A powerful guide on finding courage and strength to start fresh after life's challenges—divorce, loss, and unexpected change. Discover five practical steps to rebuild your life, nourish your new identity, and create meaningful renewal at any stage.
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Influential Woman · Healthcare
Marlys Neis
Author | Educator | Speaker on Resilience, Caregiving, and Navigating the Healthcare System, Marlys Neis - Author, Educator, Speaker
Surprise, AZ 85379
1Article published
3Awards received
In Conversation
Marlys Neis for Bold. Brilliant. Unstoppable.
Read the transcript
Marlys Neis: them to keep moving forward. Influence is not about position or titles.
What does being an Influential Woman mean to you?
Marlys Neis: Hello, I'm Marla's Neese. I'm an author, educator. And resilience mentor. I've spent many years in healthcare leadership, teaching, caregiving, and navigating illness and loss myself. To me, being an influential woman means using what you've learned, especially through life's harder experiences, to encourage someone else and to help them to keep moving forward. Influence is not about position or titles. It's about helping another person believe that they can take the next step.
What's one piece of advice you would give to younger women chasing their dreams?
Marlys Neis: If I could offer advice to a younger woman chasing your dreams. I would say set goals and expect good things from your life. Believe in yourself even before others do. Be persistent when your path changes because it will. And if you choose a partner, choose someone who supports your dreams and believes in you. And finally, now and then, lighten up. Try not to take yourself in life too seriously. Laughter is the seasoning that makes the hard things go down easier. Your life can become more than you imagine. Just keep moving forward.
Full transcript available
Her Story
About Marlys
Marlys Neis has spent more than five decades working at the intersection of healthcare leadership, education, caregiving, and writing. She began her career as a bedside nurse before moving into hospital administration at the University of Michigan Hospitals in Ann Arbor and later serving as Vice President of Nursing at community hospitals in both Madison, Wisconsin, and suburban Chicago. In these leadership roles, she worked closely with physicians, educators, and clinical teams to strengthen patient-care systems and support the development of healthcare professionals during a period of significant change in American medicine.
Her commitment to preparing the next generation of caregivers later drew her into the classroom, where she taught biology, medical terminology, and health-science pathway courses for more than twelve years. Teaching allowed her to combine practical knowledge with mentorship and compassion—qualities that have shaped her work throughout her career.
Later in life, Marlys faced a series of personal challenges that reshaped her perspective, including years as a caregiver for her husband during his Parkinson’s disease and recovery from a serious automobile accident. These experiences deepened her understanding of resilience—not as a theory, but as a lived practice.
At age seventy-six, she published her memoir Sing, Even If You Can’t, followed by Keep Singing: A Guided Journal for Finding Resilience. She is currently writing a new book focused on navigating the healthcare system from the patient and caregiver perspective. Today, she shares insight drawn from both professional leadership and personal experience to encourage others facing illness, loss, transition, or reinvention. Her message is simple but powerful: It is always possible to begin again.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Marlys
01What do you attribute your success to?
I grew up on a farm in Iowa, where I learned early that work has meaning when you do it well and take responsibility for the outcome. That experience shaped my expectations of myself throughout my career. Later, strong mentors helped me recognize my leadership abilities and encouraged me to continue my education and take on larger responsibilities in healthcare administration.
Over time, I learned that success is rarely about one opportunity - it is about persistence, preparation, and a willingness to keep growing through both professional and personal challenges. Those lessons have continued to guide me in my work as a teacher and now as a writer focusing on resilience and caregiving.
02What’s the best career advice you’ve ever received?
One of the most important influences in my career was a mentor who encouraged me to pursue graduate study in nursing administration and to recognize that thoughtful leadership can shape healthcare systems as well as individual patient experiences. She helped me understand that good leadership requires both clarity and compassion - seeing the practical realities of healthcare while also recognizing the human impact of decisions. That perspective influenced my work throughout my administrative career and continues to shape the way I write and speak about resilience and caregiving today.
03What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
Healthcare is ultimately about caring for patients, families, and the professionals who provide that care. My advice to young women entering the field is to stay curious, continue learning, and recognize that leadership opportunities often appear earlier than you expect them.
It is also important to take care of yourself. Healthcare is demanding work, and sustaining a long and meaningful career requires both commitment and balance. The profession needs thoughtful leaders as much as it needs skilled clinicians.
04What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
Healthcare has always been both rewarding and demanding work, but today, one of the greatest challenges is supporting and retaining skilled professionals at the bedside while managing the increasing complexity and cost of care. These pressures create important opportunities for stronger leadership at every level of healthcare organizations. When nurses and other professionals are involved in decision-making and supported in their work environments, both patient care and staff satisfaction improve. I believe the future of healthcare depends on strengthening those partnerships between clinical staff and leadership.
05What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?
