May 21, 2025 • 31 mins
What happens when life shatters everything you thought you knew about yourself? Rosemary Barnes takes us on a remarkable journey from Ukrainian farm upbringing to becoming an international speaker, bestselling author, and confidence coach—navigating through unimaginable personal tragedy along the way.
Rosemary's story begins with her dual life: weekdays in the city attending school and lessons, weekends on the farm where her family instilled the values of hard work and responsibility. This foundation shaped her into someone others always saw as dependable, even during her brief rebellious phase. But it was through facing life's most devastating challenges that Rosemary discovered the true nature of resilience and reinvention.
With unflinching honesty, she shares the heartbreaking loss of her son to a fentanyl overdose and her daughter's earlier struggles with crystal meth addiction. These experiences forced her to confront painful questions about parental responsibility while weathering harsh judgments from others. Through this crucible of grief, Rosemary discovered a profound truth: "Being human means you make mistakes. Being human means you will be judged incorrectly." Her hard-won wisdom reminds us that self-forgiveness is essential when navigating life's darkest moments.
Today, through her company Confidence Stages, Rosemary helps others overcome their confidence barriers and find their authentic voice. Drawing on her background as a classically trained singer and educator, she specializes in helping people master public speaking—"If you can learn to conquer that great fear of speaking in public, what can you not take on?" Her approach transforms this common fear into a gateway for broader personal empowerment.
Rosemary's parting wisdom resonates with universal truth: "Nothing is permanent. The only thing you can count on throughout your entire life is that everything will change." Rather than resisting change, she encourages us to embrace it as "an opportunity for adventure"—a perspective that doesn't diminish our suffering but offers a path forward when one seems impossible to find.
For more Divas That Care Network Episodes visit www.divasthatcare.com
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
welcome everybody to another session episode of
phoenix butterfly and diva style.
Oh my gosh, on the divas thatcare network.
You guys, I'm so excited tobring you the most incredible
woman today, this super, and Ireally hope that.
(00:24):
I know that you're going tohave a lot of takeaways from
today.
So please have your pen andpapers ready and let me
introduce you to Rosemary Barnes.
Rosemary is an internationalspeaker, international
bestselling author and executivepresentation trainer, leading
others to speak, to engage andspeak to succeed.
(00:48):
She holds degrees in education,music and drama from a number
of Canadian universities and iscertified as a professional
speaking coach.
Through sessions on bridgingthe generation gap, Hang on
everybody.
(01:08):
Through her company ConfidenceStages, she offers keynote
addresses and breakout sessionson bridging the generational gap
in the 21st century andpersonal, professional and
corporate confidence andreinventionvention, among others
.
As an executive presentationtrainer, Rosemary works with
(01:29):
content, presentations anddelivery skills and uses her
voice production expertise toempower all speakers to connect
with their audiences withmaximum impact and influence.
She has presented in theaters,lecture halls, boardrooms,
classrooms, conferences and myfavorite, in the shower.
(01:52):
You rock, Rosemary.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
Welcome to our show Hi Amanda, Thanks for having me
on the show.
It's great to be here.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
That's wonderful.
Could you share a little bitmore about yourself to our
listeners?
Speaker 2 (02:07):
A little bit about me , oh dear, how do I compact all
these years of experience into afew quick words?
Speaker 1 (02:16):
How would people relate with you?
Speaker 2 (02:18):
How will people relate with me?
All right, I am long beforeyoda existed.
Uh, to do, do not, there is notry.
I was taught all my life do it,do it right or don't touch it
at all.
So apparently my parents wereyoda before yoda existed.
(02:42):
I was raised half on the farmand half in a city.
I was born in Alberta, livedthere all my life until five
years ago when my husband and Imoved to beautiful Vancouver
Island and it's gorgeous.
But I'm in Alberta, I'm aprairie girl, I'm the daughter
of Ukrainian farm folk and thatgreat, honorable tradition.
(03:04):
The benefit that I got wasduring all week I could go to
school in the city, go to balletlessons in the city, go to
piano lessons in the city, andthen on the weekends, as soon as
dad got home from work at fiveo'clock on a Friday night, we
would just pile into the familycar and barrel off down the
(03:27):
highway to the farm where wewould do a whole week worth of
work in two days.
And then dad would trydesperately to get us back home
for Sunday night's wonderfulworld of Disney at 6 pm.
He couldn't always make it, butthere you go.
My life was never full ofsitting around.
(03:48):
I was never a sit-around girl,except that I did love to read.
And my mother and since I am ado or do not kind of person and
sometimes I leap in withoutlooking to see how deep that
(04:09):
water is.
So when I got involved in agood book, nothing and nobody
was going to pry me away fromthat book.
Much to my mother's absolutechagrin, rosemary quit reading
about other people's lives andgo live your own.
So it was go do run all thatsort of thing.
(04:30):
So I think I'm one of the fewremaining people that know how
to get a chicken from the coopand onto the dinner table.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Right, that's a unique skill.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
It is a unique skill.
Now, being absolutely honest,hardworking people.
My family knows how to do twothings very well my parents, my
brothers, my sister.
They know how to love and theyknow how to work.
They haven't the slightestinclination what relaxation
(05:03):
leisure resting looks like.
It wasn't part of my existence.
So one of the things that I hadto get over was that I don't
have to have the same work ethicthat my parents do, even at 90,
they still live part-time inthe city and part-time at a farm
.
At nine years old, they'restill planting a garden with
(05:26):
enough potatoes to feed me.
I have grandchildren.
They're still making sure Ihave enough potatoes, but that's
a value that I inherited aswell.
But it took me a long time torealize that I didn't always
have to be working to be worthy.
Speaker 1 (05:46):
Oh, that's a good one no-transcript.
