They Said Linthead Kids Don't Go to College — He Got 3 Degrees

They Said Linthead Kids Don't Go to College — He Got 3 Degrees

What do you do when everything around you — the house, the store, the school, the church — belongs to the cotton mill? When your grandfathers started working at age 9? When your daddy quit school in 8th grade because he figured the mill was his destiny anyway? If you are Donald Williams — you go to Clemson. And you do not stop until you have three degrees. In Episode 97 of Hear Where You Belong Podcast, host Dea Irby sits down with Donald Williams — educator, researcher, author, storyteller, musician, and one of the most genuinely inspiring guests this podcast has ever hosted. Donald grew up in the cotton mill villages of Rock Hill, South Carolina, became the first in his family to graduate from a major university, and eventually earned a bachelor's, master's, and doctorate — all from Clemson. He then spent more than a decade with the Department of Defense Education Activity, supporting schools and families across the United States and around the world. His co-authored book, Born of Nothing: From White Trash and Lint Heads to Purpose Across Generations, tells the raw, real, redemptive story of two families who were told they would never amount to anything — and proved every single person wrong. In this episode we talk about: 🏭 Life in a cotton mill village — where the mill owned everything including your sense of possibility👴 Grandfathers who were child laborers at age 9 — and the faith and dignity they carried anyway📚 Being the first in his family to go to college — and not even knowing what the SAT was as a senior😬 The school counselor whose face said it all — linthead kids don't go to Clemson📉 Getting 6 D's and 1 B his second semester — and the two parental voices that kept him from quitting🚪 The random knock on his dorm room door that God used to change everything🌍 Looking at a globe in 3rd grade and thinking he would never see those places — then working on the other side of the earth🎵 Writing 60 to 80 songs over a lifetime — love letters to his family and to God💛 Both of his sons earning doctorates — and what that means about breaking a generational cycle✊ Why Donald Williams will never go quietly into the night — and his grandson Noah's hilarious take on it 😄 And his favorite quote — the one that is written in his own book and lived out in every chapter of his life: Your starting point does not determine your finishing point. This episode is for every person who has ever been told — by a look, a system, a circumstance, or their own inner voice — that they cannot go further than where they started. Yes. You. Can. 💛 📖 Born of Nothing by Donald Williams and Jason Pike — available on Amazon, FREE on Kindle now!🌐 Find Donald at iamdonaldwilliams.com🎙️ Subscribe to Hear Where You Belong Podcast wherever you listen📺 Subscribe on YouTube and hit the 🔔 bell so you never miss an episode

You Are More Than What You Have Become — Leadership, Belonging, and the Courage to Be an Original

What does it take to stop trying to be a duplicate — and finally step into being the original God designed you to be? That is the question Reverend Kevin T. Taylor has been answering his entire life. And in Episode 96 of Hear Where You Belong Podcast, he answers it in a way that is going to stay with you. Kevin is an executive strategist, pastor of the oldest Black church in upstate New York, founder of the Tailored Stewardship Institute, and award-winning author of A Charge to Keep: Immutable Leadership Lessons from the C-Suite to the Pulpit. At the heart of everything he does is one unshakeable conviction: belonging is built through trust, dignity, and systems that make people feel seen, valued, and safe enough to contribute fully. In this episode, Kevin opens up about the season he walked away from pastoral ministry — convinced he did not fit the mold, that he was an outsider who had no business in the pulpit. Then came a trip to see The Lion King on Broadway. And one line from Mufasa to Simba that stopped him cold: You are more than what you have become. He also shares his remarkable vision for the future of the church — sensory rooms for autistic children, accessible spaces for seniors, classrooms for every learning style — and why belonging means designing for the people who are NOT yet in the room. Plus a conversation about AI that will completely change how you see it. Not the boogeyman. A thought partner. And listeners who stay all the way to the end? There is a special gift waiting for you. 😄 His favorite quote from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. will leave you with exactly what you need: If you can't fly, then run. If you can't run, then walk. If you can't walk, then crawl. But whatever you do, keep moving forward. 💛 Visit Kevin at RevKTaylor.com — and mention this podcast for 10% off his coaching package. #HearWhereYouBelong, #YouBelong, #YouAreMoreThanWhatYouHaveBecome, #KeepMovingForward, #RevKevinTTaylor, #TailoredStewardshipInstitute, #AChargeToKeep, #LeadershipAndFaith, #BelongingInTheChurch, #OriginalNotDuplicate, #ChurchLeadership, #AIAndLeadership, #NewEpisode, #ChristianPodcast, #ChangeIsAProcessNotAnEvent

