[SUBDUED MUSIC] I remember walking
to school when I had a pair of pants
that had a side pocket. And the side pocket had
change, loose change, and so walking down
the street, you just hear the change just
jingling, jingling. And there was a group
of gang members. I had to walk by
them to go to school. And I remember
just trying to walk by them trying to look
confident, to not look scared. But they heard the jingling. Hey, is that change
in your pocket? Hey, hold your head up. Be a man, now, boy. Hey where you going, bro? Hey, I said, I hear that change. Look at me, man. Hey, come on, boy. [INTERPOSING VOICES] [INTENSE MUSIC PLAYS] I just ran as fast as I could. I just had to figure
out, How can I get away? That's the world I
lived in, and that's where I started really running. [OMINOUS MUSIC PLAYS] [HOPEFUL MUSIC PLAYS] I grew up in Queens
in New York City. I lived on the
Southside of Jamaica, so I lived in a low-income part
of the inner-city part of New York City. [SUBDUED MUSIC PLAYS] I grew up with three older
brothers and a younger sister. My parents--great parents. But when I was 11 years
old, they divorced, and life became very
different at that point. And Christmas was
never quite the same. That first Christmas
where we weren't together, we didn't have those
family traditions, and there was no longer
those great presents under the Christmas tree. [SAD MUSIC PLAYS] Matter of fact, I think
that first Christmas after the divorce, I don't think
there was a Christmas tree. And that was hard. It was like, "What
happened to my family?" I started to think,
"When I have a family, this will never happen." And so it was a lot
of confusion for me at that time as a young boy. [DARK MUSIC PLAYS] After the divorce and
after that Christmas, it just felt so different. I was searching for--"Who am I? Where do I belong?" And living in New
York City at the time, you was trying to survive
this day without getting hurt, beat up, or killed. And that kind of
led, at least for me, to a lot of poor decisions
at that very young age. [TROUBLED MUSIC PLAYS] I ran to this gang environment. This gang, I think, was
going to offer me some protection--belonging to
a group where I can feel, in some sense, safe again. [DARK MUSIC PLAYS] But I think I was searching. I was trying to find
who I was and trying to find that identity amidst
people that wasn't quite sure who they were either. [DARK MUSIC PLAYS] After being involved in this
situation for about a year, I realized that I'm
in a worse situation now than when I started. [TENSE MUSIC PLAYS] And that was the next strategy
for me, is figuring out, well, How can I get away
and still be safe? [HIP-HOP MUSIC PLAYS] (RAPPING) You know
we [INAUDIBLE].. My oldest brother, who
didn't get involved in gangs, he was involved in a rap group. And so trying to
connect with him and his rap group when rap
and hip-hop and that was coming to the forefront. (RAPPING) --erudite, man you
grabbed a pen, and then we-- And I think that was my next
thing looking for something. (RAPPING) We did it once, now we
checking in with a second wind. When it comes to lecturing,
they call me Malcolm Excellent. My record spin a veteran-- I would grab the mic,
and I say, "Peter P, my mellow, my brother,
get on the mic, let's rap to one another." I think I was a
pretty good rapper, but, you know what, it's
kind of like hindsight. And I was a young rapper. (RAPPING) Yeah. We coming to a theater near. Burn it up, turn it up
so the people can hear. Yeah. We the kind stay
synced with the fear, 'cos I can spit slang
and still speak clear. The rap group and slowly
getting more involved in that was a way out of the gang,
because I had a reason that I was doing something different. But it all attract
random violence; it all attracted that. [INTERPOSING VOICES] And I think that put me
in another perspective, like, there must be
something better. [HOPEFUL MUSIC PLAYS] So as I transitioned,
as I looked at my life, from joining a gang,
from joining a rap group, I was still searching. I was still running. I was still trying
to find myself. [INTENSE MUSIC PLAYS] I had another good
friend who was Muslim, and he was trying to tell
me about the Muslim faith. [MYSTERIOUS MUSIC PLAYS] And once again seeking
for protection, I started to study
with the Muslim faith, because they have a
strong health code. That kept me away from the drugs
and the drug abuse and that, that I was seeing my friends
and others getting involved in. I started to think more about
deity, about if there is a God. And it got me involved in
the reading of prophets, of their words, where they
talk about God and afterlife. And this life is
meant to prepare you for something better. It was a beginning. It was a start for me. [UPLIFTING MUSIC PLAYS] Guess another defining moment
was my mother had been--left New York City and
moved to Hawaii. And she decided to stay. She said, "I'm not
coming back to New York. If any of you children
