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| Power Style Wellness Connections |
BOLD MOVES BY COURAGEOUS WOMEN
By Ruby Thomas
Do you ever look at someone's life and say: "What was she
thinking?" These women inspire by taking the next, courageous
step.
Surprise, I’m a Woman
“They were a little surprised when they saw me,” she says.
“They had all my IDs made up and had to go change them from
male to female.” Jamison Blanton is a hydraulic engineer and still
works for the U.S. Army Corps. of Engineers. She graduated from the University of
Louisville’s Speed School where she was one of several women in her class. Jamie
discovered a liking for math and science in high school and had a natural fascination
for how things worked. “It just made sense to try the engineering field.” She chose
hydrology because, “I like the concept of water and the power of water.”
Part of Jamie’s responsibility as a hydraulic engineer is maintaining lake levels in
Kentucky and Indiana. After rain falls, it’s up to Jamie and her team to decide how much
water can or cannot be released in order to keep the lake at a normal level. She works
closely with the U.S. Geological Survey to maintain gauging equipment used to
measure lake levels. When heavy rain falls like it did in Indiana in early June, she is
also responsible for forecasting when the lakes are expected to crest. She admits that
her job can be a little frustrating at times, because there is no exact science to
hydrology. “I never knew my job would rely so much on Mother Nature,” she jokes.
Jamie has worked with the Corps since the ‘90s and is still fascinated by what they do.
“I find it incredible that you can dam a river,” she says. She also loves the lakes and
wishes she spent more time outside the office and in the field. “I would love to visit my
lakes at least once a year.”
Jamie is proud of what she has accomplished as a woman in a male-dominated line of
work. “It gives me a little boost of self-confidence,” she says. She admits that studying
engineering was challenging for her. “It was hard for me to stick with it not so much
because it was male dominated, but just because of the rigorous class work.” Yet, she
advises women who have a desire to work in the sciences to pursue it.
The Power of an Education
As a young girl growing up, Patricia Duffley-Renow, Ph.D. dreamed of becoming a
medical doctor. During her childhood visits to her pediatrician, she would ask all kinds
of questions about life in the medical field. Things did not turn out quite as she
dreamed. Life was hard for her single mother trying to raise seven children. Life
circumstances and illnesses forced Patricia to leave school after completing only the
eighth grade. She found work, but even at that young age she knew she wanted more
out of life. She joined the U.S. Army soon after turning 17 years old and only days after
receiving her G.E.D. certificate. “I knew that if I went into the military, I could possibly
get some benefits for my mother as well as for my brothers and sisters,” she says. The
military is where she learned the lessons that would set her on the path to success. Life
in the army taught her to “persevere and reach for the sky.”
Her family valued education. “It was something we felt was important in our lives,” she
says. “As I matured, I realized that in order to get anywhere in this world, you needed to
have an education.” After the military, she went back to school and earned a bachelor’s
degree in psychology from the University of Tennessee, as well as a master’s degree in
occupational health and safety. Fate would set her on a new career path after one of
her sisters suffered an accident which left her with severe brain injury. Patricia became
the caregiver for her sister and her children. “It was hard to get any type of services for
her,” she recalls. Patricia was inspired by a rehabilitation counselor who was able to
help her sister and decided she’d go back to school to get a master’s degree in that
field.
Her biggest educational accomplishment came in May of this year when she graduated
from the University of Tennessee with a doctorate degree in educational psychology.
“It was unbelievable. It’s still sinking in,” she says. She is especially proud to have made
the giant leap from a G.E.D. to a Ph.D. “When you tell people you have a G.E.D., they
look at you one way. When you tell people you are a doctor, they look at you a totally
different way.” She says people tend to look down upon those who have a G.E.D. She
assures those who did not earn a traditional high school diploma that it’s nothing to be
ashamed of. “I am proud that I can say I am a G.E.D. graduate and now I’ve obtained
my Ph.D. You can obtain any type of educational degree once you’ve obtained that G.
E.D.”
She believes it’s important for those who are in high school to complete their studies,
because it will open many doors in life. “Without that, there are barriers you’ll have to
cross as you get older.” She’s a strong believer that “where there is a will there is a
way.”
