Episode 197: You’re Allowed To Change Your Story | Lindsay Bednar | Author & Founder of Rodney K Press
If you’ve been listening for a while, you know Kara loves books, big dreams, and the power of storytelling. Today’s guest, Lindsay Bednar, lives all of that. She’s the founder of Rodney K Press, an independent publishing house. She’s also a writer, author coach, wife, mom, sister, and daughter who’s passionate about helping others reach their goals. In our conversation, we talk about executive presence, emotional intelligence, and how to lead with confidence without losing your voice, plus how pursuing your best self can open doors for success, service, and making other people’s dreams come true.
“I am so astounded by people’s stories & their resilience. There is a novel in everyone if they choose to share it.”
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Follow along using the Transcript
Chapters:
00:00 Creating a business that works for you
01:10 How Lindsay built Rodney K Press
03:00 What was missing from her teaching career
04:30 Lindsay’s childhood and early creative drive
06:20 Family legacy and expectations
08:00 Leaving stability for entrepreneurship
10:00 Building confidence and getting mentorship
12:45 Meditation and inner child work
14:50 Breaking the “I’m bad at math” story
17:10 Listening to your creative urgency
19:00 Starting her podcast, Storytelling
21:15 The problem with polarization
23:00 Telling stories to find common ground
24:45 Designing a business around your life
26:15 Helping writers bring their stories to life
28:00 Why she doesn’t take royalties
29:45 Books that shaped her mindset
32:30 What powerful really means
35:30 Balancing family and business
38:15 Advice for aspiring authors
It was you telling me and affirming that you can do this. Like it you went into this business to create something that works for you. So if you're not creating something that works for you, what's the point? Which was so like I almost needed permission for someone to say, you can take your summers to be as flexible as you wanted them to be.
That's Lindsay Bednar and this is The Powerful Ladies Podcast.
Hey guys, I'm Kara Duffy, a business coach and entrepreneur on a mission to help you live your most extraordinary life by showing you that anything is possible. People who have mastered freedom, ease, and success, who are living their best and most ridiculous lives, and who are making an impact, are often people you've never heard of until now.
If you guys have been listening for a while, you know that I love books, that I believe anything is possible and available to us if you go and get it. And how important I think the power of storytelling is. Today's guest, Lindsay Bednar, shares those values. She is the founder of Rodney K Press, an independent publishing house.
She's a writer, an author's coach, a wife, mom, sister, and daughter. And she is diligently in pursuit of her best self and how accessing that best self allows her to be more available, more successful. And more of service to help make other people's dreams come true.
Like all my drinks, I'm like that meme where they're like, do you have six drinks on your desk? If yes, you work from home?
Yep. Tea, water, coffee's done.
I'm back
on coffee. Shouldn't be. But I am.
If you're gonna have a vice, I don't know if that's the worst one to have. I agree. I agree. Yeah. I'm really excited to have you here today.
I have so many questions because from the outside looking in, you life looks amazing. Oh, aw, sweet. You have the most adorable, healthy family. You guys do all these fun things. You have a great business that you are kicking ass in. You are active and traveling, and I'm like, that's the life. Like you've got a lot of things nailed.
So I'm excited to talk to you about that today, but also, you have been a client of mine and you have created this beautiful, amazing way to serve your favorite people who are writers.
Yeah.
Let's tell everyone your name, where you are in the world, and what you're up to.
For sure. First of all, thank you for that super kind intro.
My name is Lindsay Bednar. I am in Andover, Minnesota, and I am currently a publishing. Started my own publishing company, Rodney K Press in 2016, and I've been doing that full-time for the last two years now. And what were you doing before that? I was teaching high school English for 12 years. And that was awesome.
I loved my students. I loved the connections I made on a daily basis, but what was missing was that creative outlet. And we usually don't leave a career or anything for that matter, unless there's something missing. That was my missing it came to a time when, for a while it was just this desire to have more of a creative outlet.
