Former WLBT news anchor and Chief Metrologist Barbie Bassett spoke to the Magee Lions Club at Berry’s Seafood Restaurant last week, sharing with them lessons she learned from growing up on her parents’ farm in Quitman County, Miss.
“One of the first things I learned,” Bassett said, “was that you can’t leave the ground comfortable if you want to grow something. You must disturb it. Creativity thrives in disruption.” She told her audience of club members and their wives, “If you want change, you have to get involved; you have to participate in the disruption.”
A second lesson learned on the farm came from her days chopping cotton in the field without pay. “My dad didn’t think we needed an allowance,” she said. “When I asked about getting paid for my work, he reminded me that I was getting free room and board in his house.” I learned that my complaints would get me nowhere, but working hard and doing my best in life would eventually pay off, and it did. I learned to replace grumbling with decisions to do more.”
She talked about the family’s habit of tearing down their catfish ponds every few years, spreading the old dirt that the catfish had “pooped in” and forming new ponds. She said that soil made the farmland richer, and the new, deeper ponds worked better for the fish. “Tearing down is a necessity for building back,” she summarized for the audience.
Using her own garden as an example, she advised, “We have to weed out our attitudes and pluck out the negative ones.” She said her mother never let her read “trashy” magazines or watch what she called the “nasty”dramas on TV. “If you read, listen to and watch drama, you’ll start living the drama,” her mother said. “It’s garbage in-garbage out.”
She described some of America’s current bad attitudes that need weeding out. “We’re so angry,” she said. “Anger is our new path to celebrity. We’re living in a time when opinion has devoured truth. The only truth is the truth of God. The absence of truth leads to ambiguity. We are cancelling people and killing each other with words. I’d rather use my energy to move things forward.”
She added, “We’ve gotten away from civility. We want to see other people crash and burn instead of lifting others up.”
Bassett said her mother was an excellent archer who could always make her shot because she aimed carefully and pulled the arrow far back to shoot. “The farther you pull, the farther the arrow goes,” she explained. “The more you’re pulled back by circumstances, the farther you can go as a result of not wanting those circumstances to hold you back. Don’t let where you’ve been keep you from moving up.”
She talked about their farm dog, Coco, who stood and looked at the new invisible fence, learning that if he ran through it, he would be shocked. “But he saw the land he wanted to explore outside the fence,” she said, “and he decided that getting to that land was worth enduring the shock, so he finally got the courage to run through it.” She likened the incident to the invisible fences people build for themselves—fear, insecurity, lack of knowledge. “When you’re willing to pay the price, you can get through the fences you’ve built for yourself. Be more afraid of not going through than of what you’ll endure to get to your goal,” she advised. “Hidden behind that shock is your opportunity.”
Bassett practices what she preaches. A graduate of Mississippi College and Mississippi State University, she has been named Best TV Weather Caster and Best TV Personality. She is a former Mrs. Mississippi who has written three books and sits on eight boards of directors. She is a sought-after speaker, a Sunday school teacher and praise team member at her church, and an entrepreneur while also home-schooling three teenagers, who have become known as the “Bassett Hounds.”
Bassett praised the Lions Club and similar organizations for what they do in their communities.
