First Cup of Coffee – June 10, 2025

Sending out love to all you listeners I'm getting to meet in person! So great! Also, on boundaries, how you don't have to be mean to protect your writing time, but that you do have to hold your feet to the fire.

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Transcript

00:01.62
Jeffe Kennedy
Good morning everyone. This is Jeffe Kennedy, author of Epic Fantasy Romance, also writing as Jennifer K. Lambert. I'm here with my first cup of coffee.

00:15.76
Jeffe Kennedy
This is delicious. Today is Tuesday, June 10th, 2025. And I don't know, i I know that like they say,

00:27.40
Jeffe Kennedy
a the ubiquitous they say that we should be consistent above all else. ah Inconsistent little me.

00:38.49
Jeffe Kennedy
I'm still waffling on whether to change this from Mondays and Fridays to Tuesdays and Fridays. A lot of times on Monday after the weekend, I feel like I don't have that much to say.

00:50.10
Jeffe Kennedy
And also sometimes I'm traveling. So, but anyway, I feel like You my lovely followers are ah you are here for the I am not articulate am I ah you're here we're here we talked together.

01:10.67
Jeffe Kennedy
um i think you get the notification it pops up and it tells you and that's probably what you do rather than looking for it at a particular day time. Anyway, we'll see.

01:23.81
Jeffe Kennedy
We'll see. I keep going back and forth on this. As I said, um i had a lovely, lovely time at FanFusion. it was It was amazing.

01:35.31
Jeffe Kennedy
I really had a great time. And one of my favorite things is... meeting people, you who listened to this podcast or watch this podcast.

01:47.42
Jeffe Kennedy
ah You know, like I, I can see the numbers, although long time listeners will know that i I deliberately do not look at numbers. Like they send me notifications and graphs and things that I should share, you know, like, Oh, your podcast had so many listens. And, but because I put this in so many places,

02:08.08
Jeffe Kennedy
I don't know my full numbers because I know a lot of you watch via YouTube. a lot of you watch bya Instagram, Facebook. Um, you don't, the ones that go through the ah actual podcast services.

02:23.47
Jeffe Kennedy
I know some of you only listen, uh, maybe some of you only watch. And I do have one friend that I know for sure only reads the transcript. Excuse me.

02:34.85
Jeffe Kennedy
Um, because she she can't be bothered to watch and listen. So she skims the podcast to get like my three nuggets of actual information amidst the blathering. But anyway, it was so great to to meet people who like say I listen to your podcast and I have my cup cup of coffee with you.

03:00.94
Jeffe Kennedy
And how great is that? ah One of the funny things about being out as Jennifer K. Lambert now is, um and actually what I should do is I should show the book again. I did a special video of it. Watch me as I caress this book.

03:19.73
Jeffe Kennedy
um I did a special video of it on Thursday, the unboxing, but it doesn't hurt to show this gorgeous, gorgeous book more than once we might just have to do it every podcast uh and my friend kelly robson gently chastised me actually she just encouraged me to um take off the jacket because i didn't think to do that so here we are undressing the book what well look at this

03:51.68
Jeffe Kennedy
the case stamp. It's got the gold rose embossed on it and the gold embossing on the spine. And it is unbelievably beautiful.

04:04.57
Jeffe Kennedy
So I had this with me and was, this was the fondle copy. And, uh, one really nice moment at at my signing was when, I told the girl that she could fondle it, you know, and people were being very respectful about not touching it till I said, you know, this copy is for fondling. And she picked it up and eagerly fondled it.

04:25.99
Jeffe Kennedy
And her partner with her, this very tall guy, laughed. And I said, are you laughing at us? And he said, oh, no, I'm a nerd. And I thought, you know, that encompasses everything. Right.

04:36.88
Jeffe Kennedy
So just in case you didn't see the unboxing, here are the stenciled edges with Oneira's house. um beautiful and then the purple rose at the bottom and then on the bottom pages are the purple roses and at the top the purple sky with stars and we already have we have the end pages with the same gold rose and beautiful beautiful inside and the maps and And it is just an incredibly beautiful book.

