean that you should say it. But there’ve been a lot of times where I wanted to rip somebody’s wig off.
On your social media pages, you share a long list of jobs and responsibilities you undertake. Is the list long because you’re still evolving as a person and finding out who Phaedra is?
Everything that I do comes from a place of passion and experience. I’m very multi-faceted, so I’m always thinking about the next frontier. My love for funerals came from experiences with death. It came from a place of pain, and I turned my pain into passion. I saw a lack of people in that business who genuinely wanted to help people and understood the grieving process. It came from some of my best friends committing suicide and getting killed. So, I really saw it as a ministry. I still do funerals for free, and haven’t made a penny off of any funeral I’ve ever done.
You’ve been speaking around the country. What is that thing that you’re really able to dig down and share with people that resonates with them?
In this past year, people have seen how I’ve dealt with my husband being incarcerated, and I became a single mom in front of the world. But I think that on the flip side, people saw me as a pregnant woman, going to school and getting my degree. I had both of my children on the show. And I was still able to come out of all of that unscathed. People have seen me at the best and at the worst of times. They’ve seen me in heated situations where I handled myself respectably. I can speak to the students because I know what it’s like to stay up all night studying. I know what it’s like to be pregnant and go to school. I can speak to the person who is in a marriage with issues; I’ve been that person. I’ve been in many adverse situations where I’ve succeeded and didn’t compromise my morals. I think a lot of these things resonate with people because these are things that we all deal with. Tests build testimonies. As long as you’re questioning, “God, why am I here?” and not accepting defeat, that’s when you know you have the option to get out.
During this age of social media, common, everyday occurrences are amplified and given great attention from the public, especially for someone like you. When the attention turns negative, how do you deal with it?
To be honest, I think if everyone’s agreeing with you, you’re doing something wrong. If you’re doing something right, that’s when everyone is criticizing you. Social media has made people so rude. But I really try not to open myself up to that kind of negativity. I don’t read the blogs because they are not news. I get my news from people who have been certified to do so.
Do you think “Black lives matter” in this country?
No. I don’t. I think Black lives have been devalued by the United States merely because of legislation and acts of people in power that say, especially to our Black boys, that they don’t matter. I see it all too often. I think that, socioeconomically, people that sit in my tax bracket are not putting money back into our community. This year, I participated in Bloody Sunday’s 50th anniversary, and I could count the number of celebrities on one hand. I saw more politicians than people who influence the culture. They haven’t taken their platform to really use it in a way that is influential in our community.