Speaker 2 (06:00):
sitting around doing nothing was bad, which meant the
opposite was good, and I was agood girl.
I was a good girl.
I would never have dreamed ofgetting myself into trouble, at
least not until the teenageyears.
And even then.
Even then I decided okay,that's enough of this good girl
(06:21):
stuff.
I am going to.
I am going to be a rebel.
It's my rebel years and I cando something rebellious.
I know I can, and so I wastrying my darndest to make sure
that I was not being Miss GoodyTwo-Shoes all the time.
It put me into a real tailspinwhen a couple of friends of mine
(06:43):
once turned to me in the midstof my rebellious period and said
you know, we can always counton you to take care of us.
You're such a mother.
And I was gobsmacked becausethere I was in mid being as
naughty as I knew how to be, andthey were telling me how.
There I was in mid being asnaughty as I knew how to be and
(07:04):
they were telling me how good Iwas.
Speaker 1 (07:07):
Way to go.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
Rosemary, yes, yes.
Now, that's not to say I wasalways a good girl, but the
point is that I was raised to beresponsible and I bloody well
am.
Even in the midst of my biggestirresponsible phase, everybody
else still looked at me as theresponsible one.
(07:28):
So I guess that's just the hatthat I wear and that's it.
We've had a lot of hats on thishead over the course of life,
some of them good and some ofthem bad.
I have had to learn to beresilient.
I have had to learn that whenyou're everything, everything
changes.
You cannot hold still onanything.
(07:50):
Time itself will change it, ifnothing else.
When something new happens.
If you're in charge of that,it's called reinvention.
If you're on the reactive sideof that, it's called change.
So, and opportunities for new,different, better are all around
(08:15):
us.
If you instigate them, it'sreinvention.
If all you can do is bouncearound reacting to it, we call
it change.
So that's why I'm writing mythird book, which is called
Confident Reinvention Personal,professional and corporate
(08:36):
transformation.
We have to do it all the time.
We have to reinvent ourselvesall the time, due to time and
tide and circumstances and woes,and goodness knows, there isn't
a person alive that hasn't hadto bear some sort of unexpected
or unacceptable change.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
So what triggered in your life to allow you for this
to be important?
Speaker 2 (09:05):
For learning to survive reinventions, even when
they're thrust upon you.
Yes, what challenges have youovercome?
The latest, of course, is themost painful, and that was that
July of two years ago.
(09:26):
The phone rang and it was mydaughter telling me that my son
was dead, her brother.
The two of them had a reallywonderful relationship.
They called each otherdoppelgangers.
(09:48):
They completed each other'ssentences.
They were better together thanthey were apart.
My daughter is an earth mother.
She certainly didn't know itwhen she was growing up, but now
that she's a mom with two kids,my daughter is an earth mother.
Anything that is broken orhurting or sad finds its way to
(10:13):
her door and she takes it in andshe comforts wherever it needs
to be.
When my daughter's brother wasborn, she was two and a half and
she was instantly his mom.
He was a very sick little babyand the only one that could stop
(10:36):
him from crying half the timewas his sister.
I couldn't make him stop.
His dad couldn't make him stop.
We would stand on our head andwiggle our feet in the air.
That didn't work either, butsomehow our daughter could
connect with him and ease hispain, whatever it was that was
eating at him so badly, and theywere like that till the day he
(11:04):
died.
Wow, it was as horrible as youthink it is to bury a child.
It is all that and thousands oftimes worse.
It's two years and I still amweepy just at the thought of
(11:26):
losing my son.
So I'm breathing and I'mcomposing myself.
Part of me died with him, butthere's a huge part that had to
go on living Grief.
No one can ever know what you'refeeling when, when someone says
(11:49):
to you I know how you'refeeling, right, no, you don't,
no, you don't.
You may have some inkling, youmay have had a very similar
experience, but no one can everknow how you're feeling.
And it is absolute arrogance towalk up to somebody and say I
know how you're feeling.
You can't Just like you can'tknow what someone tastes.
(12:11):
What tastes delicious to youmay taste completely foul to
somebody else.
Right, perfumes that you thinkare the best smell ever created
to someone else may be purepoison and create asthma attacks
and severe allergic reactions.
Right, you can't know.
You can't know what ishappening for someone else.
(12:33):
So, first and foremost, you haveto learn, when you're in this
state of grieving, to forgiveother well-meaning people when
they say things like I know howyou feel they are, only it's an
awkward situation.
You don't really know what tosay.
(12:53):
You don't know how to comfort.
You would love to give comfort.
You don't know what to say, sothese ridiculous things come out
of our mouth.
So, first and foremost, whenyou're grieving, not are you in
the throes of anger and denialand all of those things, but now
you also have to be acceptingand forgiving of all the people
(13:15):
that want to help you.
Yes, there is no right way togrieve.
The only thing that I can sayis you have to grieve the way
you have to grieve, and howeverlong that takes it takes,
however short it takes it takes,and you have to give yourself
full permission to do that.
Speaker 1 (13:36):
Would you find it takes a lot of self-love to do
that, to really honor yourself.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
Well, it really was, in my case, a huge amount.
Okay, the deep and dirty nastysecret of this whole thing is
that my husband and I have hadtwo children.
Our daughter decided that inher teenage years that becoming
a drug addict would be a goodthing to do, so she was addicted
(14:06):
to crystal meth and doing allthe things that that world
entails.
She was actually living on thestreet for a while.
Her story of reinvention is anabsolute success story.
It's wonderful.
It's wonderful.
It's wonderful to have seen herthrow her life absolutely away
(14:30):
and then watch her pick up thepieces.
She couldn't find all the pieces, thank goodness.
So she created new ones and sheis a success story personified.
My crystal meth, angst-filleddaughter is now my effervescent
bubble of joy, just like she waswhen she was a child.
