I'm Not Hard-Headed with Ebony Walden

[00:00:00] What's good, family? I'm Nikesha Elise Williams, the host of Black & Published Podcast, and the author of the novel The Seven Daughters of Dupree. This historical fiction novel is about the secrets kept between mothers and daughters over the course of seven generations, and is told backwards in time from 1995 to 1860. The Seven Daughters of Dupree was published January 27th, 2026, and is available everywhere books are sold.

[00:00:28] So if you can, please consider getting a copy of The Seven Daughters of Dupree today. This is the Mahogany Books Podcast Network. What got me to that trip was success, was the idea that success and ambition were the things to be concerned with in life. And I always tell people what got me to the trip was not going to get me through the trip.

[00:00:56] What's good? I'm Nikesha Elise Williams, and this is Black & Published, bringing you the journeys of writers, poets, playwrights, and storytellers of all kinds. Today's guest is Ebony Walden, author of the travel memoir, Where I'm From, A Poetic Journey Across Five Continents. It's a book Ebony wrote after her 2010 trip that took her to 17 countries, but one she let sit on the shelf for a decade before she decided to share her story.

[00:01:25] I was like, I have no desire to be out here hawking no book. That's not what I want to do with my time at this moment. And I had fulfilled my purpose for that moment. And I was like, oh girl, I'm done. Let me move on to the, which is so me. Let me move on to the next thing. As a go with the flow free spirit, Ebony readily admits that she believes she should follow just about every idea she has. The reason she says after conceiving, fundraising, and embarking on her global odyssey,

[00:01:53] it took her three and a half years to come back to herself. Plus, the biggest challenge she faced in writing a book featuring poems co-written with authors around the world. And why she says everyone should live like a traveler. That and more is next when Black & Published continues.

[00:02:32] First question, when did you know that you were a writer? I became a writer because I wrote, although I probably wouldn't have self-identified myself. I was blogging when blogging was a thing probably 20 years ago. And then in about 2009, I started hosting Open Mic. So people thought that I was a poet and I wasn't. So I became one because I was like, I can do what they can do.

[00:02:58] So I started writing poetry, blogged my way around the world. So I think it's a becoming. I think people are like, oh, when do you become a writer? When you write consistently. So for the past 20 years, I've probably written consistently through essays and blogs and poetry and now a book, et cetera, et cetera. And so did you know that going on your worldwide trip, literally around the globe, is that something that you wanted to chronicle for a book? Were you always intentional about that?

[00:03:26] No, I think that if you would have told me I was going to write a book about it, I'm not at all surprised. I'm a writer, but that was not the point of the trip. The point of the trip was have a wonderful, expansive experience and to capture it in a variety of ways. So I wrote poetry on the trip. I had journals. I blogged on the trip. I had a monthly newsletter. I took 7,000 pictures. My goal then was to take people who knew me and who supported me on the trip around the world with me through words, videos and photography.

[00:03:56] And my number one goal was to have a good time. After having a good time and experiencing all that you did on the trip and taking all the photos and writing all the blogs and essays, when did it occur to you that, hey, maybe this can be for a wider consumption than just those who know me and supported me to help me go and to see me off? Yeah, I think it was a progression over time. I actually didn't write the book for anybody else other than myself.

[00:04:22] So in 2010, I went on a 17 country, five continent trip around the world. And then when I got back, there was like three years that I was not really interested. I was the trip was so transformative. I was just like, okay, this blew my mind. I need a time to put my life and my ego back together really. And then in 2014, I took my first memoir writing class. It was six weeks to say, okay, is this something I want to write about?

[00:04:50] But I wasn't thinking about, oh, let me turn this into a memoir. I was thinking this was a really transformative experience. How do I go back and country by country, lesson by lesson and encounter by encounter and catalog what I learned. So I'm a profoundly spiritual person. And I think everything happens for a reason. So I was like, well, I don't think God, the creator took me around the world and taught me all these lessons so I can forget them. And I'm like, I'm not hard headed. So I don't need to learn these lessons again.

[00:05:18] I need to catalog them and write about them. So I know why this trip was transformative in a detailed and specific way. And I can incorporate those into my life. So 2014, I took my first six week class. 2015, I took a year long writing class that basically happened between 2015 and 2017. And it sat on my shelf until 2024, because after I finished the book, it was, I was one of the only people in my class to finish.

