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- [00:00]
A
My dad committed suicide. My son ended up getting cancer at 17 years old. And my faith has grown because I feel like that God just used those bad situations to turn them around for good into good things. And so I try to do that as well. I try to turn everything bad that happens in my life around to something good and positive.
- [00:28]
B
It takes a lot of grit or I would say self awareness to have that resilience. Where does that energy come from?
- [00:34]
A
God. He has changed my life. Starting at 13 years old, my life changed at a Christian camp that I went to. And ever since, I've just tried to live my life for him, do what he would have me do, and make an impact on others, be his hands and feet, love on people, be kind to people, and just.
- [01:00]
B
My name is Rudy Moore, host of Living the Red Life Podcast, and I'm here to change the way you see your life in your earpiece every single week. If you're ready to start living the red life, ditch the blue pill, take the red pill, join me in wonderland and change your life. Welcome to another episode of the Living youg Legacy podcast, the Red Life edition. For Inside Success. I am Ray Gutierrez. Joining me today is another powerful woman, a woman in power, Shanna Summers. She is the founder of Greater Vision Academy. Did I get that right?
- [01:31]
A
Yes, you did.
- [01:32]
B
Welcome to the show.
- [01:33]
A
Thank you.
- [01:34]
B
How does it feel to just finish your episode, having all these cameras, being in Miami and you were in a studio without air conditioning? Quite the resilience here.
- [01:48]
A
So I was really hot. Yes, you were. I feel famous now, so I'm hot and famous.
- [01:54]
B
There you go. I love it. Talk about turning a negative into a positive. Clearly, you're just, like, still beaming with. With. With dopamine, as we call it, after your episode. But you walked in into the fire going, it's warm in here. Let's get it done.
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A
Yeah. I love that you guys. Let me tell, like, the real story, which focuses a lot on God. And you guys, let me talk about that. And I've just been through a lot, and so I cried. I didn't want to cry, but I knew I would because I've. I've been through some things that made me cry for sure, so. But it was great. And you guys are so professional and, like, I just love that about you guys. I was not expecting. This seems like the real deal.
- [02:42]
B
Oh, gosh. Well, I'm very prideful of that. Lord and I, and. And really we've built quite an empire here the last couple of months, and we. We quickly grown to Jason, Kofi, and Anton as well. So we're very pragmatic of what we've achieved here, which is why I'm sitting on the lips. What are we gonna learn about you in your episode? You talked about faith and just unleashing you when it talks about your North Star per se. What are we gonna learn about you?
- [03:08]
A
I think you're gonna learn that anybody can do anything, because I'm really nobody. I started this journey at 21 years old and I feel like that that's a kid. Like I was a kid. And I started directing my first daycare. And then some things happened. My dad committed suicide. My son ended up getting cancer at 17 years old. And I've just, my faith has grown because I feel like that God just used those bad situations to turn them around for good, into good things. And so I try to do that as well. I try to turn everything bad that happens in my life around to something good and positive. And I learn from it. And then I'm a glass half full type of person. I always try to see the positive. And then because my son is now cancer free, everything bad that happens, I'm just always like, at least we're alive. You know, my son's alive, my, my children are alive and me and my husband are alive. And so nothing is, you know, that bad. I live my life like that. Like, oh, it's not that bad. It'll, you know, it's okay.
- [04:36]
B
Where does that, where does that come from? It takes a lot of grit or I would say self awareness to have that resilience. Where does that energy come from?
- [04:44]
A
God, he has changed my life. Starting at 13 years old, I was. My life changed at a Christian camp that I went to. And ever since, I've just tried to live my life for him, do what he would have me do and make an impact on others, be his hands and feet, love on people, be kind to people, and just try to do his work here on earth. And so I do have a lot of faith. I truly believe that he healed my son from cancer. He had an incurable cancer that, I mean, that's what incurable means. That is, is not going to go away. And he's 24 now and he is great. He's in great health. And so my faith is strong. And so I try to pour that out on others. And I counsel kids. I'm definitely not a guidance counselor, but I, I do, I pray with kids and try to help them get through whatever struggles they're going through. I, with my dad's suicide. I have a lot of students that have been suicidal or deal with depression and things like that. And I always try to help them and pray with them and try to get them back to living the life that God has planned for them.
- [06:14]
B
I was saved at nine, but later down my path, I became suicidal. It was just, it was a sense of like, I, I want control of my life and I, I have the ability to end it because I wanted the pain to stop.
- [06:27]
A
Yeah, yeah.
