HOW I KNEW IT WAS TIME TO CHANGE CAREERS
For more than a decade my focus has been on helping schools, international NGOs and families transform their connections and create learning opportunities. I was proud of creating curriculum programs and laying the foundation for the schools, childcare centers and NGOs that I gave consultancy work for. I knew that my presence was creating impact and a much needed redesign to the existing learning methods. Yet I felt the urge to pivot at a very crucial point in my life.
How a Pit Turned Into an Inciting Incident
In storytelling, an inciting incident is the event that starts the story. It is the moment that defines the character’s transformation. My inciting incident was when at age 37, I heard the words “I am sorry, it is breast cancer.”
Devastated I turned into turning this phase into an opportunity for growth. I learned how to fill my own cup. To set boundaries. To go after what nurtures me specially with my time, energy and attention. This is when I realized that working with families and schools are not where I want to be.
That realization was difficult for I have been defined as the parent educator, the curriculum and educational consultant, the go-to person to talk about learning, engagement in families and training teachers. But I knew deep down I had to PIVOT. I knew I had to change where I use my time, energy and attention. Not only with my family or the friends I spend it with but more importantly with the work I want to do. Coming off from chemo treatments I was faced with a realization that I didn’t know what to do.
Experimenting on what works I never anticipated that after breast cancer I will be faced with another hurdle- redefining myself specially my career. So I made 2016 as my year of experimentation. It was a year that I turned to looking at
what do I do best and to whom do I do it for?
I also started working on defining “what do I want to leave behind?”
This was when I went to the drawing board and started asking myself:
- What are my POTENTIALS? What am I good at? What can I do so well that other people benefited from it?
- What are my PASSIONS? What makes me excited? Alive? Encouraged?
- What have I PERSEVERED in? What do these experiences tell about me? These 3Ps helped me identify my life purpose. It helped me connect to my core values and needs. These are the same questions we use in our 90 Day Action Planner.
Coming from a difficult situation, exploring these areas was not easy. I had periods where I second guessed myself. Periods where I felt an impostor. Periods where I thought it was comfortable to go back to the “old me”. Yet the pull of going after what is essential became a big rallying cry. It helped me persist when I was ready to go with what was easy.
Career Pivoting is easy when you have these:
A clear why. Understanding why I want and needed the career change helped me stay on track. It helped me go back to why it’s important in the first place and what I am gaining out of it.
A support circle. Having my husband, my children and close friends to support me with the changes I went through helped a lot. It gave me room to try new things and I felt encouraged knowing that I was moving in the right direction.
A firm belief that it’s going to be worth it. During the times I was going through self doubts (Can I do this? Who am I to do this?) one of the mantras that pulled me through is the line “Live what you love”. I am reminded daily of that as it’s in my mantra bracelet.
That firm belief that I am living what I love and knowing how much it is nurturing me gave me so much affirmation that it’s going to be worth it. That at the end of the day I am at peace with what I was doing. And it was all worth it.
On Moving Forward
For the past year working on building Co.LAB I found myself taking my space, sharing my message and shifting ideas on how entrepreneurship can be. My work with Co.LAB has given me the room to expand on the impact I want to stir with others and is helping me crystallize the LEGACY that I want to leave behind.
After a tumultuous moment, a life defining incident, I have seen myself go through a process of change. Transforming not only who I am serving, but also being deeply connected to why I am doing not. I may have pivoted my career and is starting anew, yet I have never felt so connected to myself as I do now.
How about you, are you called to change?
Sometimes the change we need is not the one we seek. We are entrusted to situations that are shaking us out of our comfort zones. Getting us into unchartered territories. Don’t fret. There is room for growth and transformation.
But only when you allow for it.
