Radical Redemption with Derrick Wells

“It’s you and I showing up authentically every day being led by that which is within us, and that which gave presence to us, and just letting that shine in the spaces that we enter into.” – Derrick Wells

Derrick Wells recognizes the transformational power of identifying his choices and owning why he made them. He can track the decisions he’s made throughout his life and the gifts that have come from even the worst of them: like discovering faith, and his future life path, while in jail.

As a community leader, Derrick Wells faces unique challenges right now. He sees a power in all of us to not just go through hard times, but to grow through them. 

This week on Find Your Fierce & Loving, Derrick shares his extraordinary story from the streets of Chicago to Senior Minister of Christ Universal Temple. Along the way he was propelled by the power of discomfort, growth, and the commitment to become more of himself, until he could become the vital teacher and leader that he is today.

• (03:13) – Transforming consciousness
• (07:35) – Journey to Christ Universal Temple
• (18:40) – Accessibility of teaching
• (22:18) – The future

Chicago native Derrick B. Wells, Ed.D. is an author, artist, corporate CEO, and The Senior Minister of Christ Universal Temple. Derrick’s journey to ministry draws from his own personal life of encountering challenges as an adolescent in the inner-city of Chicago. In his words he was “unchurched,” but found his way to Christ Universal Temple in search of someplace that could help him change and become better. Nearly five years after the Reverend Dr. Johnnie Colemon’s retirement, the Reverend Dr. Derrick B. Wells was selected by the congregation as the second Senior Minister in the history of CUT. In his new book, Guidelines for a Master: 12 Steps to an Extremely Happy Life, Derrick shares clear insights on how to live an authentic life through practical spirituality. In 2012, Wells was a contributing author for the book Spiritual Principles for a Prosperous Life.

Do you want to unleash your inherent love and goodness, liberate yourself, and free humanity from the oppressive systems and structures we have created? We are here to support you in finding your fierce and loving life. Join us in Our Circle, a vibrant membership community rich in opportunities for engagement and transformation. Find out more at lolawright.com/our-circle.

You can follow Lola Wright, on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter and learn more about my work at lolawright.com.

Chicago born and built, Lola grew up in wealth and privilege, yet always sensed something was missing. She sought out aliveness and freedom in music, immersing herself in the hip hop and house music scenes of 90s Chicago. After finding herself on her own at 23, as the mother of two young children, she became determined to create a new experience.

Lola is an ordained minister with a gift for weaving together the mystical and material, she served for many years as the CEO of Bodhi Center, an organization committed to personal transformation, collective awakening, conscious activism, and community-building. 

This podcast is produced by Quinn Rose with theme music by independent producer Trey Royal.

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Lola Wright (00:01): Personal transformation and collective awakening involve being the most alive, brilliant, inspired, creative, on fire version of yourself. A version that is not consistent with the status quo. My name is Lola Wright, and this is Find Your Fierce & Loving. This podcast is a wake up call, a roadmap back to your holy purpose, an invitation to set fire to the box you’ve been living in and watch it burn.

Lola Wright (00:40): Another extraordinary interview today with a brilliant friend. I just want to say. I am incredibly fortunate to have such a deep, deep, well of knowledge seekers, teachers, practitioners, and I hope that you enjoy hearing from them. I love being in meaningful conversation. In fact, I’m a terrible guest at a cocktail party because I basically just jump into like, “All right, so what’s going on in your soul? Oh, you don’t want to talk about that. Great. How about race, religion, politics, anything, anything, anything?” It’s just, most people aren’t really up for that game. So, I appreciate that you are.

Lola Wright (01:25): Today’s guest is one of those brilliant practitioners. He is a Chicago native. Derrick Wells is an author, artist, corporate CEO, and The Senior Minister of Christ Universal Temple. He really is a contemporary man of God’s spirit, life, the universe. His story is one of radical redemption. His process of redemption has played a major role in his commitment to teaching people how to transform their life. In his new book, Guidelines for a Master: 12 to an Extremely Happy Life, Derrick shares clear insights on how to live an authentic life through practical spirituality. This blueprint draws parallels to a cult classic 1980s film, The Last Dragon, where he pulls analogies from the film as points of reference for readers to relate to in modern-day living.