05:10.33
Jeffe Kennedy
And it was really a testament to the power of a beautiful book. ah I'll just keep holding it up so that the the light catches the gold embossing. Oops, sorry. Or I'll throw it through my windchimes.

05:25.70
Jeffe Kennedy
oh How many people saw the cover and were and said, I have to have this book. And we even had conversations about, don't judge a book by its cover.

05:36.92
Jeffe Kennedy
So what was funny is I was there as Jennifer K Lambert my my new name and it's a transparent pin name, but nobody knows that I'm Jennifer K Lambert. Yeah, right?

05:52.48
Jeffe Kennedy
So, I'm gonna move this camera over just a little bit. There we go. I feel like I'm looking off to the side. Yeah, that's better. Um,

06:05.30
Jeffe Kennedy
So I was only on the program as Jennifer K. Lambert, and there was no mention of Jeffe Kennedy anywhere. Their bookshop had Jeffe Kennedy books, but I had so many people coming up to me and going, um,

06:23.22
Jeffe Kennedy
I looked for you everywhere and I couldn't find you. And then finally I found it under Jennifer K Lambert or vice versa. Um, there was one guy, a podcast listener. Um, and I'm going to blank on your name. Is it Adam?

06:39.12
Jeffe Kennedy
came up and was saying ah that he has been listening to the audio books on YouTube and also to this podcast. Hi. And he was like, I saw you on the escalator and I didn't know you were going to be here, but I was like, that's Jeffe Kennedy.

06:55.07
Jeffe Kennedy
And then I looked in the program and you're not here. So, Yeah, it's funny. and And on panels and stuff, people were like calling me Jennifer. So many of you know this, but it never hurts to reiterate ah that my name is Jennifer. I was born, baptized, what have you.

07:16.73
Jeffe Kennedy
ah Jennifer. But I have been called Jeffe my entire life. It was a nickname that my dad made up. And so I've pretty much gone by Jeffe my entire life. There were brief excursions.

07:30.14
Jeffe Kennedy
I tried for a little while being Jennifer instead. You know, you try on different identities. But I didn't really care for it. Yeah. I don't, you know there's a lot of Jennifers in my generation. I am slightly older than most generations or generations.

07:47.90
Jeffe Kennedy
I am older than all the generations. I'm slightly older than most of the Jennifers, but not by ah whole lot, by like a year or two. ah But there's a lot of Jennifers and many of us, there's sort of like a Jennifer diaspora into various nicknames and other, um yeah,

08:10.24
Jeffe Kennedy
iterations of Jennifer. So at any rate, I have long joked when people asked me what they should call me. ah I will say call me Jeffe because that's really what I am accustomed to to answering to.

08:23.50
Jeffe Kennedy
And I would say only telemarketers in the IRS call me Jennifer. And now This has changed. ah Not only is like my longstanding joke no longer relevant, but I need to learn to respond to Jennifer.

08:41.95
Jeffe Kennedy
Uh, so like when the moderator calls on me on the panel and says, Jennifer, and I'm like spacing out, no, no, no, I need to reply. So it's an exercise.

08:55.82
Jeffe Kennedy
It was funny to be out as this other person. um Response to, no, not another person. I should correct my thinking on that. It's me. um Here I am. i'm I am Jennifer Lambert. I need a t-shirt.

09:09.46
Jeffe Kennedy
So anyway, it was fun to but see the response to this book. People are so enthusiastic. I had three boxes of arcs. I came home with one extra arc and that was entirely because I had saved one out for this gal and I was supposed to meet her and I went matter. her It was at the very end of the con and she was gone.

09:33.02
Jeffe Kennedy
So I know that those of you who are really wanting arcs, I apologize that I told you I was out because I i only saved out that one. And yeah.

09:46.13
Jeffe Kennedy
So anyway, the other thing that I have is i received a box of the galleys. Hang on just a second. I have piles of boxes in my office. This needs to change. um I have these. I forget what they call them.