- [06:28]
B
But I did find God again. And, you know, I've always been a Christian, thank God. Literally, I was saved at nine. But I understand and do no longer fear the darkness, but quite understand it and I've actually used it and empowered it. What, what do you tell? How, how, what do you tell folks that have survived a parent, a suicide? Suicide is very close to me. A lot of my heroes are dead, unfortunately. A lot of my mentors have, have no longer exist. Clearly I'm still coping with it. How does you cope with it? Losing a father?
- [07:03]
A
He was dealing with sickness and on different medications, and it was very sudden. But I try to use it as a testimony to help others. And so I'll just. To answer that question, I'll just tell you a story. It happened the other day. So I do chapel at the school once a week. And I did the first one because it was the beginning of the school year and I always start the year with the Ten Commandments. And like, I have this little finger play I use to teach the Ten Commandments. And I started talking and just telling them, you know, I wanted them to have a great year and I wanted them to grow in Christ and, you know, us to be a family and all this. And then I was going to go into the Ten Commandments and I just felt the Lord say, like, give your testimony. So I began talking and I don't plan a lot. I didn't plan for this. I don't plan a lot because I believe that if you pray and God will speak through you. So I was like, okay, I'm just going to give my testimony because I felt like God was telling me to do that. So I started talking about my dad's suicide and I just told them, like, that's the worst thing that you can do to your family. You know, it's something, It's a different kind of death. It's not a natural death. It's a kind of death that breaks the people that love you. Like, and if you think people don't love you, then I love you. You know, we love you here at Greater Vision Academy. And it's just something that, you know, I never want any of our students to face or do. And so I was just speaking. And honestly, I don't remember everything I said. And I was, you know, given scripture and. And we had the chapel. And then after I was done, this little boy, I call him a little bo, he's an 8th grader, he came up to me with tears in his eyes and he said, you, chapel really touched me because I have been having suicidal thoughts. And he said, I have been bullied. You know, I don't feel like that I am just worthy of living. And my eyes teared up because of what he was saying, saying, and he was so sweet. He has autism. And so because my eyes were tearing up because a child was saying this to me, he thought that he was bringing up the hurt from my dad's suicide. So he said, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. I did not. I didn't mean to make you upset. I didn't mean to make you cry. I'm so sorry. And I said, no, no, please always come to me. And then we prayed together. I of course, called his mom because, you know, I have to do that if any child ever says that. But I really feel like I helped him and that he now has a purpose. And I told him, I said, you are. He's new. So I said, you are going to just be awesome here at Greater Vision Academy, and you are going to do great things and we are going to love on you and we're going to be for. Here for you every step of the way.
- [10:42]
B
Wow. Talk about the evolution of. Of, I guess, the frequency of the energy out there. Sometimes, Sometimes I. My fair. YouTube. YouTubers are the folks that have these personal ministries.
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A
They're.
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B
They're alone in their bedroom or living room and they're. They're. They're speaking gospel. Other churches have youth groups where it's more of a band and there no one's really sitting. It's more of a concert. Talk about how. How churches have really evolved and they've morphed into academies, tribes retreats, off sites. Talk about the EVOL ministries.
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A
Yeah, I'm not much of anything. Just a normal woman saying that.
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B
At least you're a ginger. That's good. You got that going for you.
- [11:22]
A
Anyway, so I. I do feel like that the school is also a church, a ministry. Yeah. Yeah. And we don't do it for the money. Money's nice. And we're. Do you.
- [11:37]
B
Do it for the tax breaks.
- [11:39]
A
Yeah, tax breaks, text breaks. I started a youth church, a church for teenagers that meets at the school. I also started a college Bible study where after kids graduate, they can come back and still, like, do Bible study and meet. So it's definitely a ministry. And it's an. I think that it's better than church because it's like every day, every single day of the week, the kids can come to us for prayer. They get. Of course, they're Bible classes, but we're not the kind of school that like, you know, bangs them over the head with a Bible and says, you know, act right or you're going to go to hell. We're not like that. We just show them the love of Jesus. And so every single day we are having chapel, Bible study, and then it goes after school, too. We have these other programs at night. And so it is a true church and ministry. Even though it's a school, I love it.
- [12:46]
B
What is happening in today's youth? Since you are mentoring today's youth, I'm curious to learn what is happening in high schools today with social media. How are folks talking to each other? How are folks bullying each other? Like, it's got to be pretty grim and dark out there.
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A
Yeah. When I was growing up, there were no cell phones there.
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B
Pagers. There was pagers when I was in high school.
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A
High school had pager. We. So I say I invented text messaging me. Because my husband, who was my high school sweetheart, I used to send him messages on his pager. So when you turn it upside down, you could say hello or let's go. You could do all that with numbers or boob. Oh, you can say. Yeah, you can say that.
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B
Boob was my favorite one.