Lola Wright (02:27): In 2012, Derrick was a contributing author to the book, Spiritual Principles for a Prosperous Life. He has an extraordinary story of changing his own life from one of trouble to one of transformation, and it really fuels his dedication to supporting others in finding that same quality of transcendence and transformation. He’s committed to facilitating the growth and evolution of human consciousness by helping people discover their untouched talents and develop their unlimited potential. I am so excited to share this dear friend, inspiring leader with you today. Welcome, Derrick Wells.

Lola Wright (03:13): It’s important for people to understand you really have dedicated your life to what we might say the transformation of human consciousness. So, you are someone who walks on the planet inviting people into a bigger idea of who they are here to be. And, might I say that you do so such that it’s not about their own efforting and muscling, but in fact, they can surrender into something greater than their personal identity and sort of have the mystery of life, call it God’s spirit, whatever word works for you, right? But, some amplifying presence, move you in the direction that lifts you. Is that how you would say it, or how would you say it?

Derrick Wells (04:04): Yeah, no, I would agree with that right? I would absolutely agree that there is something within each and every one of us that seeks to pull us up, as I like to say, by the strings of our own soul. And, it seeks to bring us into the fullest realization of who we are, whose we are, what we’re capable of. And, it seeks to do that outside of all of the noise of human experience, right? But, it also recognizes this omni intelligence that’s within us. It recognizes the seed of benefit in all of those experiences. And then, that intelligence uses the seed of benefit in experiences that might be considered mountain high, as well as experiences that might be considered valley low. And, it helps to kind of pull out of those experiences the lessons that are inherent to us so that we might not just go through difficulty or not just go through rejoicing, not just go through celebration, not just go through hard times, but grow through those experiences.

Derrick Wells (05:31): And, when we grow through those experiences, we give ourselves permission to stretch beyond our own self-identifying limitations, and we’re able to then do more, and have more, and be more, and give more, because of our commitment to become more, right? And, it’s not necessarily becoming more of what we’re not. It’s just becoming more of what we already are, and then letting that shine forth in our interactions, in our communication, in our commitments, in our activism, however, we have decided to show up and where we have decided to show up. There is a light that seeks to express through us in those moments. And, to the degree that we share that light, the omnipotent or the omniscient, or God, or spirit, is expressed in those moments, right? So, it’s not this full heavens open up and the angels sing. It’s you and I showing up authentically every day being led by that which is within us and that which gave a presence to us, and just letting that shine in the spaces that we enter into. But, it helps to know that you have it so that you can release it.

Lola Wright (07:01): Why does that feel important to you to offer to the world?

Derrick Wells (07:04): Because it’s easy to tolerate not doing it. You know what I’m saying? One of the things that trips many of us up is that we’ve learned how to tolerate experiences. We’ve learned how to settle for less than we deserve. As someone who has experienced firsthand, the benefit of living beneath the level of what I was capable of.

Lola Wright (07:32): Yeah. Can you tell us a little bit about that? What did that look like in your life?

Derrick Wells (07:37): Yeah. So, I remember making a conscious decision not to get on the bus, not to pursue the effort that was required to just leave for college, right? And, when I made that decision, it set up some other options and alternatives for me because what my mom said was, “If you’re not going to go to school, then you have to do something else to make… To add something to our home, right?” And so, my first alternative, Lola, was to go and apply for public aid. That’s what I did, right, shortly after graduating high school. But, as I got to the public aid office and started to climb those stairs, with each succeeding step up those stairs, I started to feel less and less proud of a decision that I had made earlier.

Lola Wright (08:34): Why didn’t you want to go to school?

Derrick Wells (08:36): Just being lazy, right? Just being lazy and here’s the thing, Lola. When I decided to be, I was always a good student, right? I wasn’t always a good student, but when I decided to be, I was always a good student. I can see the pattern of my decisions and how those decisions were seeds in my life that either produced fruit or didn’t, right? Nobody did anything wrong to me. There was nothing that was kept from me. These were my decisions that sprang from my agency and regardless of how intentional I was about using it or not, I was absolutely using it. So now, as I’m climbing these stairs, and I’m feeling my self-esteem leave from the soles of my feet with each step that leads me closer to this ask, I get to the public aid office. I’m sitting there. They send a social worker to kind of talk me through.