Pretty soon it became like a need. Like I need to do this, or I'm just going to burst. Yeah, so I, I started the company in 2020 when we all had time to pause and reflect and think about what we really wanted to do. That's really when I made that decision to step into a full-time.
I would just love to go back to 8-year-old.
You, when you were eight. What was your life like? What did you see your future looking like?
8-year-old me. It's funny that you picked out that age because that was like a kind of a pivotal point when I worked with my meditation coach and now dear friend Vanessa files, we pulled out as eight as something pivotal for me.
But when I was a kid, I was super into writing. Always wanted to write and I always had this feeling that I came. I came with a, a mission and I didn't know what that was. We have a lot of women who are teachers in our family. That's what my mom went to school for. English teachers my grandma and her two sisters both went to college and were teachers, which it's pretty impressive for that day and age.
And teaching was always in my blood and it was something that I, I. It didn't come a surprise to me when I ultimately chose that as a career. But it also wasn't something that ever felt. A hundred percent. I'm somebody who is very, I, my friends and my family make fun of me that I'm like type B and I'm very flexible, very creative.
I'm very big picture and and circular and not linear. Like most teachers I think are they're super organized, super. That they thrive in that kind of environment. I have a team to help me do that because that's not my forte. And so yeah, as a kid I was, I'd say very creative curious, always wanting to make people laugh.
That's been a big part of me, since I was young.
And when you, so you thought you'd be a teacher, it was in your family, and did you imagine like just days like. In a room just writing surrounded by books all day. What was like the fantasy life at that time?
Oh, honestly, I think I saw myself on stages.
There was a time where I thought I wanna be a musician or I wanna be some sort of artist, and I never knew where my life would take me. I just felt like there was something. Just big inside of me that I knew need an outlet at some point. And so when I went into teaching and when I started my career path, it was really more about I have to start adulting now.
I don't know exactly what I'm doing, but I know I love interacting with kids. I know, I love talking about books and papers. And writing. And so that was just a natural transition. But then. They say you're your twenties you're just trying to figure it out, become an adult, your thirties.
You start to say, what is it that I really want to do? And then your forties, you tend to apply it, is what I've seen.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And how did, like you grew up in nearby where you were living now?
So I grew up in Northern Minnesota. It's two and a half hours from here. Smaller town for sure.
Community where everybody knows everybody, and I love that as a kid. Yeah. It is a fantastic place to raise a family. I would say most of my friends from high school have moved back home because it is such a magical place to grow up. And Gary, my husband and I talked about it initially, but we also loved the draw to Minneapolis St.
Paul. We love going to concerts. We love. We have timber wool seasons tickets. We love going to sporting events and having those outlets was important to us. And now that we have kids, we do that not quite as much, but still fun on a adult date night to go out and but Grand Rapids, I get up there is often as possible a lot in the summertime.
It's a gorgeous place.
Yeah, I've seen lots of pictures or videos of Kristen jumping in the lake.
Yeah. It's a big tradition. We go in the sauna, we jump in the lake. Yeah.
Yeah. I think it's really interesting that I tend to find entrepreneurs in families and clusters. Your sister's an entrepreneur.
She also wasn't always your dad ran his own business. Yeah. How has seeing that other people can. Create their own income stream and business. How has it influenced your choice to make the leap from teaching to owning a publishing house?
It's a great question and I don't think I've ever thought about it consciously.
Like it wasn't conversations that I necessarily had with my parents where they pushed us into a particular direction. But for sure the modeling was there, and I think the biggest thing is that. Our parents always made us feel like we could do anything that we wanted. And instilled that confidence into us.
And so even if I didn't feel it at the time or know it, I think that being raised by people who believe in you, so huge. And I think that her and I both come from that. Yeah, we have several entrepreneurs in the family. My grandfather also had a business, and so it's definitely in our blood for sure, too.
Yeah. How has taking the leap from a very stable, steady career as teacher to entrepreneur, how has that changed the conversations that you and Gary have or the conversations that you even have with your kids about what's possible?
