#40: Turning Pain Into Power – A Conversation with Rhoda Banks
JULY 10, 2025
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In this deeply moving episode of Courage to Heal, Anna sits down with Rhoda Banks, motivational speaker, coach, and author of the powerful memoir Daughter of an Assassin. Rhoda shares her extraordinary story of growing up amid violence, intergenerational trauma, and emotional neglect – and how she rose above it all to become a successful executive and advocate for healing and self-worth.
Together, Anna and Rhoda explore themes of childhood trauma, survivor’s guilt, emotional neglect, body image, forgiveness, faith, and personal transformation. Rhoda’s honesty and resilience will resonate with anyone who has struggled with feeling unworthy or burdened by their past. This episode is a powerful reminder that healing is possible, and your legacy is yours to write.
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Transcript
Anna: Hello friends and welcome to Courage to Heal. Today I am joined by an incredible guest. Her name is Rhoda Banks. Rhoda is a passionate storyteller and advocate for personal growth and self-discovery. She's the author of the book, Daughter of An Assassin, which we'll talk about today. She's also a motivational speaker, a podcast host, a coach, and a human resources executive.
Rhoda, welcome to Courage to Heal. It's a pleasure to have you here.
Rhoda: I’m glad to be here.
Anna: Okay, so like I was telling you earlier, I finished reading your book, Daughter of An Assassin this morning, and I have to say it deeply moved me and definitely made me cry more than once. I am really glad that you decided to share your story with the world. Thank you.
Rhoda: Thank you for having an interest in it as well.
I believe that the book really resonates with a more global audience around, childhood trauma, around parenting patterns, unresolved trauma, the dynamic between the mother and daughter, relationships, et cetera.
Anna: Yeah, absolutely. So many excellent themes and you know, when you read about it and you realize that this is a real person, just one person who went through all of this and came out to be somebody as awesome as you are.
It's really a remarkable story, so, okay. I'd like to get started at the beginning of your book. At only five years old, you, you witnessed some pretty hard stuff. You witnessed a murder, and you also attended your dad's funeral, and you found out that your father, Earl Williams, Jr. was an assassin for one of the biggest and deadliest gangs in St. Louis.
And even though you didn't know him at all, his reputation followed you well into your teenage years with several instances where people took his sins out on you.
Rhoda: Yeah. In one way or another. That's so true. Yeah. Very accurate.
Anna: So, so I wonder, looking back now, what would you tell your younger self about being his daughter?
Rhoda: Uh, if I would tell myself anything, the younger version of me is that I would say his choices and his legacy is not yours to own, and that I can have a different legacy and that I can make choices.
I feel really bad about the choices he made and the families he adversely impacted from the behaviors that he had, but those aren't mine to carry. So, I would tell myself that. I will admit though, that at the, at the age that these things were taking place, I didn't really fully understand like the depths of it.
I remember my mom always saying, be careful who you tell your dad, who you tell who your dad is. And I just would like, that would just go over my head. So, when it would come up in conversation, because for some reason I always came up, I would say, oh, Earl Jr. was my dad. And it would always evoke a lot of emotion or reaction.
They would be like, what? And I never got it. My supervisor, it came up who my dad was, shared that my dad had killed his brother. And as a result of that, he terminated me and my friend, but I didn't connect that until I was like in my thirties. Like I, even though I went home crying, telling my mom that.
Rhoda, I keep telling you, stop telling people who your dad is. People hold grudges. I still didn't con, I didn't process. I was like 14 when that happened. But when I got older I said, oh, he was bitter and angry and he couldn't stand to look at me because he did say I looked just like him. And I only then did I understand. I didn’t fully understand it at that young age.
Anna: Right. I think it just goes to show what an innocent kid you were. You know, like you said, his choices are not your choices, and you were just trying to live your life, go about your way, and people do hold those grudges, which is also understandable.
Rhoda: Yeah.
