THE SECOND CHANCE CAREER

By Elize Fisher

Craving a more fulfilling and meaningful career is just one facet of the midlife transition. Upon reaching middle age, the realization dawns that our lives, too, will end when parents and older relatives die. At this point in life, the importance of achieving goals and doing what makes us happy becomes even more apparent.

Life cycles are relatively predictable for most people. During adolescence and into our thirties, almost everyone is overwhelmed with learning how to become who they think they want to be. Work and living that role continues into our forties. When one reaches forty, or midlife, achieving this goal, they discover it was not what they had intended. Reaching this midlife point, after accomplishing much and still lacking, many of us will take on the challenge of more risk and free ourselves from others’ expectations.

Throughout my life, I’ve enjoyed writing, especially short stories, and poems. It wasn’t until my mid-forties (after a career break) that I realized my passion for it. As a mother and working mom, I never had the time to explore that creative side. I was an HR Professional for over fifteen years, I completed my honours degree in 2021 and became a certified life coach. However, I still felt stuck and unfulfilled. Later that year, I came across a WhatsApp message from Jatin Gupta, better known as Inspiringjatin, and signed up for the challenge to write a book in twenty-one (21) days. I wrote my book in 14 days. (It could have been less, but I lost my first draft). 5 Easy Ways to Overcome Limiting Beliefs; was published in August 2021 on Amazon. That first publication paved the way to a new career.

The idea for a magazine came to me after watching two moms struggling to carry crying babies and bags to their cars in the parking lot while on their way to work. It reminded me of my experience and how overwhelming it was, thinking that I was failing as a mother because I could not keep it all together all the time. As a single mom, I found it increasingly difficult to juggle my career and motherhood, especially since I had little to no support from friends and family. This led to burnout in 2018, to the point where I could not help myself. I wanted to create a platform that educates, inspires, and empowers women, especially working moms to tell their stories.

With my love of writing, the knowledge gained from the book challenge, and the goal to find my coaching clients, the idea of creating a magazine seemed more than possible. But first I had to overcome my fear of starting over again in a new field. I also experienced a loss of confidence due to being out of the workforce for a while. It took lots of work to adjust to my brand-new career, but the effort produced positive results because I followed my passion.

By November 2021, I designed a digital magazine and shared it with friends and family. To my surprise, it was well received, and in January 2022, I published the first Working Mama Magazine online, officially becoming its CEO in October 2022. To date, we have successfully published twelve editions, and I enjoyed every single one of them!

The magazine represents all my passions: writing, educating, and motivating people. My goal was to find a career that matched my values and energy and my advice to anyone wanting to succeed and find career fulfilment after 40 is to find the passion that drives you and do one thing each day in line of your dream and commit to yourself. You’ll discover the key to becoming your best self is living and working on your passion!