Course Correcting: When Your Career Has Taken a Wrong Turn

 

“The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.”   –Chinese proverb

Today I want to talk about an experience that is common to all fields. Feeling like you’ve somehow gotten off course, and you suddenly realize you’re not where you meant to end up. Whether it’s about your career or your life in general, it’s this sense that you somehow, somewhere, took a wrong turn, and ended up somewhere you NEVER thought you’d be.  

I’ve certainly been there, and I was on a discovery call with someone last week who is there right now. Sometimes, like with me, I knew which path I WANTED to be on, so it was just a matter of getting myself over to that trailhead. But for this person, they had no idea. They just knew it wasn’t where they were.

 

Let’s talk about Retirement Parties

Before I moved to Bermuda I had a thriving career as a freelance cellist in Boston––a city that has one of the best classical music scenes in the world. I played the best gigs in town, ran the chamber music program for the biggest youth orchestra program in the city, taught at 2 summer festivals, and had an almost-but-not-quite full-time contract at the world’s greatest school, as their Director of Orchestras and Chamber Music, and an Admissions Officer. 

I had a constant stream of work, and money was flowing in. In fact, I was so busy, I had no idea how miserable I was. 

At least, I didn’t know until one of my non-musician colleagues at that dreamy school brought up my future retirement party, and it stopped me in my tracks. It was one of those moments that will stay with me forever. 

You see, at that school, they made a BIG deal out of a teacher’s retirement, and it was always something really special and personal to them. The school was the Shangri-La of schools, and teachers didn’t tend to leave until they retired. My colleague was waxing poetic about how they would bring in former students of mine and have them form a little orchestra, and they would play recordings from all of the groups I had played with. As she went on and on, I started to break into a cold sweat. 

No! The thought screaming in my head.  That’s not it! That’s not what I want people to think of at the end of my career. As proud as I am of my student’s successes, That’s not what I want to be known for. I loved working with my student orchestras, but it wasn’t my CAREER. It was just something I did on the side, right? Some recordings I happened to play on simply because I was the cellist the contractor called to play that particular gig that particular week? 

That was not at ALL what I thought my career (or my life) would be about. 

But, she had a point. Given what I was doing day in and day out, that is EXACTLY what my career was about. 

 

 

I realized I had somehow wandered off course, expecting the tide to turn, but I had been doing the same exact things for years. Why would they suddenly change now? In the classical music world, your career was somewhat determined by external forces. That’s just the way things worked. Other people invited you to play concerts, other places asked you to come and give a masterclass or judge a competition. To be a musician was to sit and wait for the phone to ring. Both literally and figuratively. And people called you to do a thing because they had seen you doing that thing somewhere else. And so it went. 

I realized in that moment, that if I wanted my career to look different, I would have to be the one making the changes. They weren’t going to fall from that sky.  No external force was going to magically re-direct my career for me. 

I missed playing the solo repertoire and chamber music that I loved so much in my early career days during and after college. I missed the glamour of traveling for concerts and playing in front of new audiences–all of the things that “Good” musicians did. Instead, I had fallen into complacency.  Sticking with my friends, taking on jobs that paid the mortgage, but brought little in ways of fulfillment. The problem was, I was working so much, I barely had time to practice. 

In fact, the only reason I was able to maintain my relationship with my fiancé was because he lived in a different country. 

There are always moments in life when we look up and realize we are not where we want to be. Psychologist Martha Beck calls this “The Path of Not Here.” which I think is a beautiful way to think of it. In the moment, it feels like we’re on the WRONG path, but really, we’re on the path that is correctly and perfectly telling us we’ve veered off in the wrong direction. 

 

 

It often feels like a moment of crisis. “Oh no,” we think. “All those years–wasted. Gone. What a horrible mistake I’ve made.” 

Sometimes the path of not here is a relationship that isn’t (and hasn’t been) serving you. Sometimes it’s a career we hate or a series of behaviors and habits that aren’t in alignment with who we are or want to be. 

How did we get there? It could have been because it seemed like a good idea at the time, or because we tried something and received praise for it, so we decided that’s what we should do. I have spoken to clients who chose college majors, went to grad school, and even got a PhD in Mathematics simply (in hindsight) because they loved their high school Calculus teacher. Turns out they don’t love Math––they’re just good at it. 