Anna: But again, you know, to take it out on an innocent kid, I hope that people would see the difference between your dad and you. Unfortunately not everybody did.
Rhoda: Right. And I hope that people will recognize those that know me. I live my life in a way where I'm trying to leave a positive legacy. I'm pouring into others. I'm deeply passionate about helping others to grow and glow, and that's the, that I'm writing for.
It doesn't take away the hurt and pain that he caused, but I hope that the little bit that I'm doing in the world is helping, you know, to leave it better than it was.
Anna: Yeah, yeah. I love that. To grow and to glow, that's a fantastic way of putting it. Okay. And Rhoda, you write so poignantly about having a mother who was good at meeting your physical needs, like having clean clothes and a clean house, but not so good at meeting your emotional needs, like they need to be validated, accepted, and loved.
So, can you speak more to those wounds of emotional neglect and how they affected you?
Rhoda: Yeah. They even, she passed, my mom passed away 10 years ago from lung cancer and even to this day, the lack of, of love and affection that she showed us, it's still hurts. Never had a hug from her, never was told by her that she loved us.
When we would try to hug her, she would be gone. Gone. She didn't know how to receive affection nor give it. And the older I've gotten, the more I come to understand. I understand, but it still hurts that she didn't get that from her mom, my grandmother.
Yeah, deep wounds, but it has caused me to be more intentional about being more affectionate with my kids and with my husband and with my sisters. And I think it has impacted us all in similar ways, but different ways. But that is one, we're all very close with our kids. Another right. It's like that pattern hasn't broken itself.
And we don't really know other members of our family. Like my mom's cousins, we don't know them either. We're not even close with my mom's brother’s brother or kids. So it's just this very small mix. But as far as the wounds, I think when you go through trauma, you're gonna, either, as a child, you're gonna either veer towards people pleasing personality or narcissistic.
It's gonna be one extreme or the other. And I am the people-pleasing. And so it has led to me like really, like instantly I can connect with people on a, a level where I have deep concern for them, like instantly. I can build these, these friendships and relationships, but that's not always good because some people, if you don't take the time to really get to know them and know their character, I, I have found myself being used a lot, taken advantage of.
So I think that of affection, love, and attention that I craved as a child and even on into teens and early adulthood that I did not receive from my mother. When I met my husband James, and I thought, I talk about this in the book too, I was a mess. Like kudos to James for hanging in there with me. We are still married 34 years later.
I remember I used to be curled up in the corner crying, just saying, I wanna die, because I did not feel loved by her. And there was lots of negative instances of things that happened after I left her house and she no longer could control me. And so she lashed out in very hurtful way, and that just like deepened the hurt even more.
Anna: Right. Yes, I, I do recall quite a few of those instances from the book. Um, yeah. And you recall some like really painful moments too, of being called ugly by your mom and by the first boy you ever talked to. And you know, it sounds like it was really a long journey for you to start seeing your own beauty.
What helped you the most on that journey?
Rhoda: You know, I am, um, as much as I hate to admit it, but it's a blessing. I'm 55 and I can honestly tell you that it's still a battle, but I'm better at it. I used to verbally say, I was like, I was well into my thirties and forties, and I have a friend named Debbie who heard me call myself ugly and she said, don't. You are beautiful.
Constantly hearing people tell me that I'm beautiful inside and out, and eventually I just thought I, when I look at myself in the mirror and I was like, she's a cute little girl, why would she think she was ugly? She, but I spent most of my life thinking I was ugly. So now what has.
Support the people who I've had, uh, the honor of meeting and being able to build relationships throughout the years and who have poured into me, who understood my background and why I was the way I was. So, they were intentional about being, uh, encouraging and complimentary. That really helped.
The people who I've been blessed to call friends, and they have poured into me, and they have consistently, and even strangers. I recall several times. One time I was with a friend at dinner, and we were sitting at the table, and it was a group of people sitting next to us and they were getting ready to go and one of the ladies with that group came and told me, you’re beautiful.
