Clover Leaf Chronicles
Welcome to "Clover Leaf Chronicles," your daily podcast dedicated to exploring the diverse and impactful publications from Clover Leaf Publications. Each episode delves into our latest children's books, eco-thrillers, and investigative reports, highlighting the stories and themes that inspire readers to cherish and protect our environment.
Join us as we journey through enchanting tales like "Licorice’s Big Adventure," where young minds are introduced to the wonders of nature and the importance of wildlife conservation.
We'll also delve into the "Sean & Julie: Eco Cops" series, following FBI agents tackling environmental crimes, blending action and suspense with pressing ecological issues.
Additionally, we feature in-depth discussions on our "Investigative Voices Reports," uncovering stories often ignored by mainstream media, exposing government corruption, environmental crises, and corporate wrongdoing.
Whether you're a parent seeking engaging and educational content for your child, a reader passionate about environmental justice, or someone interested in investigative journalism, "Clover Leaf Chronicles" offers insightful discussions and behind-the-scenes looks into the publications that aim to educate, entertain, and inspire action.
Tune in daily to discover how our stories can enrich your life and empower you to make a difference in the world.
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Clover Leaf Chronicles
Finding Freedom: Overcoming Narcissistic Influence in the Workplace
Find my books at Cloverleaf.pub or search Lidia LoPinto on Amazon.
Unlock the secrets to dealing with narcissists as I, Lydia Lupinto, share a gripping tale from my own engineering career where I faced off against a narcissistic boss. Through the courageous journey of Karen, a fictional character inspired by real-life challenges, discover the empowerment that comes from recognizing your worth and resisting manipulative influences in the workplace. This episode takes you on a transformative journey, teaching you how to identify toxic behaviors and find the strength to walk away, leading to profound personal relief and empowerment.
Journey with me as I introduce the compelling book "Freedom from Narcissists: Brave Stories of Survival and Healing," filled with inspiring narratives of escape and recovery from narcissistic grips. These stories resonate with my own experiences with anxiety, drawing a powerful connection between personal struggles and the liberating process depicted in my latest book series on anxiety. As we wrap up, I share my excitement about the upcoming releases in this series and offer a peek into the creative process behind these empowering works. Join the conversation for an infusion of hope, positivity, and actionable insights designed to guide you toward freedom and healing.
Hello everybody, and this is Lydia Lupinto today, and I'm going to remove this background because it seems to twitch. Hold one one minute here. I'm going to remove it virtual background and I'm just going to have the green curtain, okay, so that this way you can see that I got the book today. It's fantastic. I'm very happy with the illustrations and everything on this book. This is part of my anxiety books. I have a whole series now of five books. I also have the anxiety coloring books which people just grabbed at the craft show, because you'll never see coloring books with this kind of art. They're fantastic. Of course, there's always the Christmas book. I'm going to talk about that later. That's beautiful, but today we're going to talk about one of my five books on anxiety.
Speaker 1:And, of course, if you have a partner, a family member, if you have a partner, a family member, most importantly, a boss, that you depend on for your income, and that person is a narcissist, you're going to have issues and you can deal with them, but sometimes you have to let go of them because they're very difficult people. So this book what it does is it'll give you the strength to basically move. Move on with your life and because your life is is very short. These are all the stories in it. Your life is very short, really, and putting up with narcissists is a very difficult. It sucks the life out of you, and so it's better to find the strength to move away from them than to live with them. Okay, here's a couple.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna go through the images now. I just wanna show you what they look like in the book. Okay, the colors and everything I'm gonna read. I think the one thing that I'm going to read, I think the one thing that the one story that I thought was interesting is the story of a boss, because I think we all have had bosses, and that would be more generic, and that's the story of me. Okay, so I'm gonna put the picture on here. That would the picture. Every story is one page and it's purposely made short, because I think that we want to make an impact, uh, but we don't want to stress you out with a long story. This is a picture book. This is meant for you to read, a feel-good story that will empower you, and the pictures are there to reinforce. They're also very decorative and very nice. This one I'm going to read today.
