Overcoming the pain of abusive relationships inspired some of Mary J. Blige’s biggest hits ... Here’s how music helped save her ...
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00:00If Mary J. Blige can pull out of the shitstorms that she's been in all her life since childhood,
00:06anybody can do it.
00:07Just hang in there.
00:08Stay strong.
00:09Put your head up.
00:10I don't care what kind of thing you win.
00:11Put your head up and push.
00:12Push and believe.
00:13When I was a little girl growing up in the projects, I just loved to sing.
00:36And I wanted to sing because it set me free from all of the negativity and all of the
00:46confusion that was happening outside of our home.
00:49We lived in the projects, but we had love in our home.
00:52But when we stepped out that door, it was hell.
00:55And we learned how to survive.
01:07My mom is a survivor.
01:08She was a single parent mother, very, very small.
01:11And she raised us on her own.
01:13She had three jobs and she never stopped.
01:16I just want to thank God for my mother right now.
01:21And I want to thank God for this moment, because it doesn't have to be like this.
01:43The music, it has to be therapy and it's therapy for me.
01:46I always have people come up to me and say things like, wow, Mary, no more drama saved
01:50my life, or the My Life album saved my life, or a particular song helped me get out of
01:54an abusive relationship.
01:56That's when you know it's therapy.
01:58So when it becomes therapy, it's bigger than you because everybody's healing from it or
02:02trying to get better or relate to it.
02:04I'm a giver.
02:05I believe that I'm in this music business, not just because of my talent and me being
02:10a singer or whatever, but it's because my heart is able to get everything, receive everything
02:17that I receive and then give it back to the universe, you know, seed time, harvest time.
02:30There's been times in my career that I didn't even want to step out of my house because
02:35I was hurt so bad.
02:38But God gave me the strength to keep stepping and keep my head up, regardless of what anybody
02:45thought about me, regardless of what was being said about me, regardless of who hated me
02:51or who didn't.
02:52My skin is tough.
02:54I walk out.
02:55I can handle it.
02:58The more famous I become, the more I return, the more I don't even have to return back
03:03to my roots.
03:04It's just been so hard for me in my life that I don't know any other way but to stay connected.
03:10And staying connected as I deal with what life really is.
03:13Just because my financial status is better than what it was, it doesn't mean that I don't
03:19still have to deal with the person I am.
03:21The person I am has issues from the past.
03:24So I'm always connected back to that.
03:28I remember being that little girl that didn't have things or didn't always get what she
03:32wanted for Christmas or had to watch her mother be abused.
03:36So I don't think I could ever disconnect from that.
03:39Money doesn't make me like, oh, things are beautiful.
03:43I have to continue to fix myself.