She did it outta nowhere, and that's have happened several times and I was like, thank you. And so I'm also working on learning how to accept the compliment. I have a friend that has the whole movement around accepting the compliment and the psychology of it. And so just leaning in and accepting that, and that is the story I started telling myself that.
Number two, when you look in the mirror, how true is it that you are ugly and unattractive? So, you know, I've recently got my coaching certificate, and I think I probably, that going through that program has really helped me more than I've helped anyone else. With the coaching tools I've learned, I've learned how to coach myself internally and even when I'm tempted to have those thoughts.
I quickly checked myself, like today, I saw a young lady, um, and I was like, Ooh, I, I wish my stomach was like this. And I quickly told myself, oh, no. Comparison is the thief of joy. I'm happy with the body that I was given and learning to love myself as I am, because I also told myself recently, I said, you know what?
There's never been a day in my life. I can recall that I've not thought about my weight. Mm. And so I've made an active decision. Very intentional not to think about that because apparently my body is comfortable at this size because no matter how many times I lose weight, I always end up back where I'm at.
So, learning to accept myself as I'm, and learning to love me for me, and then surrounding myself with people. I like to say surround yourself with people who light up when you walk in a room. Oh, I has been healing, healing.
Anna: I love that, that that's such good advice, you know, because I think sometimes all it can take is just one of those positive people that get you to start questioning those negative, like that negative self-talk in your head. Yes. And sometimes that all it takes to start unraveling that, you know, messed up ball of yarn.
That's our brain. Yeah. And you know, you mentioned, like in the book, you do talk about the realities of living in a larger body, like being shamed by other people. And feeling exasperated because of your physiology. Because I do believe we kind of settle into a weight that we're meant to be at.
And you make a very great point too, about how some people can't afford healthy food. They're just eating to get their fill, and they don't have time to go to the gym because they're working two or three jobs.
Rhoda: Yeah.
Anna: So, what would you say to young girls out there who feel ashamed because of their size?
Rhoda: Yeah. I would say to challenge the thinking, their thinking and thought and, and fight against these norms have not been healthy for lots of people. And I would say to younger women, no matter what size you are, no matter how tall, short, no matter what shape, no matter what shade you are, beautiful.
We were all uniquely made for a specific reason. We all have beauty. I can find beauty in anyone. We all have beauty. I would tell the younger girls, and this is a really good, um, niche to focus on for younger girls, is to self-love, love themselves, to lean in and love yourself. Nobody else really matters.
What matters most is how much you love yourself and the stories you tell yourself. The other thing is there's a psychology behind fashion. The colors you wear. Clothing you wear, what's, find your style that you're comfortable with that makes you feel good, and you go with that, be the trendsetter. And so I love color and I tell people I dress for how I wanna feel.
And today I wore yellow because I wanted to feel happy and bright. And yellow is also a healing color.
So, I've been wearing lots of yellow, and so that's what I would tell the younger girls. It really doesn't matter what others think of me. There's a book that says What you think of me is none of my business. What matters most is what I think of myself. And I would say to them, think positive thoughts. Positive thoughts, positive. Tell yourself positive things. Look in the mirror and speak to the image that's looking back at you and speak. Positive affirmation. You're beautiful.
Anna: I love that. Yeah. I, um, often tell my clients who have those like body image issues to look at themselves in the mirror and find something they like, because sometimes we start small.
One thing you like yourself for, one. Maybe it's your eyelashes, maybe it's your ankles. Just one small thing and start there, and then eventually, hopefully you can grow to really love your whole body.
Rhoda: And the other thing is, what would you say to a friend who came to you for encouragement?
And perhaps they were, they were questioning their appearance and their body image or their, uh, levels of attraction. How would you encourage them flip the script. Say those things to yourself, and that's another area that I'm working on. What would I tell someone else? Okay. That applies to me too.