And her two children can youhear it in my voice?
(14:53):
I'm just going.
You are my bubble of happiness.
People, that whole littlefamily people, that whole little
family.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
She is thrilled to scrub her toilet because she's
got one.
Speaker 2 (15:11):
Yeah, it's amazing your perception shift?
Hey, absolutely.
So there was my daughter and Iwas left feeling like not very
much of a mom.
My husband and I were lookingwhat did we do?
What could we have done?
What should we have done?
We were supporting her to thepoint of enabling her.
The hardest thing I've ever hadto do in my whole life was
(15:34):
drive my daughter to a woman'shomeless shelter and force her
out of the car.
Homeless shelter and forced herout of the car, especially when
I had to drive around the blocka couple of times to wait for
the Johns that were outside thedoor trying to pick up these sad
(15:55):
ladies to go away so that Icould safely kick my daughter
out of the car.
Speaker 1 (16:02):
I don't mean to laugh , but I know it was awful in
that you know I want to care foryou but enable you in the best
way that I can.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
That's right, and so we were actually enabling her by
giving her a warm bed and aloving home so that she could
carry on and do all the thingsshe was doing that were illegal,
illicit, immoral, all thosewonderful things with which she
was passing her time, to thepoint where someone told us you
(16:33):
know, it's your fault, it's yourfault that your daughter is a
drug addict, it's your faultthat your daughter has had three
abortions and don't even ask mehow I feel about abortions but
to be told point-blank.
And then you walk down thestreet and people are talking
about these young people.
(16:54):
Where are their parents?
And I could just only say tomyself I'm right here and I'm
swimming as fast as I can.
Speaker 1 (17:02):
That's right.
You can do the best you canright.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
Then we got her safely.
We didn't.
She got herself safely onto atrack of recovery and a new life
and rebirth and all thosewonderful things that have
happened to her since and allthose wonderful things that have
happened to her since.
And it was then that our sonfell off the rails.
(17:28):
We didn't know for his wholelife.
Now you have to understand.
Both my children's IQs were wayastronomically high in the
genius level.
Smart people, smart, smart,smart people, frighteningly
smart.
And put them together smart,smart, smart people,
frighteningly smart.
And put them together HolyHannah cakes, they, they.
(17:49):
You know what the two of themdid for fun, they read the
dictionary and found cool words,I mean.
So then when we discovered thatafter our son graduated with a
second university degree, thewheels fell off his bus, we had
no idea that our son hadAsperger's None.
(18:11):
He had found his own copingmechanisms his whole life and he
was so clever that he hid itbeautifully.
But when he got the Asperger'ssufferers cling to structure.
If their structure is fine andthey can work within their
(18:34):
little boxes, everything is fine.
But when the structure ofeducation came away from our son
, his bus crashed, he becamesuicidal, he became an alcoholic
.
Then he started mucking aroundwith drugs too, and he died of a
(18:55):
fentanyl overdose.
Now, what do you think that didto my husband and I and our
confidence as parents?
We were 0 and 2.
It was.
If anything is going to shakeyour confidence, it's that the
(19:21):
children that you brought intothis world and cared for and
loved within an inch of theirlife.
And you know, we were pushingthem out of the nest gently,
gently, gently, making sure theywere prepared.
We did everything we could tobe the best parents we could,
and one of them was a drugaddict and the other one is dead
(19:43):
.
And one of them was a drugaddict and the other one is dead
.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
The confidence level takes a pretty big hit.
So, rosemary, if anyone'slistening to you that maybe is
going through similar right, yousaid you can't duplicate a
situation and you can'tduplicate how a person feels.
But if someone's listening toyour story right now and they're
like, oh my gosh, you know thishas happened in my life or this
is happening to someone I careabout, what advice would you
give them?
Speaker 2 (20:14):
The advice, oh my goodness, understand, especially
when you're told that it's yourfault that you enabled them.
You made this be as bad as itis, and I heard that an awful
lot.
The thing to remember is that,first of all, nobody is perfect.
(20:34):
We all make mistakes.
For the most part, mistakesthat parents make go away
without anyone really making abig fuss of them.
But no parent that I know andthere are, I'm sure there are,
(20:55):
but I don't know them.
So I'm going to say nobody, asin the people that I know,
nobody gets out of bed in themorning and says to themselves
gee, I wonder how I can screw upmy kids' lives.
Today Nobody gets out of bedand says, gee, I wonder which
strange person on the street Ican make feel badly about
(21:16):
themselves.
Today Nobody does that.
For the most part, people arevery and this is the word of the
day.
For the most part, people arevery and this is the word of the
day solipsistic.
Oh, I know it's a great word.
Sol beings the sun and, in theancient times, the center of the
universe.
Before they knew what theuniverse was, to the ancients
(21:37):
the sun was the center of theuniverse and all other things
orbited around its little self.
To be solipsistic, then, is toplace yourself at the center of
the universe and all otherthings orbited around its little
self.
To be solipsistic, then, is toplace yourself at the center of
the universe, around all which,all other things rotate.
All babies are solipsistic.
They don't care if mommy anddaddy are tired, hungry, sick.
They want what they want andthey want it right now.
Everything is about me, me, me,me, me, me, me, me, yes, me, me
(21:59):
, me, me, me, me, me, yes.
So when you're, the worst that aparent can do usually is to be
solipsistic is to just simplynot be aware of what's going on
around everybody else, becausethey just, you know, that's the
attitude, but nobody goes out oftheir way.
(22:22):
To be ugly, that's the attitude, but nobody, nobody goes out of
their way to be ugly.
And yet, when there are people,when your children have gone
astray, the same way as if yourbusiness is falling off the
rails or if your latest, yourlatest endeavor isn't going as
planned, you blame yourself hardenough anyway.