want to come live with me, here's money for a
one-way plane ticket." And I grabbed that plane
ticket and moved to Hawaii when I was about to turn 15. And that gave me a
whole new perspective, because I was away from all the
distraction and all the noise. And moving into an environment
that was a lot slower paced, I guess, gave me the opportunity
to think a little bit about really what I wanted. And then I went to high
school, and then that's when I got involved
in athletics. And I think athletics was
a saving grace for me. [RHYTHMIC MUSIC PLAYS] That led to me getting
a college scholarship to play basketball at Brigham
Young University, Hawaii campus. [FAST MUSIC PLAYS] As I was playing
basketball, being part of a team, another group,
I got to see something unique on this basketball team. It was interesting because at
the different basketball games or football games, you've always
saw their parents in the crowd. And that was meaningful to me. That, once again,
reinforced in me that I want to have
a family, that we are going to be together, that
we're going to work together to get through everything
that is tough and hard. And so I saw that in my
teammates and their family. [INSPIRING MUSIC PLAYS] When I enrolled in
that first semester and I met with that
academic adviser at Brigham Young
University-Hawaii, she alluded to
the fact that this was a religious institution,
and so, in order to graduate, you have to take a religion
class every semester. Right when she said
that, I said, "Well, I want to study
the New Testament." Because I knew from
the Muslim faith that they talk about this Jesus
Christ as a wonderful prophet. But I want to know,
Who is He now? Who is He? [SPIRITUAL MUSIC PLAYS] And I learned
about Jesus Christ, how he was the Son of God. And I learned how to
pray to a Heavenly Father in the name of Jesus Christ. [INSPIRING MUSIC PLAYS] And so I knelt down in that
little apartment in Hawaii and told my Heavenly
Father for the first time that I loved Him. And then I knew. [JOYFUL MUSIC PLAYS] I knew that there was a Father
in Heaven, that I was His son. It was a light. It was a light that I felt that
distilled it upon me in a sense that I'd never felt
before that time. I felt like I knew who I was. And I knew who I could become. It let me know that repentance
and forgiveness is in my grasp. And that helped me tremendously. [TRANSCENDENT MUSIC PLAYS] As I look at the
world today, even as I look at where
I came from, I think we still
involved in a place where there's those that
attempt to deceive us, to distract us from
who we can become. [CONFUSED MUSIC PLAYS] And in the midst of being
deceived and being distracted, we can be discouraged. We can lose hope. We can forget our true identity,
and not only our true identity but who we can become. Because if we don't
know who we are, it's very difficult to
realize who we can become. [OPTIMISTIC MUSIC PLAYS] When you have
feelings of deception or there's things that
are distracting or have feelings of discouragement,
we will feel those things. And it's OK. There's nothing wrong
with being discouraged. That's part of this life. There are times and moments
that we'll feel discouraged, but we don't have to stay in
that condition, on that moment. We can overcome
those moments in time by strengthening our
relationship with our Heavenly Father and His
Son, Jesus Christ. I'm grateful that I had those
moments of discouragement, but they don't define me. Just because I have those
moments, that's not who I am. Who I am: I'm a child of God. I'm a son of God. That's who I am. And because I have
that divine heritage, because I possess the
attributes of Deity, oh man! I can rise above
this and be better. And that's what I'm striving
to be, just better every day and become more like
my Heavenly Father and His Son, Jesus Christ. If I can do it, you can do it. That's the thing. If I can do it, you can do it. [INSPIRING MUSIC PLAYS] I never pictured myself
having a college degree. I went to college
because my high school counselor didn't think I could. I stayed in college
because I love learning. And I went on to graduate with
a business degree and then a masters. And then I went on
to obtain a PhD, which--I never thought
I would do that. I meet my wife,
Stephanie, in college, and now we have
our four children. Christmas is what it
should be once again. And it has provided that unity,
that foundation, that source of happiness, the source
of completeness as we now, as a family, look to God. [UPLIFTING MUSIC PLAYS] As I started to look back
about my life in New York City, this running, this
finding, the searching, and then, that first semester,
taking that New Testament class, to say, "Man, I found it! I found it." When you're running from the
darkness, this feeling of fear. But when you're running towards
the light, there's hope. You know you're running
to strength and peace and happiness. We all need to be
running to the light. [HOPEFUL MUSIC PLAYS]
