February 17, 2024 • 30 mins
Get excited! This is the fourth of our Meet the Authors series just ahead of the publication of Women Excelling Everywhere book, launching digitally on February 23rd and in paperback on International Women's Day, March 8th.
Meet Linda Rodgers, who believes happiness is not an endowment; happiness is a choice we get to make every day and through being an educator, author, and speaker, she helps others to make their happiness, every day.
Order your copy of the WEE book on February 23rd HERE
If you need help you can dial or text 988 in the U.S. for Suicide and Crisis Lifeline call center. The 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline provides 24/7, confidential support to people in suicidal crisis or mental health-related distress. You are not alone!
Connect with Linda:
Like the show? Be sure to Like, Subscribe, and Share! Interested in being a part of WEE? Reach out to our group liaison, Kelli@WomenExcellingEverywhere.com
Meet Linda Rodgers, who believes happiness is not an endowment; happiness is a choice we get to make every day and through being an educator, author, and speaker, she helps others to make their happiness, every day.
Order your copy of the WEE book on February 23rd HERE
If you need help you can dial or text 988 in the U.S. for Suicide and Crisis Lifeline call center. The 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline provides 24/7, confidential support to people in suicidal crisis or mental health-related distress. You are not alone!
Connect with Linda:
- LindaRodgersAuthor.SquareSpace,com
- Linda.Rodgers.Author@gmail.com
- TikTok
Like the show? Be sure to Like, Subscribe, and Share! Interested in being a part of WEE? Reach out to our group liaison, Kelli@WomenExcellingEverywhere.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:08):
Welcome, Welcome everyone to this episode, this special episode of the Women Excelling
Everywhere Podcast. I am here withthe wonderful Linda Rogers, author, speaker,
and co author of the Women ExcellingEverywhere book. Linda. Welcome to
the podcast, Julie, thank youso much for having me on this show.
(00:30):
I am so excited to be here, and I just want to start
by thanking you. I want tothank you for spearheading the Women Excelling Everywhere
project. It is a real privilegeto be part of this great work.
So thank you so much. Oh, and thank you for being a part.
I'm honored for you and all ofthe co authors sharing their wisdom.
And it's going to be amazing.Absolutely, it is an amazing project and
(00:53):
I can't wait for everyone to beable to order it and read it.
Now. I want to get toknow I want to help everyone get to
know Linda a little bit more.I am going to start by reading her
professional bio and then we'll get toknow the real Linda. All right,
So, Linda Rogers is an avidexplorer of the human psyche proudly wears many
(01:15):
hats as an author, a speaker, and an educator for over twenty thirty
years in the education sector. Sheis a resilient trauma survivor. She's not
just a change maker, but abeliever in the transformative power of thought on
both physical and mental earth, physicaland emotional healing. Her quest for understand,
(01:36):
her quest for understanding. Linda diesinto the realms of quantum physics,
epigenics, epigenetics, weaving the narrativearound the innate potential to heal ourselves.
An open minded logical thinker, shebalances her earthly wisdom with a spiritual connection,
blending the best of both worlds.I love that Canadian born and calling
(01:59):
a small town near the picturesque wineregion of Niagara her home, Linda embraces
the serenity of nature, walks alongthe Bruce Trail and Niagara Escarpment. Yeah,
which I can't wait to visit youone of these days, when not
indulging in the guilty pleasure of theNetflix Netflix binging like so many of us
(02:22):
do. Right As a mother too, she uses her craft not only to
mend emotional wounds, but also sprinklesher journey with hilarious dad jokes, even
though her children often roll their eyesat her. I've been there and her
courtly sense of humor. Linda isa storyteller, a soul for soul full
wanderer, and a true enthusiast ofthe human spirit. So once again,
(02:46):
Linda, Welcome, Welcome to theWomen Excelling Everywhere Podcast today. I am
thrilled to be here just I can'twait for this book to come out.
It's going to be amazing. Iget so excited every time I just think
about it. Oh, I'm soglad I do too. I'm kind of
at that like pinch me stage.It's like this has been such a project
(03:07):
that for so many years that Iwanted to see come to fruition, and
it's coming just a couple of weeks. Let's actually a week away, just
a little over a week away.Crazy, yeah, time go, I
know. So we're very excited aboutthat, and I want for the readers
to be able to get to knowall of you as well as anyone who's
(03:30):
hearing this podcast. Because you followthe channel, you know, it'll give
you inspiration to go or the youknow, help you to think. Okay,
I want to I think I wantto go meet these ladies and read
their chapters. So we read alittle bit about where you are at and
what you do and what you like. But I always like to ask people
(03:52):
kind of a little bit of theirbackground, Like I like to take them
back to where did they you know, where did they grow up and what
inspired them to go into the careeror the field that they're in. So,
like education, it's not always it'sa it's a hard job and it's
not always acknowledged as how difficult itis, but it's such a necessary job
(04:14):
the education system. So tell usabout Linda, what did you grow up
and what made you want to becomean educator? Well, I grew up
in a small town in southern Ontario, Canada, and it's the town of
welland it's located twenty minutes from NiagaraFalls, and growing up I lived in
a particular part of the city thatis known as French Town. My parents
(04:34):
were both born in the province ofQuebec and they blessed me with the gift
of a second language. So asa result, I'm fluent in Canada's both
official languages, French and English.In terms of career path, I am
currently wearing two hats. By day. I support elementary school students with special
needs and during off hours, I'man author and speaker, and I focus
(04:57):
on mental health and trauma and overcoming limiting beliefs and the power of thought
to heal both physical and emotional pain. In both instances, it's my desire
to support growth and development that drivesme to pursue those vocations. I love
that. And you're when I spokeeducator, we take it to an even
higher level when you say that you'rean educator of those with special needs,
(05:20):
so you have seen and work withon a day to day basis individuals who
have dealt with some of those emotionalor mental issues. That has probably did
that make you curious about or helpyou on that journey of the mind and
(05:41):
the brain and the healing and allof that. Absolutely. I mean,
I work with most of the childrenthat I work with are ne're divergent,
and so there could be any varianceof difficulty level that they're experiencing and seeing
their struggles, seeing what they're goingthrough, it really inspired me to want
to learn more about how our brainfunctions and how we can how our thought
(06:02):
processes affect the way we interact withother people and in the world in general.
