Sometimes looking back to the past can give you insights into the present.

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This time of year always seems to turn me inward. The gray skies, cooler temperatures, and often-inclement weather feed my need to hibernate, and the warmth and coziness I find indoors lend itself to sitting with my mind and turning its eye to the past.

Earlier this year, I made the difficult decision to end a career that had seen me through nine years of momentous life changes. It was a career I loved but I was no longer in love with it. It was a career that had given me much, but in the end started taking more than it was giving. In leaving that career, I allowed myself the luxury of finally chasing a long-held dream that I’d always been too afraid to explore.

Recently, I uncovered my old coursework materials from when I underwent training for that last, well-loved career. I had tucked those worse-for-wear binders away, unwilling to throw them out even though I hadn’t referred to them in years. It had been so long since I last thought of them, I couldn’t remember what they held. Old class notes, sure; but what else was in those binders? What new information could these pages impart?

As I went through those neatly written notes, old assignments, and school journals, I was taken back a decade. Ten years ago, I left a well-paying job and career that was sucking my soul dry to try something different from anything I’d ever experienced before. I had no idea what I was doing, if I was going to be able to support myself doing it, or even if it was a good idea to be doing it at all. All I knew was, I couldn’t stay where I was any longer. Something needed to change. I needed to change.

So, I did. It was an arduous nine-month process, filled with self-revelations and struggles. At the time, I was single. While my family thought my choices were good ones, financially and emotionally I had no other support. I had to look within for the strength and perseverance I needed to succeed in my goals. Even though I’d always had the luxury of a stable family willing to help me out if I needed it, this time, nobody was going to pick up the slack if I crashed and burned. It added a layer of stress, but also developed a resiliency I didn’t know I was capable of before this.

As I looked at those assignments that were meant to help us work through our issues, I was reminded of things that felt so important at the time, things that I struggled to let go of and move on from. I saw how much I thought I knew, and how humbling it was to be confronted with the alternative: I did not have it all figured out. I saw how frustrating it was to try to stand up for my needs in a room full of people doing the same thing for themselves. We were a group of individuals struggling to be heard and seen. I fought to find compassion for my classmates even as I attempted to find it for myself.  

It also reminded me that all those fears I felt so long ago—of failing, of success, and of never feeling like I was prepared and informed—still haunt me today. However, even though I felt all those fears initially, by the time I finally retired from my old career, I was confident in my abilities and my knowledge. All those fears had been quelled in the vastness of time and experience.

As I’m taking these first tentative steps in this new career, as I struggle to find my footing and gain some feeling of success, I’m thrown back to those same feelings and emotions that plagued me a decade ago. I’m afraid that I’ll fail, that I’ll never be successful, that I’ll always be less informed than the next person. As much as it meant a decade ago, it means more now; this time, it’s a lifelong dream I’m pursuing, and to fail at this would mean that I am talentless, that I am a failure at the things that mean the most to me. It is terrifying.

Life is cyclical. Just when you think you’ve conquered a fear or something holding you back, it comes around again just to make sure. It’s so easy to forget how scary new things are, and how difficult it can be to start something and feeling like you are “late to the game.” Luckily, life has a way of making sure you remember these old fears, usually when you’re at or near your lowest point and don’t have the wherewithal to deal with it.

But we deal with it. It’s not easy and it’s not fun, but we get past it. Eventually, we find our footing. We stop feeling like outsiders or imposters or fakes, and we begin to feel like maybe we made the right choice. We continue to gain confidence in our abilities, and we begin to shine. Not every choice, not every dream always works out. It’s heartbreaking when we must walk away from something that meant so much. But for those dreams that go the distance, they are so much the sweeter for having gone through the strife.

The binders I found were filled with choices, both good and bad. But here I am, ten years later. I survived all those choices. I came out on the other side wiser and more experienced. I learned lessons that can be applied to life in general, and my career specifically if I so choose.

Changing direction didn’t mean that all my years of experience were null and void; just the opposite. It lent a depth and breadth to life that I couldn’t have had without it.

Those binders showed me the eager, hungry person I was all those years ago. I witnessed her struggles and successes, and I applauded her bravery in going after what she wanted most in the moment, and not taking no for an answer. They showed me the person I’d forgotten I was, once upon a time.

Even as they showed me who I was, they let me know who I might be. That new person was not someone who needed to hold onto old things that no longer served her. So, even as I appreciated all those binders had to teach me, in the end, I let them go. Because I’m on a new journey now, a new path. One I’d never have found if it wasn’t for that person ten years ago, who decided to take a risk and go in a completely new direction. I wouldn’t be where I am today without her.

By Kate Williams

From: United States

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