I talk about this all day. When I first talked to him about wanting to leave the security and structure of a teaching position, it was scary for him for sure.
He and I grew up very differently and I had a very, abundant mindset when it come to financials or just being taken care of where his background led to a more scarcity mindset. And in any relationship, it's super important to have those conversations as to how does that affect the decisions you make in your career Yeah.
And your spending. And so we started to have more of those conversations. But when I first left teaching to write my own book and start my company. I was still pretty green and I hadn't fully grown into myself yet. And so I did that for a year and I wasn't earning a stable income where I felt like this is viable right now.
So we talked about it and we had one, let's see. We had one, we had Whitney, and I think Garrison wasn't born yet. No, he was little. He was, yep. So he was little. We had both kids, but it was. Yeah. Were those financial decisions of, is this something we can do right now? So I went back to teaching.
I, I went to a new school and one of the things that was huge in this time period is that I had a mentor who really saw me and believed in me, and she helped to raise my confidence like I had never had in my career before. Yeah. And that was huge. And I, she would often say I see you.
Growing into my position as the administrator role. And it was ironic because it was all of that validation that allowed me to leave that position knowing that I am capable of doing a lot. And then at the same time I was starting to do more of a meditation practice with vanessa. And so just being more in touch with myself and what it was that I really wanted to do made that shift. So when. I started to evolve as a person and grow confidence and bring on more clients. Gary started to, see, okay this is going somewhere. He could have some more faith in the process.
But what really shifted my business was, without a doubt hiring you and taking it. Thank you. From it's true. I took it from something that I was. Dabbling into being able to step into it full time. And I tell people this all the time the it's so funny, the fears that we have about stepping into something that is so divinely us, thinking that a teaching job was going to be more lucrative which if anybody knows teaching salaries and you can look 'em up online. Mine were, I taught in the lowest paying districts probably across Minnesota. So the fact that I was fearful of that, just surprising to me now. But in addition to that.
When I hired you the very next day, you helped me rearrange my fees and just like the nuts and bolts of my business. The next day I got a new client, which almost paid for hiring you in full, and it was like. The universe was saying, this is what you're supposed to do. Yeah, you made the right move and now you can relax and really focus on growing this business.
So all of those steps combined allowed him to get more on board for me to see it as a viable business.
For sure. You still hold the record for fastest return on investment of all of my clients, and I tell people that now and they're like, oh okay, so how fast, like they get competitive.
They're like, can I do it in less than 48 hours? I'm like, probably.
I know. I actually heard Chris on a interview talking about how she made it back in two days and I was like, I was one, yeah,
exactly. I don't wanna step over your meditation practice because I think that's a piece that is so critical to your journey.
What does that look like? How often are you doing it? Yeah. What do you use your meditation time for? What are you putting into it and what are you getting out of it?
Great question. I've done a number of things from, I, I had an initial session with Vanessa where we. She guides you through really tapping into that inner child and going inward and we removed a lot of distortions that I had.
One of the ways in which she explained it a long time ago, and I think it's a fantastic analogy, is we're all born perfect, right? We're just these innocent babies. There's nothing wrong with us as we grow older. And enter into society. We get all of these opinions and labels and things put onto us, and you can think of it like.
A little splatter of mud. So when I was growing up, I was an overweight kid. I was a hundred, and I think the scale tipped off at 196 pounds when I was 15, and, which
I cannot imagine.
Yeah. It was it was extremely humbling. It was difficult in a lot of situations, but I also had a lot of. Fantastic friends who were, yeah.
Who love me for me. So it wasn't a terrible childhood by any means, but I definitely heard insults about my weight, right? Every time there was an insult, this little mud splattered here I didn't get into the high math group in sixth grade, little more mud.
I'm not good at math. And so you start to get this story that you develop by things that are outside of you, and it really. Clouds, everything that you have within you and all the potential that you have. So she will go in and start to remove those distortions to start to take off the mud and let you get back to who you are created to be with all your potential.