Anna: Yeah. It's, it's amazing how nice we are to other people. And how mean we can be to ourselves sometimes. Yes. So, I love that technique of just flipping the script and saying, Hey, if your friend came to you Yeah. Would you tell her she is ugly?
So without giving too much away from your book, on your 16th birthday, you woke up to your mom basically ordering you to not come home until you got a job.
Rhoda: Yes.
Anna: And this kind of was like a pivotal point in the book where you started meeting everyone else's needs while putting your own needs second.
Rhoda: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Anna: And I can see how that like would play into the people pleasing that you named earlier too. So like what was it like knowing that you had the burden of taking care of your sisters and even your mom too, and it was all on your shoulders at such a young age?
Rhoda: It was heavy. And I remember when I made the decision to leave home because she was constantly threatening me. If you get pregnant, you gotta leave. If you get pregnant, you’re on your own.
My grandmother was very pivotal in this. She said, Rhoda, there comes a point when two women can't live in the same house. And she co-signed for me an apartment and I made the decision. So, I had to go back to my mom's house to get my things. And I'll never forget this. She was sitting on the couch when I left and I was getting ready to leave and she was looking down like she always do, sitting in the dark.
And she said, so you're leaving and you're not coming back. I said, yep, I'm leaving and I'm not coming back. And she just started crying and I remember leaving. That hurt me so bad because I've always been trying to please her ever since I was little. I've been trying to please Dorothy, but I also realized that it wasn't a, at some point I realized it wasn't my responsibility.
And then two, she didn't really appreciate all that I did. So that made me angry and I was like, well, I'm done. I'm done trying to please her. I'm done trying to take care of everything. But up, up until that point, when I realized that it was heavy and I was doing all I could, like two years in row, I worked two jobs.
I worked a summer job for the underprivileged kids because I still qualify. I worked at Burger King. And I was paying bills. I was buying school clothes, school shoes, and I felt guilty after I left because my sisters got the brunt end of it because my mom was one that would give up easy. When I left, she like gave up, stopped paying rent they were living on in shelters and living in a car that was in my name.
Then eventually they moved in with us, but that was short-lived. I won't give that away. I talked about that in the book as well, but to your original question, it it's heavy. And as parents, um, this is not uncommon for the older sibling, the older child, to try to have to be the one they like the second parent, they're like, plan B.
Um, that's a lot to carry and it's really unfair, and I understand that life is hard for a lot of us, but it's unfair because you robbed that child of the childhood experience. And once you are an adult and you are out on your own, I just told some young people this other day, you never get the opportunity again to like not have to worry about, you know, how you're going to eat and what bills I've been paying bills since I was 14 and I've never not had a car note.
And I think this, see, this is an adverse impact of things that I've gone through is like, to me, debt is normal and that's not good because I'm getting older, and if I lived for retirement, that I could enjoy my retirement versus stressing out paying bills adverse impact, because that was what I was taught. Let's get a loan, let's get debt. Rhoda, do this, Rhoda, do that. And um, it's just not fair. And it was, it was heavy and it was a burden.
Anna: Yeah. Oh, I bet that's, yeah, that's such a heavy burden to carry. And like you said, you only get to be a kid once. And let's, you know, let's talk about that intergenerational trauma. 'cause that's a huge theme in your book. You talk about how kinda later in life you have this realization that your mother's childhood consisted of taking care of a broken and drunken mother.
Who was a better grandma to you. And she also had to deal with the violent brother. And later in your life you developed this empathy for her, despite the way she treated you. And I wonder, do you see the development of that empathy as a pivotal point in your own healing?
Rhoda: Mm-hmm. It's, it's much more freeing to forgive and view situations of other people through their, try to look at it from their point of view and their lens.
It's much more freeing and I believe that if I didn't do that and I harbor any ill will and just came down on Dorothy, which was my mom's name, down on her for everything and every decision and every choice that that's not helping me. I'm just building up resentment, which I believe can lead to sickness and disease.
