ORLANDO, Fla. – This week on “Black Men Sundays,” host Corie Murray interviews retired U.S. Army Sgt. Roy Lewis, a motivational keynote speaker with decades of experience in leadership.
Lewis is also a certified personal trainer and the author of “Broken Things,” a book in which he shares stories of his faith and relates them to ways we can all move on from hard times. Called upon in 2007 to enter a combat zone in Iraq, Lewis told Corie that while he and his fellow soldiers were growing increasingly homesick, he decided to write.
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“I took three personal stories where there were some events that were kind of catastrophic to me and really shook my faith, you know, really tested my faith. One was when I was over in Iraq, my son got arrested, and I could share that story at another time. And then my daughter had a rare form of epilepsy; at 16 years old, she stopped talking. And then of course, the third event was when I was in actual combat over in Iraq,” Lewis said. “All three of those events really, if you’re a believer, it really tests your faith. It really tests you. If you really believe in God, you know, God shows up, and he did in those moments of where, if he didn’t show up, I would have probably lost it all.”
Lewis’ motivations to join the military in the first place were described in retrospect somewhat, as while he says he was young, broke and curious when he enlisted, it was the experience of being a service member that made it all worth it.
“I remember telling my wife, I said, ‘Let me go down to the recruiter’s office and check this Army thing, and I’m not really sure.’ That’s the last thing I remember. Next, you know, I was on a bus bound to Fort Dix, New Jersey. That’s all I remember, I was on a bus, the rest is history. I’ve never been that scared in my life and I thought I’d made the worst decision, Corie, in my life, of joining the military, not knowing I made the best decision,” Lewis said. “It gave me, by joining the military, gave me skillsets, gave me things that I didn’t have before I joined the Army. So, I got my computer technology training and everything from the military. (...) When I got out, I had skills, and it also gave me knowledge of money.”
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Lewis told Corie that if he had to do it all over again, however, he would have started his own business.
“I didn’t know all the tax breaks and everything that were associated with owning a business. My son-in-law, my baby girl’s husband, he is a owner of a martial arts academy in Oklahoma City. He owns not two, but three academies in Oklahoma City, and he’s killing it. He goes on vacation when he wants — yeah, he earns his money, but he calls the shots — and with my personal training business, when I file my taxes, I’m like, ‘I don’t owe the government nothing, I don’t owe them nothing,’ because I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, I wish somebody would have told me this when I was in my 20s,’ but that’s how I learned how now I realize with money, money is a tool. It’s not something for me just to go get, you know, a six pack of beer and pizza on the weekend, my money goes to work for me.”
Hear the full interview and more in Season 5, Episode 5 of “Black Men Sundays.”
Black Men Sundays talks about building generational wealth. Check out every episode in the media player below.