Yeah, and you've seen I've noticedwith It's interesting because I just recently,
just a couple of weeks ago,I did a presentation. Uh the
school school hired me down in centralCalifornia to do a presentation for their charter
(06:24):
program, which included a lot ofhomeschool families, and one of them.
It was so touching to me becauseafterwards, a couple of the students came
up to me, teenagers that werein the room, because it was adults
as well as teenagers, and theycame up to me afterwards, and the
one was just like, I can'tbelieve that she's neurodiversient and she has struggled
(06:44):
with that label with just the challengesthat that puts on her and her self
esteem because of it. So Iwould assume that you've also like for her,
it was so freeing and it wasit just made her feel so good
about herself to be able to knowthat just because she was under that label
of neurodiversion, it didn't mean bad, worse good. Otherwise you might it
(07:06):
just meant Okay, this is justwho you are. It's the way your
brain's wired. Exactly. Love yourselflike you have you seen your students struggle
with that self esteem issues over theyears, I certainly have, but I
would like to speak to the factthat I have a daughter who is neurodivergent
as well. She's an adult nowand she lives with me. But growing
up I was able to experience itfrom different perspectives. Of course, I
(07:29):
was experiencing it in the school system, working with students who have many different
ways of learning and living. Butthen when I brought this little one into
my world who had her own wayof doing things, and I had to
relearn how to be a parent,you know, because you have that when
you bring a child into the world, you have this idea of what parenthood
(07:49):
is going to be like and howyou create this idea of who your child
is going to be. And thenwhen you figure out that things aren't exactly
the way, yeah, you gothrough this whole process of relearning. Okay,
now what? And so I thinkhaving had the experience of being a
mother of a child who has specialneeds, it really enabled me to connect
(08:11):
with the parents of the students thatI work with because I understand that I
have their kids for six hours ofthe day and they have their kids for
the rest of the time, andit's hard raising children who have special needs
because their needs often surpass our abilityto understand, especially when they're having those
(08:33):
those breakdown moments and you just wantto connect. You just want to hold
them. You just want to makethem feel like they belong. And when
they're crying and saying, mom,it's just it's not working out at school.
I have no friends, and nobodywants to talk to me. It
just wants to break your heart.So you know, I'm on the school
yard. I have my eyes andears open for the little ones who are
(08:54):
on their own, who don't haveanyone to connect with, and we're going
to get them and help them tomake connections with other students, because isn't
it all about connection, right?Everything we do in our lives, it's
all about connecting to people, forsure, absolutely, And when you can
make those connections positive ones, youknow, every little reassurance. And I
(09:16):
one of the things that I willoften tell my clients that I'm working with
who are trying to get past,you know, blocks in their life.
I tell them they have to,you know, they have to do some
research on their own past and theirlife growing up, and I tell them
there's nothing more damaging to an individualself esteem or feeling of self worth than
(09:39):
the insignificant things said to them bysignificant people in their lives and teachers.
So I just applaud you for havingthis passion for that because you can also
say that some of the most significantpositive experiences are by the significant people in
your life. So by you providingthat for these kids, based on your
(10:00):
own experience in knowing what it's likeraising a child neuro divergent child, you're
able to give them that extra littleboost of confidence and self build their self
esteem a little bit. Is justabsolutely wonderful. I love that you're doing
that. Yeah, So now canyou share, is there a particular moment
(10:22):
in your life that was like itwas a pivotal moment, it was a
turning point, it was it wasthat aha moment that really affected your life
moving forward. Yeah. For sure. For me, the most significant turning
point unfolded about a year before thewhole pandemic chaos happened. I had a
lot going on, and I wasreally struggling in every area of my life,
(10:46):
and I remember at this moment soclearly. I was I was coming
home from an appointment and I wastaking the long way home. I was
too upset and I wasn't ready tohead back. And I'm sure some of
your listeners can relate, you justneed a minute of peace. Well,
my car was my refuge from problemsof working home and it was the only
(11:07):
time I could be alone with mythoughts and feelings. And on that particular
day, I'd been crying again,as I had been many times during that
period in my life. I somuch so that I couldn't even see through
my tears, and I had topull the car over, and I was
trying to calm myself, but Ijust couldn't get a grip. I was
overwhelmed and stressed out and sad andangry and anxious, I mean, you
(11:30):
name it. I had the wholerainbow of emotions going on, and I
was trying to catch my breath.And then something inside me just said,
enough is enough. You know,it's time that I faced my truth and
I finally get the help I needto deal with the trauma of my past.
So I gathered up my courage andI called the Sexual assault helpline right
there on the side of the road, and I asked to speak with a
(11:52):
therapist, and I was put onhold and I waited alone in my car.
I was scared, but I washopeful. But then when the voice
at the other end of the linefinally returned, the reply I received just
about undid me. There I was. I was feeling lower than ever.
And then I was finally finding thestrength to reach out, and I was
(12:13):
told that there was a wait list. Oh no, and the timeline was
more than one year. Oh.I was devastated. Right, I was
devastated, and I was finally readyto get to the heart of the matter.
And then I was told I hadto wait. And in that moment,
I learned that there was actually aplace that was even lower than rock
Bottom. Because I was there,I put my name on the wait list
(12:37):
anyway. But then I was filledwith this rebellious thought at that like,
hell, am I going to waitaround for someone to come and rescue me?
So while I waited to receive counselingservices, I embarked on a spiritual
healing journey that really gradually shifted mywhole life. So I studied my brain
and my body like it was myjob, and I wanted to understand my
experience holistically, like in a sciencemeet spirituality kind of way, and that
(13:03):
eventually led me to write a bookbecause I wanted to learn. I wanted
to share what I'd learn about ourinate ability to heal ourselves. I thought
that was super important. It wasa message that I needed to get across.