Speaker 1:Karen shuffled the papers on her desk, her hands trembling slightly Across the room. Her boss, alan, was charming the executives with her presentation. The slides, the data, the pitch. It was all her work. For months she had told herself it didn't matter that letting him take the credit was part of paying her dues.
Speaker 1:But today something snapped. When the applause died down, karen stood, her heart pounded and her palms were damp. But she forced herself to walk to the front of the room. Thank you for your time. She said her voice stronger than she'd expected. I'd like to answer any questions about the analysis. I conducted the research and prepared the recommendations.
Speaker 1:The room went silent, alan's smile froze, his jaw tightening. After an uncomfortable pause, the executives nodded and began asking her questions. She answered each one with precision, her voice steady, despite of her nerves. When the meeting ended, she returned to her desk. When the meeting ended, she returned to her desk. Her heart was still racing, but for the first time in months she felt proud of herself. Karen, the pride didn't last long, karen. My office Now.
Speaker 1:Alan barked as he stormed past. She knew that was coming Behind the closed door. Alan didn't hold back. Who do you think you are undermining me like that? His voice was now controlled, but the venom was clear. Karen met his glare. I deserve credit for my work, alan. That's all I did. His response was swift You're fired, pack up your things.
Speaker 1:Karen expected to feel devastated, but as she cleaned out her desk, an unexpected sense of relief washed over her. Walking out of the building with her box of belongings, she fell lighter. She deserved better and she would never let a narcissist take advantage of her again. So this is an interesting story. There are many personal stories in here. There are 18 stories, many personal, many about partners and about other people. Because narcissists can be anywhere, it can be anybody. Because narcissists can be anywhere, it can be anybody.
Speaker 1:So this person took advantage of this girl by taking credit for her work, and I have to say that that was me when I was a young girl that looked a little bit like this in my younger days, younger days, and there was a boss that, as I started my career as an engineer, there was a boss who took over my report, put his name on it, erased my name with whiteout and scribbled his name on the report and presented it as his to his boss. Unfortunate for him, my boss called me in my office and showed me this insanity and showed that he was taking credit for my work. And I was just in complete shock. I couldn't believe that someone would do that. You know, I didn't even think it was legal. But he did it and but the boss recognized it and told him. But he never got fired for doing something like that and attempting it. It was just, you know, he just let me know. I think maybe it was even to just let me know that they can do whatever they want. Maybe it was even to just let me know that they can do whatever they want. And years later I left that job because it was all like that, you know.
Speaker 1:But this kind of thing happens all the time and usually narcissists make great bosses, they make great leaders in companies. So you're likely going to face a narcissist if you're working for a corporation, and it's rare if you don't, and you should be very happy if you don't. But this is what happened to this girl, which was actually me. A lot of the stories are not real. I make them up, but they're based on something I've heard from somebody and I write them in this very brief format. This is the whole story that I just read to you.
Speaker 1:Now there are other stories is reclaiming her space because the person that she thought she loved was a fraud and took advantage of her financially. This is another fellow who also was taken advantage of by his roommate, a lady that lived with an abusive husband who took the joy out of her life and wouldn't allow her to laugh Learning to laugh again. A letter to my abuser. This is a woman who was married unarranged marriage and this is what happened to her. So some of them are sad stories. Here's a lady running away from her husband who was abusive. And here's a man who was abused by his partner and he was embarrassed to say that he was being abused by his girlfriend. Okay, taken advantage of. A lot of times.
Speaker 1:The abuse could be taking advantage of you, financially or otherwise. Here's a woman who's so relieved she finally hears the children and she's relieved that she's left a relationship with a narcissist. She smiled again. Here's another lady. In this case, this person was gaslighting her to the point that she felt completely devastated and she couldn't paint anymore because he kept putting down her work and gaslighting her to the point that she was basically paralyzed. And they can be very abusive psychologically to the point that they will paralyze you psychologically. It depends on what kind of narcissist you're dealing with, but some of them can be very cunning narcissist you're dealing with, but some of them can be very cunning, and they do do all these things purposely. They keep it in mind, they have plans to do this. So that's the friend who saved me. Here's another lady that was abused and she looks in the mirror and finally realizes what has happened to her and she finally has the strength to walk away. And this is done in a poem. And here's the first story is actually with a wife walking away from a husband who doesn't support her writing.