Curiosity and lifelong learning have shaped nearly every stage of my career. Healthcare is always changing, and remaining open to new knowledge has been essential both professionally and personally. At the same time, family has always been central to my decision-making. My experiences as a caregiver later in life deepened my understanding of resilience and strengthened my commitment to helping others navigate illness, change, and loss with clarity and hope.
Her Content Hub
Articles by Marlys
When Life Asks You to Begin Again
Finding strength and renewal through life's inevitable transitions and fresh starts.
WHEN LIFE ASKS YOU TO BEGIN AGAIN
By Marlys Neis
“Begin again.” How many times do we hear those words as we move through life?
At some point, every woman faces a moment when life asks her to begin again—after loss, after disappointment, after unexpected change, or simply after realizing that the path she expected is no longer the one she is walking.
For many women, the first real experience of beginning again comes after a life change they never planned. For me, it was a divorce. Years later, as I reflect, I can see that leaving familiar surroundings and starting over in a new place gave me the energy I needed to rebuild and begin again.
Thirty years later, following the death of my husband, I once again found myself alone, grieving, and needing a new start. I resisted leaving the home where we had been happy. But my children had moved away, and relocating closer to them eventually became a source of comfort and strength. At the time, I did not fully recognize the value a fresh start could offer. Looking back now, I consider that decision one of the best I have ever made.
In truth, a fresh start is as important for the human condition as it is for the technology we use every day. When our electronic devices fail, we are all familiar with the reset process: “Reboot the computer.” “Turn it off and then back on.” In many ways, that is what we are doing when life tells us to begin again. The mistake we often make is trying to begin again in the same old rut.
My first experience with beginning again came at the age of eighteen, when I left home to attend college three hundred miles away. There were no cell phones, no easy transportation, and no quick trips home. Success did not feel optional—it felt mandatory. That early experience quietly taught me something important: beginning again is a process, as intentional as rebooting a computer. There are steps that, if repeated consistently, can lead to a smoother restart and often to stronger success.
Over time, I repeated that process more than once—moving from Iowa to Colorado for graduate school, from Colorado to Michigan to begin my administrative career, from Michigan to Wisconsin for my first senior leadership position, from Wisconsin to Illinois to build a new life with a new husband, and finally from Illinois to Arizona as I rebuilt my life after loss.
Each move brought uncertainty. Each move also brought renewal.
What I gradually discovered is that beginning again is not a single dramatic decision. It is a process—one we can learn.
Five Steps to Begin Again
Through these transitions, I identified five simple steps that helped me begin again each time—and may help others do the same:
1. Make the commitment.
Deciding to let go and move on is often difficult. Stability and familiarity matter to all of us. Recognizing that continuing “the same” is not producing the desired result is never easy and is not always a voluntary decision.
Beginning again is always a new start, but not always a new location. It means doing something different and letting go of former identities. This is not easy and requires commitment.
My hardest new beginnings were emotional: my divorce, the loss of a job I loved, and the death of my husband. Each required a commitment to change and to release who I had been. That commitment is what makes a new beginning inevitable.
2. Build and nourish your new identity.
Yes, grieve what has passed—but also allow yourself to feel excited about your new perspective and the world’s new view of you.
Journaling can be helpful during this transition. Remind yourself of the positive aspects of this new beginning. Be grateful for what remains possible.
Spend time exploring and learning. Read. Grow. Become curious again about who you are becoming.
3. Establish new routines that support your new beginning.
This is where relocation can sometimes play a role. A fresh start may include a new home, a new job, or a move away from an emotionally difficult environment.
New routines—and sometimes a new setting—create visible signals that change is truly underway.
The most difficult relocation I experienced followed my husband’s death. I have since learned that relocating after the loss of a spouse or child can be an important step in allowing yourself to begin again. Leaving a home filled with memories can be painful, but it can also create space for healing and renewal.
4. Build solace and renewal into your new life.
Self-care is always essential, but new beginnings can bring unexpected stress. Learning to manage that stress is as necessary as breathing.
Make exercise and time for reflection part of your “begin again” routine. If you love nature, find outdoor spaces that bring you peace—and return to them often.
5. Build new connections.
Healthy social interaction is essential. A new beginning often includes distance from previous support systems. While it is important to maintain existing relationships when possible, it is equally important to create new ones that support the life you are building.
Friendships take time to grow, but the willingness to reach out begins immediately.
At times, beginning again can feel like giving something up—or even losing something important. I have come to understand that it is neither.
The most meaningful moments in life cannot be relived exactly as they were, but they are never lost. They travel forward with us.
Beginning again is not running away. It is carrying forward what matters most and allowing it to shape what comes next.
Moving on is not losing. It is building.
And at any stage of life, beginning again is always possible.
About the Author:
Marlys Neis is an author, educator, and speaker who writes about resilience, caregiving, and beginning again after life’s unexpected changes.
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