10:01.28
Jeffe Kennedy
there it's the same interior as the arc. It just doesn't have to cover and it has a little less information, ah but it is a paper arc. And so we are opening up the ARC team applications again.

10:16.52
Jeffe Kennedy
Assistant Corrine has opened up the Google form. And so some of you have contacted me through various social media. You can ah contact her through my website or on social media. She's Sullivan McPig.

10:33.49
Jeffe Kennedy
I think you can find links most anywhere or ping me and I'll try to reply. So yeah, we've got a few of these things. So might as well get them out because then they'll be obsolete. Let's see. What else do I have to tell you?

10:51.70
Jeffe Kennedy
Oh, I wanted to tell you about a funny conversation i had with a friend of mine um who has really interesting perspectives on stuff. Isn't that great when you like make new friends and they teach you new ways of looking at the world?

11:08.81
Jeffe Kennedy
So many of you longtime listeners know that I have this that talk about being a woman and being a writer. And, and I stand by this part. Absolutely. That, you know, there, you have to defend your writing space.

11:24.43
Jeffe Kennedy
I had one gal, actually it was why I was, ah I was slightly late meeting the gal at the end of the con who didn't get her, her arc. I thought she'd wait for me, but she did not.

11:35.13
Jeffe Kennedy
Um, so but I was like 12 minutes late, but it was partly because I was talking to this gal, um, young gal who came up to my signing table at the very end and had her mother with her standing slightly back. And I think her mother had ached her on task.

11:53.35
Jeffe Kennedy
But this gal was asking me the, the age old perennial, um, ubiquitous twice for that word in this podcast. That's $10 right there. Uh,

12:05.39
Jeffe Kennedy
ah Many of you will get that joke. I won't explain. ah The question of that she's not getting her writing done, right? That she wants to write, ah but she just doesn't.

12:21.37
Jeffe Kennedy
And her mother's kind of standing behind her, making gestures and and mouthing, like, she's a wonderful writer. And this girl's like, my professors say I i write a good story. And her mom's like...

12:33.92
Jeffe Kennedy
ah The Greek chorus cheerleader on behind. ah But yeah, she wanted to know how, you know, and and I had like a few minutes, right? I'm packing up my table and i share i have a few minutes to give her this advice that I like have spent however many years doing this podcast. It's like, what is this season?

12:56.60
Jeffe Kennedy
Well, it really doesn't matter, does it? But I think we're on like season eight or something like that. Um, let's just check.

13:07.77
Jeffe Kennedy
I'm sure all of you know better than I do. Yeah, it's season eight. So eight years of doing this podcast and a whole lot of it talking about how do you get yourself to write?

13:18.98
Jeffe Kennedy
Uh, so content set down to like three minutes as I'm packing up and kind of aware that I'm supposed to go meet this gal. And, um, so you know, I said to her, my typical advice, you know, that you have to, you're not going to find the time you have to make the time. And she kind of rolled her eyes and she said, I have a lot of time.

13:42.29
Jeffe Kennedy
and it's like, well, still, it's the same that you have to carve out that time. Right. you know? And I said, I know some people can't do it, but for me, it worked and it worked for a lot of people.

13:53.61
Jeffe Kennedy
Right. Every day at the same time, every day, you have to be there. Even if it's only 15 minutes, you're You're there. You do the writing. um i made a rule for myself when I was first doing that, that I could write whatever I wanted, but I had to write during that time.

14:11.98
Jeffe Kennedy
ah You know, and really, and I said, you have to hold your own feet to the fire. There's no trick to it. There's no getting around it. There's no shortcuts. You have to just write.

14:27.32
Jeffe Kennedy
Do it. And I said, you know, think of it as a character building exercise. You know, you will grow as a human being by learning how to do this, how to do the focused, concentrated work to move your writing forward.