I would say that was the first step, and that really started to unlock a lot of things. I downloaded the Calm app every day when I would drive to school, I would get in my classroom, I would shut the door and I would just do 10 minutes of meditating, followed by some writing. And that really allowed me just to connect back to self from, sometimes you have a busy morning, especially with a family, you might have the kids arguing or you and your husband get in a tiff and it just allows you to recenter and and breathe deeply.
And then I went through her activate course, which was really important for building my business as well, because do a lot of inner child work to further remove distortions. One of the, when I was, when you had mentioned eight years old, 8-year-old Lindsay, one of the. Exercises we did really worked to remove the distortion that I can't do math, which was said in when I was eight years old, when I had a, like a math tutor.
And as soon as I started working with her, I just thought, oh, my sister never had that. I must suck at math. And so it's a story I've told myself over and over again and. So removing those distortions, learning to better connect with your higher self has been so important for me, not just to best figure out what it is that I want to do, but also to get the confidence back that we all inherently have without all of those labels society puts on us.
I love this conversation. I think this is so important to. Release people from all the things they're carrying that have nothing to do with them.
And to move everyone back in alignment with how they could be contributing to the world. In a way that like lights them up and like things start working.
So how has stepping into your business, like what has it op opened up or unlocked for you in other areas that have surprised you?
Great question and very timely. So one of the things I realized with publishing is it the things that I love most about publishing are working one-on-one with clients and hearing their stories.
So if it's a children's book writer, it's just getting to connect with them on a personal level and find out more about them. I've worked with several authors on their memoirs, so really getting deep into their life and how that has shaped their perspective and the way that they view the world because of that lens that they have.
That was also my favorite part of teaching was outside of the classroom. It was on my prep hour when students would walk in and they would unload. All of this stuff that they were dealing with. Yeah. And I would listen to their stories and think my gosh, you're so resilient. And if it were me, I wouldn't even be in school right now.
Like I i'm, I am astounded by the human spirit and people's unique stories. And so I've recently started recording. My podcast, which we'll be releasing soon called Storytelling. And my intention with that is to really bring forward my favorite things about everything I've done in both careers, which is sharing those stories that help give people an understanding of why people operate the way that they do in this world.
Yeah. You know what their perspective is, all the different lenses we have. My intention is when we can better understand the perspective somebody has in their life experiences, we can better appreciate the decisions they're making and how they lead their life, and hopefully dissolve so much of the divisiveness in this culture.
'cause it's maddening, this divisiveness I'm
yes for. And like we're, for everyone who's listening, we're recording this the day after election day in 2022. So it's very present. But I actually got very hopeful looking at how the results were coming in because you saw how the increase in people voting, like split splitting cards, it's called, where people were choosing to vote independent Democrat or Republican based on each person, not just like circling one thing on the ballot, which I was really excited to see because I don't know anyone who is like.
I'm over here and there's no way I'm changing. And you're like, no. Everyone is if we had to draw it out, it would be this crazy diagram of I agree over here, but I agree over here and I agree over here. And I'm like, when? When is our, when are our political leaders gonna get that? We are so much more alike than you are trying to use marketing to say otherwise a million percent and we're so over it.
Yeah. Nobody actually wants to be fighting with each other. Like it is this created concept that we're hating each other and disagreeing and,
I just.
I agree. And with the, that's so frustrating with part system. I just don't know, like the vast majority of people I know are also independent because they, they they can flex some issues from over here, but even if there's a candidate that rises up, then the two sides tend to squash. Yeah. The person other, I think we are, I. I wholeheartedly believe that consciousness is rising. That is as she as it is right now. It is because all this stuff has to be on earth before we can get to where we're going.
And I think it's shining a light on how much we all loathe this division. And that we can start to find common ground. And so that, that give me hope.
Yeah. And I. I love that you've started a podcast. Welcome, welcome to the community. Thank you. And stor telling, getting to share other people's stories and just the, I get caught off guard when I meet people who aren't curious about other humans.
Yes.