(22:45):
Know that being human means youmake mistakes.
Being human means that you aregoing to be judged incorrectly.
The only person you have toconvince of anything is yourself
, and what other people say anddo usually comes from the
(23:06):
kindness of their hearts.
The thing is to look atyourself in the mirror and
realize that you are a humanbeing.
You are no deity.
You were not born to have allthe answers.
All you can do is the bestthing you can do for the next
(23:28):
five minutes.
Speaker 1 (23:28):
Right, and taking that concept, the next best
thing we have a few more minutesI would love you to share with
our listeners.
What have you done in spite ofthis?
You are super incredible andmagnificent and, like you said,
you have your third book on thego and ready to for all of us to
read, and Well, what have Idone?
Speaker 2 (23:52):
All right, I have tons of degrees because I am a
lifelong learner.
I thought all my life that Ivalued intelligence.
In fact, it's not intelligence,it's curiosity.
I find it amazing that someonecan look at something and not be
curious about how it was madeor what its life cycle is, or
(24:15):
what does this turn into?
Or there's a pretty rock.
In my mind it's that's abeautiful rock, let's look at it
, let's appreciate it.
A beautiful rock, let's look atit, let's appreciate it.
And now let's pick it up andsee what's underneath it.
Uh, that's curiosity, and Ivalue that.
Curiosity to me takes the formof lifelong learning.
Um, I haven't even decided whatI want to be when I grow up yet
(24:36):
now.
I have worked.
I have worked in business.
I own my own business.
I have worked for a majoruniversity in purchasing, I've
done the boardroom, I've done,done the.
You know, when you're this old,you got lots of miles on you and
the one thing that I can say isthat confidence can be shaken,
(24:57):
confidence can be destroyed, butconfidence can always be
reinvented.
Confidence can always startgrowing again, and from the most
unlikely places.
Remember that there is the Sun,is going to come up tomorrow.
So what have I done?
(25:17):
Well, I was a mmm.
Have you ever heard the sacredgifts?
No, the sacred gifts, your corepower, your core, strength,
your core, what you were put onthis planet to do, et cetera.
Well, my major one is I'm ateacher Now.
I was a school teacher for awhile.
(25:38):
I taught drama and I taughttheater to a professional
theater group and I taughtEnglish in high school and music
and I taught all those lovelykids to play the saxophone and
the flute and the baritone andall those things, and so I
actually was a formal teacher.
In fact my license is stillintact.
But now I teach other things.
(26:01):
I teach confidence, I teachresilience, I teach reinvention.
My company is called ConfidenceStages, because my company
exists to help you overcome yourconfidence barriers, no matter
what stage you're in or on, andso I teach people to speak in
(26:23):
public, to give presentationsthat get the big.
Yes, because public speaking isthe greatest fear, second only
to death.
Jerry Seinfeld says that ifyou're forced to go to a funeral
, 95% of the people would ratherbe in the casket than having to
give the eulogy.
My thought is, if you can learnto conquer that great fear of
(26:47):
speaking in public.
What can you not take on?
Speaker 1 (26:52):
Right.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
So what I do is I help people find the way to.
I help them with content andstructure of their presentations
.
I teach them with presentationskills, I teach them delivery
skills, I teach them roomcontrol, how to handle the
audience participation things.
And my special little piece ofthe pie is I'm a trained
(27:14):
classical singer.
I told you I had a degree inmusic as well, and so the use of
the voice for speakers issomething that most people never
get.
And yet you can invite withyour whispers and you don't have
to yell to make sure that it'sintense.
How you use your voice, how youcare for speakers, this is
(27:34):
their moneymaker.
How do you care for that?
So that's what I do now.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
That's awesome and I do it with utter confidence.
You've come so far.
You are truly so far.
You are truly an inspiration,and this time together has just
absolutely flown by.
I've been so enthralled withyour journey and what you've
gone through and just listeningto you share your story and
really feel your emotions and Ireally hope that all the
(28:02):
listeners that are listening andreally something's triggered
inside them I know it is and toreally allow them to take that
next step in their life.
And you really have shone alight for me too, that if you
can do it, why can't anybody?
And to, really picking up thepieces of your life and moving
on is so important and soempowering.
Picking up the pieces of yourlife and moving on is so
(28:23):
important and so empowering and.
Speaker 2 (28:25):
I'd like to offer if, if, because I'm about halfway
through writing my third book onconfident reinvention and I'm
including people's stories ofreinvention in it.
So if anybody would, any ofyour listeners would like to get
ahold of me and share theirstory of reinvention.
(28:45):
I'd love to take it down andsee if it can fit in my book.
They can reach out to methrough Confidence Stages.
My website iswwwconfidencestagescom, and I'd
love for them to get a hold ofme.
That would be great.
Speaker 1 (29:01):
That would be beautiful.
How long do they have beforethey?
Because this is going to be onthe network so it can be shared
over and over through time, okayso today's date is the end of
May of 2018.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
My manuscript is going to be finished by the
middle of July of 2018.
So between the next six weeks.
If anybody would like to getahold of me, please do.
Speaker 1 (29:26):
And if you don't get your story into a book and you
still want to get ahold ofRosemary cause, you feel that
she's impacted you in some way.
I'm sure she would love for youto reach out to her as well,
for her services.
Absolutely Awesome, rosemary.
Is there anything else you'dlike to?
One more tidbit of advice oranything that's coming to you.
Speaker 2 (29:48):
Yes, I would like to remind everybody that nothing is
permanent.
The only thing you can count onthroughout your entire life is
that everything will change.
You can't control it.
You can fight it and bring upall that negative energy, or you
(30:11):
can look at every new changealong your path as an
opportunity for an adventure, anew one you hadn't seen coming
yet.
Keep the enthusiasm high forwhatever is to come tomorrow.
