Starting Over Is a Skill... And I Got Really Good at It!
How Making One Better Decision at a Time Can Rebuild Your Entire Life
A few years ago, I moved back to the United States and essentially started my adult life over.
I didn't have a job waiting for me or a big savings account to make the transition comfortable. I was going through a divorce, raising three children, and trying to rebuild a career after spending years outside of the traditional workforce.
It wasn't exactly giving "future success story."
At the time, I thought my biggest challenge was figuring out the plan. What job should I take? What career should I pursue? Did I need to go back to school? Where was all of this ultimately supposed to lead?
Looking back, I was asking myself the wrong question. I didn't need to know how I was going to rebuild my entire life. I needed to know what move would put me in a better position than the one I was standing in.
So I got a job. Then I got a better job. At one point, I worked two jobs. I went back to school while working and raising my children, earning a bookkeeping certificate and eventually my Business Administration degree. None of those decisions individually transformed my life. Together, they did. Somewhere along the way, I realized I hadn't simply gotten my old career back. I had built a better one.
The Next Move Method
That experience changed the way I make decisions. I call it my Next Move Method, although I certainly didn't have a name for it while I was living it. The idea is simple: when you can't see the entire path forward, make the decision that puts you in a stronger position to make the next decision.
Instead of asking, "Is this the perfect move?" I started asking, "Will this give me more options, experience, relationships, information, or leverage than I have today?" Sometimes that's taking the job that gets you back in the game. Sometimes it's enrolling in a class, showing up to an event alone, introducing yourself to someone you don't know, or finally sending the email you've been overthinking.
It doesn't have to fix your entire life. It just needs to improve your position. And even if it does not go perfectly, you still walk away with experience, information, or a clearer idea of what you do not want. You are still gaining something.
Then you reassess and move again. We tend to romanticize reinvention after the fact. Once someone makes it through a difficult season, it's easy to connect the dots and turn the experience into a neat story about resilience. Living through it doesn't feel nearly that organized.
There were jobs that were stepping stones instead of destinations. There were exhausting stretches when work, school, and motherhood all needed something from me at the same time. There were plenty of moments when I wondered whether I was making the right decisions. And many, many shower cries. There wasn't one dramatic moment when I suddenly knew everything would work out. There were just next moves.
You Aren't Starting From Zero
Women returning to the workforce can be especially hard on themselves about the time they spent away from it. Maybe you stayed home with your children. Maybe you followed a spouse's career. Maybe you moved across the country or across the world. Maybe your marriage ended. Maybe life simply took your career somewhere you never expected it to go.
It's easy to look around and feel as though everyone else kept moving while you fell behind. I understand that feeling. What I eventually realized was that I wasn't starting from zero. My life had continued teaching me things even when those lessons weren't producing résumé bullet points.
I knew how to manage competing priorities, communicate with different personalities, solve problems without perfect information, adapt quickly, and keep moving when circumstances weren't ideal. Those weren't gaps in my professional development. They became part of what made me better when I returned. There is an enormous difference between starting over and starting empty-handed. And quite frankly, once you get back out there, you realize something else: everyone else does not have everything figured out either.
Look around your workplace or industry and ask yourself honestly: Is every person here more competent, capable, or qualified than I am? Of course not! There are people who know more than you, and you can learn from them. There are things you'll need to catch up on, and you will. But you don't need to know everything before you decide you belong in the room. You are allowed to learn while you're in it.
A Different Kind of Security
Rebuilding also changed my definition of security. I used to think security meant creating a life stable enough that nothing could knock it over. Now I think security is knowing that if something does go wrong, I can figure out what to do next. I've already met the version of myself who had to rebuild. I trust her. One of the mantras I used and still use now is, "I am resourceful, capable, and a little unhinged."
That doesn't mean I've stopped questioning myself. I can still overthink with the best of them. I occasionally have a full existential crisis and then answer an email five minutes later as though everything is perfectly normal. The difference is that uncertainty doesn't automatically stop me anymore.
Today, I work in foodservice, an industry I genuinely love, building relationships across manufacturers, distributors, and operators. My career looks different from the one I imagined years ago. I'm grateful for that. The woman who created my original plan hadn't lived enough yet.
What Is Your Next Move?
If I could sit across from a woman who is currently looking at the wreckage of her Plan A, I wouldn't hand her another five-year plan. I'd ask her one question: "What is your next move?" Not your forever move. Not the move that proves everyone wrong. Not the move that magically fixes everything by Tuesday. What can you do next that gives you more options than you have today?
When everything feels like it's free-falling, the first goal doesn't have to be building an extraordinary new life. Sometimes the first move is simply figuring out how to stop the fall. Get your footing. Then start rebuilding from there. Starting over isn't a failure. Sometimes it's the first page of a chapter you never would have been brave enough to write if life hadn't forced you to close the last one. Make the next move. Then reassess. Then move again. Careers can be rebuilt that way. Confidence can be rebuilt that way. Entire lives can be rebuilt that way.
I know because that's exactly how I rebuilt mine.
