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I was in the IT world for almost 30 years and had a good career with a good salary and lots of travel…but with that comes burnout. And that’s what happened to me, I burned out and left. I knew I needed to do something with my life, but I didn’t know what. My friends would always ask me to teach them to cook and several of them suggested I open a cooking school, and I just thought, “Yeah, right.”
But then I thought about it more and realized that what I love to do in my personal life is to cook and entertain, and what I love to do in my business life is the training component…so I married them together and came up with Simply Impressive!
I was 52 when I opened the school. I just did it. I thought it was going to be a 6-month filler until I was ready to go back. But after I had done it for a while, I had such a good following that I can’t imagine going back into IT.
If you would have ever told me that I was going to leave IT and do this, I would have called you a liar! But I’ve always been a great cook, I’ve always been an incredible instructor and this turned into a business with a great following and this is just the right thing for me to be doing.
Life in Our 50's
Hormones are a thing of the past…but we are not dried up! While some may think it’s awful, I view it quite differently. I don’t suffer from PMS anymore, I don’t have to deal with “that time of the month,” and I feel more free than I ever have in my life.
The more I think about it, I realize there’s a cost savings to it—I used to freeze all the time, but now with these hot flashes and night sweats, I save money because I no longer have to buy heavy pajamas to keep warm in the winter. Hormones? What hormones? In our 50s we just don’t have any left. Instead we have hot flashes, chin hairs, droopy boobs, and all of those things people joke about. In our 20’s, 30’s, and even our 40’s, we might have been offended and said, “Not me!” But in our 50’s we look at them as signs that we’ve made it.
We made it through the child bearing years, school, and being afraid to go out without makeup. For me, it gives me the freedom to be who I am without having to worry about pleasing everybody else. I am what I am! And I’ve finally learned to accept it.
I laugh more at everything and can even laugh about the menopause symptoms. Menopause is a right of passage. It means that I’ve finally made it through the tough part of my life. What’s left is frosting on the cake!
A View of Success
Until I was in my late 40s, I used to measure success by the amount of money I made or the size of my office or the number of people that reported to me. It was shallow. Now, success to me is having a wonderful family, having friends that are there for me when I need them. It’s putting things in perspective instead of getting worked up about everything. It means letting go of a lot of baggage that built up over the years and being free to do what I love. It means putting family first—where they should have been all along. It’s a give and take. It’s giving back to the community and taking in the great feelings of knowing I did something great for someone else.
The Joys of Having my Own Business
I have a great boss! I can no longer complain about the idiot I work for. I can set my own deadlines for things. (However, I did finally realize that it wasn’t my boss giving me awful deadlines…it was actually me doing it to myself!) As an overachiever, I now find that I have worse deadlines than I did before. But at least now, I am doing it for myself.
The benefits go on and on: I can choose what I want to do. I can choose the challenges that I want to take on. I can “change on a dime” instead of going through all the red tape required to change things in a large corporation. I can take a day off when I want…but I always forget to do so! And as part of my business, I can feed my kitchen gadget habit all in the name of customer service.
On the downside, my friends have stopped inviting me over for dinner because they feel intimidated. Heck, I’m the same person! I still cook the same…now I just have a different title!
But then I thought about it more and realized that what I love to do in my personal life is to cook and entertain, and what I love to do in my business life is the training component…so I married them together and came up with Simply Impressive!
I was 52 when I opened the school. I just did it. I thought it was going to be a 6-month filler until I was ready to go back. But after I had done it for a while, I had such a good following that I can’t imagine going back into IT.
If you would have ever told me that I was going to leave IT and do this, I would have called you a liar! But I’ve always been a great cook, I’ve always been an incredible instructor and this turned into a business with a great following and this is just the right thing for me to be doing.
Life in Our 50's
Hormones are a thing of the past…but we are not dried up! While some may think it’s awful, I view it quite differently. I don’t suffer from PMS anymore, I don’t have to deal with “that time of the month,” and I feel more free than I ever have in my life.
The more I think about it, I realize there’s a cost savings to it—I used to freeze all the time, but now with these hot flashes and night sweats, I save money because I no longer have to buy heavy pajamas to keep warm in the winter. Hormones? What hormones? In our 50s we just don’t have any left. Instead we have hot flashes, chin hairs, droopy boobs, and all of those things people joke about. In our 20’s, 30’s, and even our 40’s, we might have been offended and said, “Not me!” But in our 50’s we look at them as signs that we’ve made it.
We made it through the child bearing years, school, and being afraid to go out without makeup. For me, it gives me the freedom to be who I am without having to worry about pleasing everybody else. I am what I am! And I’ve finally learned to accept it.
I laugh more at everything and can even laugh about the menopause symptoms. Menopause is a right of passage. It means that I’ve finally made it through the tough part of my life. What’s left is frosting on the cake!
A View of Success
Until I was in my late 40s, I used to measure success by the amount of money I made or the size of my office or the number of people that reported to me. It was shallow. Now, success to me is having a wonderful family, having friends that are there for me when I need them. It’s putting things in perspective instead of getting worked up about everything. It means letting go of a lot of baggage that built up over the years and being free to do what I love. It means putting family first—where they should have been all along. It’s a give and take. It’s giving back to the community and taking in the great feelings of knowing I did something great for someone else.
The Joys of Having my Own Business
I have a great boss! I can no longer complain about the idiot I work for. I can set my own deadlines for things. (However, I did finally realize that it wasn’t my boss giving me awful deadlines…it was actually me doing it to myself!) As an overachiever, I now find that I have worse deadlines than I did before. But at least now, I am doing it for myself.
The benefits go on and on: I can choose what I want to do. I can choose the challenges that I want to take on. I can “change on a dime” instead of going through all the red tape required to change things in a large corporation. I can take a day off when I want…but I always forget to do so! And as part of my business, I can feed my kitchen gadget habit all in the name of customer service.
On the downside, my friends have stopped inviting me over for dinner because they feel intimidated. Heck, I’m the same person! I still cook the same…now I just have a different title!
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