 

Sometimes it’s just one subtle shift at a time, like my story above. My love for chamber music led a friend to ask me to give some chamber music masterclasses. Someone saw me do those, and asked me to run a student chamber music program. From there? I was good with teenagers, so teaching opportunities were always on offer. The paychecks were regular and slowly those regular paychecks forced me to say no to concert and travel opportunities that would have conflicted. I stopped practicing solo rep. I stopped playing chamber music. The change was so slow, so subtle, that I didn’t even notice. 

It’s not like life was horrible. I had amazing friends, a great home, I did have time to do some traveling, and those gigs I was doing, while maybe not artistically fulfilling for me, were a hell of a lot of fun. I adored my students, and loved teaching them. I wasn’t unhappy doing that work, it just wasn’t the path I was meant to be on. 

I felt that viscerally, with my entire being, once I came face to face with it. 

 

 

If Not Here, Then Where? 

Animal trackers will tell you that getting off the track is always a part of the process. That it’s important to know where the animal hasn’t been so that you can narrow things down.  And the same is true for tracking our own paths through life. Finding yourself in Beck’s “Path of Not Here” can be seen as a fortuitous moment. 

“Right! Got it! Time to turn around.” 

For some people, the RIGHT path was known all along, it’s just that slowly but surely we inched ourselves off course. For others, they went down the road that they thought was the right path. They power forward with vim and vigor, sure that this is the way, only to reach the end of it and realize their car is not in this parking lot. 

 

Now what? 

A person in this situation. Realizing they are NOT where they want to be, and looking at dozens of different trail signs all veering in different directions can be daunting. So daunting, in fact, that you might choose to just hang out in the (wrong) parking lot and make yourself at home. 

I can see it in the eyes of a new client when I ask them what they want their career (or life) to look like and they look downward and sheepishly say “That’s the problem. I don’t know. I just know that this isn’t it.” 

One of my clients, Mark, was in that position. Having quit the corporate world, he knew he wanted to be an artist. He just didn’t know what KIND of artist. A sculptor? A painter? Mixed-media? Photography? He was paralyzed by indecision, feeling that he had wasted too many precious years already and didn’t have time to “experiment.”  He wanted to figure out what he wanted, and then just go for it. Pedal to the metal. 

It doesn’t always work that way. 

 

 

What DO You Know?

For my artist client, I asked him to get quiet for a second. To sit still and just listen. And then I asked him this question: 

“What is one, tiny little thing about this that you know to be true?”

And after a minute he said “I know that I want to spend part of every day making art” 

And so we started there. For the next 30 days, he didn’t need to find any more answers. His only mission was to make some art every day. From there he started enrolling in a few art classes, and entered a competition, and has started posting his work and showing it to others. He has since been able to see more of the path he wants to be on, and it came out of asking, one step at a time. What DO I know? 

 

• The soloist who knows they want to be home for their child’s birthday
• The freelancer who knows they want to perform outside of their own city
• The accountant who knows they want to grow roses in their front yard. 
• The cinematographer who knows they are fascinated by chefs and the art of food creation
• The dancer who knows she wants to use her art to create a platform for climate justice. 

 

Buckle Up.

If you thought being lost was scary, hang on to your butt. Because identifying the RIGHT path. The one that is perfectly aligned with your soul and your values, and you know in your heart is YOUR path, is scary AF. 

You can see it, right there, but there are a lot of uphill bits, and there’s a waterfall you’re going to have to get around (don’t worry–it’s stunning!) and what’s worse, you now can’t NOT head out on this path. 

And also, you’re too old to be starting over, aren’t you? Or not experienced enough? Or maybe you’re too young, or too fat, too skinny, too wealthy, too poor, too….pick your excuse. 

And then tie up those laces. We’re heading off.

We all know the famous story about the painter, Grandma Moses, and how she didn’t become a professional artist until she was 78 years old. An avid artist as a child, she set her creative pursuits aside to make way for more practical activities like farming. 

Or Colonel Sanders, who didn’t get into the food industry until he was in his 40’s and didn’t start KFC until he was 62 year old! 

