Isaac Keys returns to St. Louis with message of healing 

Actor and former NFL linebacker Isaac Keys returned to his hometown with a message he said he spent years avoiding: Black men don’t have to hide their struggles with trauma and depression.

Speaking to counselors, violence intervention workers and disaster relief staff at an event hosted by the Urban League of Metropolitan St. Louis, Keys discussed his new memoir, The Grind Don’t Stop, It Just Changes, and reflected on growing up in St. Louis, navigating street culture and processing the death of his father.

“We put on that armor to survive, especially growing up in the late ’80s and ’90s,” Keys said. “Writing this book allowed me to release a lot of things — release some anger, bitterness, or just have more understanding about who I am.”

James Clark of the Urban League Division of Public Safety said Keys’ willingness to speak openly about his own struggles resonated with employees who work every day with residents coping with violence and trauma.

“Isaac is a very unique person. He can speak to so many facets of the urban African American experience,” Clark said. “He sees the turmoil that our young people find themselves in, and he wants to use his life to inspire young people to fight through what they face every day.”

Clark said Keys’ openness about dealing with depression after leaving football also encouraged counselors and therapists who help others process trauma.

“Our therapist, he talks about trauma [that] plagued him for a long time. So for him to say to her, ‘You know, I deal with trauma,’ empowers her,” Clark said. “This information helps motivate them personally, but then also it gives them more of a reservoir that they can go to when they’re talking to our clients.”

Writing the memoir also meant revisiting experiences Keys had carried for years. Publisher Brian Johnson of Live Your Dreams Out Loud Publishing, who has known Keys since 2004, spent about a year interviewing Keys and shaping hundreds of thousands of words of notes into a 70,000-word manuscript.

“The one thing that I wanted him to do was get everything out of his head,” Johnson said. “It was a process of sitting down, asking the right questions, being intuitive, and knowing to push in.”

Keys said writing the book forced him to think about what he wants to leave behind.

“Time is really limited, and you don’t know how much time you have,” Keys said. “So what are you doing with your time? What are you doing with your life? What are you leaving behind?”

Among those listening was Jameel Robinson, who had been an Urban League intern for only about a week after joining the organization through its job placement and educational programs.

“He said what I’ve been hearing a lot, but when he said it, it just hit different,” Robinson said. “It made me want to keep grinding, keep going, stay focused.”

Robinson said Keys’ message reinforced his commitment to making the most of the opportunity.

“Like he said, ‘The grind don’t stop, it just changes.’ That really stuck with me,” Robinson said. “It made me not want to lose track of what’s really going on in life.”

Keys said he hopes sharing his experiences encourages young people to face challenges without compromising their values and to recognize that caring for their emotional well-being is part of building a successful life.

“Identify your dreams. Identify your goals,” Keys said. “Life is not gonna be easy. You can create the life that you want to live, but you’ve got to be willing to put the work and the sacrifices in for those things.”

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