Me too. I recently had an experience where it was such a one-sided conversation. I'd ask a question that wasn't supposed to be a one word yes or no answer, and that's all I would get back. And I was like. What are you from another planet? Like I don't, no. This is supposed to be interactive, like what's happening.
I cannot meet someone and not have a million questions. So when someone else doesn't, I'm like, what do you think about all day? What are you using that brain for?
I agree.
So I'm really excited to see the evolution of your podcast and I love that. You are leaning more and more into your talents and your gifts and just like the selfishness of what brings me joy and lights me up.
And I think we get so nervous about being selfish when we're planning not just our business, but our life. And that leads me to something that's also really unique about you as a client, in addition to being the fastest one to get a return on your investment. We also were really strategic in structuring your business cycle to be exactly what you wanted.
You said, I don't wanna work summers, I have two kids. I wanna spend that time with them. And you're like, I don't know how to grow a business and not work Summers. Yeah. So what did we do for everyone who wants to know now?
Yeah.
So it was basically, it was you telling me and affirming that you can do this.
Like it you went into this business to create something that works for you. So if you're not creating something that works for you, what's the point? Which was so like I almost needed permission for someone to say you can. Take your summers to be as flexible as you wanted them to be. Yeah.
So that was a breath of fresh air and what I have learned, books really come in cycles. A lot of people wanna release them during the holiday season and they wanna release them in the spring, which makes sense. So it. Organically lend it itself to many of these books would then be in production, which is the other side of it during the summer.
And so whether it was where they were being printed or my design team was working on them, it was more hands off for me. And just a little bit more management. As opposed to really working deeply with content in those hour meetings every other week. And so that alleviated a ton of time this summer and my summer looked so much differently from last summer, so I'm so grateful for that.
Yeah.
I'm just glad that you trusted me in it also. 'cause so many times a client will ask for what they really want and I'll say, you can have it. And they go. No, I can't. And they choose something different. So you were such a great client at just being like, okay, I can have what I want. Let's make it, and that was really great.
I have to add that in. You giving me permission to carve it out just as I wanted to. I continued to double my salary from the previous year because of your coaching. So I am. So great. Love that.
I love that. And I also want to let everyone listening know that talk about what it means to be an independent publisher because Yeah you are so much more than a publisher and there are so many people out there who have an idea for a book, a children's book, their own book, whatever it is.
And. They don't know where to start. They think they have to work with some big, huge company like Penguin or Random House to make it happen. And you have so many clients who have Amazon bestsellers.
And they've done it completely independently through you because you're not just a publisher.
I refer to you as like an author, coach. Yeah. So explain to people what the process is to work with you and what would that look like?
Yeah. Thank you for that description because I do also think of myself as an author coach first. The whole reason I got into publishing was because of my love of writing, and it is something that has always inherently come naturally to me.
And so when I was teaching, it was the same thing. Like I, I had. Teachers that they really loved to analyze books and talk about books. But when it came time to writing, especially when the students wrote their memoirs, I was like, yes, this is my favorite project. So definitely an author, coach first, and I work with authors in their content development from sometimes they have a.
Full manuscript, rough draft, and sometimes they come to me with an incredible story and say, I have no idea how to do this, but I have a story to share. And I'm like, perfect, you came to the right person. I can't wait to dig in. And I really do love to work with material from the ground up because it can be almost more difficult to go back and try to.
Change and edit something that is already built out. For anybody who's thinking about writing a book if you just have the thought of it, that is a great time to connect. Yeah. Because I can really guide from the beginning stages. So in addition to the author coaching I would say that the first.
Half of our time together is working on the actual content, and we use those meetings to discuss what it is that I want them to build on what I have questions about. And one of the things that. I think anybody will say who's worked with me is I will push them to dig deeper. And it's something that a coach, is always going to do.
Yeah. Whether it's your coaching style, a personal trainer, you need that person to push you to the next level. And then of course, it's the accountability partner who keeps momentum. So the thing about a creative outlet, especially a book, is it's easy to. Set it aside and you get busy with all of your time commitments.