Derrick Wells (09:53): And, the part that was transformational for me was in talking with my social worker. She was absolutely one of my first life coaches because her attitude and her disposition and her disappointment in me as a young Black man was palpable. The agency rising up within me in that moment, and I remember in that moment, deciding to never put myself in a situation where I would have to be subject to someone handling me in that way. And, here’s the thing. She was not wrong. She was right, right? She was absolutely right because what it did is… It activated the achiever in me.

Lola Wright (10:51): I just want to sort of footnote the power of discomfort, you know what I mean? We’re living in a time and in a society where we are so addicted and attached to comfort. And, what I hear you saying was the healthy pressure that this woman applied to you was so necessary for your transformation.

Derrick Wells (11:16): Absolutely, it was. It was a catalyst. And, I believe in divine discontent, right? And, what she did was she forced me to consider some other possibilities. So, I went to the other extreme. So, the decision that I made once I decided to no longer attempt to be on public aid was to go to the other extreme. And, the other extreme for me now was to become a drug dealer, right? So, I went from looking for what was for me. So, I’m not suggesting that this is not a right or necessary decision for everyone. I’m just talking about how I was approaching it as an 18-year-old in 1988.

Lola Wright (12:09): Oh yeah. I’m a welfare recipient. I was an 18-year-old mother. Thank God for welfare. You know what I mean? I have no shame in that.

Derrick Wells (12:18): I hear you. I hear you, right? So, I went from that decision now to really compounding my situation with what I thought was an easier road. So, in becoming, in becoming, in choosing, right? I don’t want to miss the power of choice in how my life was being shaped in that season. And again, as an 18-year-old, without a ton of experience, right? But, I come kind of from the streets. My sisters and I, although my mother worked as hard as she could to provide the best life for us that she could, we were still poor. I was still raised in poverty. And, the people who got it the best and who got it the most from my perspective, were the people who got it the easiest. Now, the thing about seeing them from afar, is you is you never see the hardship.

Derrick Wells (13:19): You never see the struggle. And, when I just look at the ultimate cost, having people who I came to grow really close to, and seeing them fighting for corners that we could never really claim, right? And, now just having to wrap my mind around, my 19 year old mind, around the unprocessed trauma of what it means to just, to walk away, to feel lucky that you’ve walked away from an intersection, seconds before the people you were just with get murdered, right? And, why did I make it, and someone else didn’t?

Lola Wright (14:15): So, how’d you get from there to the military?

Derrick Wells (14:18): The last time I went to jail, the officers, as they kind of raided the house that we sold out of…

Lola Wright (14:26): What year is this Derrick?

Derrick Wells (14:28): This is 1989.

Lola Wright (14:29): So, this is height of the… Well, it’s at the height of the crack epidemic, right?

Derrick Wells (14:34): Yes. So, I’m not even a full year out of high school. The officers come, and they raid the place that we sell out of. Well, during that time, to the point you’re making… This is the height of the epidemic. So, the jails are crowded. The only way, or one of the few ways that you get someone for possession to stay in jail, is if you charge them with a violent crime. What the officers did was they fabricated an armed robbery, and they charged me with armed robbery. As they say, like, “I’m a whole dealer, right?” But, I’m not guilty of what I’m charged with, but it does get me off the street, right? Having an opportunity now to be off the street, and to really now for myself, assess, is this really who I am?

Derrick Wells (15:37): Is this really what I’m about? Our gang meetings… We couldn’t congregate in the cells. So, we would go to the church services to have our meetings. So, there would be church happening in the front of the room, and my gang in particular, would meet in the back of the room. And, I can remember, on the first time, the first occasion this happened, I remember being torn between what we’re talking about in the back of this room and what the people are saying in the front of the room. I remember being pulled to it, right? But, I couldn’t find the courage to leave what was happening in the back of the room to go to what I was being pulled toward. So, I had a homeboy, one of my good, Sharif Muhammad, who I grew up with.

Derrick Wells (16:35): But, Sharif and his cousin Kiar, went to the Navy. And Sharif… He called me, and we’re talking. And, he’s been in the Navy at this point, maybe four months, five months. I’ve always been able to identify the music that was playing behind the message that was being communicated. His music is different. His voice is different. What he’s saying is different. This dude is different, right? It’s only been four months, and he is radically changed from the dude I knew four months ago. I’m like, “Where did you get that at because I need that?” And, really just hearing the difference in who he was, and he might not have seen himself as all that different, but I could hear it. Hearing the difference in him was the other catalyst that moved me from tolerating the experiences that I was in to deciding now to go and join the Navy. So, that’s how I went from slanging and banging to being in the United States Navy.

