Hey Superstars!! 🦸🏽♀️
In this episode of the SuperwomanCan podcast, host Samantha interviews author Micole Williams. They discuss the importance of empowering women and breaking past negative stereotypes. Micole shares her daily routine for maintaining a positive mindset and introduces her book, "35 Love Notes to Self," which contains affirmations for readers.
They also discuss Micole's journey as an author, her strategic approach to publishing, and the role of his childhood and faith in shaping his career.
Micole also reflects on her personal growth and transformation, the impact of her faith, and her experiences with peer pressure and mental health during middle school.Tune in to the SuperWomenCan Podcast with Samantha Lubanzu!
💜Michole Williams💜
As an internationally featured writer, publisher and filmmaker, Micole Williams is an eclectic force with a love for community, a gift of storytelling, and a passion for education and entrepreneurship. This Jackie of many trades loves inspiring and empowering people to evolve eclectically with her award-winning media arts business, Eclectically You Experience.
The proud native Houston, Texan is a third-generation teacher / first-generation entrepreneur.
Her Houston-rooted company celebrates literacy, artistry, wellness and entrepreneurship. The University of Houston's SURE program selected her business and her Amazon’s Best Seller nonfiction debut, MISS LIT FOR LIFE LESSONS as one of its 2023 participants. Williams is dedicated to equipping the future, serving as a classroom teacher for over 14 years in Houston and surrounding areas and this book and lessons are continuing to serve a community. Her most recent book, 35 LOVE NOTES TO SELF, published in 2023, spreads the message of self care and self-love.
Houston has always been her muse and a backdrop in her fiction novel series, TANGLED WEB OF TRUE LOVE TALES and TOXIC TIES TRILOGY. She’s enjoyed being featured author at three major Texas universities, NAACP Convention, NABJ.org, and other national platforms as well as working behind-the-scenes in Hollywood on TV shows. Dedicated to honing her craft as a storyteller, she earned her MFA in Screenwriting at Houston Baptist University in 2021. Her work in TV and Film has been honored when she was selected as a 2021 James Baldwin’s Urban Writer-in-Residence and 2022 NY Athena Film Festival TV Lab Participant.
Her most recent writing/producing/directing project is an autobiographical documentary about her writing journey, “365 Days in LA”. With film festival success at Cannes Shorts and over 8 other festivals, winning Best Documentary at Ticfy Festival, her film premiered on Magic Johnson’s Aspire TV Network in 2022. EYE is steadfast about continuing to serve and share stories in the process!
💜SuperWomenCan Podcast💜
Sharing our unique, compelling, and powerful stories as well as hints and tips; Samantha Lubanzu and her Guests on the SuperWomenCan Podcast will show you how to supercharge your Success from the ground UP!!
SuperWomenCan Podcast, will help change the narrative, and shift your mindset as you listen to how to be more successful in your career, make more money, have a better home life, and have more time with family and holidays you will be ready to take successful life-changing steps.
So if you're a woman of colour or even an ally who wants to be successful and reach your highest dreams!
So what are you waiting for?
Join us now and let us help you make more money, have a better home life and spend more time with your family whilst achieving the career of your dreams!
Samantha Lubanzu host:
🖥 Website Find me at: www.samanthalubanzu.com
👔 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samantha-lubanzu-career-biz-strategist/
📲 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/samantha.lubanzu
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📲 Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/sammylubby
Guest Social Handles:
📲https://g.co/kgs/kRwoxc
Timestamps
Samantha (00:00:02) - Hello. I am so excited! As always, you are now tuned in to Superwoman Kan podcast. I am delighted beyond words. I like when you just can't move and you see because you're on edge. Excited to hear more because we have a special guest and I'm going to inducer in just a moment. Another super superwoman and I cannot wait to share. But before I do that, of course, I've got to remind you the Superwoman Can podcast has been created for women like you who are breaking past negative stereotypes, narratives, glass ceilings, concrete ceilings, and all of the above that tell us that we can and we know we're superwomen and super can. Now, I'm delighted because we've got such a superwoman right now, who's going to be able to tell you how you can gear up to have a happier life, to be more successful, have more money in the bank, and more importantly, have more balance at home? Let's hear from our special guest. That's the noise of making from actually moving my seat as we introduce Michael Williams.
Samantha (00:01:15) - Welcome. Tell us more about yourself.
Micole (00:01:18) - Hi everyone, and thank you so much for having me. Samantha. This is quite an honor to be called any day of the week a superwoman, but just really excited to be here. And yes, it is all about just empowering women and even the men who support the women percent.
Samantha (00:01:37) - I love that men who are listening in we got you here too. So tell us more, but tell us about yourself. What do you do? How do you do it? Why do you do it? Is that a million work questions?
Micole (00:01:52) - Yeah, I really would start off with. I really try to work on the inner life first. We have so many external pressures and so many external voices and noises, and I think it's really important before even starting our day, to really just tap into the inner spirit and figure out where we really are. A lot of times we just wake up differently. I know I normally wake up really well, like I'm in a good place, and then all of a sudden I start thinking and realizing what I'm about to go into this world, social medias and that world and maybe external factors at the job and just those things can start to change, just even the way I start my day.