Um, and so I prefer to be free and I also have a philosophy in life, and that is I'd rather take the hurt than be the one delivering the hurt. So, because we all gonna have to stand in judgment, and I wanna be able to say that I did the right thing even up until she took her last breath, I was right there when she found out she had lung cancer, I was right there. It, I was so present and so supportive. That the oncologist wrote me a letter after she passed away, and it was so moving because I, I doubt that many doctors do that.
He said, I wanted you to know that I observed how good of a daughter you were. My mom was difficult. She was even difficult with the cancer doc, and he knew it and he watched me. This was after she passed and then after she passed, some of her friends told me, she said Rhoda was a really good daughter.
She couldn't pay her bills. She had just retired, but she didn't get a lot of social security because she hadn't, she would get good jobs and quit. There was a pattern paying bills while she was sick. She was living, my grandmother was living with her. I was there cooking. I still had my family. I still was working full time. I still was traveling for work. And me and one of my sisters, we had a pack. Like we would never let her go to, uh, chemo without one of us.
So we arranged our lives so that that could happen. Um, again, when she passed, I wanted to be able to live the rest of my days without regret. Uh, and without, you know, ill feelings and feeling like I was free because I knew that I had done the best that I can do, despite all of her ways and the things she had done to me, it, it didn't matter to me.
I was there as a daughter, and I was gonna support her and help her through this. I talked her through the transition. I would tell her, do think you just need to lean in and ask the Lord to receive your spirit unto him. I would have conversations with her. I remember I said, because you never could tell, does she believe?
What's her faith? She never went to church. She was just this hard person. And so, one day I was telling her about repenting and she said, well, the me and God are cool. I know why you. And that's how we would, we would have this relationship, but it would, it's freeing for me, um, and I would say this to anyone, it's forgiving others is for you, right?
It's, it's more for you than it is for other person. And it frees you of any obligation, regret, thoughts.
Anna: Beautiful. Yeah, because there were a lot of things to forgive and you openly did that. Yeah, that's remarkable to me. And Rhoda, you also talk about the survivor's guilt, that sense that you were never supposed to make it out of that low-income housing at Carr Square Village where you were surrounded by poverty and violence and strife.
How did you find a way to cope with that survivor's guilt?
Rhoda: Yeah, and I, here's a, here's a true story, Anna. I didn't break through that, uh, mindset didn't change until two years ago. Like I was constantly reminiscing about Carr Square Village and family, but it was, it was dangerous, but, but we were close. It was just very dysfunctional. And I have more vivid memories than my younger sister because I was older. And so I would like crave to see some of these people and always talk about these people. And so every year they would have a Carr Square reunion.
So a few times we went with our mother, all the girls, there's four of us, and the last time we went was probably like 15 years ago and they started shooting. So we had to run to somebody's apartment to hide out and we never went back. So. The one sister Rhoshay, who I speak of in a book, I'm really close with her, she was out the country on a vacation.
I had people from reach out to me through Facebook and they were saying, you gonna come to the reunion? And I was like, you know what? I haven't been in a long time gonna go. So I tried to, I'm not going mother friend. She, uh, she lived close by the area where we grew up, so I picked her up and we went and I got to see Cindy, who I talk about in the book and other people I grew up with, and all of a sudden you hear all these gunshots.
They were like right there, like near me. And I still suffer from post-traumatic stress from the gunshots and murder I witnessed. I left. So the girl Cindy called me. She was like, oh my God. I was kept trying to get your attention. Couldn't get your attention. I was gone. I got my mother friend Renee. We got up outta there. I never, and this is what came to me as I was driving home, trembling.
The Lord said, I have delivered you from there. There is no reason for you to feel guilty about being delivered and there is no reason for you to look back. And the story he reminded me of in the Bible was when, um, Lot and his family was leaving Sodom and Gomorrah… You cannot look back because if you look back, you gonna turn it a pillar of salt.