Finding A Place for Books
Kate Larken fell in love with words as a little girl playing in her grandfather’s newspaper
printing shop. She figured out a way to turn every chore into an opportunity to explore
and play with words. A simple task like watering the garden became a challenge to see
how fast she could write a word in the air using the hose as a pencil and water as ink. “I
have printer’s ink in my veins,” is how she describes her fascination with the written
word. It’s no wonder then, that the girl who could fall asleep on stacks of newspapers in
her family’s printing shop now makes books her life’s work. Kate is the owner of
MotesBooks, a literary publishing company in Louisville. “I didn’t think someday I’d own
a publishing company.” When a “serendipitous opportunity” presented itself, however,
she ran with it. “I grew up around story tellers. I care about how a story is told and how
people use language,” she explains.
Kate describes herself as a life-long learner. She earned a master’s degree in
journalism and has been writing songs and plays for as long as she can remember.
She was a teacher before venturing into the publishing industry. While teaching arts
and humanities, she realized there was not enough material available on Kentucky.
“The logical thing seemed for me to stop teaching and start writing, editing, or
publishing the material teachers needed.” She was creating text books for schools
when a reporter who was a friend asked her to publish a collection of newspaper
articles. This is how MotesBooks was born. “I didn’t know how to make books,” she
says. She didn’t let that stop her. She used her knowledge of the publishing business
to fuel her new passion. She did lots of research, talked to people, and taught herself
many things along the way. Kate also held on to a piece of wisdom an uncle had
shared with her many years ago: Start small and show growth.
“I really adhered to that. If you start too big, you can easily fall on your face, then you
feel like you can’t do anything.” She kept that bit of wisdom from her uncle in mind and
built MotesBooks.
Kate likes publishing titles that may not have been given the place they deserve by
large publishing houses in big cities like New York. She started a book club partnership
program a couple years ago with the goal of getting more book clubs to read
MotesBooks authors. She compares these books to motes dancing in a beam of
sunlight. “Each one of those little motes can reflect one of these books I shed some
light on.” Kate’s approach to life is to be totally honest and willing to admit that she
doesn’t know it all. She is comfortable not conforming to a standard. “Don’t worry about
the rules. It’s okay to break them.”
Taking a Step for Help
Theresa Hinton decided it was time to go into business for herself when 70-hour-long
corporate work weeks started cutting into time with her two children. “I wanted to spend
more time with my sons and have a greater sense of accomplishment,” she says. Yet
she admits that those years in the corporate world set her on the path to being a
successful business woman. “I appreciate those years, because I learned a lot from
inadvertent mentors.”
She describes herself as a shy person, but you would never guess that from her million
dollar business accomplishment. Theresa is the owner of Comprehensive Consulting, a
firm which provides medical reviews and case management in Louisville. Two years
ago, she was looking for a way to lift her business out of a slump and came across the
Make Mine a Million $ Business competition. “The thought of the contest intimidated
me,” she admits. However, the promise that the winner would receive coaching,
mentoring, business assessment, and peer review was too great an offer to let shyness
stand in the way of what her business needed.
“It will cause me to be exposed to different things, different people, and different ways
of doing things,” she told herself. She finally decided, “I’m going to compete whether I
win or not.” She went through the process of entering Comprehensive Consulting into
the competition including overcoming a bad case of nerves and delivering the required
speech at the National Conference of the National Association of Women Business
Owners in San Francisco. Theresa said that when she walked into the conference
room and it was her turn to speak she really had to reach down inside herself and
focus on the fact that she was doing it for the good of her company.
The payoff came when she found out she’d won. “The pit of my stomach did a little flip,”
she recalls. The prize was the mentoring and resources she needed to push her profits
over the million dollar mark, a goal she accomplished last year. “I was watching the
numbers week by week, month by month,” she says. When Comprehensive Consulting
finally hit the big number, Theresa could hardly believe it. “Maybe I did the numbers
wrong, let me go back and look.” She didn’t just accomplish that goal, but her business
became one of the highest grossing companies in the Make Mine a Million $ Business
community. She does not believe she would have done it without the help from her
mentor. “If it was just for me, I think I would have always made excuses for myself,” she
says. Winning the contest and accomplishing the million dollar goal was an affirmation
that pushing yourself outside your comfort zone can only make you grow.
