Find The Clues To Your Next Career Move

Ten years ago, I was in a Digital Marketing role at a large financial services firm. After a successful career building websites and digital experiences, I had a stomach churning feeling that I was ready for my next move. I knew I wanted something different, but I had no idea what it could be. I felt stuck, disappointed and like I should have this figured out already! 

In that space of uncertainty, I decided to get involved in the many other activities available at my organization. I became active in the company’s women’s leadership development and networking group. While in the network, I connected with powerful, female leaders at all levels of the organization. A year into my work with these incredible women, I became pregnant with my first daughter, which sparked the idea to create a Workplace Flexibility event. We invited the most senior female leader in the organization at the time for a keynote speech, with a follow-up panel conversation about the organizational needs of working parents and the direction workplace flexibility was headed. I worked tirelessly to coordinate the event details and promotion on top of my day job. I was LIT UP by the process, the momentum and the excitement that grew with what seemed like a movement my colleagues and I were building. 

The day of the event I was 9 months pregnant and feeling my strongest pregnancy symptom—EMOTION. I pinned the lavaliere mic on our keynote before her talk and walked to the back of the room to take in what I along with my co-conspirators had created. A standing room only, packed audience. An energy that was hopeful and supportive and HUNGRY to know more. Our speaker started her talk with a heartfelt working parent meltdown story in which her overwhelm had caused her to forget something for her son’s class. In that moment where priorities came into the foreground, she chose to spend the extra time doing right by her family instead of attending the senior level meeting to which she was already late. 

I looked down at my growing belly, riveted by her words and taken with the intense energy of the room. I felt more alive that day than I had in many years of my digital career. Something shifted. All the clues for my next move were right in front of me, but I couldn’t see them. I was fearful for how I was going to juggle work and family in my own life. 

After my daughter was born, I started a new Digital Marketing role that was part-time and flexible. I knew it was a safe move, but also that it was the right move for me at the time, given my priority shift. I was able to work with great people, use my strengths and years of expertise AND control my schedule. My friends who were struggling to stay afloat would remind me often that I had the dream situation for a working mom. And for the most part, that was true. But there was something nagging at me throughout this time. It showed up when I mentored some of my colleagues and coached my friends through their career challenges. It was there when I presented to a room of employees and felt comfortable being myself, sharing stories to demonstrate my point. Or when I obsessively read articles about the disparity between men and women in senior leadership roles and the gender pay gap. When Anne-Marie Slaughter’s Atlantic article, "Why Women Still Can’t Have It All" appeared in July 2012, it rocked my world and was all I could talk about for days. All the clues were there, but it took time and space, supportive people and running a marathon (yep, best rut-busting tool out there!) to get me to trust the evidence and build a case for my career transition. 

When I work with clients who are seeking clarity about their next step, I say, "It’s OK not to know right now, but walk through your life with an openness to finding the clues, and when you find them, notice how they feel in your body." If you’re stuck in your head, listen to what your body is telling you with butterflies, or fireworks or flow. 

My clients create a list of past projects, programs, conversations and brief moments when they felt ignited, curious and alive. And then they open their eyes to the moments they brush off in their every day life as "silly" or "nothing." They know those moments were something and by acknowledging them and giving them space to grow—who knows if that something can turn into THE thing. 
 

A Thank You To My First Mentor

When I was nine years old, my mom returned to the workforce after a 13-year career break. Financially, we were struggling, so my parents decided to forgo finding an afterschool babysitter. Instead, I became your stereotypical eighties latch-key kid, walking home from the bus stop on my own, with a Papa Smurf keychain that said, “Don’t Lose These Keys!” and an afternoon that was a blank slate. 

Having grown up to that point with a stay at home mom, I struggled with all of the new-found freedom at first. In the first few weeks, I called my mom two or three times an afternoon—and you can guess how this went over with her employer. She had to cut me off, limit me to one 5-minute conversation and then I was left to figure out how to fill the rest of my afternoon. 