It'll surprise you.
Speaker 1 (30:28):
Oh, that's beautiful.
Thank you so much, Rosemary.
My pleasure Rosemary Barnes, andshe's truly inspirational and
magnificent, and if you wereinspired or thought of anybody
while you listened to her showtoday, you know you can share it
on wwwdivas that care forwardslash Amanda, and you will find
(30:49):
her interview there that you'remore than welcome to share and
empower other people to reallymake those changes in their
lives and maybe to get through.
They're going through a darkplace in their life and they
just need some inspiration andsome light, and I really do
truly do feel that she is thatlight.
So thank you so much, Rosemary,and find us on the Divas that
(31:13):
Care Network, and thank you somuch for listening and I look
forward to talking to you againsoon.
Bye, everybody.
welcome everybody to another session episode of
phoenix butterfly and diva style.
Oh my gosh, on the divas thatcare network.
You guys, I'm so excited tobring you the most incredible
woman today, this super, and Ireally hope that.
(00:24):
I know that you're going tohave a lot of takeaways from
today.
So please have your pen andpapers ready and let me
introduce you to Rosemary Barnes.
Rosemary is an internationalspeaker, international
bestselling author and executivepresentation trainer, leading
others to speak, to engage andspeak to succeed.
(00:48):
She holds degrees in education,music and drama from a number
of Canadian universities and iscertified as a professional
speaking coach.
Through sessions on bridgingthe generation gap, Hang on
everybody.
(01:08):
Through her company ConfidenceStages, she offers keynote
addresses and breakout sessionson bridging the generational gap
in the 21st century andpersonal, professional and
corporate confidence andreinventionvention, among others
.
As an executive presentationtrainer, Rosemary works with
(01:29):
content, presentations anddelivery skills and uses her
voice production expertise toempower all speakers to connect
with their audiences withmaximum impact and influence.
She has presented in theaters,lecture halls, boardrooms,
classrooms, conferences and myfavorite, in the shower.
(01:52):
You rock, Rosemary.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
Welcome to our show Hi Amanda, Thanks for having me
on the show.
It's great to be here.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
That's wonderful.
Could you share a little bitmore about yourself to our
listeners?
Speaker 2 (02:07):
A little bit about me , oh dear, how do I compact all
these years of experience into afew quick words?
Speaker 1 (02:16):
How would people relate with you?
Speaker 2 (02:18):
How will people relate with me?
All right, I am long beforeyoda existed.
Uh, to do, do not, there is notry.
I was taught all my life do it,do it right or don't touch it
at all.
So apparently my parents wereyoda before yoda existed.
(02:42):
I was raised half on the farmand half in a city.
I was born in Alberta, livedthere all my life until five
years ago when my husband and Imoved to beautiful Vancouver
Island and it's gorgeous.
But I'm in Alberta, I'm aprairie girl, I'm the daughter
of Ukrainian farm folk and thatgreat, honorable tradition.
(03:04):
The benefit that I got wasduring all week I could go to
school in the city, go to balletlessons in the city, go to
piano lessons in the city, andthen on the weekends, as soon as
dad got home from work at fiveo'clock on a Friday night, we
would just pile into the familycar and barrel off down the
(03:27):
highway to the farm where wewould do a whole week worth of
work in two days.
And then dad would trydesperately to get us back home
for Sunday night's wonderfulworld of Disney at 6 pm.
He couldn't always make it, butthere you go.
My life was never full ofsitting around.
(03:48):
I was never a sit-around girl,except that I did love to read.
And my mother and since I am ado or do not kind of person and
sometimes I leap in withoutlooking to see how deep that
(04:09):
water is.
So when I got involved in agood book, nothing and nobody
was going to pry me away fromthat book.
Much to my mother's absolutechagrin, rosemary quit reading
about other people's lives andgo live your own.
So it was go do run all thatsort of thing.
(04:30):
So I think I'm one of the fewremaining people that know how
to get a chicken from the coopand onto the dinner table.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Right, that's a unique skill.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
It is a unique skill.
Now, being absolutely honest,hardworking people.
My family knows how to do twothings very well my parents, my
brothers, my sister.
They know how to love and theyknow how to work.
They haven't the slightestinclination what relaxation
(05:03):
leisure resting looks like.
It wasn't part of my existence.
So one of the things that I hadto get over was that I don't
have to have the same work ethicthat my parents do, even at 90,
they still live part-time inthe city and part-time at a farm
.
At nine years old, they'restill planting a garden with
(05:26):
enough potatoes to feed me.
I have grandchildren.
They're still making sure Ihave enough potatoes, but that's
a value that I inherited aswell.
But it took me a long time torealize that I didn't always
have to be working to be worthy.
Speaker 1 (05:46):
Oh, that's a good one no-transcript.
Speaker 2 (06:00):
sitting around doing nothing was bad, which meant the
opposite was good, and I was agood girl.
I was a good girl.
I would never have dreamed ofgetting myself into trouble, at
least not until the teenageyears.
And even then.
Even then I decided okay,that's enough of this good girl
(06:21):
stuff.
I am going to.
I am going to be a rebel.
It's my rebel years and I cando something rebellious.
I know I can, and so I wastrying my darndest to make sure
that I was not being Miss GoodyTwo-Shoes all the time.
It put me into a real tailspinwhen a couple of friends of mine
(06:43):
once turned to me in the midstof my rebellious period and said
you know, we can always counton you to take care of us.
You're such a mother.
And I was gobsmacked becausethere I was in mid being as
naughty as I knew how to be, andthey were telling me how.
There I was in mid being asnaughty as I knew how to be and
(07:04):
they were telling me how good Iwas.
Speaker 1 (07:07):
Way to go.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
Rosemary, yes, yes.