So we meet every other week so that we can keep momentum and they have homework to complete in between. I'll have things I'm working on and then we come together and share ideas. In addition to that, I have learned the publishing industry since I released my first book, so I know about. The various ways to bring forward a book, whether it's print on demand, going through offset printing.
I understand the Amazon algorithms and what categories books fit in. I also have a kick ass design team that they're fantastic and their husband and wife and I just adore them. And we. If it's a children's book, I will facilitate the Illustrator acquisition because that can be a very lengthy process and very overwhelming to a new author.
And the other thing that I do that I think is really unique and different is I help authors design Kickstarter campaigns. And the reason I do this is because bringing forward a book is an investment. Yeah. Yeah. And traditionally. You may not have to, if with a traditional company, you won't have to invest initially, but then they're gonna take 75% royalties of your book for its lifetime, even if they're doing nothing to market it.
And to me, that's highway robbery. So I don't take ties. I simply wanna be compensated for my time and bringing the book to fruition. And then. It's like I send my kids off to college and watch 'em spread their wings, which is pretty cool. So the Kickstarter, the crowdfunding really does help people offset that initial investment.
Yeah,
I love that. Something that I realized recently, talking to another podcast guest, they asked me who my heroes were as a kid. And I realized that all of mine were fictional, and I didn't realize that until very recently, which just shows how real they were to me. Like I was obsessed with the Babysitters Club books as a kid, Nancy Drew.
Gem and the Holograms and I realized that they were all like teenage entrepreneurs and I was like, it is no surprise that I'm doing what I'm doing now. Funny.
Yeah.
Because as a kid I'm like, of course you can be 13 and start a business. Like totally. You are crying out loud, Nancy Drew's like breaking into buildings and that's seems to be okay.
Like she always gets it. Always works out. And I thought that was so crazy to me that of course there were like powerful other people. Like I always thought it was really interesting like what Amelia Earhart did, and there were people that were real, that I was inspired by even, parents and family members, but the people who really, I was like, yes, that those are my people.
They weren't even real.
How have did you have that same experience with books? Do you remember a book that. You had an aha moment about either yourself or how the world works or what you wanted.
Great question. I would say as a kid, babysitter's Club was for sure my favorite series.
Yeah. And yes, funny that they were kid entrepreneurs just like acting like adults. They've come up with a TV show now that my daughter's really into. She's also read all the books too. It's been fun to relive that with her. Yeah. But the book that has shaped a lot of my. Mindset on how I view the world.
Has, is the Glass Castle by Jeanette Walls. Okay. And it's about a dysfunctional family. The dad was like this crazy genius, but a severe addict and the mom likely had bipolar and was also extremely creative and a phenomenal artist. Very dynamic characters. And then the daughter, Jeanette, throughout the story, she had to grow up quickly and become very independent.
But because of the fact that her dad was so intelligent and that her mom was creative, she did, and they would do all of these have these interesting conversations and read big books at a young age. She went on to be very successful in life and. It affirmed to me that the only limitations that we have are the ones that we put on ourselves.
And I've recognized that I come from a very loving family and I have not had a difficult life. So I know that there are people who are like, oh, easy for you to say. But I've also taught in. In schools and in districts where my students had lives not very different from this character.
And so when we would read this book together and we would talk about it they saw themselves in this woman and I have watched these kids, so many of them walk away from their backgrounds and make a better themselves. And so Ozzy says Hi. So I know that I truly believe that the human spirit is incredibly resilient and that we can carve out any life that we want from ourselves or ourselves. And that if we allow things done to us or the past to shape our future. Then we're just gonna be spinning our wheels. And so yeah, that, that book was a huge eye-opener for me and one that I loved working with the students reading with the students. So
that speaks directly into, what does powerful mean to you?