She says that many times, women business owners get into a cycle where they are
working so hard they forget to reach out for help and open themselves to new
experiences. She advises women to take that first step no matter how
difficult something may look. They’ll be surprised that it’s usually not. From Surviving
to Thriving Djenita Pasic and her family were visiting Louisville from Bosnia to celebrate
the Kentucky Derby with friends when Sarajevo was taken over by Serbian forces on
Derby Day 1992. “We never planned on living here permanently,” she says. “When we
realized we couldn’t return, we decided to do the best that we could. It was very difficult
in the beginning. We came with a suitcase and a bag, but we were in a place we knew,”
she says. Djenita and her family were familiar with Louisville, since they’d lived here for
a couple years in the late 1980s when her husband studied medicine.
While the war was going on in Bosnia she started rebuilding her new life in Louisville.
Her husband became re-certified as a doctor and her daughter went back to school
while Djenita went to work for an international business firm. She enrolled at the
Brandeis School of Law in 1995 after a lawyer friend encouraged her to pursue a legal
career. Djenita was inspired to pursue a law degree after seeing how much her
husband had studied to reach his goal of becoming a doctor. She also realized that in
the U.S. you are not limited to one career and making a career change was looked
upon favorably. After graduating from law school, she went to work for Frost Brown
Todd LLC as a senior associate in the international business department. She worked
there for eight years until the department split up and she decided it was time to do
something different.
She was at a point in her life where she did not feel the need to keep doing as much as
she had while working as a full-time corporate attorney. “I worked with the best of the
best and paid my dues. It was time to do my own thing and find my own way.” She
decided to join her sister who owned a business development consulting company in
Vienna, Austria called Brainswork. Her sister’s company deals with the marketing side
of business. “We help companies expand their business in terms of re-branding and re-
positioning. We help businesses connect with each other.” She started Brainswork U.S.
A., LLC in 2006 handling the legal aspects of setting up companies in the U.S. and
abroad.
Besides being the chief networking officer for Brainswork U.S.A., LLC, Djenita’s other
passions are teaching and non-profit work. She is an adjunct professor at Brandeis
School of Law. She also travels to France and Lebanon to teach international
commercial contract at the Bordeaux Business School and Notre Dame University
School of Business. She sits on the board of several local organizations and works with
Bosnian refugees. “We generally tend to be absorbed with ourselves and focused on
what is happening to us. We need to get out of ourselves and focus on others and the
world around us,” she says. “Once you are able to truly open up in that way, you
become much happier with yourself.”
By Ruby Thomas
Do you ever look at someone's life and say: "What was she
thinking?" These women inspire by taking the next, courageous
step.
Surprise, I’m a Woman
“They were a little surprised when they saw me,” she says.
“They had all my IDs made up and had to go change them from
male to female.” Jamison Blanton is a hydraulic engineer and still
works for the U.S. Army Corps. of Engineers. She graduated from the University of
Louisville’s Speed School where she was one of several women in her class. Jamie
discovered a liking for math and science in high school and had a natural fascination
for how things worked. “It just made sense to try the engineering field.” She chose
hydrology because, “I like the concept of water and the power of water.”
Part of Jamie’s responsibility as a hydraulic engineer is maintaining lake levels in
Kentucky and Indiana. After rain falls, it’s up to Jamie and her team to decide how much
water can or cannot be released in order to keep the lake at a normal level. She works
closely with the U.S. Geological Survey to maintain gauging equipment used to
measure lake levels. When heavy rain falls like it did in Indiana in early June, she is
also responsible for forecasting when the lakes are expected to crest. She admits that
her job can be a little frustrating at times, because there is no exact science to
hydrology. “I never knew my job would rely so much on Mother Nature,” she jokes.
Jamie has worked with the Corps since the ‘90s and is still fascinated by what they do.
“I find it incredible that you can dam a river,” she says. She also loves the lakes and
wishes she spent more time outside the office and in the field. “I would love to visit my
lakes at least once a year.”
Jamie is proud of what she has accomplished as a woman in a male-dominated line of
work. “It gives me a little boost of self-confidence,” she says. She admits that studying
engineering was challenging for her. “It was hard for me to stick with it not so much
because it was male dominated, but just because of the rigorous class work.” Yet, she
advises women who have a desire to work in the sciences to pursue it.