Speaker 1:So I think I've gone over this book before. I just wanted to say that if you uh want to order it, I do have a dozen copies in the office right now. So if you order them from my website at cloverleafpub and I'll put the link you can buy them. There's two buttons. You can buy them from Amazon if you want to. If you have Prime and you prefer to use Amazon, you can always use it. But if you buy it from me, I'll ship you this one and I'll sign it and dedicate it to you, and you can. There is a little box that you can tell me what dedication you want in your book, and I'll do that.
Speaker 1:You can also pair this up if you're using it as a gift. Okay, you can pair it up with this book which, um, for the anxiety, is to relieve your anxiety, and it has these beautiful, uh, angel images that when you color them with pencil, if you're good at it, you can cut it right out of the of here and and put it up on the wall. Or you can make a photocopy and put it up on the wall, or you can make a photocopy, color it in and make your own print. Okay, so these are beautiful images. I came up with these myself and this is how it looks when you color it and this is how it looks before you color it. There's a description in the back, so this will make a very nice little gift.
Speaker 1:People were grabbing these at the craft show, grabbing them right away. I only had like a couple because I haven't gotten all the copies today. I got a dozen of these and a dozen of these, okay, um, you may also want to pair up the gift with the Christmas book for the kids, and this is adorable because this is all done in a vintage style and look at the beautiful images of this book. And what people wanted to buy it at the craft show is because this is a treasure hunt. And what people wanted to buy it at the craft show is because this is a treasure hunt. In other words, you take this book and you act it out with the kids during Christmas and it's a treasure hunt.
Speaker 1:You're going to be finding the missing item on the tree, or the tree won't talk. See, the tree is magic, but it can't talk without this missing item, which I'm not going to tell you what it is. But all the animals in the forest. But it can't talk without this missing item, which I'm not gonna tell you what it is. But all the animals in the forest helped out by looking for this missing item. They all helped. And, of course, you guys can look for the missing item on the tree and you can make a little game out of it.
Speaker 1:It's got beautiful images, okay. These are the kinds of images that you could also frame. I think some of these are frameable, okay, they're so cute. Look at this one the train, okay. So I love vintage images, so I made this book purposely with the vintage images. Look at the dog, okay, and it's a very cute Christmas book. So if you want to buy a package, you can buy the coloring book, you can buy the Christmas book, buy the coloring book, you can buy the christmas book and that's some.
Speaker 1:Definitely freedom from narcissists, which is a great book for anyone who know who's struggling with that. All for yourself. Okay, I do have other books coming, uh, and if you look online on my on my cloverleafpub under the anxiety book, the anxiety set of books, a series, you will find I have a number of other books for anxiety. I'm going to make a video about the tea book. I'm waiting for a copy. There's a bunch of others on talking to your inner child, there's another one.
Speaker 1:These are all things that when you go to therapists and they'll tell you to do these things to talk to your inner child, think about leaving the narcissist They'll tell you all these things, but you don't have stories or inspiration and it may be very difficult to do these things that they recommend. You know they might say you need to color, but here is a coloring book for adults, because color what You're going to color a children's book. Maybe you want to color something that you can frame later and this gives you some instructions on how to color it, but it's very artistic. Okay, I do have some for cats, I have bags. Also I'm going to be doing dogs and other things and horses, but I think that the angels one is the one that people really liked.
Speaker 1:So this book it's called Freedom from Narcissists Brave Stories of Survival and Healing. So these are inspirational stories that you can read so you can compare your situation to these stories and see how bad it is and whether you should be considering making a move away from this narcissist. In this case, the lady was fired, so she had no chance to make up her mind. But the idea that when something like this happens, you feel terrible because you have to find another job, but you learned your lesson, that the next job you get, you're going to make sure you're not going to be working for narcissists or you're going to learn some techniques on how to deal with them. Okay, in the case of this woman, if she wanted to keep her job, she should have never undermined her boss.