[00:05:47] Our instructor gave me feedback. She was like, it's ready to go. And I sat it right on the shelf and went about the business of building a business. Cause I was like, I have no desire to be out here, hawking no book. That's not what I want to do at my time at this moment. And I had fulfilled my purpose for that moment. And I was like, Oh girl, I'm done. Let me move on to the, which is so me. Let me move on to the next thing. And then in 2024, by that time I had been to, I've been to 50 countries now, but by that

[00:06:16] time I had finished all 50 States. And I think I had been to 43 countries. I was about to go on a year long remote working journey, which would be the source for my documentary series, black beyond borders. The documentary series actually was supposed to be another book. So I'm literally sitting in this room here. I'm writing the proposal for that book. It was just going to be about me traveling across the African diaspora and highlighting the

[00:06:43] differences and threads of black culture globally. So I'm sitting here writing that. And then the spirit said to me, girl, you already got a finished book. Why are you trying to write a new one? And I said, you're right. So I leaned back here. The book was bound. I pulled it off the shelf. I put it in front of me. I read it that weekend. And I said, now my life is about travel. I'm going to have a documentary series. Now it makes sense. It's not pulling me from what I feel like my central calling is. It's going to add to it.

[00:07:13] So then I was like, okay, it's time. Let me do. It's essentially the same books with a good amount of editing. I had to take it down from a hundred thousand to like 85,000 words and change some things because I'm a different writer. But I was like, I ain't rewriting this book. It's going to get a couple edits. It's going to press on because here's what we not going to do. So let's talk about your publishing process. You are published with She Writes Press.

[00:07:38] And knowing that you didn't want to do a heavy rewrite, what was your process of connecting with an editor or a publisher? There's three options that most people are thinking. Are you going to self pub? I know I didn't want to do that because I'm a self motivated person. And I was like, I don't want to take that. I have a whole ass business. Plus I'm working on a documentary. I don't want to self another thing. I've self enough. Right. So I knew I wanted some kind of help. Then there's hybrid publishers. There's a wide range.

[00:08:07] And I said, well, that's an option. And then there's traditional. I didn't have the time, the patience or the energy to go get an agent and query that felt like it was going to take like three to five years to get out. Like you do a query. You got to find an agent. Then the agent has to find somebody who wants to public your book. And then this is not the day and time where they're really excited about unpublished authors that don't have a strong following. I said, I don't have time for all that. I need to get this book out so I can move forward.

[00:08:36] So I thought hybrid was fine for me. How can I find something that was affordable, reputable, and really cared about the voices of women and cared about the voices of black women. I came across. She writes because they have a women of color writing contest every year where they give away to free publishing packages to women of color to really try to close the gap there is in the industry about not having. Women authors. They specialize in women and they specialize in memoir. Look, I like clarity. Be clear.

[00:09:05] Be timely. Be timely. And you got my whole heart. Those two things. So I met with Brooke. She's really immersed in the publishing world. Respected Brooke Warner. She's a big advocate of memoir. I really liked her style. Straight shooter. Like, here's what we do. And I was honest. I said, look, this causing me some heartburn. I do DEI and racial equity work. And all I see is white faces. Mm hmm. This is not on brand for me. And we talked openly about that. That's publishing. Yeah.

[00:09:35] Yeah. And so I said, mm hmm. This has a problem. So basically she was like, that's publishing. That's why we did the writer content. And that's the work I do. So I was like, well, let's have further conversations to see how not only I can be an author, but we can have conversations about what I can do and to bring more women of color. So we've done some stuff together and I just really like Brooke. She has a, um, Ted talk with our, which I really loved. And it's about green, like this green lighting revolution and how you need to green light yourself.

[00:10:05] You cannot wait for somebody else to say, okay, you are ready. And that's just the type of person I am. Nobody told me to go on around the world trip. I came up with myself. Nobody told me to start a business. I did it myself. And nobody was going to tell me the book that I was going to write because even some of the other hybrid publishers were like, make it self-help-y blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, that's not the book I want to write. And so I submitted to their process. They have kind of rigorous process.

[00:10:34] They either you get a red light, which is like, go back to start. You got some work to do a yellow light is you need some coaching and some developmental editing or green light. You're ready to rock and roll. You usually either ready rock and roll, or you need a copy edit. So all I needed was a copy edit. They liked it and move forward. So that's what I like clear, painless on one accord. It's going to be 14 months. I would highly recommend it. It's definitely an investment in yourself. And I said, look, if I'm a bet on somebody, I am my best thing.

[00:11:03] So if I can invest in myself, like I would, you know, for a degree, I travel or I would for a trip. Okay. This is like one of my trips would be this. So it's about what you want to invest in yourself for. And unless you famous already, you're making a lot of money from selling these books. So it is like these little $2 coins that I'm making.

