You Can Make a Difference: Remarkable Story To Inspire You to Do Something Big | Mel Robbins Podcast

KEYPOINTS

• 01

  Lorenzo Lewis turned barbers and stylists into mental health advocates

  His nonprofit, the Confess Project, has trained over 3,000 barbers and stylists across 52 cities in 35 states, reaching more than 3 million people a year; Mel cites roughly a million people reached for every thousand trained. Lewis isn't a therapist or doctor, and nobody asked him to do this. Mel's point: he saw a problem and answered the call.

• 02

  The gap he's addressing: access and trust

  Mel cites that only about 4% of therapists and licensed mental health professionals are Black, that 47% of people still see seeking therapy as weakness, and that 60% don't fully trust the person they get help from. Lewis says it's hard to open up to someone who doesn't share or understand your lived experience, and historical distrust of medical providers and authority adds another barrier.

• 03

  He was born to an incarcerated mother and lost his father at 10

  Lewis was born while his mother was in jail; his father died in prison when he was 10. To keep him out of foster care, his aunt and uncle drove from Little Rock, Arkansas, to Newark, New Jersey, to take him in. He had a good upbringing in many ways, but felt lost, angry and unseen, wondering whether his parents loved him or whether their absence was his fault.

• 04

  Unrecognized grief can look like 'bad behavior'

  After his father died, Lewis was kicked out of school in about third grade and spent around two months in a behavioral health facility at 10, coming home on weekends. Returning to school, he felt ashamed and tried to make it sound cool. Mel says it makes her angry when struggling kids are disciplined instead of having mental health or learning differences addressed, and notes men often shove sadness down until it erupts as anger.

• 05

  'A child who is not embraced by the village will burn it down'

  Lewis quotes the African proverb to explain how, at 17, he joined a gang and was arrested on a firearm charge. He frames it as lashing out at himself because he didn't feel loved or seen, not simply bad choices.

• 06

  A juvenile detention cell became his turning point

  The weekend before court, a month shy of 18, he kept thinking this was the same place he was born and where his father had been. Thanks largely to his aunt pleading with the court and his clean record, the judge gave him a second chance. He promised her she'd never see him in the system again and that he would go to college. He kept his word, earning a human services degree from Arkansas Baptist College.

• 07

  Barbershops and salons are community hubs

  Lewis grew up doing homework and eating dinner in his aunt's beauty shop, later built behind their house, and found his first mentor, Sylvester, the only male barber among five operators. He says Black barbershops were tied to civil rights organizing, are among the few routes to generational wealth, and, outside church, are rare places where homeless neighbors, principals and entrepreneurs gather together.

• 08

  The idea came from hospital work and empty men's events

  Working on an inpatient mental health unit in Arkansas, Lewis saw patients from all walks of life cycling back, saying treatment felt pointless and not feeling honored or included. His first event, a back-to-school mental health event at a Black church in Little Rock, drew about 700 people. But men wouldn't come to library sessions; only the women who wanted their men to get help showed up.

• 09

  Manhood norms make vulnerability hard

  Lewis says ideas of manhood, growing up without fathers at home, and media and hip-hop images make it hard for men, especially Black men, to be vulnerable. He credits figures like Charlamagne tha God for championing mental health. His view: model vulnerability by being transparent that you're still learning, too.

• 10

  The four-part training formula

  Barbers learn active listening, validation, positive communication and stigma reduction, drawn from therapeutic practice but used as advocacy while cutting hair. Instead of 'don't worry about it' or 'just pray,' they might say: 'I noticed your day's been hard. What's going on? How can I support you?' Each shop also gets a resource directory for housing, health care sign-up, jobs and bill pay.