Now, that's not to say I wasalways a good girl, but the
point is that I was raised to beresponsible and I bloody well
am.
Even in the midst of my biggestirresponsible phase, everybody
else still looked at me as theresponsible one.
(07:28):
So I guess that's just the hatthat I wear and that's it.
We've had a lot of hats on thishead over the course of life,
some of them good and some ofthem bad.
I have had to learn to beresilient.
I have had to learn that whenyou're everything, everything
changes.
You cannot hold still onanything.
(07:50):
Time itself will change it, ifnothing else.
When something new happens.
If you're in charge of that,it's called reinvention.
If you're on the reactive sideof that, it's called change.
So, and opportunities for new,different, better are all around
(08:15):
us.
If you instigate them, it'sreinvention.
If all you can do is bouncearound reacting to it, we call
it change.
So that's why I'm writing mythird book, which is called
Confident Reinvention Personal,professional and corporate
(08:36):
transformation.
We have to do it all the time.
We have to reinvent ourselvesall the time, due to time and
tide and circumstances and woes,and goodness knows, there isn't
a person alive that hasn't hadto bear some sort of unexpected
or unacceptable change.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
So what triggered in your life to allow you for this
to be important?
Speaker 2 (09:05):
For learning to survive reinventions, even when
they're thrust upon you.
Yes, what challenges have youovercome?
The latest, of course, is themost painful, and that was that
July of two years ago.
(09:26):
The phone rang and it was mydaughter telling me that my son
was dead, her brother.
The two of them had a reallywonderful relationship.
They called each otherdoppelgangers.
(09:48):
They completed each other'ssentences.
They were better together thanthey were apart.
My daughter is an earth mother.
She certainly didn't know itwhen she was growing up, but now
that she's a mom with two kids,my daughter is an earth mother.
Anything that is broken orhurting or sad finds its way to
(10:13):
her door and she takes it in andshe comforts wherever it needs
to be.
When my daughter's brother wasborn, she was two and a half and
she was instantly his mom.
He was a very sick little babyand the only one that could stop
(10:36):
him from crying half the timewas his sister.
I couldn't make him stop.
His dad couldn't make him stop.
We would stand on our head andwiggle our feet in the air.
That didn't work either, butsomehow our daughter could
connect with him and ease hispain, whatever it was that was
eating at him so badly, and theywere like that till the day he
(11:04):
died.
Wow, it was as horrible as youthink it is to bury a child.
It is all that and thousands oftimes worse.
It's two years and I still amweepy just at the thought of
(11:26):
losing my son.
So I'm breathing and I'mcomposing myself.
Part of me died with him, butthere's a huge part that had to
go on living Grief.
No one can ever know what you'refeeling when, when someone says
(11:49):
to you I know how you'refeeling, right, no, you don't,
no, you don't.
You may have some inkling, youmay have had a very similar
experience, but no one can everknow how you're feeling.
And it is absolute arrogance towalk up to somebody and say I
know how you're feeling.
You can't Just like you can'tknow what someone tastes.
(12:11):
What tastes delicious to youmay taste completely foul to
somebody else.
Right, perfumes that you thinkare the best smell ever created
to someone else may be purepoison and create asthma attacks
and severe allergic reactions.
Right, you can't know.
You can't know what ishappening for someone else.
(12:33):
So, first and foremost, you haveto learn, when you're in this
state of grieving, to forgiveother well-meaning people when
they say things like I know howyou feel they are, only it's an
awkward situation.
You don't really know what tosay.
(12:53):
You don't know how to comfort.
You would love to give comfort.
You don't know what to say, sothese ridiculous things come out
of our mouth.
So, first and foremost, whenyou're grieving, not are you in
the throes of anger and denialand all of those things, but now
you also have to be acceptingand forgiving of all the people
(13:15):
that want to help you.
Yes, there is no right way togrieve.
The only thing that I can sayis you have to grieve the way
you have to grieve, and howeverlong that takes it takes,
however short it takes it takes,and you have to give yourself
full permission to do that.
Speaker 1 (13:36):
Would you find it takes a lot of self-love to do
that, to really honor yourself.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
Well, it really was, in my case, a huge amount.
Okay, the deep and dirty nastysecret of this whole thing is
that my husband and I have hadtwo children.
Our daughter decided that inher teenage years that becoming
a drug addict would be a goodthing to do, so she was addicted
(14:06):
to crystal meth and doing allthe things that that world
entails.
She was actually living on thestreet for a while.
Her story of reinvention is anabsolute success story.
It's wonderful.
It's wonderful.
It's wonderful to have seen herthrow her life absolutely away
(14:30):
and then watch her pick up thepieces.
She couldn't find all the pieces, thank goodness.
So she created new ones and sheis a success story personified.
My crystal meth, angst-filleddaughter is now my effervescent
bubble of joy, just like she waswhen she was a child.
And her two children can youhear it in my voice?
(14:53):
I'm just going.
You are my bubble of happiness.
People, that whole littlefamily people, that whole little
family.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
She is thrilled to scrub her toilet because she's
got one.
Speaker 2 (15:11):
Yeah, it's amazing your perception shift?
Hey, absolutely.
So there was my daughter and Iwas left feeling like not very
much of a mom.
My husband and I were lookingwhat did we do?
What could we have done?
What should we have done?
We were supporting her to thepoint of enabling her.
The hardest thing I've ever hadto do in my whole life was
(15:34):
drive my daughter to a woman'shomeless shelter and force her
out of the car.
Homeless shelter and forced herout of the car, especially when
I had to drive around the blocka couple of times to wait for
the Johns that were outside thedoor trying to pick up these sad
(15:55):
ladies to go away so that Icould safely kick my daughter
out of the car.