Yeah, so this obviously was oneof the challenges or issues that you
had to to overcome. Now,if you were going through anyone who's listening,
(13:28):
by the way, this is areally good good point for me to
insert this. If you are inpain, if you are experiencing those PTSD
moments or complex PTSD, or you'refeeling that you have something you need to
get off your chest or get outof your brain or release those emotions,
then I encourage you. Linda encourageyou. We encourage you to reach out
(13:52):
for help by all means. Donot put it off. Do not feel
you have to deal with this onyour own. There are services, and
even if you have to go throughwhat Linda did right there, that you
don't, there are lots of peopleto reach out for. So I'm encouraging
the listeners to reach out if that'ssomething that they need to do too,
(14:15):
because you don't want to be miserableand you don't have to be miserable.
You don't have to be But nowI'm sure that it wasn't like this,
this smooth selling sailing, because whenyou go deep, when you start walking
through those that you know that pasthistory, the family of origin work,
and you're really digging and trying toconfront that trauma and emotionally come to grips
(14:41):
with that. There's always going tobe setbacks, you know, moments where
you feel like, Okay, Ijust made five steps forward. Well wait
a minute, I feel like Ijust made ten steps back the next day.
So were there any of those timesfor you that played a crucial role
in your personal development? For sure? I mean life is not perfect,
(15:01):
right, There are always going tobe ups and downs. For example,
I sat on that wait list fora year and two months before I was
finally able to access trauma therapy,and that started in February of twenty twenty.
But my treatment was short lived becauseabout one month later, the whole
darn world shut down. Talk abouta setback, no kidding, And I
(15:24):
could have thrown the towel in rightthen and there, but once again,
I didn't let that get in myway because my healing was important to me,
so I found other ways to accessinformation that would help me in my
healing journey. And one of thebeautiful things that occurred during the pandemic was
the overabundance of free and paid onlinepersonal development courses. There was a ton
of content out there. Everybody wasoffering something, and I devoured as many
(15:48):
as I could. One of themost crucial understandings I gained from that knowledge
was that you can't just wish forthings to change, and having a desire
to change is not enough to guaranteeresults. You have to take consistent,
repeated action and it moves you inthe direction of your goals. I mean,
(16:10):
change is hard, and it sucksa lot of the time, and
you want to give up just aboutevery day. But if you stay focused
on your goal, and here's thepart that's really important, you have to
celebrate all the little victories along theway, yes, and then yes,
little by little you shift your perspective, and then one day you look back
on all those tough days and yousay, you know what it was worth
(16:32):
it. I'm glad I stayed thecourse. Totally agree with you on it.
I tell people every night, everynight, you celebrate every little win,
Like if you picked up the phonebut didn't actually make the phone call,
that's okay, you picked up thephone. Like every little win,
no matter how small you feel itis, you have to start training your
(16:55):
brain to focus on that. Yeah, right, And the only way to
do that is to tell it thatwas amazing and let it know that you
are proud of yourself for doing thatone little thing. So I absolutely agree,
one hundred percent. One hundred percent. Now, you obviously had to
(17:15):
develop a lot of resilience and determinationthrough this time because you were going through
this huge this huge stuff and thisdeep stuff, not like just superficial like
this was deep stuff for you togo through this pretty much isolated a lot
on your own because you were doingit there, How did that build your
(17:37):
resilience or your determination to reach yourgoals of having a healthy mind. I
got to be honest, The wordresilience used to really take me off.
It was the whole concept of whatdoesn't kill you makes you stronger? Yeah,
And to me that felt like afalse promise, especially after all that
(18:00):
I've been through. You remember thatday I was telling you I was taking
the long way home while I hadreached a breaking point. My marriage had
broken down, my personal identity wasstolen, my daughter was diagnosed with a
rare heart condition, and then Iwas hit with my own health crisis that
landed me in the care of thenearest cancer treatment center. So, I
mean, with all those things happeningin my life, it's no wonder I
(18:22):
found myself in the middle of amental health crisis. Sure. Yeah,
And during that time I learned theimportance of self care and I was able
to rediscover who is Linda, whatmatters to her, what ignites passion and
excitement. And that's when I beganto write and speak about stress, trauma
(18:42):
and the power of belief to shapeour lives. And another thing I learned
is that, you know, afterall that I thought about resilience in the
beginning, I learned that it's actuallymore about It's not about how many times
you can pick yourself up. It'smore about how long it takes you to
to move through the hardships. Becausewe don't always get to decide what we
(19:03):
experience in life, right, butwe do get to choose how long we
let it influence our reality. Yeah, that doesn't mean we ignore our pain.
We still have to allow ourselves tofeel all those emotions, the good,
the bad, the ugly, allof them. But we don't just
sit in them any longer than wehave to, because the longer we sit
(19:23):
in our pain, the longer wehold on to anger or resentment, the
longer we prolong our suffering. Yeah, and there's and you can't bury it
either. No, you have todo that addressing. And it is okay
to be, as you said,on the side of the road, crying
(19:44):
so hard that you can't see throughyour tears. It's okay to have those
moments. There's nothing wrong. Asa matter of fact, oftentimes those emotional
Releasing that emotion through crying is catharticfor the brain. It gets. It's
better to get it out than itis to constantly swallow that lump in your
throat and push it back down,because it eventually will come out, and
(20:10):
it'll come out as an anger explosion. It'll come out, you know,
at the most inopportunity time. Yeah. And isn't that how our bodies process
the hormones of stress, right?It leaves our body through our tears and
through our sweat, and through oururine and our breath, and so crying
is actually a really good thing tohelp you process all that stress and trauma
and get it out of your body, get it out of your system,
(20:32):
and you know, like I say, it comes out through your breath.
So having good old rant session withyour girlfriends is great not only to get
it out of your mind, butalso to process it and get it out
of your body. Absolutely absolutely one. And then to begin to let it
go, which is isn't always theeasiest thing to do. Letting it go
(20:52):
is tough, and I don't knowhow you feel about this, but again,
one of the things that is reallygood to do is understand that the
more you sit in that, themore damage you're doing to your entire body,
to your health. When you understandthe stress response in the brain and
what that does to the and howthe amigdala takes over and slows to a
(21:15):
crawl, your immune system slows toa crawl. Your digestive issues. So
most people who've had trauma in theirlife or are highly stressed have chronic digestive
issues. Like they go hand inhand, and it's because the neurons are
talking to each other, right,and there's so many neurons on your gut.