Lola Wright (17:56): You want to be more alive. You want to unleash your inherent love and goodness, liberate yourself, and free humanity from the oppressive systems and structures we have created. We are here to support you in finding your fierce and loving life. Join us in Our Circle. This is an affirming and radical space that will gather weekly, on-demand or live, whatever works best for your life. For more information on how you can engage in Our Circle, visit lolawright.com/our-circle. I’d love to have you with us. 

Lola Wright (18:40): What do you sense your unique thumbprint is in the evolution of human consciousness? When I’ve talked to our good friend, Gaylon, he has often said to me about you, “Derrick is a mystic.” I don’t know that everybody really knows what he means when he says that. When you hear that he says that about you, what do you hear?

Derrick Wells (19:04): When I hear that, here is what I recognize. So, here is where I think the pattern of your soul doesn’t always fit the yes of your commitment, right? So, in my practice, I am more mystical. In my teaching, I am not just because when you teach to the masses, if you will, it does require, and please don’t take this the wrong way, not you will, but it requires a simplification of the concept or the idea or the theory or the construct so that it’s more digestible. I don’t necessarily teach or do ministry in the ways that are most conducive to how I consume, you know what I’m saying? I consume in one way. And, I absolutely, as I digest it for myself, it expresses out, in, through, and as my contribution in community and in ministry and in relationship in those ways.

Derrick Wells (20:14): But, I don’t force my imprint or my tendency. I don’t force that into my ministry. There was one of our… And I used to, I used to. Actually, they parsed it out during my training, right? We would have mock teaching sessions. And, I’ll just go in and say… And, Helen Carrie would say to me, like, “That’s a really wonderful, beautiful way to put that. That’s way up here. How would you communicate that to a four-year-old? Right? How would you say that to a six-year-old? How would you make an eight-year-old get that?” There is a reason. Good, bad, indifferent why the news is presented at the level at which it’s presented.

Lola Wright (21:04): Yeah. The developmental editor of my book said that the top-selling books in the world are written at a fourth-grade level.

Derrick Wells (21:13): There’s a reason why the news is broadcasted at a fourth-grade level. If you want the most people to be able to consume it, then you’ve got to put it where they can get it. And, that’s not a judgment about where people are, but when we look at where people are in terms of where they are able to work with it, get it, unpack it, and apply it, you’ve got to put it at a certain level. And, so the mystic in me is largely quiet when it comes to ministry, right? Now, in my personal practice, yeah, I still get down like that. That’s still my vibration. That’s still what I love. That’s still how I move. So, it’s not the imprint of my ministry. I would say the imprint and contribution of my ministry taps into another aspect of my background, and that’s just my propensity for love, right? I like to say that I was incubated in love.

Lola Wright (22:18): What’s your sense of what’s transforming in your community as a result of this pandemic?

Derrick Wells (22:27): It’s going to be really interesting how that unfolds. When it comes to leading change because you know as I do, the problem isn’t change. The problem is certain types of change. Most of us aren’t wearing the same body odor we were wearing yesterday. Many of us have gone through the transformative process of bathing and brushing and combing and releasing. That’s all change.

Lola Wright (23:00): I’ll close with this. When you look at the state of the human experience right now, we’ve arguably gone through one of the most toxic presidential political climates. There’s a conversation around racial injustice in this country that has been long needed, and I’m optimistic actually has some transformative capacity to it. There’s profound economic inequity. There is a global pandemic. I mean, there are lots of effects that can take you out mentally and otherwise. How do you subscribe to a philosophy, a theology, that says there’s only ever good occurring here? How do you make sense of the dis-ease we are experiencing?

Derrick Wells (24:00): One of the things that I believe that we do, that is hopeful, is we do make a distinction, right? For some people, it would say, “Well, it might be a distinction without a difference.” But, we make a distinction, right? We make a distinction between what we consider to be reality, and what’s considered to be non-reality or the appearance, right? So, we say that a reality is that which is in accord with God, principal, the higher power, the universal urge, and the things that are consistent with that will always reflect that. And, the things that are the appearances have a root cause somewhere and more often than not, that cause is connected to people, right? So, when the people are involved, the dis-ease starts to show up. The racism starts to show up.