That's the story that came to me as I was driving home, and from that moment, I was delivered from that mindset of survivor's guilt. Like I don't owe anybody anything and there's no reason for me to feel guilty about that.
But I have been, I have been feeling guilty about it, and my husband was so upset with me. He was like, I told you not to go. You, you don't have to keep looking back. You don't have to keep looking back. And that is so true. And that's a lesson in that, that's a lesson in it when you, you know, I had all these vivid memories, like it was so great and it wasn't, it was very traumatic.
Anna: Mm-hmm. Yeah, absolutely. That's, that's such a powerful story because sometimes you do need a higher power to, to kind of show you the way. And that was your way out of that survivors guilt.
Yeah. And Rhoda, I wanna say like your rise to professional success is really inspirational because you started as a cashier in a parking garage. You went on to earn two master's degrees. Not one, but two! Became an executive in human resources.
And as I mentioned earlier, you're also a motivational speaker. You have a podcast, you're an author of this book. And despite all of these accomplishments, you still had to deal with racism and microaggressions at work at the doctor's office. I'm sure there are many other instances you didn’t mention in the book.
Rhoda: Mm-hmm.
Anna: And I wonder like, do you have any message for Black girls and women in America who, let's be honest, often have to work twice as hard as their White peers to be seen as competent?
Rhoda: Yes. So true. This conversation yesterday with one of my mentees about the microaggressions that we experienced in the workplace and what we have to realize… It's usually a them problem. It's not a me problem. It's not a us problem, it's a them problem. If you can remember that, that's half the battle right there.
The other is if the individuals are. An exhibit, behaviors that showcase that they may be open to learning. You can use those moments as learning opportunities too. And I have had the opportunity to to educate right in the moment. And the other thing I would say is it's important for us to be our biggest ally.
And let people know when they've said or done something. Because often they're coming from a place, they're not intentional. Microaggressions are rarely intentional. They are coming from a place they haven't had the knowledge or exposure. They don't have, they don't realize how this is.
They have no idea sometimes how these things land. I care about the people enough, I will tell them the truth. And I will educate them in a moment. So I consider it a gift if I'm, if I'm giving you feedback, if I don't care about you, I usually don't. And I walk away and I chalk it up as ignorance on their behalf.
I mean, it happens so often, more often than we know. Gaslighting, putting you down with these backhanded compliments. Um, just, it just happens too much for me to take that in. Like life is hard enough, so I'm not gonna carry that. I raise their awareness otherwise, just keep it moving.
Anna: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. That's beautifully said. That's beautifully said. Thank you for that.
Rhoda: Mm-hmm.
Anna: Um, and, okay, let, let's see if I can speak about this without getting teary eyed, because the most heartbreaking story in your book for really anybody, but especially for parents, is about your oldest son, Lil’ James.
Right. You speak of this incredible guilt you felt when you couldn't help him overcome his untreated mental illness and resulting addiction. I wonder at this day, have you come to accept that you truly did the best you can raising him, and that his choices are not your fault?
Rhoda: I did, and that was quite the journey.
He's been calling once a week, and so last week we actually had a conversation about that because he's in therapy and um, he's in like an anger management and drug abuse class. And he was sharing with me that they were getting to the root of why he chose that path.
And I shared with him that I talked to a trauma therapist, and one of her questions was, what parenting patterns did you take from Dorothy and that you passed on to your kids? I was like, I'm embarrassed to say it, but there's really two big ones and one of them is yelling. Dorothy yelled a lot. And so when I couldn't convince Lil James or Jalen to do what I want them to do, I yell.
Jalen actually helped me break that cycle. That's my youngest. He's 12 years younger than Lil James. And Jalen would say in a very calm voice, why are you yelling, mom? And that question would just gimme pause. And I was, yeah, why am I. Second thing that I took from Dorothy, and this was an actual pattern, so little James and I had this conversation last week is when I couldn't get, he would stay out late.