Any time someone utters the words “Well, it’s too late now. That ship sailed a long time ago, you can’t teach an old dog new tricks or some such quip, they are faced with this evidence that anyone can change their life trajectory at any time. 

I had a student years ago whose father was a prominent and highly respected physician.. But he had originally trained as a jazz bass player. It wasn’t until after having his 2nd child that he decided to go to medical school–in his 40s (gasp!!) He finally became a practicing physician in his early 50s, and is now a leader in his field at a major hospital in Boston. 

Okay, okay (I see you nodding in annoyance) I get it. A few special people can make a mid-life career shift. But HOW? And what about this, and what about that? 

Well, let’s talk about this and that. And how. 

 

 

Identifying 

Back in Episode 21, we talked about meeting your potential self–the version of yourself that has achieved all of your secret goals, dreams, and desires. What is it that your Potential Self does that is different from what you are currently doing? What’s that amazing work that feels so aligned and filled with integrity for who you are and what you’re about? And if you’re still unclear, just start with what we talked about earlier—with whatever small piece of the puzzle you DO know. 

 

Chart out the Steps

To steal from Brendon Burchard, No BS what would it take? (narrow it down to 5 steps) and then…. No messing around. If you HAD to achieve it, what 5 steps would you put into place? 

Say you wanted to become an artist. Your 5 steps might look like: 

1. Buy some art supplies
2. Create a dedicated studio space. 
3. Take some art classes
4. Find a community to lean on for support
5. Find places to show your art. 

If you want to lose 100 lbs? Your 5 steps might look like this: 

1. See your doctor to get blood work done and discuss. 
2. Hire a nutritionist
3. Hire a chef or meal service to provide healthy meals
4. Hire a personal trainer who can help you stay consistent and avoid injury
5. Clear your house of tempting treats. 

Or Run a Marathon: 

1. Buy some good running shoes
2. Join a running group
3. Carve out time each morning and on the weekends to train
4. Hire a trainer
5. Sign up for incrementally more challenging races throughout the year. A 5K, 10K, Half marathon, and finally, the Marathon itself. 

Yes–some of these steps might be costly, but it’s important to write them down. If you can’t afford to take art classes, what could you do instead? How could you learn from an instructor without paying for classes? Youtube videos? Can you trade art lessons from your neighbor for lasagnas or garden veggies, or childcare? 

 

 

Choose your Method

Burn the Ships! This is when you quit cold turkey. It’s the person who just stands up, quits, and walks out the door. They’ll figure it out later. Although this is something I very rarely advise, there are times when it’s the best possible motivator, because if you DON’T figure something out, the mortgage isn’t getting paid. And there are a few situations where doing this might be the best method–especially when it comes dangerous, toxic, or severely unhealthy behaviors. 

Abra Cadabra! (the great disappearing act) This is when you leave a situation abruptly, but don’t make a big deal out of it. You politely decline each gig rather than tell the contractors that you’re no longer interested. You just…disappear, but without having to make a grand announcement or answer people’s questions before you’re ready to discuss your next moves. 

Quiet Quitting (nobody likes that guy) This is when you show up and go through the motions even though your heart is no longer in it. You do the BARE minimum and collect your check. In theory, it should be fine–you’re doing exactly what they are paying you to do, right? But the negative energy and lack of enthusiasm coming from you will be palpable, and will drag EVERYONE down. That’s not fair. Don’t be that guy. 

The Subtle Pivot (Before they knew it…) This is when you use your current work (even though it’s the wrong work) as a runway for what’s next. You make a commitment to continue to give 100% to what you are doing, while slowly putting the important plans in place for your next move. You’re applying to school while kicking so much butt at your job that your boss writes you an absolutely glowing letter of recommendation. 

 

Okay–we’ve talked about:

• How to know you’re on the wrong path
• How to decide the right path or at least the right direction
• Identifying your steps, or at least your very first one
• And Choosing your route. 

Next week we’re going to cover how to navigate the switch. What to expect, who and what you need to take with you, and my favorite tips and tricks to get yourself fully on that right path.

See you back here soon!

Cheers, 

Kate