And when you see powerful next to ladies, does it change how you're thinking about power,
I've never thought of powerful as like a, I guess a gender specific thing until I became older. I definitely had instances in my career. I remember being called the blonde chick one time in a teaching position by. Male. And he was talking to somebody else and referred to me as the blonde chick, and so I was like, oh, okay. So that's his frame of reference of what I can bring to the table apparently, which is very little. And so I've had situations like that where I wanted it, it made me want to prove to him how valuable I was for sure. But. Overall. Other than that, I've really just thought of powerful as people who.
Refuse to adopt a victim mindset no matter what's thrown their way. No matter, some of the people I follow on social media are, there's one gal who's a CrossFit athlete who doesn't have, she's amputee. She's has one leg missing and just watching her videos is yeah. I if I don't get to the gym today, and she's doing that I, I have no excuse.
So I think it's just so inspiring to see people who have all these obstacles and they do it anyways, and they work really hard. It's inspiring for me. So I would say people who are, resilient. They don't adopt a victim mentality. And then people who really speak their truth, even when it's difficult, and do so in a way with integrity.
With kindness and in a way to, really just be transparent and vulnerable. Yeah,
we ask everybody on the podcast where they put themselves on the powerful Lady scale. If zero is your average everyday human and 10 is the most powerful lady you can imagine. Where would you put yourself today and on average?
That is a great question. And one, I think we should all do little check-ins with every so often. I don't typically think of that. So what I will say is most of my life, I think I was around probably like a three or a four. I. I think I was doing a little bit of hiding. I'm somebody who I think a lot of people would've considered the cheerleader on the sidelines.
As opposed to stepping out and into myself and. Being that person was fantastic because I I studied people. I love supporting people, making them feel good. And you get to a certain point where you're like I wanna be out there too. I literally had it was my sophomore year when you had to be invited to junior prom in order to go and I watched, most of my friends get asked, and I wasn't. And that was what propelled me to start losing weight. And I just started walking every day and and changing my lifestyle. But I think for a long time I was just scared to step forward. And so in the last five years, I think I've really shifted and.
Because of my meditation practice, because I've had women who've seen me in more of a leadership role and I've seen my potential. I've definitely grown. I'm, I don't think I could ever give myself the highest grade, 'cause I'm a huge perpetual learner. I'm a big believer in broke mindset.
So I'm, maybe a six, seven, I don't know.
Yeah.
Somewhere around there for
people who. Consider themselves like not readers.
What do you want them to know about what's possible? Through books?
Yeah. There's so much that happens when you read a book where you. I don't know how to describe it other than you can be transported to an another world is one thing.
If it's fiction or but especially with memoirs and people's stories there's so much that we can learn from other experiences that we may never have. The opportunity to experience in our own life and. Cultures have burned books to eradicate a, societies have burned books to eradicate a culture, to to just diminish it. And it speaks to how valuable stories are and storytelling is because it really does give people a better understanding as to, this lifestyle, this character, this person. This part of the world. So yeah, I think it's incredibly valuable.
I can't imagine life without books, right?
I, you'll often think or be asked if you had to lose one sense, what would it be? And I'm like, not my eyes.
Please. Because I can't sure, I could listen to books, but it's not the same. And I'm so picky because I do read tangible books and I listen to books, but I'm so picky about who the author is when I listen that I have just stopped after five minutes, been like, Nope, I cannot listen to this narrator.
Same. But the, everyone in Thrive will tease me or clients because I always have a book for a response often, and. I just can't imagine not having it. Like I've had to call back the books in my life just from a space perspective and Oh, sure. It's like a whole process of be, of really going through that kaari of thank you so much.
You're now gonna go to another home and make another impact.
Yeah. Yeah. And I, there are many books that I've come back to because, it's my husband and I love comedy movies and we'll recite them a lot of times and a lot of times you watch something the second, third time and you find that little line, that dry sense of humor that you never noticed before.
And it's super funny. Same way with books, but on such a more poignant level of things that you pick up on that you didn't. That you didn't see the first time, or you're in a different part of your life. And it just speaks to you differently. It hits you differently. And so yeah, there's some I have that I wouldn't give up.
