We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Lashawn “Suga Ray” Marston a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Alright, Lashawn “Suga Ray” Marston thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Have you been able to earn a full-time living from your creative work? If so, can you walk us through your journey and how you made it happen? Was it like that from day one? If not, what were some of the major steps and milestones and do you think you could have sped up the process somehow knowing what you know now?
Yes, I’m fortunate to have been able to earn a full-time living from my creative work. It was not always like this. It’s been an incredibly challenging, yet oh so rewarding journey thus far. Let me break it down for you. When I first changed my life in 2008 and committed to being a more positive human, and tapping more fully into my creative side, I had no idea how I would make it. I remember buying my first video camera from a crackhead, transforming a crack house into a film studio, and enrolling my friends into the creative process with me. It was fun, but I did not make a lot of money. I made a few dollars shooting music videos, and I made a few dollars filming events for people, but those were few and far in between. One of the major steps that eventually led to me earning a full-time living from my creative work was simply making the commitment to doing so. During the pandemic things changed for me. I made a deeper commitment to enhance the quality of life in my community. From initiating vegan food distributions, to facilitating an outdoor spoken word space, to curating my own photographic art exhibit, I was on a creative roll. These creative endeavors didn’t bring me direct income, as they were simply acts of service to my community, but they did build my notoriety, and it did add to the karmic debt I emitted into the Universe. It was on March 9th, 2021, exactly 14 years since I was released from a 3 year prison bid, that I signed my first contract as a creative that would pay me a salary for one year for simply being me. That was epic! Had I known these spaces existed prior, I probably would have generated a full-time living sooner, but all is divine, and if would’ve happened sooner, I might not have been ready.
Lashawn “Suga Ray” Marston, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
I am a 38, soon to be 39 (3/14) year old artist, activist, community builder, entrepreneur, philanthropist, visionary, and so much more. I guess one can say I got into this industry maybe 15 years ago, but in reality I’ve been writing poems since age 5, and at 14 years old a friend and I wrote a 60 page movie script that never got completed. I’ve been an artist my entire life. I’ve been a visionary and philanthropist my entire life. As a creative entrepreneur, visionary, healer, and everything else, I provide a host of services. I write for people – whether that’s script writing, essay writing, blog writing, creating bios, copy editing, and stuff like that. I am a filmmaker, so I offer videography and directing services to folks. I am an ordained minister, as well as a therapeutic art coach, and I offer marriage services, funeral services, grief support services, meditation and other healing outlets to people. For the most part, I help clients identify their why, become better at community building and engagement, unlocking a creative aspect they need to move forward in an area of their life, etc. I literally help make the world a better place and I make a decent living doing so.
One thing I’m most proud of is transforming my life. I had a death wish. I was selling drugs and carrying guns. I was drinking myself to sleep and engaging in all type of reckless behavior. But I grew. I became vegan and I fully committed myself to becoming better in every area of life. I did all of this in the same community. That’s big for me because a lot of people have to leave their neighborhood to change and they end up doing so much for others, essentially forgetting where they come from, although they always say they love their hood. Although I started doing a lot of work in other neighborhoods, I was specific in building relationships with others that would ultimately be beneficial to the work I’d do in my community. And I worked that plan almost to perfection. I’m most proud of sticking to my guns. People left me when I struggled to earn a living. But I stayed committed through the loneliness, through feeling like no one believed in me. I believed in and although I sacrificed a lot, I’m living the dream I wholeheartedly believe the Divine has for me.
Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?
Wow. This one hits. I’m actually currently building a lifestyle brand called “Sustained Resilience”. Along with my faith and my vision, all I really have is my resilience. There are so many examples of resilience in my journey. I was telling this one story recently. When I first split from my ex-wife we put our son into public school so he could have some stability although we didn’t have much at home. I remember my ex-wife saying “All of his friends fathers have jobs, what is he gonna tell his friends when they ask what his father does.” I said “he’s gonna tell them that his father is making the world a better place.” This exchange bothered me greatly as I had believed up until this poiny, that she was envisioning with me what was on our horizon. Needless to say, because I wasn’t making a lot of consistent money, not enough to adequately take care of my family as I said I would, my ex-wife left me. One of the big reasons was because my lack of income and dedication to a dream that didn’t seem like it would happen for me. But I knew it would. I knew it wasn’t necessarily my actions or inaction, it was just a matter of time. And as I mentioned in a previous question, since February 2020 until now, I’ve made more money than I had made in the previous 10 years combined. It’s been crazy. It was this realization, as well as the many other examples of resilience I have, that led me to create the Sustained Resilience brand, with our motto being “You are born resilient, you just need to sustain it and you’ll create the life you dream of.”
Is there mission driving your creative journey?
The particular goal and mission driving my creativity is my mission to heal the world. At 7 years old, when I saw Michael Jackson sing Heal The World I knew that’s what I wanted to do for the rest of my life. I knew I wanted to use my gifts and love of words to positively impact humanity. So, because I want to heal the world, I know that I must be engaged in every area of life as humanly possible, thus I’m into arts and culture, food and health, education and economics, politica and religion, technology and science, and all the other things.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.lashawnmarston.com
- Instagram: www.instagram.com/sugaray4506
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/sugarayproductionz
- Linkedin: Suga Ray
- Twitter: www.twitter.com/SugaRay4506
- Youtube: www.youtube.com/queensbridgestudios
Image Credits
Eric L Cooper, Bryanna “Echoes”