[00:11:26] I'm using the book as a jumping off point to tell a larger story, a larger body of work and a bridge to some intellectual property I want to make. So if you think about it as an investment and you like starting a body of work, a legacy project, I thought she writes press could help me do that. And so then what were like the biggest notes that you got in submitting to the process before the book came out? At that time, they only take books that are ready to go. Okay.

[00:11:54] If your book is not ready to go, you will go in the coach, you will go a yellow light or red light. So they only take books ready to go. So mine really were like copy editing notes. I had spent a lot of time, even like when I put it on the shelf, like getting the structure out. And I knew what I wanted to do. I went to 17 countries. I knew I wanted to write about 15. I knew I wanted it to be linear. I knew I wanted the first chapter to be planning because everybody wants to know what, how the hell you get the goal on this around.

[00:12:21] I knew I wanted where I wanted to stop, but just in the developmental process, even before that, I think the biggest things were I'm a poet. So the first book had a lot of my poems in there. And then the second, the biggest difference is from she writes. So you got to get all these permissions. I created poems with people. And then the version that I submitted to them were poems that I co-wrote with people around the world. Now you try to find these people 15 years later to get their permission. It was a problem.

[00:12:51] I found two people out of like 12 or 13. So I had to decide to take their actual word for word poems out of the book, but I'm a writer. So it gave me a good problem to have. Like, how are you going to embed this in the narrative? So I made it more like, it is exactly what it was. It wasn't interview. So you get the substance of the poems through conversation and narrative, not just reading them. Now, I also have on my website, if anybody interested, I created an anthology with the poems that are separate. Cause you know, that's just going on my website.

[00:13:21] It doesn't have the rigor of actually being something that's published. So that was the biggest challenge trying to find those people. Where does poetry fit in there? And I think in my mind, a lot of my poems are going to go in there, but then I feel primarily a memoirist essayist, more than a poet. Although I have books and books of poetry.

[00:13:44] So I said, look, let this poetry go in another book and let these people read on the journey, uninterrupted, immersed in this experience. That is my number one goal. So where to put the poetry, how to put the poetry, whose poetry and how to get permission were probably my biggest like notes and challenges and really wrestle and struggle. All right. So like, let's go ahead and have you read something from where I'm from so we can dive deeper into the book.

[00:14:07] Ebony Walden's travel memoir, Where I'm From, A Poetic Journey Across Five Continents, takes the reader to 17 countries that transformed Ebony's life and perspective of the world. From her teaching in schools and orphanages in South America and Asia, to backpacking across Europe, going on safari in Africa and facing every obstacle that comes with living out of a suitcase far away from home for eight months.

[00:14:32] Ebony writes with a reflective clarity on what it means to be from a place, from a people and to truly live in the world. Here's Ebony. Yeah. So this is about one of the first pages of the book. This is the introduction. In September of 2010, I stood defeated at a red phone booth on the side of the road in Gretham, England. I rested my 50 pound backpack on the wall of the phone booth and let myself slide down. My strength sank with me.

[00:15:01] Once I hit the ground, my shoulders began shaking and tears flowed in parallel rivers down my face. I looked at the directions I printed from the website, two miles to walk, too far with this backpack. My feet hurt. My shoulders would sore. I'd already called a cab. The number kept ringing and ringing. The phone at the retreat center where I was staying did the same. Ringing, ringing and ringing.

[00:15:25] I didn't have a cell phone. And after volunteering in Central and South America for two months and backpacking for five weeks through six European countries, I just wanted to be stable. I wanted to rest, not sizey, not shapes around cities on my own, not meet random people I wouldn't see again. The burden of carrying a bag and myself had become too heavy, and the weight came crashing down on me.

[00:15:52] I wanted more than ever to be in a warm place, safe, eat a good home cooked meal and bask in the smiles of people who might actually remember my name. I sat there for 10 minutes, my hands covering my eyes, legs stretched out in front of me. No cars drove by. No people passed. The air was chilly and gray clouds loomed above.

[00:16:14] It was just me, a red phone booth, a sleepy town closed on Sunday in my tears. Breathless and defeated, I felt the ache of my own need. I thought traveling the world would be liberating. But in that moment, I felt more lost than ever. How would I move forward?

[00:16:32] That lonely road in England outside a red phone booth with nothing but my backpack and the weight of my own tears was one of many pivotal places on my trip that caused my cracking sense of self to eventually shatter. This is the story of how I got to that lonely road and how I gathered those pieces up and kept going. How in searching for the world, I finally found myself. What did you find out about yourself after visiting 17 countries in a year?