Micole (00:02:37) - So I think it's really important to get a ritual together and get a routine together, some type of structure to where you can combat those voices and noises before you even really get going. And one of the current things that I've been feeling that has been helping not only me, but luckily other people along the way has been my recent book. So it is 35 Love Notes to Self and it is 35 affirmations that really get you going to where you can really step out into that world and I guess be the superwoman. Oh, I.
Samantha (00:03:10) - Love the title 35 Letters to Self. So 35 Love Letters to self can one of the love letters? Is it really long? Like it? Just a love a natural letter or is it short? Yeah. Super short. Can you give us like one.
Micole (00:03:25) - Like how today is the 24th, right.
Samantha (00:03:28) - Oh, like this moving moment.
Micole (00:03:31) - I'm looking at this calendar from afar. Is it the 24th? Really it is right. I know right now with my days, but going so far earlier and so it fits in our purse.
Micole (00:03:42) - Right. So I was really mindful of that. You can carry it with you, but it says day 24. I strive to learn even more knowing that I don't know everything. I am humble and I do want to read another one because I vary in length. But like for instance, day 22, it says I quiet because it goes with what I was saying earlier. I quiet outside noise and the notion that I have to be who society projects me to be. I am always finding and keeping a purposeful groove that reveals my destiny. I am eliminating confusion and I am living and operating in my creator's perfect timing. So yes, that's something that to me, I'm really happy that it's setting a tone for your day. And then it also is a journal. So you get to write on the side whatever love note you want to yourself that makes them more personable, because that's what it's really about. You set a tone, but we all are carrying on our different lives and we all are going down our different paths, and we just need to make it make sense for ourselves.
Samantha (00:04:55) - I love that. I love that a lot. I'm very big on affirmations and setting yourself up for the day. Yes. A really great way to set up for the day. Whatever. Like habits and routines and rituals do you have that creates success for you?
Micole (00:05:12) - I think success is something I've had to come to terms with. What is that for me? What definition do I have? And for me, I just look at it like someone who is at peace, someone who has their obligations taken care of, someone who can enjoy the freedoms of life without feelings of guilt and resentment and just weird, damaging emotions, and someone who is pouring into others in a way of servitude or service. Or for so many years I was a teacher and so that was my job. But even it spills over into just life in general, and some of the main things that fill me up inside are just sharing with other people and also learning from them. So if that success, I feel like the way that to keep that I feel it is definitely my faith has kept me very focused in what makes me feel at peace.
Micole (00:06:07) - And it keeps and gives me peace that surpasses my understanding. And another thing that I would say is I'm a fan of really nice bubble baths. I can give you the recipe because when I say every weekend, if I don't do this, I don't really start my week. And what I do is I love the hot bubble baths, but it's Epsom salt. Lavender is best, especially if you're like, high octane, always working. You need something soothing. You can also use essential oils. I love peppermint, it's a contrast where you have this soothing aspect, but then you have this spritzer or this feeling of energy, and you can also use orange or lavender or eucalyptus. I love that, and just a couple of dots drop ups are good. And then I love baking soda as well in the actual bath. So you have a couple of different things of course. Bubble bath. Right. So that's to me the remedy to a lot of things, no matter what your week was, no matter how many travels or maybe teaching or maybe being a mom, or if you're blessed to do that, whatever the week has brought you that's so beautiful and also so challenging.
Micole (00:07:21) - You can end off with that. That that Sunday is really good for a bubble bath, in my opinion. And then I try to save that if I'm not traveling with the book. I try to let that be a day of creativity and taking care of some business I couldn't take care of during the week depending on what was going on. So I treat myself to a matinee movie if I can. These past weeks I've been all over the place, just cross country wise. But if I'm home, I will go to a movie. And lately we know not a lot of movies are out because of the strike, which is very understood. But I would go to a matinee on that Saturday and just try to sit in the middle, where normally it's not a lot of people there, so I was just trying to get lost in something creative because as a writer, you can always appreciate somebody else's work, and that's one thing. And then Thursdays I try to devote those afternoons to clients who are publishing their books.
Micole (00:08:22) - Since I am a publisher, that's my best day to just share knowledge in that way.
Samantha (00:08:29) - Wow, your whole week sounds like my relaxing year. If I can have one of your days, even just one a year, I'd be very happy. It sounds good. You know what? I was just sat there when you said you had me at Bubble Bath girl. Oh, it's only I have. I have the Epsom salt lavender in. I was literally going, I need to do that tonight. I'm not going to Sunday. Who wants to wait till Sunday? I want to. I haven't done that for a long time, so I think thank you I will definitely. You've just reinforced it. Go and have a little bubble bath and agree. Anyone listening to to in today, I would just say self-care is vital and having that affirmation, that book is incredible. Honestly, going to go and get that book because I think if you set up your rituals like you've just said and you take care of yourself, then everything else takes care of itself.
Samantha (00:09:24) - Oh, yeah.
Micole (00:09:25) - Love that.
