I’ve always said I’m not a risk taker, but I may have to rethink that.
As I write this, I am one month out from walking away from a very lucrative, challenging, impactful career as CEO at a company filled with people and a culture that I love and respect. I wasn’t underpaid. I wasn’t overworked. I had excellent benefits. The company emphasized work/life balance. We made difference in our clients’ lives. I was doing work that allowed me to be a strategic leader.
And then I quit. It was sudden. It was painful It was bittersweet. It took everyone by surprise, including me. It was financially imprudent. It was done without a Plan B. It was illogical. It defied reason. It left myself and my family wondering what was next. It was a risk of epic proportions. And yet I know with every fiber of my being, it was the right thing to do.
Doing what was right for me, at least in this very short window of time, has been filled with so many different layers; fear, anxiety, excitement, opportunity, more fear, more anxiety, happiness, joy, peace, calm, more fear, more anxiety….I think you get the drift. I am a worrier by nature; I worried about money and financial security while I was in my lucrative career, so to leave that behind was very scary. The interesting thing is that I am certain it is going to be okay; what okay is I have no idea as of yet and it is certainly going to be different from what our life has been like in the preceding years but that doesn’t mean it does not have the potential to be great and maybe even better in some ways.
I took a risk. I took a very big risk. I took a leap of faith and followed my heart which was screaming so loudly, I could no longer ignore it or silence it. I didn’t know what was next or how it was going to play out, but I knew with certainty if I didn’t do this, it would be the biggest regret of my life. That was the turning point for me. When I thought about being 85 years old and surveying my life, I suddenly knew that, while I MIGHT regret giving up this career, I would regret not leaving it to be 100% present for my teenage daughters, my husband, my friends and not least of all myself.
This seems like the right choice and I have faith that following my heart will ultimately lead me to where I am supposed to be. That being said, as I sit at the bottom of the valley floor, looking up at the precipice I just leaped from, I am still adjusting. I am alive, I am not broken, but I have never been here before and I now must create a new map of my world, which is scary and exciting all at the same time.