14:44.57
Jeffe Kennedy
Uh, And I do think that it can be, I mean, she was unusual in that she said she had lots of time. I don't know what was going on in her life, but ah she did seem like she was a little bit at loose ends maybe.

14:58.77
Jeffe Kennedy
So, but many people do not have lots of time, right? You know, you're occupied with all sorts of obligations, including probably one or more paying jobs, right?

15:10.51
Jeffe Kennedy
Because your writing is not going to pay you at first. ah And women, I think, in particular, have demands on their time and are oh meticulously programmed to put other people before themselves.

15:29.95
Jeffe Kennedy
as a general rule uh so that as soon as somebody says uh i want you to do this thing for me or be there for me uh it's easy to let go of what feels like a selfish enterprise where you're by yourself staring at a computer screen or at a notebook or possibly just out the window which is part of it right so I often talk about that I have this fantasy of being like the male creators in movies, ah you know, where they have the temper tantrum because somebody moved a stack of paper, you know, that I feel like,

16:09.94
Jeffe Kennedy
You know, like this is probably unbalanced behavior, which is what my friend pointed out to me. ah But I love that men have this ability, like through programming or through biology or whatever it is, where they feel much more comfortable telling other people to F off and, you know,

16:29.50
Jeffe Kennedy
Oh, don't move my papers. Don't anyone, don't make any noise. ah they're They're much more willing to defend what they're doing. They don't regard it as selfish in the same way that women are prone to do.

16:42.75
Jeffe Kennedy
And I know I'm doing a binary there, but I feel like that's part of those programmed binary gender roles. So anyway, i was telling my my new friend this, you know, because I was bothered that I'd had my writing interrupted last week. And and I was saying that about the my standard story. i You know, I guess I have my set pieces, right?

17:06.61
Jeffe Kennedy
ah my You know, that I am the the male writers in movies. and And he said, he said, hopefully those male writers only exist in movies.

17:19.41
Jeffe Kennedy
And I thought, cause you know, he, he's a man and he works with a lot of creative people and has studied a lot of creators.

17:31.49
Jeffe Kennedy
And I thought, wow, you know, no one has ever said that to me when I have told that story. And I, I think it was really just such an excellent and valid point, right? That that kind of behavior isn't appropriate.

17:49.33
Jeffe Kennedy
building fence around your writing and guarding it and prioritizing it is great. Throwing a temper tantrum is not so great.

17:59.92
Jeffe Kennedy
Right. And yeah, so I'm, I'm loving that evolution of, of the idea of the concept.

18:10.73
Jeffe Kennedy
And it reminds me of a quote I read a long time ago, and I know I re shared it, but I don't remember who said it now. So I can't credit it, but I thought that it was really useful saying that your your boundaries don't have to be like a barbed wire fence topped with razor wire, um that they can simply be a bright and shining light that says, i am worthwhile, that what I am doing is important and worth protecting.

18:45.04
Jeffe Kennedy
and And I love that idea. i Some of you who've been listening a while know that I've been learning more about boundaries. And I feel like there's more information out there about boundaries. You know, but the boundaries are the things you set for yourself.

18:58.73
Jeffe Kennedy
So instead of trying to tell everyone in your household, don't you dare move this stack of paper. Don't you dare make noise while I'm trying to create. Instead, you control your own world, your own boundaries around it where you're like, I will not respond to noises during my writing time.

19:21.68
Jeffe Kennedy
Uh, if someone tries to stop me from writing, unless it is ah medical emergency, I will tell them to wait an hour.

19:33.67
Jeffe Kennedy
Uh, and I feel like that's, that's such a useful way to come at this. So, um oh, and I wanted to do a shout out to ah Brittany Arena, who I just met.

19:47.32
Jeffe Kennedy
Her book, Dance of Lies, is out today. Happy book birthday. It looks really good. She's sending me a copy and I'm excited to read it. So, yeah, on that note, I'm going to to get some writing done.

20:03.58
Jeffe Kennedy
And I will talk to you all on Friday. You all take care. Bye-bye.