Derrick Wells (25:15): The inequity starts to show up. So, for instance, we don’t necessarily consider a forest fire a bad thing, right? We accept it as a by-product of nature. We don’t necessarily consider a hurricane a bad thing. We recognize the science is telling us that there is some impact that we as people are having that’s causing some form of global warming that may they be producing more of these, but just by and large, when those things disrupt and destruct what’s in their path, while we feel some kind of way about it, we don’t necessarily consider it an evil thing, right? We see them just as acts of nature. And, so the element that shifts how we perceive it, is almost always directly related to the level of involvement that people have with it. And so, when the people show up, the dis-ease shows up. When the people show up, the dysfunction shows up.

Derrick Wells (26:33): So, if I can bring dis-ease or dysfunction in a balanced possibility, I can also bring healing and harmony. One of those things are consistent with reality, as we would describe it, a reflection of the God possibility, the God potential, that exists in, through, and as all of us, and one of those things does not. What’s the degree to which I am going to make a commitment to be someone who rather than screams at the darkness, decides to light a candle or be a light, and let the reality of harmony and peace and justice and receptivity and acceptance and inclusion, let those things resonate with me and reflect those things back in how I move in the world.

Derrick Wells (27:37): And, what’s the degree to which I’m going to not do that and create divisions and accept some people because of how they show up and reject other people because of how they show up? So, the reality is really, that which is consistent with God, and the way that shows up in our life, world, and affairs. And, the dis-ease is a by-product of when we choose to function outside of the possibility of good that exists as a possibility for all of us.

Lola Wright (28:10): And, I always think it’s important to remind everyone that when we speak of God, we are not talking about some Santa Claus figure in the sky.

Derrick Wells (28:19): Yes, I’m talking about a power and a potential that exists right here within me. There is no place that I need to go in order to connect with that which already is. The only place I really have to get to is centered within the core and essence of my being, and then do the work that is necessary to live from that reality.

Lola Wright (28:46): Derrick Wells, you’re such a living demonstration of possibility. And, I am deeply inspired by the rigor with which you do life. I’ll take your extreme, transformed self any day. I’m grateful for it.

Derrick Wells (29:05): Let’s get after it, Lola. Let’s do it.

Lola Wright (29:07): So, how do people find you if they want to know more? Do you have a website? How do we get to you?

Derrick Wells (29:15): You can get at me at all of the social medias. I believe at Rev Derrick Wells. You can also access me in my other life, in my coaching life, through derrickbwells.com. And, I’ve got some good stuff coming that’s in that lane as well. So, I’m here to help you be transformed as well. One of the things that I love about my story is that, I’m not only a client, I’m the player president, you know what I’m saying? I don’t have to tell anybody about the theory of how to radically transform yourself. I am someone who has radically transformed his life.

Derrick Wells (30:02): I heard what my teachers said. And, as an intellectual, I was willing to put it to the test and see if it would prove out. And, it in fact has proven out, and my life is different. My wife would tell you, I’m nowhere near the knucklehead I used to be. And, my mother is proud of me. I’m my children’s hero. If I don’t have anything else in life, I’ll take those, you know what I’m saying? I’ll take my wife being able to stand up anywhere and say, “My husband is a good husband and a good man.”

Lola Wright (30:39): And, I know your wife well enough to know that she does not mince her words. She says what’s on her mind.

Derrick Wells (30:44): She wouldn’t say it if it weren’t so. If I can be of support in helping someone manifest their own unique form of greatness because I believe we all have it in us, then that’s what I’m committed to doing, whether I do it in the spiritual religious space, or whether I do it in the coaching space. What’s important to me is that I do it.

Lola Wright (31:10): I’m so grateful for the presence that you are in my life and in the city and in this world. So, many, many blessings and thank you.

Lola Wright (31:21): If you enjoyed this show and would like to receive new episodes as they’re published, subscribe wherever you get your podcasts, and consider leaving a review in Apple Podcasts. Your review helps others find this show. You can follow me at Lola P. Wright on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter, and learn more about my work at lolawright.com. This episode was produced by Quinn Rose with theme music from independent music producer, Trey Royal. 

Derrick Wells (31:55): But, when I started to talk about canceling Christmas before cancel culture was a thing, when I started talking about canceling Christmas, she was like, “Well, that’s a bridge too far.”