[00:17:01] So many things. So in the back of the book, there's 15 lessons. But I think if I were going to step back, is that what got me to that trip was success, was the idea that success and ambition were the things to be concerned with in life.

[00:17:18] And I always tell people, what got me to the trip was not going to get me through the trip. That makes sense. So success, I was a planner, I fundraised, like my mind is just very visionary organized, right? It's very type A. So that's what got me to the trip.

[00:17:36] But fundamentally on the trip, and I think this is through life, I was operating before the trip. And when I began the trip at half of my human capacity. And what the trip helped me do is to break open the part of myself that needed to live in order to be a whole functioning human being and let go of my survival mechanism.

[00:17:59] I needed heart. I needed intuition. I needed discernment. I needed discernment. I needed to be like, girl, ain't nothing on this trip certain. You have to embrace uncertainty and be present with yourself. Be present with these people. Be present in the moment and not react, but respond because issues going to hit the fan.

[00:18:18] I'm crying in a phone booth three months after I'm going on this. My suitcase breaks, you know, all different things. It's just like a series of obstacles and you have to roll with it and release control of life yourself. You have to ask for help. You have to learn to trust. So all of these things, the yin, the yang, I don't know what the yin or the yang represent, but they're two different parts.

[00:18:44] So say I started with the yin. I could be wrong, but the trip helped me get the yang of life and humanity, right? I needed all of these other qualities that are really emotional intelligence qualities. I knew how to survive. I knew how to be successful. I knew how to plan and I knew how to be ambitious. I learned on this trip how to be softer, how to be vulnerable, how to just ask for help.

[00:19:12] Yes. Ask for help. All of these qualities that you need to be a full, fresh, integrated human being. So this was the beginning of me sort of embracing the wholeness of what it means to be human. Your trip was like part missions, part excursions, vacations. In seeking out the different service projects or teaching opportunities that you did, what stayed with you most once you came back home?

[00:19:38] I volunteered. I wrote poetry. I backpacked around the world. I volunteered anywhere between two weeks and six weeks at six different places. So that's actually where I spent like five out of the eight months of my travels.

[00:19:52] Those were the best. Well, the, one of them wasn't necessarily so good, but they were the most transformative. You know, I think when you're working with kids, I work with kids at schools, community centers, and orphanages. They're hilarious. They're curious. Like they were one little kid was like, is it hot in your country? And I said, well, I mean, in the summer, sometimes I said, why this is up in the mountains of Peru. They hadn't seen black people. He said, is that how your skin got like that?

[00:20:17] So he thought I was burnt girl. You're dead. Yes. So, and then other kids were like, what's happening with your hair? Cause I had shorter locks, but locks just weren't as popular as they are now. And clearly it's a black woman's thing, mostly a black Americans woman thing. So it's right. It's like every day to us, but 16 years ago, it wasn't like it was now, but other people are just like, what, how did you get your hair? Is it a wig? What is happening?

[00:20:43] This other little boy said, and Kenya was like, do you know you are black like us? And I said, well, yeah, I've been black my whole life. He said, well, do you know Michelle Obama? Are you related to Barack? I said, what is this line of questioning? So I love the way Barack is from Kenya. So yeah, that's exactly what I said. I said, well, actually you are more likely to be related to him than I am. I think kids make you present. Like I couldn't bring my ambition to them.

[00:21:13] There's no, even when I was teaching my first day in Guatemala or my first week in Guatemala, I'm like, okay, I'm teaching English. What are all of the English words that y'all know? You, you, you said what? So kids will make you crack up and not take yourself so serious. Learn how to play, learn how to be present. When I was in India, the little girl that I was working with, she, all she wanted me to do was sit there and count her jumps while she was

[00:21:43] jumping rope, right? Or help with homework or just be a quality adult that they can trust and engage. So kids, hands down, they will make you work for it. They will make you show up and really just not take yourself so serious. And I was on the ambition train. So all I had to do was play.

[00:22:03] So play, enjoy. And like one day I'm helping in with homework. And so, you know, it's kind of a stereotype, but true. Like Indian folks love to dance. So all the kids like F this homework. Well, they didn't say that, but essentially let's go dance. So they're like, oh, come on, Didi. So Didi is mean sister was like their term of endearment for me. So they say, come on, Didi, get up and dance with us. So I'm there. I'm supposed to be helping these kids that are at an orphanage and I'm here dancing. I'm counting jump ropes. And so that was just beautiful. I'm not a kid person.

[00:22:33] I have kids. I like to give them back to their parents. Forever auntie. Yes. Yes. I am the auntie. Right. And so I just love that every memory I have, every belly laugh that I have that was deeply impactful was coming from these children, which were hilarious and the most open and curious people that I met around the world. And so I met that curiosity, even sometimes it was uncomfortable with a measure of grace because they're really learning.