So keeping in mind that, goahead and release that emotion and understand
(21:37):
that it when you release it,don't reach out there and grab it and
bring it back. So don't go, oh, okay, okay, I'm
gonna let it go and then I'mgonna bring it right back in, because
then that you're just perpetuating that thatdamaging, that damaging process within your body.
So tell us how you then,because obviously you had those health challenges
(22:02):
and doing the self care helped withthat. Is what are a couple of
the the day to day routines orweek to week routines that you really believe
are going to help people two reallyheal, really get their brain to heal
(22:26):
their body. Yeah. From myown perspective, having experienced trauma, it
created this whole system of limiting beliefsthat I acquired about myself all these experience
I had of abusers in my life, including teachers ironically who were not living
(22:47):
up to their standard. But anyway, that's that's in the book. I'm
not going to tell you about thatpart because I want you to read it
right. Yeah, So, whenwhen we acquire these limiting beliefs, sometimes
are in the subcontinent, and we'renot even aware that they're there. They
just sit there kind of in thebackground, running as this ongoing program that
(23:07):
is telling us that we're not goodenough, will will never live up to
what our mother wants for us,or whatever. It is, the the
limiting relief that we acquire. You'llnever be healthy, you'll never be wealthy.
So for me, there were twothings that I did very consistently that
I found helpful. One is Isurrounded myself with words of affirmation, and
(23:32):
if you walk into my home youwill find them all over the place.
They are in the bathroom, sothen when I wake up in the morning,
it's the first thing I read.They are by my bedside on my
night table, so that when Igo to bed at night, it is
the last thing I read. Ihave post its on my computer, on
my refrigerator. I have framed expressionsand sayings and quotes all over the place,
(23:56):
because for me, I needed toread it and say it in order
for me to eventually be able tointernalize it as maybe it is true,
maybe I am worthy, Maybe maybeI am more special than I think I
am. So that was real numberone for me in terms of over to
come over get over all those limitingbeliefs. And the second that I use
(24:18):
was meditation and self hypnosis, andthose I do at critical times during the
day. There are two periods inthe day when our brains are most susceptible.
They're in that THEATA brain wave state, and that is when we wake
up in the morning and just beforewe drift off to sleep at night.
And so I was listening to meditationsthat would be, for example, helping
(24:41):
me with my self esteem or helpingme with my health. I mean,
you can go on YouTube and literallygoogle anything you want want to work on,
any limiting belief and it will populateany kind of meditation that you're looking
for, and then I would justput them in my EarPods to those before
I go to bed at night orin the morning. And I still do
(25:03):
it. So it's been like afew years that I've been working on this
and I still do it because it'sso beneficial. Yeah, I love that,
And I want to emphasize too thatit is. It is a multi
prong approach, right, I thinkthat it's not you know, I I've
talked to people in the past wherethey're like, you're so frustrated because I
repeat the affirmations in the mirror outloud every single day and it just doesn't
(25:26):
give me. The brain's a funnything. And if there's a Grand Canyon
connection in your brain to something negative, right, it's that strong. It's
that deep as as if it werethe Grand Canyon, or you know,
as deep as Niagara falls, right, Like, if it's that deep,
doing doing one approach isn't enough.You have to you have to take this
(25:51):
multi, multi approach. So withthat, as where as we're kind of
bringing this all together, a lotof that information I am d is in
the chapter, so you kind ofgave us a little preview of the chapter.
What was your reason, Like whywere you drawn to or attracted to
(26:12):
becoming a co author and the WomenExcelling Everywhere book, Well, the whole
concept of an inspirational book written bywomen for women was a big draw for
me. You know, when Ibegan my healing journey, I made a
promise to myself. I vowed thatall my suffering would sort of a purpose.
So now I want to share mystories in the hope of inspiring other
(26:33):
women to persevere and not be afraidto want more and being a part of
this collaborative book with all the otherincredible authors is a real privilege and I'm
exceedingly grateful for that. I thinkit's I can't I can't wait to read.
I've gotten to read a few ofthe chapters, but I haven't gotten
to read all the chapters, right, so, I am so much looking
(26:56):
forward to reading the entire book asa whole, from cover to cover.
With that, what impact do youhope that this book and your story is
going to have on the women whoread it, Well, you know,
we all have a story, wehave all been through stuff, and if
(27:21):
the stories contained within this book helpsjust one woman find the courage to keep
going for just one more day,then my hope for this book will have
been realized. That's beautiful. That'sbeautiful. That should be on the back
of the book. That is absolutelybeautiful. Linda, Thank you so much
(27:42):
again, thank you for being inthe book. Thank you so very much
for being on the podcast today andfor all of the work that it is
that you do. You are agem and I can't wait to see the
great things that you're going to domoving forward. Thank you so much.
Jillie. It was a pleasure speakingwith you today. I hope that we
(28:03):
can continue working together. You areincredible. You are the type of person
who just brings people together and makestuff happen. And we need more Julies
in the world. So thank youfor being you. You are so sweet.
So now, if the listeners wantto, obviously you'll be able to
go on February twenty third and orderthe book directly off of Amazon, and
(28:25):
needless to say, just keep contactwith us on social media. You will
be seeing it all over the placethat day. But if somebody says,
you know what, I really wantto get to know Linda better, how
can they reach you directly? Well, they can find me on Facebook,
Instagram and TikTok at Linda dot Rogersdot author, or they can visit my
(28:47):
website where they will find links toother books that I've written and co authored
at Linda Rogers author at squarespace dotcom. I love it. I love
it all right. Thank you onceagain so much for being on the on
the show today and sharing your story. Oh thanks for having me, Julie.