We wouldn't hear from him. He would have people in our house when we weren't there, and it was so disrespectful. And only thing I could, uh, go to was, you need to get outta my house then if you can't obey me. I left when Dorothy was threatening me. And then, the only difference is when I left, I went and I had people in my circle from my husband and his family that were good people.
So they helped me stay on a good path. What Lil James said to me last week was he say I around kids, that parents gave them a lot of freedom. And you didn't give me that freedom and I wanted it. He said, so when you wouldn't give it to me, I took it, he said, and then I took it too far and started dabbling into all kind of drugs and things like that.
I say, you know, look, James, I'm glad to hear you say that and admit that. You had choices to make and made the choices you made.
Anna: Oh my gosh. So that came from him. First of all, I'm so glad that you're in touch now. Yeah, that's a wonderful continuation to the book story in the book. Yes. But yes, to hear that from him, I'm sure had such a big impact.
Rhoda: It did. It did. Very, very freeing.
Anna: Yeah.
Rhoda: As a mom when, uh, Jalen was younger and I would just be crying and crying. My face had all kind of stress reactions to this, and he was young and he said, you thinking about Lil’ James? And I said, yes. And he said, he just needs to be good.
And, um, one of the things I, I've asked Jalen, I said, what's your greatest fear in life, Jalen? And he said, ending up like Lil James.
And that's heartbreaking too, because I'm sure he walk around, he now, he's 21 and he understands that mental illness is in our DNA and I'm sure he walks around with that fear.
And I think that has worked to his benefit because he's not a risk taker. He's risk averse. He doesn't club. He doesn't party, he doesn't smoke weed, he doesn't drink. And he, he's a football player and he in college on football and he has plenty opportunity to do so. And all his teammates respect him.
Anna: Yeah. Oh, that's great. That's fantastic. If any young people are listening, see, you can be respected If you don't do drugs and don't go clubbing, you do not have to conform. You can actually be an example for them.
I'm so glad that all of this seems to be looking up for Lil’ James for your whole family. That's lovely. And, and Rhoda, despite all of the trials and tribulations you've been through, you make it clear in the book that you never lost your faith in God.
Rhoda: No, I never did.
Anna: Right. In fact, it grew stronger. So, what wisdom do you have to share with people who may be going through tough times and are questioning their faith.
Rhoda: When the tough of the time gets, the stronger, your faith should become lean into it because what's on the other end of that is something great if you can just hold out to the morning.
That's how I say hold out to the morning. Don't give up, don't give in believe, and I spent a lot of time literally speaking outta my mouth like a crazy person in my house. To my situation, and if the situation wasn't lined up with what the word of God had promised me, I would tell it. This situation has to change because it's contradicting the promises that God have left on record for me.
And so there are many times in my life where I felt like giving up where I wanted to end my life even, and I'm so glad I didn't. If you made it, meaning you were born, and our chances of being born are like one in 400 trillion… You have a divine purpose for being here. And if you are here, you should be figuring out what is that purpose.
What is the gift that I have to bring the world and be about doing it? So for those reasons alone, I wouldn't give up. I'll stand strong. I will stand confident. I will speak what I want, and I will speak it till it comes. Until I see it. Until it happens. And that's advice I would give anyone.
Yes, times are hard. Life can be really hard, but he didn't say it wasn't gonna be hard. One thing I do know all things are temporary and this too shall pass. And so if you just hold on and hang in there, you can have a testimony, no test, no testimony. We gotta go through something to be able to help others. And so that's my advice.
Anna: Oh, I love that. I love that. And I think your book really, like the whole book really is a testament to that. No test, no testimony, right? Because you had to go through a lot to get to where you are. And you know, let's talk a little bit about where you are as a coach and as a motivational speaker. What kind of topics do you speak about? What kind of coaching do you offer? Tell me a little bit about that. Yeah,
Rhoda: So, my coaching is predominantly leadership coaching. I'm really passionate about that because leaders have a lot of power influence in the workplace and you, you as a leader, whether they know it or not, they impact the mental wellbeing of employees.