[00:23:03] Had I not volunteered, I would have had a very different experience. And when you talked about being vulnerable and asking people for help, there was this little boy in the children's home that I volunteer at. The children's homes I was volunteering at in India. They literally got kids that were orphaned and left at the train station in Delhi. And they had them come and live there.

[00:23:21] So this little boy, he was four. He had this scar, huge scar on the side of his head. So rough and tumble. And I just took it upon myself while I was there for three weeks to try to soften this little baby up that you are in a safe place now that you can relax. You don't have to hit, you don't have to scratch.

[00:23:38] And I have this. It's in the book where I just kind of take him up in my arms. He's like rubbing. I'm trying to show him how to be soft. And I'm like, rub my face. Okay. He smacked me a couple of times upside the head, but right. But by the end we got it right. He's, I was just like, nice, nice. You're rubbing my face. I'm rubbing your face.

[00:23:57] And that required a different side of me than I was normally operating. This playful, this nurturing, this motherly, because that is what the experience required. And I'm deeply grateful for the ways in which children just brought me back to the fullness of being human, of being an auntie, of even have a mother, mothering spirit when you're not a mother.

[00:24:21] We all can embrace being kind of that motherly open and just a safe place for people. After your five continents, 17 countries, and you came back home, what was your readjustment like? Girl, I was a mess for three and a half years. A hot ass mess. Just disintegrated. I think because, well, in the book I write, the winds of the world had blown through my protective layers.

[00:24:52] As a person and my survival mechanisms. So think about everything you think, you know, to be true about life and about yourself have just disintegrated on just a piece by piece on the road. And so I spent the next three and a half years kind of decimated, but in a good way. If you're a spiritual person, it's called the dark night of the soul, which means your ego has disintegrated, but you haven't yet figured out what you're going to be next.

[00:25:17] So you're in this liminal space of, I'm not what I'm used to be. And I'm not yet what I am going to become because I needed years to really integrate the experience in those lessons. So I felt really tender for a long time. And I left super confident. Like even when I got back, people were like, come, come.

[00:25:39] Cause I hosted a poetry event, you know, before I left, they were like, come host. And I'm like, I don't want to be on nobody's date. I don't even know who I am. What can I say? What can I do? So literally I took that time to cocoon. It was my cocoon time. I walked every day to work. I walked home, rain, sleet or snow. I read like 30 to 50 books a year. This is now this is dating myself. I didn't even have internet at home girl. I did red box. That's all I did. Red box. Yes. No internet. I remember. I remember red box. Yeah.

[00:26:08] Girl, I just read box. No internet at home. So it was just such a, and I went to church and I showed up for my loved ones and had them. It was like the quietest time in my life. And when I think back, it was hard and painful, but it was really beautiful. Like I just had this time to, to say like, I am actually not trying to be anything or anybody anymore.

[00:26:30] I'm trying to just recoup and rest and enjoy life without having to produce anything without having to be ambitious. And I went back to my job. Cause they gave me a leave of absence. Even one time I said to my boss, I said, Oh, I need some stuff to do. She said, girl, just relax. It'll come back around and you'll be busy. It's fine. So it was a really, yeah, it was a cocooning. It took me three and a half years. I tell people that my cheese was all the way off my cracker. It had slipped off girl.

[00:27:00] What brought you back to yourself where you felt like the cheese was securely on the cracker? Girl, it still ain't on there. It still ain't on there. Friend. Friend. So I think, you know, time and distance and in the midst of that, you know, I came back, I'm feeling tender. I fall in love, that crumbles. So I was like a hot girl. It was a mess. Yes.

[00:27:25] Girl, I was crying. It was a mess. Like all the tears that I hadn't cried on the trip and all the tears I hadn't cried. I felt like for my whole adult life just came crashing down on me. Talk about like that would send you back out on the road into the world. Cause I'm like, not me coming home. And then I'm in love and then I get heartbroken. Let me go back outside.

[00:27:43] Girl. So, so, okay. So what I did was I'm still an adventurer. And so that's when I started local adventures. So I'm like, I live in Virginia. They have some of the best state parks in the country. So I went to parks. I went to Luray caverns, like these little two, three hour trips. You know, I had, and I was like, I've been around the world. I don't, I don't want to get on a plane. That's an, I had enough for now.