Speaker 1:If you're working for a narcissist, you're going to have to put up with him. Okay, you're not going to change his mind. You're not going to change him. The only thing that can change is you, and you may have to put up with a lot of nonsense in order to survive on that job, and that I'm telling you for personal experience that you're not going to win the battle against the narcissistic boss. You're going to lose all the time. They're very strong people, they're very selfish people and they just don't have a soul. A lot of them. They don't really have any emotions or feel sorry for you. They just fire you and that's it. So you can survive a narcissist, but you're gonna have to bend and that may not always be what some people want to do.
Speaker 1:This young girl learned the hard way that you go up against a narcissist and you lose, and that's the story I wanted to bring to you. She felt better, but now she has to find another job. Same thing with all the other stories about the husbands or the partners who are narcissistic. So this is probably my most negative book about the husbands or the partners who are narcissistic. So this is probably my most negative book. I don't have too many negative books. They're all fun and rainbows. I don't like negative books. I've been writing novels about terrorism for too long and lately Charles is in charge of the terrorist books and the action books. I'm more into the children's books and the positive books, and this is probably the only one that I'm going to put out this year. That's negative because it's dealing with a negative personality, which is narcissists.
Speaker 1:And in doing um, getting away from somebody like this, you're going to experience some pain. But the only thing I could tell you is, if you read enough about narcissists and there's plenty of literature on them they don't feel any pain. You are the only one that feels pain. They don't feel pain. They don't feel sorry that you left them. They don't feel pain. They don't feel sorry that you left them. They don't feel bad at all. They just move on. And you know they aren't capable of having certain emotions like normal people. They just don't have that ability to feel like you do. Then it may not be very empathic. So in that case, you're, you're, you're. It's a losing battle. If you're trying to change a narcissist, the only thing you can do is walk away and all the therapists will tell you that uh, and there's.
Speaker 1:You know this is known, but this story and I think is isn. I think these stories are empowering because they tell you a short story about how somebody else had to deal with it and what the results were, and in some cases they were very happy afterwards. In other cases they were just glad to get away from them. I love this picture. This is a bride who got away from them. But look at this. I love this picture. This is a bride who got away from her narcissist fiance, who realized before it was too late that she was not marrying the right again.
Speaker 1:You can get these books. I think the narcissist book is 14 and if you buy uh more than uh than a hundred dollars worth of books, you get 30 off. So you may want to stock up. I do have all the other ones that are the, the five books in the anxiety. You can buy all five and get a 30 off at my website. This. You don't get that discount on amazon, you only get it from me and uh, I'll make sure I don't have them all in the office, but I can order them and uh, it will send them to you. So if you always can always contact me via email or through my website or through the Facebook page and I will get back to you if you have any questions about this and I will continue to write books about anxiety. As you know, in the past years ago I think before COVID I suffered from anxiety and lost vision in one eye not lost vision, but movement of my left eye and that even compounded the anxiety. So I was not well for quite a long time. So I do have knowledge, first hand knowledge, of what anxiety can do and how bad it can affect you. So, um, you may want to, uh, just take a look at these books. It's coming, coming from the heart.
Speaker 1:Some stories are my stories. Some stories are just based on other stories I have read, and I think I purposely wrote them to be short and sweet and they're really meant to be inspirational and positive. Even though the book Just the Freedom from Narcissists seems negative, it's about freedom from these narcissists. It's about reclaiming your life and how important that is, because every minute you spend suffering under a narcissist, that's one minute that you haven't lived because they have you under their thumb. They usually use financial leverage or emotional blackmail to keep you around. There's different techniques, so they make it difficult to separate yourself from them separate you know yourself from them. But these are the stories that will help you get away from the narcissist and start living your life.
Speaker 1:So thank you very much, and I will go over some of the other books that I have. I haven't gotten all the copies yet because these are so new. I've only been working on them for a few months, so they're just out and I'm going to go over them. I think I posted a video online and I posted the links to each of the books with the covers, and here I'll show you. I showed you some of the pictures and I'll have a couple of more videos with some more pictures of what these books are about, so that you can get an idea of what's inside. Thank you very much and have a great Christmas. Bye-bye now. I'll see you soon because I have another book that I have to present, probably tomorrow.