Speaker 1 (16:02):
I don't mean to laugh , but I know it was awful in
that you know I want to care foryou but enable you in the best
way that I can.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
That's right, and so we were actually enabling her by
giving her a warm bed and aloving home so that she could
carry on and do all the thingsshe was doing that were illegal,
illicit, immoral, all thosewonderful things with which she
was passing her time, to thepoint where someone told us you
(16:33):
know, it's your fault, it's yourfault that your daughter is a
drug addict, it's your faultthat your daughter has had three
abortions and don't even ask mehow I feel about abortions but
to be told point-blank.
And then you walk down thestreet and people are talking
about these young people.
(16:54):
Where are their parents?
And I could just only say tomyself I'm right here and I'm
swimming as fast as I can.
Speaker 1 (17:02):
That's right.
You can do the best you canright.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
Then we got her safely.
We didn't.
She got herself safely onto atrack of recovery and a new life
and rebirth and all thosewonderful things that have
happened to her since and allthose wonderful things that have
happened to her since.
And it was then that our sonfell off the rails.
(17:28):
We didn't know for his wholelife.
Now you have to understand.
Both my children's IQs were wayastronomically high in the
genius level.
Smart people, smart, smart,smart people, frighteningly
smart.
And put them together smart,smart, smart people,
frighteningly smart.
And put them together HolyHannah cakes, they, they.
(17:49):
You know what the two of themdid for fun, they read the
dictionary and found cool words,I mean.
So then when we discovered thatafter our son graduated with a
second university degree, thewheels fell off his bus, we had
no idea that our son hadAsperger's None.
(18:11):
He had found his own copingmechanisms his whole life and he
was so clever that he hid itbeautifully.
But when he got the Asperger'ssufferers cling to structure.
If their structure is fine andthey can work within their
(18:34):
little boxes, everything is fine.
But when the structure ofeducation came away from our son
, his bus crashed, he becamesuicidal, he became an alcoholic
.
Then he started mucking aroundwith drugs too, and he died of a
(18:55):
fentanyl overdose.
Now, what do you think that didto my husband and I and our
confidence as parents?
We were 0 and 2.
It was.
If anything is going to shakeyour confidence, it's that the
(19:21):
children that you brought intothis world and cared for and
loved within an inch of theirlife.
And you know, we were pushingthem out of the nest gently,
gently, gently, making sure theywere prepared.
We did everything we could tobe the best parents we could,
and one of them was a drugaddict and the other one is dead
(19:43):
.
And one of them was a drugaddict and the other one is dead
.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
The confidence level takes a pretty big hit.
So, rosemary, if anyone'slistening to you that maybe is
going through similar right, yousaid you can't duplicate a
situation and you can'tduplicate how a person feels.
But if someone's listening toyour story right now and they're
like, oh my gosh, you know thishas happened in my life or this
is happening to someone I careabout, what advice would you
give them?
Speaker 2 (20:14):
The advice, oh my goodness, understand, especially
when you're told that it's yourfault that you enabled them.
You made this be as bad as itis, and I heard that an awful
lot.
The thing to remember is that,first of all, nobody is perfect.
(20:34):
We all make mistakes.
For the most part, mistakesthat parents make go away
without anyone really making abig fuss of them.
But no parent that I know andthere are, I'm sure there are,
(20:55):
but I don't know them.
So I'm going to say nobody, asin the people that I know,
nobody gets out of bed in themorning and says to themselves
gee, I wonder how I can screw upmy kids' lives.
Today Nobody gets out of bedand says, gee, I wonder which
strange person on the street Ican make feel badly about
(21:16):
themselves.
Today Nobody does that.
For the most part, people arevery and this is the word of the
day.
For the most part, people arevery and this is the word of the
day solipsistic.
Oh, I know it's a great word.
Sol beings the sun and, in theancient times, the center of the
universe.
Before they knew what theuniverse was, to the ancients
(21:37):
the sun was the center of theuniverse and all other things
orbited around its little self.
To be solipsistic, then, is toplace yourself at the center of
the universe and all otherthings orbited around its little
self.
To be solipsistic, then, is toplace yourself at the center of
the universe, around all which,all other things rotate.
All babies are solipsistic.
They don't care if mommy anddaddy are tired, hungry, sick.
They want what they want andthey want it right now.
Everything is about me, me, me,me, me, me, me, me, yes, me, me
(21:59):
, me, me, me, me, me, yes.
So when you're, the worst that aparent can do usually is to be
solipsistic is to just simplynot be aware of what's going on
around everybody else, becausethey just, you know, that's the
attitude, but nobody goes out oftheir way.
(22:22):
To be ugly, that's the attitude, but nobody, nobody goes out of
their way to be ugly.
And yet, when there are people,when your children have gone
astray, the same way as if yourbusiness is falling off the
rails or if your latest, yourlatest endeavor isn't going as
planned, you blame yourself hardenough anyway.
(22:45):
Know that being human means youmake mistakes.
Being human means that you aregoing to be judged incorrectly.
The only person you have toconvince of anything is yourself
, and what other people say anddo usually comes from the
(23:06):
kindness of their hearts.
The thing is to look atyourself in the mirror and
realize that you are a humanbeing.
You are no deity.
You were not born to have allthe answers.
All you can do is the bestthing you can do for the next
(23:28):
five minutes.
Speaker 1 (23:28):
Right, and taking that concept, the next best
thing we have a few more minutesI would love you to share with
our listeners.
What have you done in spite ofthis?
You are super incredible andmagnificent and, like you said,
you have your third book on thego and ready to for all of us to
read, and Well, what have Idone?
Speaker 2 (23:52):
All right, I have tons of degrees because I am a
lifelong learner.
I thought all my life that Ivalued intelligence.
In fact, it's not intelligence,it's curiosity.
I find it amazing that someonecan look at something and not be
curious about how it was madeor what its life cycle is, or
(24:15):
what does this turn into?