[00:28:06] I did eventually get back on a plane. And then I started my 50 states. I haven't been through my own country. I want to get to know it. So I started my 50 states, which was doable. Right. So I dip my toe out. I love a little adventure. I love a little weekend trip. Come on, just go. I love a little hour away. Let's go to a little Virginia quaint town. Give me some beer.

[00:28:26] I'm always drinking beer, wine or spirits. One of them going to get you right. So I did those things. Charlottesville where I was living is a bastion for wineries. So I went to wineries. So I did these mini adventures, mini dates with myself. I read, I had a spiritual director, which is really helping me understand like the spiritual nature of what I was going through and helped me work through it. A therapist. So piece by piece, I kind of put it back together.

[00:28:51] And then I moved to Richmond about 12 years ago. And then that felt like each thing I was doing was getting me back to myself. Not long after that, I lived in a monastery for a year. So that was really, and she was like, girl, you, you, you, you look like my mother. Like what you doing? Okay. I think people in your life is like, Oh, okay. That's what you're doing now. Okay. My cousin was like, you don't going around the world. Now you live in a convent. I said, yeah, I needed to get myself all the way together.

[00:29:22] So after then I had another job and then I quit my, my job again and started a business. So I think step-by-step moment by month. Yeah. I'm always kidding. And I was like, okay, I'm doing a remote working year. This is everybody in my life. They've been like, okay. My mother asked me the other day, well, how you doing? I said, mom, I'm tired. She said, until you be up doing something else that we, you don't know what it is. And we don't know what it is either. So I've, I've embraced that, that that's what my way.

[00:29:45] I have an idea. I'm totally obsessed and in love with it. I make it happen. It decimates and tires me. I get a little rest and I come back and I do something. Do it all over again. Do it all over again. Right. So I think piece by piece. And I would say like having my business, because it requires me to be in front of people and lead conversation. It was, it was like me being open mic Ebony again.

[00:30:12] Even starting that, I didn't have imposter syndrome, but I was telling somebody the other day that it just started their business. I felt like the first two years people didn't perceive that, but I was shaking, not shaking inside, but just like insecure about what you have to offer.

[00:30:25] And I said, child, I get up there now. I said, this is what I got. If you don't want it, I'm still going to charge you. And we're going to walk through this thing. So I would say it's probably taken me up to maybe the past five years to, to actually feel a hundred percent like myself again, or what would be a new self that's integrated in those things and to feel like being public again.

[00:30:47] So like you took the trip 2010 and five years ago was 2021. So like, that's a good, good long time to like finally come back to some version of your old self. What's integrated with what was transformed on the trip. What are you working on next? You've mentioned your business. You mentioned your documentary. What is next for you? Ebony Walden. Girl to seek help and get the cheese back on the cracker again. I'm going to let you have it.

[00:31:16] I'm silly. I'm now in the midst of this book tour and this thing will take over your whole life. Snatch your edges. You see, I don't have any, my, I have the side of my head shaved, which is a joke. So I'm in the midst of the book tour, which is crazy. The big projects are, I have a documentary series called Black Beyond Borders. My first season came out last year. It was about my six week remote working journey into Senegal.

[00:31:39] I'm working on season two, which is about my month long journey through Afro descendant culture in Columbia. That is finishing up. That should be out Black History Month of next year. And I'm also working on season three, which will be my first full length documentary. And that's about Ghana and the sister city relationship that Charlottesville has with this win of Ghana. And so they've been having people go back and forth for 20 years.

[00:32:03] So my full scale documentary is like what happens when we return and return together. I got a couple of books back there. I want to do some scripted shows. I need to do some poetry. But the biggest thing that I would say between the book and the films, and I think every writer should think about this. I think books are jumping off points or I'm looking at as a jumping off point for greater intellectual property.

[00:32:28] I'm a trainer, teacher, like that's what I do for work. I want to leverage the wisdom I have from working with leaders for 20 years and traveling for 20 years to create some framework. So it'll be keynotes, workshops where I'll teach people how to live beyond borders, how to lead beyond borders. What are the five characteristics that I've learned to be a great traveler that every great leader needs to know?

[00:32:53] How do you think about creativity beyond borders? So I love to work with different mediums. I took this one experience. It has been like eight different things I'm not even going to go into, but I think that's a skill that I want to teach. So living beyond borders, how to understand your identity beyond borders. So I do identity work of what it means to be a black woman moving through the world, but also what I've learned as a black person by traveling across the African diaspora.

[00:33:20] So it's keynotes, it's talks, it's workshops and frameworks that I want to put into action to have people pay me. Cause these, these little two cents from the book, I love it, but it's like two cents. So I need to make some real coin. So holla at your girl if you need a speaker. All right. I want to move around to a speed round in the game before I let you go for the morning. What is your favorite book? All About Love by Bell Hooks. Who is your favorite author? Bell Hooks is one of them. Who is your favorite poet? Lucille Clifton.