God Never Left — Holding Deep Grief and Deep Faith at the Same Time

What do you do when the thing you feared most actually happens — and then happens again? Kathy Rogers knows. And somehow, impossibly, beautifully — she is not bitter. She is not broken. She is a woman whose faith grew unshakeable in the very seasons that would have destroyed most of us. In Episode 95 of Hear Where You Belong Podcast, Kathy joins host Dea Irby for one of the most tender, honest, and deeply faith-filled conversations this podcast has ever held. Kathy is a business owner, speaker, author, and host of the Your Best Friend's Mom Podcast — and her life story is not an easy one to tell. In January 2018 she was diagnosed with aggressive triple negative breast cancer. She survived. Then her mother lost her five-year battle with metastatic ovarian cancer. Then, six months later, her daughter Elena was diagnosed with metastatic breast cancer. Two years later, Elena went home to heaven at just 29 years old. And through all of it — every chemo treatment, every funeral, every grief-soaked Christmas — Kathy kept hearing the same quiet voice: trust me. In this episode, she opens up about what it truly means to surrender to God not by desire, but by necessity. She talks about the community that showed up with cards every week, loaves of bread left on porches, and gifts on Christmas Eve from a woman she had only just met — and why Satan's greatest tool is isolation. She shares what she witnessed in her daughter's face as Elena found complete peace in Jesus, even in the face of death. And she talks about why she started Your Best Friend's Mom Podcast — born directly from Elena's tight circle of friends who still needed a wise, warm, experienced voice in their corner. Her book, Look for Good: Discovering God in Grief, Celebration, and the Everydays, is already changing lives two and three steps removed from people she has never even met. And that, she says, is only God. Her favorite verse — Ephesians 3:20 — will anchor you. He is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine. He proved it in Kathy's life. He is proving it still. This episode will move you — and remind you that you are never, ever alone. 💛 #HearWhereYouBelong, #YouBelong, #GodNeverLeft, #LookForGood, #KathyRogers, #YourBestFriendsMom, #GriefAndFaith, #TrustMe, #CancerSurvivor, #BerevedMother, #FaithThroughGrief, #ImmeasurablyMore, #Ephesians320, #NewEpisode, #ChristianPodcast, #HoldingGriefAndFaith, #CommunityInGrief, #FaithNotFear, #GodIsFaithful, #YouAreNotAlone

We Do Not Become by Accident — We Become Through the Stories We Choose to Live | a convo with Laura Patac

What happens when success on paper no longer feels like alignment in real life? That is the question Laura Patac spent years avoiding — and then finally, bravely, answered. Laura is a storyteller, leadership speaker, Gallup-certified CliftonStrengths Coach, and author of Whole, Not Perfect — an Amazon bestselling book in spiritual growth that is less a book to read and more an experience to live through. With over 25 years of executive leadership experience across 7 countries and 5 continents, Laura had a life that looked extraordinary from the outside. High-end roles. Good salary. Constant achievement. Constant movement. And a very quiet, very persistent disconnection she could not explain. In Episode 94, Laura joins Dea Irby all the way from Romania for a conversation that is going to reach into your chest and rearrange something. She opens up about the moment she realized she could no longer hear herself underneath all the noise — the roles, the responsibilities, the versions of herself she had built for every room she walked into. She talks about what reinvention actually looks like when it is not about becoming someone new, but about returning to yourself. And she walks through the three questions that started everything: Who am I beyond what I do?What am I actually good at?What still feels true to me? She also unpacks how CliftonStrengths revealed the patterns driving her life — and how some of those patterns were serving her while others were quietly running the show unchecked. Plus the story of Whole, Not Perfect — a book born from a lifetime of poetry, 5 years in the making, and a LinkedIn poll that chose the title. And her favorite quote — from her own book — is one of the most quietly powerful things said on this podcast yet. We do not become by accident. We become through the stories we choose to live. This episode is for every high achiever who has everything on paper and still feels something is off. You are not broken. You are just ready to come home to yourself. 💛 #HearWhereYouBelong, #YouBelong, #WholeNotPerfect, #WeDoNotBecomeByAccident, #LauraPatac, #ReinventionJourney, #BelongingStartsWithin, #CliftonStrengths, #HighAchieverLife, #FromSuccessToAlignment, #NewEpisode, #ChristianPodcast, #StoriesWithPurpose, #InternalAlignment, #WholenessNotPerfection

"The Greatest Good You Can Do Is Reveal Someone's Riches to Themselves" | Ep. 93 with David Ask

What if the most powerful thing you could do for someone wasn't give them your advice, your money, or your time — but help them see who they already are? That's the question at the heart of this conversation, and David Ask has built his life around answering it. David is an entrepreneur, inventor, lead coach for the True North Resiliency Program, and author of the upcoming Guardians of Grit — a book for fathers raising strong, uncrushable sons anchored in identity and purpose. He's also the man who turned a simple thermostat guard into a product carried in over 3,700 retail stores — and who spent a full year showing up daily for a friend who didn't want to live anymore, not because he knew what to say, but because he knew how to stay. In Episode 93, David and Dea get into all of it — the power of hospitality as a secret weapon, what it means to set the temperature in your home, why knowing someone is the only way to truly love them, and why belonging starts the moment someone looks across a room and says: I am really glad you are here. He also shares the desk story. And if it doesn't wreck you in the best possible way, check your pulse. His favorite quote from Benjamin Disraeli will reframe everything you think generosity means. The greatest good you can do for another is not to share with them your riches, but to reveal to them their own. This one is for the fathers, the friends, the ones who show up — and the ones who are finally ready to believe they are worth showing up for. 💛 #HearWhereYouBelong, #YouBelong, #RevealTheirRiches, #GuardiansOfGrit, #TrueNorthResiliency, #DavidAsk, #BelongingMatters, #FathersAndSons, #IdentityMatters, #ShowUp, #NewEpisode, #ChristianPodcast, #PricelessAndPurposed, #SeeingSomethingSaySomething, #YouAreGodSInheritance