Or there's a pretty rock.
In my mind it's that's abeautiful rock, let's look at it
, let's appreciate it.
A beautiful rock, let's look atit, let's appreciate it.
And now let's pick it up andsee what's underneath it.
Uh, that's curiosity, and Ivalue that.
Curiosity to me takes the formof lifelong learning.
Um, I haven't even decided whatI want to be when I grow up yet
(24:36):
now.
I have worked.
I have worked in business.
I own my own business.
I have worked for a majoruniversity in purchasing, I've
done the boardroom, I've done,done the.
You know, when you're this old,you got lots of miles on you and
the one thing that I can say isthat confidence can be shaken,
(24:57):
confidence can be destroyed, butconfidence can always be
reinvented.
Confidence can always startgrowing again, and from the most
unlikely places.
Remember that there is the Sun,is going to come up tomorrow.
So what have I done?
(25:17):
Well, I was a mmm.
Have you ever heard the sacredgifts?
No, the sacred gifts, your corepower, your core, strength,
your core, what you were put onthis planet to do, et cetera.
Well, my major one is I'm ateacher Now.
I was a school teacher for awhile.
(25:38):
I taught drama and I taughttheater to a professional
theater group and I taughtEnglish in high school and music
and I taught all those lovelykids to play the saxophone and
the flute and the baritone andall those things, and so I
actually was a formal teacher.
In fact my license is stillintact.
But now I teach other things.
(26:01):
I teach confidence, I teachresilience, I teach reinvention.
My company is called ConfidenceStages, because my company
exists to help you overcome yourconfidence barriers, no matter
what stage you're in or on, andso I teach people to speak in
(26:23):
public, to give presentationsthat get the big.
Yes, because public speaking isthe greatest fear, second only
to death.
Jerry Seinfeld says that ifyou're forced to go to a funeral
, 95% of the people would ratherbe in the casket than having to
give the eulogy.
My thought is, if you can learnto conquer that great fear of
(26:47):
speaking in public.
What can you not take on?
Speaker 1 (26:52):
Right.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
So what I do is I help people find the way to.
I help them with content andstructure of their presentations
.
I teach them with presentationskills, I teach them delivery
skills, I teach them roomcontrol, how to handle the
audience participation things.
And my special little piece ofthe pie is I'm a trained
(27:14):
classical singer.
I told you I had a degree inmusic as well, and so the use of
the voice for speakers issomething that most people never
get.
And yet you can invite withyour whispers and you don't have
to yell to make sure that it'sintense.
How you use your voice, how youcare for speakers, this is
(27:34):
their moneymaker.
How do you care for that?
So that's what I do now.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
That's awesome and I do it with utter confidence.
You've come so far.
You are truly so far.
You are truly an inspiration,and this time together has just
absolutely flown by.
I've been so enthralled withyour journey and what you've
gone through and just listeningto you share your story and
really feel your emotions and Ireally hope that all the
(28:02):
listeners that are listening andreally something's triggered
inside them I know it is and toreally allow them to take that
next step in their life.
And you really have shone alight for me too, that if you
can do it, why can't anybody?
And to, really picking up thepieces of your life and moving
on is so important and soempowering.
Picking up the pieces of yourlife and moving on is so
(28:23):
important and so empowering and.
Speaker 2 (28:25):
I'd like to offer if, if, because I'm about halfway
through writing my third book onconfident reinvention and I'm
including people's stories ofreinvention in it.
So if anybody would, any ofyour listeners would like to get
ahold of me and share theirstory of reinvention.
(28:45):
I'd love to take it down andsee if it can fit in my book.
They can reach out to methrough Confidence Stages.
My website iswwwconfidencestagescom, and I'd
love for them to get a hold ofme.
That would be great.
Speaker 1 (29:01):
That would be beautiful.
How long do they have beforethey?
Because this is going to be onthe network so it can be shared
over and over through time, okayso today's date is the end of
May of 2018.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
My manuscript is going to be finished by the
middle of July of 2018.
So between the next six weeks.
If anybody would like to getahold of me, please do.
Speaker 1 (29:26):
And if you don't get your story into a book and you
still want to get ahold ofRosemary cause, you feel that
she's impacted you in some way.
I'm sure she would love for youto reach out to her as well,
for her services.
Absolutely Awesome, rosemary.
Is there anything else you'dlike to?
One more tidbit of advice oranything that's coming to you.
Speaker 2 (29:48):
Yes, I would like to remind everybody that nothing is
permanent.
The only thing you can count onthroughout your entire life is
that everything will change.
You can't control it.
You can fight it and bring upall that negative energy, or you
(30:11):
can look at every new changealong your path as an
opportunity for an adventure, anew one you hadn't seen coming
yet.
Keep the enthusiasm high forwhatever is to come tomorrow.
It'll surprise you.
Speaker 1 (30:28):
Oh, that's beautiful.
Thank you so much, Rosemary.
My pleasure Rosemary Barnes, andshe's truly inspirational and
magnificent, and if you wereinspired or thought of anybody
while you listened to her showtoday, you know you can share it
on wwwdivas that care forwardslash Amanda, and you will find
(30:49):
her interview there that you'remore than welcome to share and
empower other people to reallymake those changes in their
lives and maybe to get through.
They're going through a darkplace in their life and they
just need some inspiration andsome light, and I really do
truly do feel that she is thatlight.
So thank you so much, Rosemary,and find us on the Divas that
(31:13):
Care Network, and thank you somuch for listening and I look
forward to talking to you againsoon.
Bye, everybody.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Special Summer Offer: Exclusively on Apple Podcasts, try our Dateline Premium subscription completely free for one month! With Dateline Premium, you get every episode ad-free plus exclusive bonus content.