The Power of an Education
As a young girl growing up, Patricia Duffley-Renow, Ph.D. dreamed of becoming a
medical doctor. During her childhood visits to her pediatrician, she would ask all kinds
of questions about life in the medical field. Things did not turn out quite as she
dreamed. Life was hard for her single mother trying to raise seven children. Life
circumstances and illnesses forced Patricia to leave school after completing only the
eighth grade. She found work, but even at that young age she knew she wanted more
out of life. She joined the U.S. Army soon after turning 17 years old and only days after
receiving her G.E.D. certificate. “I knew that if I went into the military, I could possibly
get some benefits for my mother as well as for my brothers and sisters,” she says. The
military is where she learned the lessons that would set her on the path to success. Life
in the army taught her to “persevere and reach for the sky.”
Her family valued education. “It was something we felt was important in our lives,” she
says. “As I matured, I realized that in order to get anywhere in this world, you needed to
have an education.” After the military, she went back to school and earned a bachelor’s
degree in psychology from the University of Tennessee, as well as a master’s degree in
occupational health and safety. Fate would set her on a new career path after one of
her sisters suffered an accident which left her with severe brain injury. Patricia became
the caregiver for her sister and her children. “It was hard to get any type of services for
her,” she recalls. Patricia was inspired by a rehabilitation counselor who was able to
help her sister and decided she’d go back to school to get a master’s degree in that
field.
Her biggest educational accomplishment came in May of this year when she graduated
from the University of Tennessee with a doctorate degree in educational psychology.
“It was unbelievable. It’s still sinking in,” she says. She is especially proud to have made
the giant leap from a G.E.D. to a Ph.D. “When you tell people you have a G.E.D., they
look at you one way. When you tell people you are a doctor, they look at you a totally
different way.” She says people tend to look down upon those who have a G.E.D. She
assures those who did not earn a traditional high school diploma that it’s nothing to be
ashamed of. “I am proud that I can say I am a G.E.D. graduate and now I’ve obtained
my Ph.D. You can obtain any type of educational degree once you’ve obtained that G.
E.D.”
She believes it’s important for those who are in high school to complete their studies,
because it will open many doors in life. “Without that, there are barriers you’ll have to
cross as you get older.” She’s a strong believer that “where there is a will there is a
way.”
Finding A Place for Books
Kate Larken fell in love with words as a little girl playing in her grandfather’s newspaper
printing shop. She figured out a way to turn every chore into an opportunity to explore
and play with words. A simple task like watering the garden became a challenge to see
how fast she could write a word in the air using the hose as a pencil and water as ink. “I
have printer’s ink in my veins,” is how she describes her fascination with the written
word. It’s no wonder then, that the girl who could fall asleep on stacks of newspapers in
her family’s printing shop now makes books her life’s work. Kate is the owner of
MotesBooks, a literary publishing company in Louisville. “I didn’t think someday I’d own
a publishing company.” When a “serendipitous opportunity” presented itself, however,
she ran with it. “I grew up around story tellers. I care about how a story is told and how
people use language,” she explains.
Kate describes herself as a life-long learner. She earned a master’s degree in
journalism and has been writing songs and plays for as long as she can remember.
She was a teacher before venturing into the publishing industry. While teaching arts
and humanities, she realized there was not enough material available on Kentucky.
“The logical thing seemed for me to stop teaching and start writing, editing, or
publishing the material teachers needed.” She was creating text books for schools
when a reporter who was a friend asked her to publish a collection of newspaper
articles. This is how MotesBooks was born. “I didn’t know how to make books,” she
says. She didn’t let that stop her. She used her knowledge of the publishing business
to fuel her new passion. She did lots of research, talked to people, and taught herself
many things along the way. Kate also held on to a piece of wisdom an uncle had
shared with her many years ago: Start small and show growth.
“I really adhered to that. If you start too big, you can easily fall on your face, then you
feel like you can’t do anything.” She kept that bit of wisdom from her uncle in mind and
built MotesBooks.
Kate likes publishing titles that may not have been given the place they deserve by
large publishing houses in big cities like New York. She started a book club partnership
program a couple years ago with the goal of getting more book clubs to read
MotesBooks authors. She compares these books to motes dancing in a beam of
sunlight. “Each one of those little motes can reflect one of these books I shed some
light on.” Kate’s approach to life is to be totally honest and willing to admit that she
doesn’t know it all. She is comfortable not conforming to a standard. “Don’t worry about
the rules. It’s okay to break them.”
Taking a Step for Help
Theresa Hinton decided it was time to go into business for herself when 70-hour-long
corporate work weeks started cutting into time with her two children. “I wanted to spend
more time with my sons and have a greater sense of accomplishment,” she says. Yet
she admits that those years in the corporate world set her on the path to being a
successful business woman. “I appreciate those years, because I learned a lot from
inadvertent mentors.”
