Pervis Taylor, III is an award-winning celebrity life/identity coach, inspirational speaker, contributor and author who has channeled his childhood trauma into a means of making the world better for others.
Tell us what was the inspiration for your new book, Surthrival Mode?
I would say that the inspiration was my life’s narrative. I grew up in Legacy, Texas where I was molested as a child. I was bullied and emasculated. Growing up, I had to work through that. It led me to the work I do today, helping men to process and become whole. I just thought of the stories of the countless men that I have helped work through these things and the steps that we take to get them to a place where they thrive within there emotions and mental health. I’ve taken men from surviving to thriving. That’s how I came up with the title Surthival Mode.
What would you say is the most important lesson that readers should take from your book?
The most important lesson, in my opinion,is that men need and have the right to be whole. We have the right to honor our humanity and that it’s okay to be human – meaning that we have the right to experience emotions. Sometimes we’re not always at our best. Sometimes, we are hurt. Sometimes, we need space and time to process. Sometimes, we need allowances to be human.
In what ways do you feel that the culture oppresses people from realizing that?
I think that in our society, especially in the age of social media, we want to be seen as living our best lives. We want to look like something instead of being something. I think that when you tie that in with toxic masculinity and hyper-masculinity, we live in a culture where men are supposed to suck it up and we’re not supposed to display emotions. It’s looked upon as weak or feminine. It is really the culture at large that has been detrimental to the progression of people, not just men, seeking the help they need to thrive in life.
You discovered an untapped market, Share with us the steps that you believe the people who influence the culture should take because a lot of the toxic behaviors you mentioned are reinforced through entertainment.
That’s absolutely true. Especially us as Black people, we have to learn how to have difficult conversations. We must learn how to be uncomfortable and still have deep dialogues about those things that are really deep inside of us. Chris Bridge says that men scream at a frequency that only men can hear. It’s time for us to bring those internal screams out externally so that we can talk about them in the light.
I think one of the first steps is us having those difficult conversations and really being a safe space for one another. That means letting go of our biases and judgments and letting people be and express who they are so that they can get the help they need. I believe that it is one of the major steps that we must take.
It saddens me to think of your experiences as a child, those are truly terrible things to go through at any age. I can appreciate how you channeled your traumatic experiences into a mission to help others. Describe the most difficult part of that.
What you teach on, you get taught on. The things that I teach men and my other clients, I actually go through them. I don’t tell them to do anything I haven’t done or would not do as far as the advice I offer. I think that’s the most difficult part of what I do. People believe that because I’m a life coach, a person that helps people to heal, I don’t go through anything as if I don’t experience broken moments and depression. They don’t see that I have to encourage myself to get out of those moments. I have a therapist because I have to safeguard myself. I’m not foolish enough to think that I’m immune to trauma or having things resurface that I believe I have already dealt with.
Outside of your accomplishments as an author and life coach, you have had highly successful careers as a model and music executive. Did entering the entertainment industry help you through your trauma or add on to it?
I think it was the result of it. When you are told that you’re not going to be anything and people make fun of you all of your life, you want to show people. I want to let you know that Jay-Z. I am modeling and doing things my bullies could only dream of doing. But, it was really coming from a place of hurt as oppose of a place that I am achieving something. It was really more about showing and proving people wrong. I believe at that point in my life it was about achieving success in spite of the people who said I never would as oppose to now I succeed for the love of it.
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