As the saying goes, it takes a village to raise a child. But once that child is raised, it’s up to him to reach his hand back to his village to support and further its survival. At the H.I.S. BET Town Hall Meeting in Atlanta on September 19, Alonzo Mourning made this point the crux of his address to Morehouse College students.

“Remember the individuals who helped contribute to you. You’d be doing them a disservice if you don’t pick somebody else up along the way,” the NBA Hall of Famer and founder of the Mourning Family Foundation tells H.I.S. BET. He urged the audience not to get too consumed with the ongoings of their own life not to see that their personal growth is spurred by the people around them.

“You’re not here in isolation. Your growth is stimulated by the relationships you establish, the people in your community. So continue to enhance your community by investing back in it and giving back.”

Mourning also spoke on how to counter racial stereotypes that can impede young African-American men from reaching higher levels of success. “How you erase that stereotype [is that] you become fully prepared to compete in our society through advancing in your technology skills and just gathering all of the information that you can so that you can contribute back to society. All of it comes full circle, and it comes right back to the importance of developing a passion to learn and appreciating education.”

(Photo: Bennett Raglin/BET/Getty Images for BET)