Then it happened. I found myself an inspirational mentor I could check in with five afternoons a week at 4PM, Eastern Standard Time. 

Oprah. 

I was riveted by her energy, optimism and belief that anybody could be anything and that anybody could get through anything. 

I was taken by the confidence and authority in her words—even when she didn’t look like anyone else I saw on TV. Already at nine, I was aware that my body was bigger and different than most of my classmates, so to see someone standing in her power simply as herself was a tremendous relief. I was grateful to know that this was possible. 

My relationship with my mentor grew over time. On the days her show was a bit sensational for my taste, I simply used it as background fodder for snacking and homework. But the days when she dug into the human experience: resilience, persistence, empathy, compassion, finding courage to stand in your convictions—I was hooked. 

I leaned most on that personal leadership foundation built during my mentor sessions in the initial weeks after my parents died in a car accident when I was eleven. I went to therapy and had the unconditional support of my extended family—but it was the Oprah Kool-Aid that truly kept me going. I’d seen first-hand how people could survive the most horrific tragedies and live to talk about it on the show. I often thought about how I would share my story with Oprah, and how she might grab my hand and tell me that I was brave. In that moment, when the rest of my family was reeling in grief and had no clue what to say to me, in my mind, Oprah knew how to be with me and I would feel in my bones that I was brave. I believed it. And it was that belief that started so small and grew to become all that I am. A survivor and someone who knows with every cell that anybody can be anything and get through anything. 

Looking back on that time now with my coach training, I know my conversations with Oprah televised in my mind, were my pre-teen version of visualization that kept me in the space of explaining my resilience, my compassion for myself and my belief that I was going to make it through. I remember keeping it to myself thinking I was either just a super fan or a little crazy—but that was actually quite an insightful strategy for an 11-year-old! 

Now that I’m in the business of helping people step out of their fears and into a life of their design, I call on my early training often and I’m certain that these were the days I first fell in love with this work. I’d be lying if I said I gave up on my mentor conversations. When I’m struggling with something in my business or in life, I picture myself in Oprah’s Santa Barbara backyard, filming our Super Soul Sunday episode and somehow, I always find my way back to being both brave and truly seen. 

In Search Of A Space To Be Imperfect

By sheer coincidence or not, my oldest daughter took her statewide English Language Arts test the same week I was preparing for my first leadership workshop with a new coaching group that I am thrilled to be joining forces with. Tensions were high in my neighborhood, where over 50% of students opted out of the controversial state testing this year. 

Walking my daughter through our reasoning behind the test being a non-negotiable in our household, while simultaneously navigating my own fears and creeping doubts about stepping into this new space of training women how to be leaders—work that is directly connected to my WHY—was nothing short of surreal. "Of course we want you to do your best, which we know you will do, but we also want you to practice taking a test. To know that this may be hard AND you can do hard things in life. We want you to know that we love you and you’re going to be OK, no matter how you do. We’ll work with you to help you learn from your experience of taking this test. This is all a chance to learn something new in your life."

As the words left my mouth, I knew they were also meant for me. That may or may not be why I had tears in my eyes as I spoke. Meanwhile she turned to me and said, "It’s OK, Mom. I know. I’m actually excited for the test!" So, perhaps the pep talk was a bit more for me than for my march to the beat of her own drum kind of girl. 

I sent my mentor off to fourth grade and decided to create some space for myself to practice, to move through the fear, and to be imperfect. 

I danced it out to my favorite power song, Sara Bareilles’ Brave. Then, I wrote the word, "COURAGE" in all caps across the white board hanging above my desk. 

I told myself, "My first time walking through this is going to be truly rough. Right now, I’m simply learning the content. It doesn’t need to sound good yet." Imperfection in progress. I’ve learned this lesson with my writing over time and I’m completely on board with writing a "shitty first draft." (Thanks, Anne Lamott!) Somehow, a shitty first pass coming through my voice has always been tougher to bear! No better time to learn. "I’m excited about the test!" Oh yes, what an exciting chance to practice. And I’m not just practicing, I’m expanding.

