Welcome to the Phoenix Tales Podcast

Yuliana Kim-Grant's Phoenix Tales

Welcome to the Phoenix Tales Podcast

Show Notes:

Welcome to the premier podcast episode of Phoenix Tales, a show about women overcoming challenges in their lives, and, like the Phoenix, being reborn with their lives reimagined. Joining our host, Yuliana Kim-Grant, this week is Ginger McKnight-Chavers, author of In the Heart of Texas. A graduate of Georgetown’s School of Foreign Service and Harvard Law School, Ginger was a practicing lawyer when challenges in her personal life inspired her to pursue another course, resulting in her own Phoenix Tale which she shares with listeners here today.

Ginger begins the conversation by describing those challenges which she faced, the traits she possessed which kept her moving forward through them, and how she came to possess them. She goes on to describe the insecurities she faced in her career as a woman of color, her feelings of being an imposter and the impact this had, her advice for empty nesters on re-engaging with the world, and giving yourself permission to pursue your passion. The episode concludes with Ginger sharing the song that she feels best describes her life. Eloquent, insightful, engaging, and thoroughly inspirational, Ginger and her tale of remaking her life provide the perfect foundation and springboard for what you can expect to hear in upcoming episodes of the Phoenix Tales podcast.

Episode Highlights:

• The challenges that redirected the course of Ginger’s life
• The traits that kept Ginger moving forward through her challenges and how she came to possess them
• The insecurities she faced in her career as a woman of color
• Her feelings of being an imposter and the impact upon her
• Ginger’s advice for empty nesting listeners to re-engage with the world
• Giving yourself permission to pursue or reignite a passion
• The one song that describes Ginger’s life

Quotes:

“I stopped seeing myself as an attorney who just liked to write in my spare time to taking writing seriously, and it transformed my life.”

“I'm the kind of person that thinks about things and analyzes them before I react for better and for worse.”

“I just became this sort of serial kind of multitask or tunnel vision kind of machine.”

“As a writer, you know, I think most of us feel like an imposter.”

“You belong there, but there's just a little something going on underneath the surface.”

“You're watching the world in order to navigate it because you feel like you're not one of those people that just waltzes down the red carpet.”

“You're always on the lookout for a situation that could be harmful or dangerous.”

“Am I at the in-law's house or in my family home? Just that undercurrent of you're never sure when someone's going to push you out the door.”

“It is a blessing to have really supportive and grounded parents and grandparents that were very active in your life.”

“Black women are the biggest demographic of readers in America.”

“I went with a small press, I hired my own publicist. I had already plotted out what I wanted to do, and who I wanted to reach, and how I wanted to do it, and created a budget for it, and what I thought was reasonable.”

“Starting to take that hour or half hour or whatever it is to devote to something that you just always want to do, but you never have time to do it. That helps because it just trains your brain to think about things other than your family.”

“Like the Phoenix, you know, you really just remade your life at a point that most people couldn't imagine doing that.”

Links:

Phoenix Tales on Instagram

Phoenix Tales on Spotify

Phoenix Tales on Facebook

Ginger's Facebook Page

Ginger's Twitter Page