Let's keep this thing going. Absolutely, absolutely, this is going to
(29:08):
be powerful and we will be keepingit going because we're going to be having
a summit, so all of youlisteners just keep keep keep your air out
for the summit. The books first, but then we've got this amazing summit
coming. And for those of youwho want to stay connected with Women Excelling
Everywhere, please go to our website, Women Excelling Everywhere dot com. If
you have a question right or ifyou're like listening to this podcast and it's
(29:33):
three weeks from now and it's pastthe launch date and you missed it or
anything, just send us an emailinfo at Women Excelling Everywhere dot com and
we'll be sure to connect you.If you have questions about anything that we
share here in the upcoming book orhere on the podcast, please my team
and I will definitely get back toyou right away at info at Women Excelling
(29:56):
Everywhere dot com. And that goesthe same for any you who are struggling
through something right now. We'll makesure you get the resources that you need.
We will help you do that forsure, absolutely, so reach out
to us info at Women Excelling Everywheredot com. From our heart to yours.
All right, And as I liketo wrap up every one of my
(30:18):
podcasts, I want everybody to takea nice deep breath in, roll those
shoulders back and go out there andenjoy every moment until next time.
Welcome, Welcome everyone to this episode, this special episode of the Women Excelling
Everywhere Podcast. I am here withthe wonderful Linda Rogers, author, speaker,
and co author of the Women ExcellingEverywhere book. Linda. Welcome to
the podcast, Julie, thank youso much for having me on this show.
(00:30):
I am so excited to be here, and I just want to start
by thanking you. I want tothank you for spearheading the Women Excelling Everywhere
project. It is a real privilegeto be part of this great work.
So thank you so much. Oh, and thank you for being a part.
I'm honored for you and all ofthe co authors sharing their wisdom.
And it's going to be amazing.Absolutely, it is an amazing project and
(00:53):
I can't wait for everyone to beable to order it and read it.
Now. I want to get toknow I want to help everyone get to
know Linda a little bit more.I am going to start by reading her
professional bio and then we'll get toknow the real Linda. All right,
So, Linda Rogers is an avidexplorer of the human psyche proudly wears many
(01:15):
hats as an author, a speaker, and an educator for over twenty thirty
years in the education sector. Sheis a resilient trauma survivor. She's not
just a change maker, but abeliever in the transformative power of thought on
both physical and mental earth, physicaland emotional healing. Her quest for understand,
(01:36):
her quest for understanding. Linda diesinto the realms of quantum physics,
epigenics, epigenetics, weaving the narrativearound the innate potential to heal ourselves.
An open minded logical thinker, shebalances her earthly wisdom with a spiritual connection,
blending the best of both worlds.I love that Canadian born and calling
(01:59):
a small town near the picturesque wineregion of Niagara her home, Linda embraces
the serenity of nature, walks alongthe Bruce Trail and Niagara Escarpment. Yeah,
which I can't wait to visit youone of these days, when not
indulging in the guilty pleasure of theNetflix Netflix binging like so many of us
(02:22):
do. Right As a mother too, she uses her craft not only to
mend emotional wounds, but also sprinklesher journey with hilarious dad jokes, even
though her children often roll their eyesat her. I've been there and her
courtly sense of humor. Linda isa storyteller, a soul for soul full
wanderer, and a true enthusiast ofthe human spirit. So once again,
(02:46):
Linda, Welcome, Welcome to theWomen Excelling Everywhere Podcast today. I am
thrilled to be here just I can'twait for this book to come out.
It's going to be amazing. Iget so excited every time I just think
about it. Oh, I'm soglad I do too. I'm kind of
at that like pinch me stage.It's like this has been such a project
(03:07):
that for so many years that Iwanted to see come to fruition, and
it's coming just a couple of weeks. Let's actually a week away, just
a little over a week away.Crazy, yeah, time go, I
know. So we're very excited aboutthat, and I want for the readers
to be able to get to knowall of you as well as anyone who's
(03:30):
hearing this podcast. Because you followthe channel, you know, it'll give
you inspiration to go or the youknow, help you to think. Okay,
I want to I think I wantto go meet these ladies and read
their chapters. So we read alittle bit about where you are at and
what you do and what you like. But I always like to ask people
(03:52):
kind of a little bit of theirbackground, Like I like to take them
back to where did they you know, where did they grow up and what
inspired them to go into the careeror the field that they're in. So,
like education, it's not always it'sa it's a hard job and it's
not always acknowledged as how difficult itis, but it's such a necessary job
(04:14):
the education system. So tell usabout Linda, what did you grow up
and what made you want to becomean educator? Well, I grew up
in a small town in southern Ontario, Canada, and it's the town of
welland it's located twenty minutes from NiagaraFalls, and growing up I lived in
a particular part of the city thatis known as French Town. My parents
(04:34):
were both born in the province ofQuebec and they blessed me with the gift
of a second language. So asa result, I'm fluent in Canada's both
official languages, French and English.In terms of career path, I am
currently wearing two hats. By day. I support elementary school students with special
needs and during off hours, I'man author and speaker, and I focus
(04:57):
on mental health and trauma and overcoming limiting beliefs and the power of thought
to heal both physical and emotional pain. In both instances, it's my desire
to support growth and development that drivesme to pursue those vocations. I love
that. And you're when I spokeeducator, we take it to an even
higher level when you say that you'rean educator of those with special needs,
(05:20):
so you have seen and work withon a day to day basis individuals who
have dealt with some of those emotionalor mental issues. That has probably did
that make you curious about or helpyou on that journey of the mind and
(05:41):
the brain and the healing and allof that. Absolutely. I mean,
I work with most of the childrenthat I work with are ne're divergent,
and so there could be any varianceof difficulty level that they're experiencing and seeing
their struggles, seeing what they're goingthrough, it really inspired me to want
to learn more about how our brainfunctions and how we can how our thought
(06:02):
processes affect the way we interact withother people and in the world in general.
Yeah, and you've seen I've noticedwith It's interesting because I just recently,
just a couple of weeks ago,I did a presentation. Uh the
school school hired me down in centralCalifornia to do a presentation for their charter
(06:24):
program, which included a lot ofhomeschool families, and one of them.