She describes herself as a shy person, but you would never guess that from her million
dollar business accomplishment. Theresa is the owner of Comprehensive Consulting, a
firm which provides medical reviews and case management in Louisville. Two years
ago, she was looking for a way to lift her business out of a slump and came across the
Make Mine a Million $ Business competition. “The thought of the contest intimidated
me,” she admits. However, the promise that the winner would receive coaching,
mentoring, business assessment, and peer review was too great an offer to let shyness
stand in the way of what her business needed.
“It will cause me to be exposed to different things, different people, and different ways
of doing things,” she told herself. She finally decided, “I’m going to compete whether I
win or not.” She went through the process of entering Comprehensive Consulting into
the competition including overcoming a bad case of nerves and delivering the required
speech at the National Conference of the National Association of Women Business
Owners in San Francisco. Theresa said that when she walked into the conference
room and it was her turn to speak she really had to reach down inside herself and
focus on the fact that she was doing it for the good of her company.
The payoff came when she found out she’d won. “The pit of my stomach did a little flip,”
she recalls. The prize was the mentoring and resources she needed to push her profits
over the million dollar mark, a goal she accomplished last year. “I was watching the
numbers week by week, month by month,” she says. When Comprehensive Consulting
finally hit the big number, Theresa could hardly believe it. “Maybe I did the numbers
wrong, let me go back and look.” She didn’t just accomplish that goal, but her business
became one of the highest grossing companies in the Make Mine a Million $ Business
community. She does not believe she would have done it without the help from her
mentor. “If it was just for me, I think I would have always made excuses for myself,” she
says. Winning the contest and accomplishing the million dollar goal was an affirmation
that pushing yourself outside your comfort zone can only make you grow.
She says that many times, women business owners get into a cycle where they are
working so hard they forget to reach out for help and open themselves to new
experiences. She advises women to take that first step no matter how
difficult something may look. They’ll be surprised that it’s usually not. From Surviving
to Thriving Djenita Pasic and her family were visiting Louisville from Bosnia to celebrate
the Kentucky Derby with friends when Sarajevo was taken over by Serbian forces on
Derby Day 1992. “We never planned on living here permanently,” she says. “When we
realized we couldn’t return, we decided to do the best that we could. It was very difficult
in the beginning. We came with a suitcase and a bag, but we were in a place we knew,”
she says. Djenita and her family were familiar with Louisville, since they’d lived here for
a couple years in the late 1980s when her husband studied medicine.
While the war was going on in Bosnia she started rebuilding her new life in Louisville.
Her husband became re-certified as a doctor and her daughter went back to school
while Djenita went to work for an international business firm. She enrolled at the
Brandeis School of Law in 1995 after a lawyer friend encouraged her to pursue a legal
career. Djenita was inspired to pursue a law degree after seeing how much her
husband had studied to reach his goal of becoming a doctor. She also realized that in
the U.S. you are not limited to one career and making a career change was looked
upon favorably. After graduating from law school, she went to work for Frost Brown
Todd LLC as a senior associate in the international business department. She worked
there for eight years until the department split up and she decided it was time to do
something different.
She was at a point in her life where she did not feel the need to keep doing as much as
she had while working as a full-time corporate attorney. “I worked with the best of the
best and paid my dues. It was time to do my own thing and find my own way.” She
decided to join her sister who owned a business development consulting company in
Vienna, Austria called Brainswork. Her sister’s company deals with the marketing side
of business. “We help companies expand their business in terms of re-branding and re-
positioning. We help businesses connect with each other.” She started Brainswork U.S.
A., LLC in 2006 handling the legal aspects of setting up companies in the U.S. and
abroad.
Besides being the chief networking officer for Brainswork U.S.A., LLC, Djenita’s other
passions are teaching and non-profit work. She is an adjunct professor at Brandeis
School of Law. She also travels to France and Lebanon to teach international
commercial contract at the Bordeaux Business School and Notre Dame University
School of Business. She sits on the board of several local organizations and works with
Bosnian refugees. “We generally tend to be absorbed with ourselves and focused on
what is happening to us. We need to get out of ourselves and focus on others and the
world around us,” she says. “Once you are able to truly open up in that way, you
become much happier with yourself.”