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A
Boob. So I say I invented it.
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B
But anyway, how dark and dreary it could be in high school today.
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A
So it's bad.
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B
Oh, yeah.
- [13:43]
A
The parents. A lot of times, a lot of parents let cell phones, YouTube, any kind of electronics raise their kids. So they're just constantly on them. If you look around at the dinner table, you're always see it. Or at a restaurant, you're always seeing kids on phones and tablets and all of that. So when my son was younger, you know, I wasn't used to all that. And he was playing on our. I guess it was an ipod back then. I don't. I don't remember what it was. Some kind of device. He had an eye device in his hand. And literal pornography started popping up on a kid's video game. And I stopped it Right Then I took electronics from my kids and I said go outside. And now he is like hunting and fishing and loving every day. He is like just a really. He's 24, well rounded kid. But anyway, it's bad the, the influence of social media on kids and it makes, as educators, it makes it so hard on us. Oh sure. They want to go on their phones, they want to cheat. We used to be a school where we use computers for every subject starting in third grade and we had to change it back to books, back to old school because the kids were cheating and not learning and so they should
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B
have been playing Carmen San Diego is what he's been doing.
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A
Yeah, yeah.
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B
Or Oregon Trail.
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A
Yeah, I loved Oregon Trail.
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B
Using the interwebs.
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A
It definitely puts some obstacles in our way and it, it's like opening a huge door to Satan in kids lives.
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B
It's, it's funny you mentioned the S word in folks go. Ah, no, no. It's a form of energy. It really is. It's the darkness comes. The devil comes in many ways.
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A
Yeah.
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B
Or how do you feel like that, that, that the advancements of technology is essentially gateways to said darkness.
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A
Yeah.
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B
In the Bible, for God's sake.
- [15:55]
A
Yeah, yeah. It opens up so many doors. We have had students as young as 12 years old addicted to pornography. It sounds horrible but it's also so accessible. It's just there, it opens up new ways of bullying through cyber bullying, things like that. So we have had to develop a very strict code of conduct where you know, any kind of cyber bullying or any kind of thing like that where you are making a child scared to come to school. That's so big where kids are scared to come to school. That is a horrible thing that we have to deal with. But it, it just opens up so much. So my advice would be to get your kids off of their stuff and you know, some of them are at least find ballots. Yeah.
- [16:53]
B
It is the year 2025 still like we still have to be tech savvy because you don't also want your child to be completely non. They need to know some sort of tech.
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A
Yeah. And phones are also safety like where they can contact their parents, you know, very quickly.
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B
And there's parental guides now, parental controllers, there's ways you can put up safety nets and safety controls on devices.
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A
I mean my kids of course have, have phones and have had phones and.
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B
But it also shows that parents need to be educating their kids far younger because the advancements of outer, outer, outer noise is going to start pouring influence right.
- [17:27]
A
We try to show the kids at greater vision. Just different ways, different ways of having fun and like bring them back to the old school, you know. And we go fishing. We have a pond and we.
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B
It's quite the academy.
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A
Yeah. We've like. We've been fishing for PE class and just things to just like get them outside and you know a new saying is like touch grass. I don't know if you've heard that.
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B
Definitely have.
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A
Okay. Like go touch grass also just to throw it out there. I'm a. I believe in a lot of all natural stuff and so I ground a lot and go outside and just put my feet on the ground and like just be one with nature. So anyway, I feel like that we're in influence and kids positively to stop opening those doors to evil.
- [18:18]
B
It's also about not opening the doors but if the door is open to at least have the screen up to protect.
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A
Yeah.
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B
From all the bad frequency and let the good stuff in.
- [18:26]
A
Yeah. Yeah. Tree.
- [18:28]
B
How can people find you and learn more about you?
- [18:32]
A
Well.
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B
Or about the academy.
- [18:33]
A
I should say we have. Our website is greatervisionnc.com we also have Venmo if anybody wants to help us with our gym project. And we have a link on our website. Website where people can help us financially. But also just the biggest thing is like pray for us because we need prayer like every day. And I'm a big believer in prayer. Yeah. Last year we had. And it sounds weird because it's Christian school, but last year we had 42 children give their hearts to the Lord. And so we take them like they are. Some of the kids have never been in church and we. We just say, you know, God loves you, he died for you, and he can change your life. And he's the only one that can give you that true joy. And the only way that you can truly succeed and be happy is if you have Jesus living inside of you. So I feel like that we definitely change kids for the better.
- [19:43]
B
I love it. Here's the proper time to say amen.
- [19:46]
A
Amen.
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B
With that, that concludes another episode of the Living youg Legacy podcast for Inside Success. I am Regou Tierras.