Look to the past to shape the present

Youthful interests might suggest what you'd enjoy doing now

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning.
This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
tip is that if you want something new in your
present life, look to your past for ideas. So I

(00:25):
have noticed that a lot of people in their forties
and fifties crave a professional reset. Some people have been
out of the workforce while parenting and they are ready
to re enter. Some people have made enough money to
retire comfortably when the time comes, and they're looking for
more meaning or more fun in the next season of work.

(00:49):
Other people love their careers for years or decades, but
the spark is gone and they want to find new
work that they will be excited about. Then there are
people who still love their careers but want to add
a new twist, or want to add a serious hobby
or volunteer outlet on the side. I have been reflecting
on mid career resets since I interviewed doctor Gillian Goddard

(01:11):
for this podcast a few months ago. Jillian is a
practicing endocrinologist, and she recently launched Hot Flash, a newsletter
about menopause that has quickly scored a lot of readers
looking for accurate information about this hot topic. In our conversation,
Gillian mentioned that she did journalism when she was much younger.

(01:33):
That seems totally unrelated to her career in indo chronology,
but she has returned to journalism in a way and
combined it with her medical work by writing her newsletter.
Her college pursuit connects with a midlife twist on a
career she loves. She is a physician and a writer. Now.

(01:54):
It makes sense that what we did as kids, or
teenagers or young adults would still speak to us. We
loved these things in the past, and while we might
be different people now, we are not so different that
former interests might not still spark something. So if you
are trying to figure out what is next vocationally, one

(02:17):
option is to consider the classes, extracurriculars, hobbies, jobs, and
volunteer roles you loved when you were younger. Is there
anything your past self thought was cool that your present
self might still want to do. There are lots of
ways you could twist things together. Did you want to

(02:39):
be a singer when you were a kid, but you
ended up as an accountant? Could you serve as the
CFO for your city's opera company? Perhaps growing up you
spend all your free time reading. You dreamed of being
a librarian, but became a lawyer instead. If your kids
are launched and your law school loans are paid off,
it may not be too late to earn your MLS

(03:00):
and become a librarian after all. Or perhaps you could
stick with your current career but provide pro bono legal
services to the library or serve on your library foundation's board.
Maybe your favorite job ever was teaching at a summer
academic program during college, but now you lead your family business.

(03:22):
Could you teach a night class at a nearby business
school to combine your experience of being a small business
leader with your love of teaching. Or maybe when you
were in college you worked in the kitchen of a
fabulous restaurant, and imagine being a chef one day. Whether
you are a doctor or a teacher or communications officer,
these days, you could lean into your love of cooking

(03:43):
by hosting dinner parties or cooking for a local feeding
ministry in your off hours. If you are at a
point in your life when you are craving something new,
think about what your past self loved to do. This
might point the way to a total career change. But
it also might point the way toward job crafting, as

(04:04):
doctor Jillian Goddard has done, or it might lead to
something rich on the side. All of these could be
fabulous outcomes. Is there anything from your youth that you
would like to add to your present life. You can
let me know at Laura at Laura vandercam dot com.
In the meantime, this is Laura. Thanks for listening, and

(04:28):
here's to making the most of our time. Thanks for
listening to Before Breakfast. If you've got questions, ideas, or feedback,
you can reach me at Laura at Laura vandercam dot com.

(04:53):
Before Breakfast is a production of iHeartMedia. For more podcasts
from iHeartMedia, please visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
wherever you listen to your favorite shows.