I have the Glass Castle for sure is one. I love Gabby Bernstein's books. And anything that has to do with really, the mindset and and manifesting exactly what you want. Because I really feel like wholeheartedly without a doubt, we are all here with a clear purpose. And I think our whole journey in life is to remember what our purpose is.
And so just need to play and involves ourself with the different things that light us up. And eventually things will start to click. But I think, the generations that came before us. We're very structured and they didn't allow a lot of that play. And I think this next generation is here to turn the dial on that.
And I'm so excited to see what they do.
Yeah. Speaking of the next generation, I know family is so important to you. How do you, how have you, throughout your life, prioritized family and how does that continue to evolve as you're stepping into this new phase of your life as well?
Yeah. For sure I have.
I have been in those moments where I've thought, okay, I created this business for more flexibility and. I'm now like, it's that saying I became an entrepreneur so I could quit the nine to five and now I'm working 24 7. You can easily fall into that trap when you love what you do. Because it's not work.
I find myself a lot of time in the evenings if the kids are busy or distracted just wanting to pull, work out and do it because I enjoyed that much. I didn't have that with teaching, you're in your groove when you're starting to do that. But there've been several things, you and I working to change my summer calendar so I could be very present with the kids. I've had my kids verbally say something before actually. It was a couple weeks ago, Garrison said something like you work too much now. And that was a bit of a shot to the gut, but I was on my computer and it was in the evening, and it dawned on me like, I have been taking my computer out more recently, and it's just a slippery slope because sometimes I would take it out when he's going off to hockey, Whitney's going off to dance, but then I'd be.
Involved in something and wouldn't put it away. And so it was a really good check, and I have been much more clear on the evenings are so precious and those are my time with the kids as well as the weekends and just trying to work as away, as long as they're around and present. If they're at activities or then I can dip back into it, but yeah, they're to the age where they'll call me on it now, which is great. And, and I will shift that quickly 'cause it's too important.
For everyone who is excited to reach out to you to work on their book and to help bring their story to life, how can they connect with you, follow you, and find you?
Yeah. Through my website, there is a book, a call button, I think, on every page. And that will sync with my Google calendar and people can just find a time that works for them. I can be found on Instagram. My handle is l bednar. I do have a Rodney K press Instagram. But honestly, I'm not good at managing both.
And because I'm. I do more on my personal page. That's another one as well. My storytelling podcast will be up soon. I have a Facebook page. Lindsay Bedner writes, I'm on LinkedIn is Lindsay Bedner. I think I have a Twitter account, but I don't use it. Okay. So those would be the best ways for sure.
And coming up, we're going to be starting a YouTube channel as well.
Love it. And the business name is Rodney K Press. So if they go to rodney k press.com, they'll find things too.
Yes. Thank you. Okay.
You're welcome. It has been such a pleasure to get to spend this morning with you and to so fun to share who you are with everyone who's listening because this podcast was almost called the Awesome and the Up To Something.
And I really do think that you are awesome and up to something in so many areas of your life where, you know, when we talk about the eight spheres of life that I'll coach people through. You are intentionally either working on or implemented systems in so many of them, and it just shows that when you, we can't win in all of them at the same moment, right?
As your son pointed out. But like you're so intentional choosing like what you want and where and what do I need and is this working for everyone? I care about my commitments and. I, it's just such a great example and thank you knowing that there are so many stories out there that we need to hear.
I'm excited people to call you so we can get those books made. Me too. Thank
you so much. Time just flew by
it. It always does. It's amazing. Yeah.
All the links to connect with Lindsay and Rodney K Press are available in the show notes@thepowerfulladies.com. Please subscribe to this podcast wherever you're listen. And I would love it if you would leave us a rating and review. They are so important for show visibility. Come join us on Instagram at Powerful Ladies.
And if you're looking to connect directly with me, please visit kara duffy.com or find me on Instagram. Ats Kara under Duffy. I'll be back next week with a brand new episode and a new amazing guest. Until then, I hope we're taking on being powerful in your life. Go be awesome and up to something you love.
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Created and hosted by Kara Duffy
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