[00:33:50] Name a poet you think people don't know enough. Lucille Clifton. What's the difference if you think there is a difference between poetry and spoken word? I think poetry is written and spoken word is a performance thing. So when I do spoken word, it's like, this is a piece that has to be brought to life. Like I'm embodying it. I think poetry, you can read it and perform it, but it's a completely,

[00:34:13] I think spoken word is the embodied art of poetry that is about using all of your body to convey the message. I think poetry is just, you can read it from the page. What has been your favorite country that you've traveled to? I have two. The favorite country from my trip around the world was Kenya. I love the beautiful people and safari is otherworldly. It really looks like the Lion King. They did a really good job. Hakuna Maktada is a real phrase, girl.

[00:34:40] And most recently, most recently, Senegal. I feel like that's like a spiritual home to me. I've been three times for several months. That's what my documentary is about. Other than this book, it's the place that I've written most about. And they have something called Taranga, which is their brand of hospitality. So it feels like a warm hug. It's on the coast. So I just love the food there. I love the people. And it's one of few places that I have returned to.

[00:35:10] If money were no object, where would you go? I know the world is wide for you. What would you do? And where would you live permanently? If money were no object, this is what I would do. I would have a house here that was a retreat center, a house in Senegal that was a retreat center, and one in Colombia that's a retreat center where I would invite people into immersive traveling experiences, and particularly Black women, so they can rest, they can create, and

[00:35:37] they can have the type of transformative travel experience that I had. And you can only do that when you know people on the ground. So that's what I'd be doing. And I would go back like three to six months between the US, Senegal, and Colombia and be my Black ass self and say, come on, Black people. Y'all need rest. Y'all need creativity. Y'all need joy. Y'all need food. Y'all need art. Come on over here to Auntie House. I love that. Name three things on your bucket list. Do you have a bucket list?

[00:36:07] I don't really anymore. So here's one thing. I was like, do you even have a bucket list? Somebody was like, where are you traveling next? I said, nowhere. Nowhere. Don't you think I should sit down? Nowhere. That part. My mother was like, whatever, girl. Here's what I would love to do. I did not come to swimming until I didn't actually learn how to swim until I got back. Right? Because I was like, I went on all these oceans. I know, girl. I grew up in. I was like, you saw all five of the oceans.

[00:36:36] I went in, but I wasn't swimming like a fish. So I learned how to swim. I'm still not a strong swimmer, but I read Tara Roberts' Black Woman, also memoir, written in the waters. She was on the show. We're friends. Okay, wonderful. Yes. And so I loved it. And that really said, ooh, come on to school by diving. So for listeners, she went around the world. She learned to scuba dive and they were looking for slave ship wrecks.

[00:37:04] So that really made me want to up my swim game and someday get scuba certified so I can go on with them on their excursions. So that's on my bucket list. I want to go to Antarctica, maybe one either for my 50 or 60th birthday so I can do all seven continents. Those are the two. Oh, and lastly, I did my African ancestry plus my ancestry, ancestry, and I have ancestry in eight West African countries.

[00:37:33] One of my goals is to set foot in every one of them and just thank the ancestors and put the soil in my feet and say, mama, we made it. We made it. We made it across the ocean and baby, we made it back and just like, just honor that and have just, just set my feet in those places just to reclaim what has so much has been stolen just to say, I'm not only coming back, but I'm thriving. And I want to thank you for your sacrifice. I love that.

[00:38:00] And for those listening, you can go listen to Tara's episode where we talk about Written in the Waters from January, 2025 is when her book came out. And so I interviewed her for that. What brings you joy? Travel and I would say my top ones are travel. I love a good Kiki with the friends, any kind of, we can walk in Kiki, we can drink in Kiki. Of course, black people. I had a little, my friends had a Kiki and they were like, I got my muumuu on.

[00:38:29] And they're like, Ebony, read from your book. I said, why are we doing this? So I love anything. And I've done this internationally. I do it at home. I love anything that involves black women with positive vibes that will keep you alive. And it is my joyful space, whether it's my sisters, whether it's my mother, just, we need more spaces where we could just throw our head back and laugh. So that is my happy place, both to facilitate that and to be invited to that. And what brings you peace?

[00:38:58] Anything involving the ocean. And I take daily walks. So when I came back from a trip and my cheese was off my cracker, I walked every day. It'll get it back on for you. It's actually physiological. It's something that clicks in your brain when you walk. So now I walk every day and I love it because it's something I can, as long as my legs are working and probably even if they can, I can, I can roll a while, just get outside, feel the breeze on your skin, the birds chirp, the trees.