Samantha (00:09:26) - Yeah. So let me. So you said your business. You're a publisher. I understand that you've written your own book. Have you written more than one book? Tell me more about the business.
Micole (00:09:36) - I have my business. Name is eclectic. You experience? I know it's a long. It's a long one. I love long titles and names, I guess, but it is. It started off in 2017 as an event planning company, and I did event and print design for different businesses. It could be locally as well as across the board. The pandemic definitely pushed me to pivot a bit, and I found that consulting was also a safer ground to still continue to serve my customers, but now in a different way. So since people would always ask me, how did you publish? How did you make a film? How did you do this? How did you do that? I use those times to now just introduce that service as well. So as far as publishing, I have published four books under my own small imprint.
Micole (00:10:29) - And so that's something that's very empowering for me, because I know I've always wanted to be a writer, but I didn't know how that was going to come about. And it's nothing more fulfilling than just publishing the types of books that you believe in. And the first book that I published was in a different I published under a different printer and so on, and also publisher, and then I learned from them. And then once it was time for me to do it, I've just pretty much changed all covers and did reprints of everything because there were two different really, the first book and then the second book. I did it in a different way as well, so I just re-introduced all of them in 2019. The first two are fiction novels.
Samantha (00:11:10) - Oh wow.
Micole (00:11:11) - We'll be finishing up that series. It's called Tangled Web of True Love Tales. And so I really delved into seven women who represented the seven deadly sins. And they each had their own love slash cautionary tale, and they were all intertwined with one another, whether they knew it or not.
Micole (00:11:29) - And so that journey pretty much introduced all seven. And then the second book was Toxic Ties trilogy, and it is a part of it's connected to that first book that I wrote. So that's what I was saying. I need to finish the trilogy, and that's something I plan to do in the next couple of months, so to speak. In months could be next two years. I'm giving myself that. And yeah, no, that's to have been non-fiction books. So one was for my teaching community, this lit for life lessons, and it's for Ela teachers or English language arts teachers. And then this, of course, 35 Love Notes to Self is the the most recent one.
Samantha (00:12:13) - Wow. Amazing. So you've written four books. How how long did it take you to write all those four books?
Micole (00:12:19) - The first one, it took me the longest because I was in college and I was trying to understand the business, and I talked to a lot of people, and I was just trying to figure out what route it was.
Micole (00:12:28) - So it was six years, and I don't think it was six years of writing, but six years of navigating. And. Yeah. And then the second three years, and then the third was maybe four months, five months. But I would say it took a lifetime of teaching in order to write it, because it was about it's a resource book for teachers. So I had to think about over the course of those times or over the course of a decade plus, what worked in the classroom. And then this is funny because 35 Notes to Self, I would say it took me a shorter time, but I didn't publish it right away. I wanted to see if it worked first. So even though I wrote it like within maybe a week, because it is a set of affirmations, right? I didn't publish it until five years later after I had been using them.
Samantha (00:13:22) - Oh wow. So you know the results of them and now you're using yours? Yeah.
Micole (00:13:27) - Was like, let me wait until.
Samantha (00:13:30) - You're using your success factor. You know that it works. And now you're confident in what you put out into the world, which is an amazing way of doing it because we're so impatient, right? People just like, you know what? I want it out now. I want it in the world. But actually, you've tested it, tweaked it, just did it, refined it, then said, now it's ready. I love that it feels like it's gold. It's meant for gold. That's what it feels like to me. Well, and then these quick let's these quick wins get it out. I always hear in the coaching world out is better than in. So get it out as fast as you can. Don't keep it in. Just get it out. And then what happens is then you're not happy with it and then it's fine. At least it's out. And you see what I mean. Then you want to bring it back and redo things. So I like that the way you've processed it in a different way.
Samantha (00:14:17) - Tell me about you as a person. Tell us your journey through life and what has made you this successful person that you are today, sitting in front of us across national landscapes. I know you're in LA right now and I'm in based in the in the UK, so we're literally international right now.
Micole (00:14:37) - Oh, that was so awesome. First and foremost, thank you for thinking that I am successful. I appreciate that, and I feel like it comes from a place of doing what makes you. And I feel like when I was a kid, I was just writing, I was just creating. I didn't think about an audience. I was doing this because it felt like the most natural way of being me. And so my expression through writing pretty much was very much my communication to myself. And then later on, I thought about it within my faith. It's my communication to God just trying to find confirmation and understanding about myself. And then I always notice it was always somebody watching, though, even though it was so personal, I would really marvel at the fact that there was always somebody to tell me from their standpoint how it inspired them.
Micole (00:15:31) - And so I think throughout walking this creative life out, which is tough at times because creation is more you are not seeing the results, you see it within yourself. Or you may be moving with the spirit of something, but you're not necessarily able to produce it just yet. And so it has been that I've had to have a lot of faith and a lot of confidence in what I the vision is first and then finding through quiet time, and then also through research and also through talking to the right people how to get something done. So I'm all about execution, and that's really what it's about. Many of us have ideas, but I'm really, really steadfast about making sure that if you have an idea, you have a way to navigate enough to get it to