Every time I tripped up my words and became frustrated, I thought about my WHY. 

Get more women into positions of power.

And I redoubled my energy and my efforts. I thought of the rapt faces of my imminent audiences. I visualized telling a room full of 30 women to stop apologizing and imagined the impact that very statement could have had on my early career. 

In day two of my preparation, my daughter was home sick and begged to watch me practice part of the workshop. My immediate response was nothing short of sheer terror, but then I thought—if I can teach her these skills at age 10—imagine how badass she’s going to be? I walked through a couple of my slides and she was FULLY engaged. "What are filler words? What do you mean by up-speak? Oh yeah, why do people talk that way?" Smiling from ear to ear, she interrupted me to say, "Mom! You are such a good coach. I could listen to this stuff all day." 

In that moment, I’d already won. She saw my fear, my hard work and the space I created for imperfection—and it was worth it for me, because getting to my goal as exactly who I am was more powerful than my fear. I’m proud to learn that lesson at my age and if you can learn it at 10, imagine what else you can do.
 

Choosing Peace Instead Of Busy

One of my closest friends often teases me when it comes to making plans, "You say no a lot." I simply smile and agree whole-heartedly. Yes! Yes, I do say no. I do the mental math to avoid overbooking. On the weekend, if I’m struggling to make something fit in, I assume it won’t. If it feels like something I "should" do instead of something that I want to do, I politely decline. 

I wasn’t always this way. I was as crazed and addicted to busyness as most people I know. But all of sudden, I was having thoughts that I wanted to leave our beloved urban Brooklyn neighborhood for the suburbs. I wanted to take a summer off and spend time upstate. Those changes felt simultaneously overwhelming and necessary. At the time I was also making the switch from my corporate job to building my own business and as part of my transition, I revisited my values and the life I wanted to create for myself. And there it was. Peace had snuck in under the radar as one of my core values. 

It felt like too many changes at one time to leave my corporate job AND our neighborhood and family support, so I said to myself, "If peace and calm is so important to me, how do I bring it into the life I’m currently living? How can I add peace without making dramatic changes?" As it turns out, this was quite a fun exercise! 

I made a list of peace possibilities:

1. Add non-negotiable writing time into my week.

2. Decrease subway time.

3. Plan a vacation in February, the shortest but feels like the longest month.

4. Go to fewer crowded school events with a gazillion screaming kids—especially when my kids are not asking to go!

5. Take walks in the middle of the day.

6. Add buffer time into my schedule—as in not scheduling my day with back-to-back appointments.

7. Add more unstructured time into my life and less weekend overscheduling.

8. Set clear boundaries about when I can see people and when I can’t. Don’t say, "We should get together." if I don’t mean it.

9. Don’t apologize when I can’t see people. I’m either available or I’m not. No need to apologize.

10. Implementing my new possibilities was as liberating as making the list. When I would get an email from a fellow parent saying, "Will we see you at the Pajama and Pizza Party at the preschool?" I would simply say, "I’ve stopped going to those things." Instead I’d take a walk with the kids or take them to the park. Ah, peace—why have I not chosen you before?

Even beyond the overt ways I’ve diminished noise in my life with less commuting and crowded school events, the addition of clearer boundaries with plans and relationships has helped me to wipe out the mental noise that kept me from the peace I was desiring. I know I’m clear on my commitments and I don’t have a lot of maybes taking up valuable space in my head. In looking at this list now, I can say that of all the changes I’ve made in my life in the past 4 years, these were among the easiest to stick with and have made a tremendous impact on my happiness and wellbeing. Some people thrive in scheduled, busy lives. I’ve learned I’m not one of them—and I’m OK with that. It may mean that things move more slowly than I would have expected, or maybe it doesn’t. Either way, I’ll find out—and with my peace list in play, I’ll be much more fun to be around in the process.