It was so touching to me becauseafterwards, a couple of the students came
up to me, teenagers that werein the room, because it was adults
as well as teenagers, and theycame up to me afterwards, and the
one was just like, I can'tbelieve that she's neurodiversient and she has struggled
(06:44):
with that label with just the challengesthat that puts on her and her self
esteem because of it. So Iwould assume that you've also like for her,
it was so freeing and it wasit just made her feel so good
about herself to be able to knowthat just because she was under that label
of neurodiversion, it didn't mean bad, worse good. Otherwise you might it
(07:06):
just meant Okay, this is justwho you are. It's the way your
brain's wired. Exactly. Love yourselflike you have you seen your students struggle
with that self esteem issues over theyears, I certainly have, but I
would like to speak to the factthat I have a daughter who is neurodivergent
as well. She's an adult nowand she lives with me. But growing
up I was able to experience itfrom different perspectives. Of course, I
(07:29):
was experiencing it in the school system, working with students who have many different
ways of learning and living. Butthen when I brought this little one into
my world who had her own wayof doing things, and I had to
relearn how to be a parent,you know, because you have that when
you bring a child into the world, you have this idea of what parenthood
(07:49):
is going to be like and howyou create this idea of who your child
is going to be. And thenwhen you figure out that things aren't exactly
the way, yeah, you gothrough this whole process of relearning. Okay,
now what? And so I thinkhaving had the experience of being a
mother of a child who has specialneeds, it really enabled me to connect
(08:11):
with the parents of the students thatI work with because I understand that I
have their kids for six hours ofthe day and they have their kids for
the rest of the time, andit's hard raising children who have special needs
because their needs often surpass our abilityto understand, especially when they're having those
(08:33):
those breakdown moments and you just wantto connect. You just want to hold
them. You just want to makethem feel like they belong. And when
they're crying and saying, mom,it's just it's not working out at school.
I have no friends, and nobodywants to talk to me. It
just wants to break your heart.So you know, I'm on the school
yard. I have my eyes andears open for the little ones who are
(08:54):
on their own, who don't haveanyone to connect with, and we're going
to get them and help them tomake connections with other students, because isn't
it all about connection, right?Everything we do in our lives, it's
all about connecting to people, forsure, absolutely, And when you can
make those connections positive ones, youknow, every little reassurance. And I
(09:16):
one of the things that I willoften tell my clients that I'm working with
who are trying to get past,you know, blocks in their life.
I tell them they have to,you know, they have to do some
research on their own past and theirlife growing up, and I tell them
there's nothing more damaging to an individualself esteem or feeling of self worth than
(09:39):
the insignificant things said to them bysignificant people in their lives and teachers.
So I just applaud you for havingthis passion for that because you can also
say that some of the most significantpositive experiences are by the significant people in
your life. So by you providingthat for these kids, based on your
(10:00):
own experience in knowing what it's likeraising a child neuro divergent child, you're
able to give them that extra littleboost of confidence and self build their self
esteem a little bit. Is justabsolutely wonderful. I love that you're doing
that. Yeah, So now canyou share, is there a particular moment
(10:22):
in your life that was like itwas a pivotal moment, it was a
turning point, it was it wasthat aha moment that really affected your life
moving forward. Yeah. For sure. For me, the most significant turning
point unfolded about a year before thewhole pandemic chaos happened. I had a
lot going on, and I wasreally struggling in every area of my life,
(10:46):
and I remember at this moment soclearly. I was I was coming
home from an appointment and I wastaking the long way home. I was
too upset and I wasn't ready tohead back. And I'm sure some of
your listeners can relate, you justneed a minute of peace. Well,
my car was my refuge from problemsof working home and it was the only
(11:07):
time I could be alone with mythoughts and feelings. And on that particular
day, I'd been crying again,as I had been many times during that
period in my life. I somuch so that I couldn't even see through
my tears, and I had topull the car over, and I was
trying to calm myself, but Ijust couldn't get a grip. I was
overwhelmed and stressed out and sad andangry and anxious, I mean, you
(11:30):
name it. I had the wholerainbow of emotions going on, and I
was trying to catch my breath.And then something inside me just said,
enough is enough. You know,it's time that I faced my truth and
I finally get the help I needto deal with the trauma of my past.
So I gathered up my courage andI called the Sexual assault helpline right
there on the side of the road, and I asked to speak with a
(11:52):
therapist, and I was put onhold and I waited alone in my car.
I was scared, but I washopeful. But then when the voice
at the other end of the linefinally returned, the reply I received just
about undid me. There I was. I was feeling lower than ever.
And then I was finally finding thestrength to reach out, and I was
(12:13):
told that there was a wait list. Oh no, and the timeline was
more than one year. Oh.I was devastated. Right, I was
devastated, and I was finally readyto get to the heart of the matter.
And then I was told I hadto wait. And in that moment,
I learned that there was actually aplace that was even lower than rock
Bottom. Because I was there,I put my name on the wait list
(12:37):
anyway. But then I was filledwith this rebellious thought at that like,
hell, am I going to waitaround for someone to come and rescue me?
So while I waited to receive counselingservices, I embarked on a spiritual
healing journey that really gradually shifted mywhole life. So I studied my brain
and my body like it was myjob, and I wanted to understand my
experience holistically, like in a sciencemeet spirituality kind of way, and that
(13:03):
eventually led me to write a bookbecause I wanted to learn. I wanted
to share what I'd learn about ourinate ability to heal ourselves. I thought
that was super important. It wasa message that I needed to get across.
Yeah, so this obviously was oneof the challenges or issues that you
had to to overcome. Now,if you were going through anyone who's listening,
(13:28):
by the way, this is areally good good point for me to
insert this. If you are inpain, if you are experiencing those PTSD
moments or complex PTSD, or you'refeeling that you have something you need to
get off your chest or get outof your brain or release those emotions,
then I encourage you. Linda encourageyou. We encourage you to reach out
(13:52):
for help by all means. Donot put it off. Do not feel
you have to deal with this onyour own. There are services, and
even if you have to go throughwhat Linda did right there, that you
don't, there are lots of peopleto reach out for. So I'm encouraging
the listeners to reach out if that'ssomething that they need to do too,
(14:15):
because you don't want to be miserableand you don't have to be miserable.
You don't have to be But nowI'm sure that it wasn't like this,
this smooth selling sailing, because whenyou go deep, when you start walking
through those that you know that pasthistory, the family of origin work,
and you're really digging and trying toconfront that trauma and emotionally come to grips
(14:41):
with that. There's always going tobe setbacks, you know, moments where
you feel like, Okay, Ijust made five steps forward. Well wait
a minute, I feel like Ijust made ten steps back the next day.