We spend a lot of time at work. I do not want employees who are on my team to ever be worried and up and full anxiety about gonna work. I want them to say, oh, look forward to gonna work. I get to go to work with Rhoda. That's what I want them to feel. So, my coaching, I can do it all life coaching and all of it, but I'm really specialized in leadership coaching.
When speaking leadership topics again, and also I have a talk that talks about from the, uh, project to the boardroom, and that's the journey, my life journey and breaking through, uh, all around resiliency and overcoming. Uh, and then when it comes to the type of work I do, currently, I am an executive head.
And my work, while it's centered on culture and inclusion today, but my background in the HR space, I've over, I've led all of the talent functions from talent acquisition, leadership development, performance management, success planning every, everything about developing people and building them up. I'm passionate about that.
I feel like if we do that well in organizations, we'll have less employee relationship issues. We'll have less morale issues. You know, the bad stuff will be less of, if we did the proactive, I call it the fun side of HR, if we did that, uh, better mm-hmm. And, and more intentional, then we would have less of those issues.
That's what really drew me to get in HR because I didn't grow up in it, so I was on the operational side of healthcare. I knew I wanted to work in HR from the master's degree that I had acquired, and no one would hire me because I didn't have any experience. So I networked my way to it. I would connect with HR executives. I would go.
I just built a reputation. It was all around building my brand, and it worked. One day, the company I was at, they had hired a new chief HR officer. She had her assistant schedule lunch for us, and she told me that she had been going around the organization, 42,000 employees for state, asking who the shakers, and makers were.
She said, I want you on my HR team. And I was like, that would be a dream come true. It took her two years to find the right position and she was the first person to give the opportunity to get into HR. And I came in, in the leadership role and I've been in HR ever since and I'm, I'm so appreciative of it because I love people.
Anna: I love people who try to make the workplace a better place. Because you are right. So many people don't feel accepted. They don't feel included, they don't feel value in the workplace. And if we could change that, oh, that would be wonderful. Because most of us need a job.
Rhoda: I've been leveraging my coaching skills in like, it's like one experience at. I probably have about 12 leaders at the current company that I'm individually coaching, and they're all telling me the positive impact that it's having, but it fills my cup and I just have to, I have to feel like I'm contributing and that I'm making a positive difference.
Otherwise, I don't feel like, I feel like my time is up there. If I'm not contributing and making a difference. So having the opportunity to interact with leaders one-on-one and, and having given them a safe space and uh, getting the opportunity to leverage the coaching skills that I've learned, that's been very fulfilling.
Anna: Great. Yeah. That's your legacy. That's the legacy you're leaving. I love that. And I will make sure to include your website and my show notes for anybody who wants to get in touch with you. Of course. I'll include your book. And Rhoda, thank you so much for coming here today. Thank you. Your book, it's like, it's really remarkable touching powerful, and I think anybody who lived through adversity, hardship, trauma should read it.
It's really an empowering story of perseverance and it has a beautiful message that it's possible to heal and overcome incredible pain if you refuse to let your past dictate your future. So well said.
To all my listeners, many of whom live with a history of intergenerational trauma, I implore you to get this book, Daughter of an Assassin and read it, ASAP.
Rhoda, once again, thank you so much for being today.
Rhoda: Thank you so much for having me. And listen. Reach out. I'll meet with you one-on-one. That's been a, a common theme as well. People wanted to talk more about it and I'm very open to that. It also is healing for me and I love the title of your podcast, Courage to Heal because it does take, acknowledge that healing is needed and even more courage to face and the hurt. I had to persevere because I said, if I could just help one person…
Anna: Oh, I'm sure you've held more than one person for sure with this book. So, thank you again. Thank you. And for all of you listening, I hope you leave feeling a little more empowered. Remember, as always, healing takes time and you're exactly where you need to be. Take care of yourselves and until we meet again, be kind to your heart.