[00:39:27] I walk rain, sleet or snow, and I can take it with me everywhere. But if I had to go someplace, any place that involves water, preferably the ocean and preferably blue water, but it doesn't have to be any kind of water or any color water. All right. So our game is called rewriting the classics. Classic is however you define it. Name one book you wished you would have written. Oh Lord. This is hard. I'm going to say the same thing.

[00:39:56] Probably all about love by bell hooks and her house. She has like a, like a three part series is part of that. And then there's a fourth one. I love it because a lot of people think if you're like a ambitious intellectual black woman that you're not thinking about love in the softer parts. And I love how she was like, this needs to be part of our cultural and social discourse. Cause that was one of the lessons for my trip is about love and relationships. That's what life is ultimately about.

[00:40:26] Name a book where you want to change the ending and how would you do it? Ooh, this is a good one. I recently read, what's it? Tayari Jones's new book. Ken. Uh, Ken. Girl, my heart was broken. I wanted, it's kind of a spoiler, but I wanted her friend to live. We all did. She didn't have to die like that. I was distressed and distraught. I talked to Tayari for the release of Ken and yeah, yeah.

[00:40:54] I just was like, most of the time I can take it in. I said, this done broke my heart twice over. Same, same, same, same. If you haven't read Ken, we're sorry. I'm sorry. Sorry. We still have to read though, but we ruined it. Still read the book. Sorry. Not really. Sorry. All right. Name a book that you think is overrated or overtaught and why? Girl, the great Gatsby. Get this out of here.

[00:41:23] I don't need to be this white man. Get it out of here. Out of here. I love us. I love us. The great Gatsby also catches a lot of direct shots on this podcast. Yeah. Like why we have to read that? I could have been reading. Their eyes were watching God. Okay. Janie and TK. That's what I need to be reading. Now I did read that in college, but I wasn't reading it in high school, but I'm saying like, I need to be reading some black women writers, not this. Get this white man out of here.

[00:41:52] No shade, but kind of probably shade, but I just feel like- No love to F. Scott Fitzgerald. Sorry. My final question for you. When you are dead and gone and among the ancestors, what would you like someone to write about the legacy of words and work that you left behind? She did the damn thing. She had dreams and she made them happen. Now, could she have been a little kinder and less crazy, but I already prefaced this with

[00:42:21] my cheese is still off my cracker. So whatever Ebony set out to do, she did it. And my whole goal is to do it for you. Meaning I'm not doing these things so I can do them. They're great. But if they don't go out and inspire somebody else to get off the couch, get your book off the shelf, get your internal life together so you can be about the business of change. Because I believe transformed people transform other people and they transform places. She did the damn thing.

[00:42:52] She inspired us and she helped us on our journey towards transformation. Big thank you to Ebony Walden for being here today on Black & Published. You can follow Ebony on Instagram and threads at EbonyWalden80. And make sure you check out Where I'm From, A Poetic Journey Across Five Continents. You can get a copy of the memoir from Mahogany Books and get 10% off your first purchase using code BLACKPUB at checkout. That's B-L-K-P-U-B.

[00:43:22] That's our show for the week. If you liked this episode and want more Black & Published, head to our Instagram or YouTube page. It's at Black & Published and that's B-L-K-and Published. There, you can watch a bonus clip from my interview with Ebony about whether she recommends people take a global adventure like her own and what she wants readers to take from her journey. Make sure you check it out and let me know what you think in the comments.

[00:43:50] I'll highlight y'all next week when our guest will be Elizabeth Essay, author of the YA novel, A Drop of Color. I had this rich Nigerian culture that I was very proud of and that was guiding my rearing and how I was coming of age and growing up within my household. And then I would leave the house and go to my predominantly white school. I was moving through the world as a Black girl in America.

[00:44:14] And something that I really wanted to highlight in this book was how Gabrielle felt very isolated at times. That's next week on Black & Published. I'll talk to you then. Peace. Peace. What's going on, family? This is Derek Young. And Ramonda Young. Owners of both Mahogany Books and the Mahogany Books Podcast Network.

[00:44:43] We really want to thank each and every one of you for listening to this episode. And if you enjoyed what you just heard, drop us a review and rate us on whatever platform you download podcasts on. We truly appreciate each and every one of you for supporting us and making us your go-to for Black books. And we look forward to connecting with you all sometime in the future. Thank you again, fam. And always remember, Black Books Matter.