So were there any of those timesfor you that played a crucial role
in your personal development? For sure? I mean life is not perfect,
(15:01):
right, There are always going tobe ups and downs. For example,
I sat on that wait list fora year and two months before I was
finally able to access trauma therapy,and that started in February of twenty twenty.
But my treatment was short lived becauseabout one month later, the whole
darn world shut down. Talk abouta setback, no kidding, And I
(15:24):
could have thrown the towel in rightthen and there, but once again,
I didn't let that get in myway because my healing was important to me,
so I found other ways to accessinformation that would help me in my
healing journey. And one of thebeautiful things that occurred during the pandemic was
the overabundance of free and paid onlinepersonal development courses. There was a ton
of content out there. Everybody wasoffering something, and I devoured as many
(15:48):
as I could. One of themost crucial understandings I gained from that knowledge
was that you can't just wish forthings to change, and having a desire
to change is not enough to guaranteeresults. You have to take consistent,
repeated action and it moves you inthe direction of your goals. I mean,
(16:10):
change is hard, and it sucksa lot of the time, and
you want to give up just aboutevery day. But if you stay focused
on your goal, and here's thepart that's really important, you have to
celebrate all the little victories along theway, yes, and then yes,
little by little you shift your perspective, and then one day you look back
on all those tough days and yousay, you know what it was worth
(16:32):
it. I'm glad I stayed thecourse. Totally agree with you on it.
I tell people every night, everynight, you celebrate every little win,
Like if you picked up the phonebut didn't actually make the phone call,
that's okay, you picked up thephone. Like every little win,
no matter how small you feel itis, you have to start training your
(16:55):
brain to focus on that. Yeah, right, And the only way to
do that is to tell it thatwas amazing and let it know that you
are proud of yourself for doing thatone little thing. So I absolutely agree,
one hundred percent. One hundred percent. Now, you obviously had to
(17:15):
develop a lot of resilience and determinationthrough this time because you were going through
this huge this huge stuff and thisdeep stuff, not like just superficial like
this was deep stuff for you togo through this pretty much isolated a lot
on your own because you were doingit there, How did that build your
(17:37):
resilience or your determination to reach yourgoals of having a healthy mind. I
got to be honest, The wordresilience used to really take me off.
It was the whole concept of whatdoesn't kill you makes you stronger? Yeah,
And to me that felt like afalse promise, especially after all that
(18:00):
I've been through. You remember thatday I was telling you I was taking
the long way home while I hadreached a breaking point. My marriage had
broken down, my personal identity wasstolen, my daughter was diagnosed with a
rare heart condition, and then Iwas hit with my own health crisis that
landed me in the care of thenearest cancer treatment center. So, I
mean, with all those things happeningin my life, it's no wonder I
(18:22):
found myself in the middle of amental health crisis. Sure. Yeah,
And during that time I learned theimportance of self care and I was able
to rediscover who is Linda, whatmatters to her, what ignites passion and
excitement. And that's when I beganto write and speak about stress, trauma
(18:42):
and the power of belief to shapeour lives. And another thing I learned
is that, you know, afterall that I thought about resilience in the
beginning, I learned that it's actuallymore about It's not about how many times
you can pick yourself up. It'smore about how long it takes you to
to move through the hardships. Becausewe don't always get to decide what we
(19:03):
experience in life, right, butwe do get to choose how long we
let it influence our reality. Yeah, that doesn't mean we ignore our pain.
We still have to allow ourselves tofeel all those emotions, the good,
the bad, the ugly, allof them. But we don't just
sit in them any longer than wehave to, because the longer we sit
(19:23):
in our pain, the longer wehold on to anger or resentment, the
longer we prolong our suffering. Yeah, and there's and you can't bury it
either. No, you have todo that addressing. And it is okay
to be, as you said,on the side of the road, crying
(19:44):
so hard that you can't see throughyour tears. It's okay to have those
moments. There's nothing wrong. Asa matter of fact, oftentimes those emotional
Releasing that emotion through crying is catharticfor the brain. It gets. It's
better to get it out than itis to constantly swallow that lump in your
throat and push it back down,because it eventually will come out, and
(20:10):
it'll come out as an anger explosion. It'll come out, you know,
at the most inopportunity time. Yeah. And isn't that how our bodies process
the hormones of stress, right?It leaves our body through our tears and
through our sweat, and through oururine and our breath, and so crying
is actually a really good thing tohelp you process all that stress and trauma
and get it out of your body, get it out of your system,
(20:32):
and you know, like I say, it comes out through your breath.
So having good old rant session withyour girlfriends is great not only to get
it out of your mind, butalso to process it and get it out
of your body. Absolutely absolutely one. And then to begin to let it
go, which is isn't always theeasiest thing to do. Letting it go
(20:52):
is tough, and I don't knowhow you feel about this, but again,
one of the things that is reallygood to do is understand that the
more you sit in that, themore damage you're doing to your entire body,
to your health. When you understandthe stress response in the brain and
what that does to the and howthe amigdala takes over and slows to a
(21:15):
crawl, your immune system slows toa crawl. Your digestive issues. So
most people who've had trauma in theirlife or are highly stressed have chronic digestive
issues. Like they go hand inhand, and it's because the neurons are
talking to each other, right,and there's so many neurons on your gut.
So keeping in mind that, goahead and release that emotion and understand
(21:37):
that it when you release it,don't reach out there and grab it and
bring it back. So don't go, oh, okay, okay, I'm
gonna let it go and then I'mgonna bring it right back in, because
then that you're just perpetuating that thatdamaging, that damaging process within your body.
So tell us how you then,because obviously you had those health challenges
(22:02):
and doing the self care helped withthat. Is what are a couple of
the the day to day routines orweek to week routines that you really believe
are going to help people two reallyheal, really get their brain to heal
(22:26):
their body. Yeah. From myown perspective, having experienced trauma, it
created this whole system of limiting beliefsthat I acquired about myself all these experience
I had of abusers in my life, including teachers ironically who were not living
(22:47):
up to their standard. But anyway, that's that's in the book. I'm
not going to tell you about thatpart because I want you to read it
right. Yeah, So, whenwhen we acquire these limiting beliefs, sometimes
are in the subcontinent, and we'renot even aware that they're there. They
just sit there kind of in thebackground, running as this ongoing program that
(23:07):
is telling us that we're not goodenough, will will never live up to
what our mother wants for us,or whatever. It is, the the
limiting relief that we acquire. You'llnever be healthy, you'll never be wealthy.
So for me, there were twothings that I did very consistently that
I found helpful. One is Isurrounded myself with words of affirmation, and
(23:32):
if you walk into my home youwill find them all over the place.
They are in the bathroom, sothen when I wake up in the morning,
it's the first thing I read.They are by my bedside on my
night table, so that when Igo to bed at night, it is
the last thing I read. Ihave post its on my computer, on
my refrigerator. I have framed expressionsand sayings and quotes all over the place,
(23:56):
because for me, I needed toread it and say it in order
for me to eventually be able tointernalize it as maybe it is true,
maybe I am worthy, Maybe maybeI am more special than I think I
am. So that was real numberone for me in terms of over to
come over get over all those limitingbeliefs. And the second that I use
(24:18):
was meditation and self hypnosis, andthose I do at critical times during the
day. There are two periods inthe day when our brains are most susceptible.
They're in that THEATA brain wave state, and that is when we wake
up in the morning and just beforewe drift off to sleep at night.
And so I was listening to meditationsthat would be, for example, helping
(24:41):
me with my self esteem or helpingme with my health. I mean,
you can go on YouTube and literallygoogle anything you want want to work on,
any limiting belief and it will populateany kind of meditation that you're looking
for, and then I would justput them in my EarPods to those before
I go to bed at night orin the morning. And I still do
(25:03):
it. So it's been like afew years that I've been working on this
and I still do it because it'sso beneficial. Yeah, I love that,
And I want to emphasize too thatit is. It is a multi
prong approach, right, I thinkthat it's not you know, I I've
talked to people in the past wherethey're like, you're so frustrated because I
repeat the affirmations in the mirror outloud every single day and it just doesn't
(25:26):
give me. The brain's a funnything. And if there's a Grand Canyon
connection in your brain to something negative, right, it's that strong. It's
that deep as as if it werethe Grand Canyon, or you know,
as deep as Niagara falls, right, Like, if it's that deep,
doing doing one approach isn't enough.You have to you have to take this
(25:51):
multi, multi approach. So withthat, as where as we're kind of
bringing this all together, a lotof that information I am d is in
the chapter, so you kind ofgave us a little preview of the chapter.
What was your reason, Like whywere you drawn to or attracted to
(26:12):
becoming a co author and the WomenExcelling Everywhere book, Well, the whole
concept of an inspirational book written bywomen for women was a big draw for
me. You know, when Ibegan my healing journey, I made a
promise to myself. I vowed thatall my suffering would sort of a purpose.
So now I want to share mystories in the hope of inspiring other
(26:33):
women to persevere and not be afraidto want more and being a part of
this collaborative book with all the otherincredible authors is a real privilege and I'm
exceedingly grateful for that. I thinkit's I can't I can't wait to read.
I've gotten to read a few ofthe chapters, but I haven't gotten
to read all the chapters, right, so, I am so much looking
(26:56):
forward to reading the entire book asa whole, from cover to cover.
With that, what impact do youhope that this book and your story is
going to have on the women whoread it, Well, you know,
we all have a story, wehave all been through stuff, and if
(27:21):
the stories contained within this book helpsjust one woman find the courage to keep
going for just one more day,then my hope for this book will have
been realized. That's beautiful. That'sbeautiful. That should be on the back
of the book. That is absolutelybeautiful. Linda, Thank you so much
(27:42):
again, thank you for being inthe book. Thank you so very much
for being on the podcast today andfor all of the work that it is
that you do. You are agem and I can't wait to see the
great things that you're going to domoving forward. Thank you so much.
Jillie. It was a pleasure speakingwith you today. I hope that we
(28:03):
can continue working together. You areincredible. You are the type of person
who just brings people together and makestuff happen. And we need more Julies
in the world. So thank youfor being you. You are so sweet.
So now, if the listeners wantto, obviously you'll be able to
go on February twenty third and orderthe book directly off of Amazon, and
(28:25):
needless to say, just keep contactwith us on social media. You will
be seeing it all over the placethat day. But if somebody says,
you know what, I really wantto get to know Linda better, how
can they reach you directly? Well, they can find me on Facebook,
Instagram and TikTok at Linda dot Rogersdot author, or they can visit my
(28:47):
website where they will find links toother books that I've written and co authored
at Linda Rogers author at squarespace dotcom. I love it. I love
it all right. Thank you onceagain so much for being on the on
the show today and sharing your story. Oh thanks for having me, Julie.
Let's keep this thing going. Absolutely, absolutely, this is going to
(29:08):
be powerful and we will be keepingit going because we're going to be having
a summit, so all of youlisteners just keep keep keep your air out
for the summit. The books first, but then we've got this amazing summit
coming. And for those of youwho want to stay connected with Women Excelling
Everywhere, please go to our website, Women Excelling Everywhere dot com. If
you have a question right or ifyou're like listening to this podcast and it's
(29:33):
three weeks from now and it's pastthe launch date and you missed it or
anything, just send us an emailinfo at Women Excelling Everywhere dot com and
we'll be sure to connect you.If you have questions about anything that we
share here in the upcoming book orhere on the podcast, please my team
and I will definitely get back toyou right away at info at Women Excelling
(29:56):
Everywhere dot com. And that goesthe same for any you who are struggling
through something right now. We'll makesure you get the resources that you need.
We will help you do that forsure, absolutely, so reach out
to us info at Women Excelling Everywheredot com. From our heart to yours.
All right, And as I liketo wrap up every one of my
(30:18):
podcasts, I want everybody to takea nice deep breath in, roll those
shoulders back and go out there andenjoy every moment until next time.
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Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
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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.