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Supernatural, only on Supernatural,

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for team. age?

1:06

I'm a smart guy, former national

1:08

merit scholar and game show champion

1:11

who chose the wrong career newspapers,

1:14

L-O-L. I wish I could

1:16

just be a college freshman

1:18

again, but now I've got

1:20

a million financial obligations and

1:22

just feel stuck sometimes. I

1:24

cannot ask you about the

1:26

game show champion aspect of this

1:28

email. Welcome

1:31

to How Too. I'm Courtney Martin.

1:33

People go on game shows for

1:35

a bunch of different reasons. They

1:38

want to run screaming down the

1:40

aisle when the announcer calls their

1:42

name. When they meet the host,

1:44

they want to say a quick

1:46

hi to their mom who's sitting

1:48

in the studio audience beaming with

1:50

pride. And sure, they want to

1:52

win big money. And maybe even

1:55

a brand new car. It could be

1:57

argued that the same things motivate

1:59

us. in our careers. Okay, stay

2:01

with me. Money and cars, right?

2:03

But also the thrill of getting

2:05

that new job. Of your resume

2:07

being pulled out of the slash

2:09

pile of desperation. A chance to

2:11

actually enjoy your day-to-day. Challenge yourself.

2:13

Maybe even make a name for

2:16

yourself. When you feel bored or

2:18

a little at sea, and don't

2:20

we all sometimes, it can be

2:22

easy to feel like your whole

2:24

life would be better if only

2:26

you had a different job. But

2:28

the older you get, the harder

2:30

it can feel to pivot. Which

2:32

is why it's time to play.

2:35

How to. I'm going to let

2:37

my producer Joel do this part.

2:39

Thanks, Courtney. This week's contestant on

2:41

how to, he's a journalist, an

2:43

educator. And as you heard at

2:45

the top of the show, he's

2:47

a former game show champion. Mike,

2:49

are you ready to how to?

2:51

Come on down. You

2:54

know, I'm overdue to be on another game show.

2:56

So I was in college. I was on Jeopardy.

2:58

I was the runner-up in the Jeopardy College tournament.

3:00

Oh my gosh. And then about 10 years after

3:02

that, I was on Who Wants to be a

3:04

Millionaire. The daytime version with Meredith Bearer, not the

3:06

Regis filled in. Excuse me. I think you need

3:08

to say repeat game show champion. Okay, I'll add

3:10

that. That's a good note. That's a good note.

3:12

That's a good note. That's a good note. Thanks

3:14

for being my editor. That's a good note. That's

3:16

a good note. That's a good note. That's a

3:18

good note. That's a good note. That's a good

3:20

note. That's a good note. That's a good note.

3:22

That's a good note. Thanks. That's a good note.

3:24

That's a good note. That's a good note. That's

3:27

a good note. That's a good note. That's a

3:29

good note. What would be your dream game show?

3:31

You said you're due to be on another one.

3:33

What would be your dream game show at this

3:35

point? I'm in no physical shape to be on

3:37

the Amazing race, but I feel like Amazing race

3:39

has a really good prize. I'm ready to go

3:41

for the big bucks. Mike is also ready for

3:43

a big change. I've worked in newspapers for probably

3:45

20 years, and what I do right now is

3:47

I advise a student newspaper at a university, which

3:49

is actually a really fun job. You know, you

3:51

know, I do enjoy it. You know I do

3:53

find myself wondering if this is really my last

3:55

best purpose in life. I'm the sort of person

3:57

I think who really enjoys novel situations and maybe

3:59

that's one reason I got into journalism. because if

4:01

you're doing it right, every day, it can be

4:03

a little different. But I just, I feel like

4:05

I've done journalism now. I would

4:07

really like to do something different. But

4:10

I have no real idea what's a

4:12

practical way to get started or to

4:14

even think about it. People in every

4:16

industry feel stuck like Mike does,

4:18

but journalism is also facing serious

4:21

questions about its viability, its audience,

4:23

and its purpose. Nowhere are those

4:26

questions more urgent than in newspaper

4:28

journalism. There's a lot of me that

4:30

would like to go back to that,

4:32

but it really doesn't exist anymore, at

4:35

least not in the form it existed

4:37

when... I started when it was a

4:39

lot of fun and newspapers kind of

4:41

ruled the roost when it came to

4:43

serious journalism and those days are long

4:45

gone. When I left my newspaper career

4:48

to take a teaching job at a

4:50

different university, that was a fun change of

4:52

pace, but now I've done the higher education

4:54

thing. I really do kind of want to

4:56

be a college freshman again, you know, and

4:58

just for the world to be new again

5:00

and for me to kind of pick my

5:02

way through choices again, but I also...

5:04

see the financial difficulty of that and

5:06

am not actually very enthusiastic about

5:09

that piece of it for sure. I

5:11

always think envy is such an instructive emotion.

5:13

Are there any friends who have careers that

5:15

make you envious that you think, oh, that's

5:17

where I wish I was going tomorrow

5:19

morning? Yeah, you know, I mean, I've always had

5:22

in the back of my mind that maybe I should

5:24

have gone to law school and I do have many

5:26

friends who are lawyers whose jobs I do kind

5:28

of, you know, look at and think, that looks

5:30

like it would be fun. Especially from

5:32

a journalism perspective, I think a

5:34

lot of the law around journalism

5:36

is changing because the politics of

5:38

this country are changing. And so that's

5:41

something I do think about. That's so interesting.

5:43

My father was a lawyer and when I

5:45

was a little girl I came home and

5:47

said, like, Daddy, I want to be a

5:49

lawyer like you and he said, you're coming

5:51

to work with me tomorrow. He sat me

5:53

in a chair in the corner. This was

5:55

the 80s, obviously, because I'm old. And he

5:57

just talked on the phone all day. Mike

6:00

is also interested in architecture and

6:02

astronomy. Those are kind of my

6:04

spare time passions now, I guess.

6:06

I read a lot about astronomy

6:08

and astrophysics. I just think that's

6:11

all very fascinating and there are

6:13

a lot of discoveries being made

6:15

all the time now because of

6:17

these new space telescopes. I mean,

6:19

the mysteries of the universe. I

6:21

mean, that's really, really interesting to

6:24

me. Yeah. Can't imagine being bored

6:26

if your job was mysteries of

6:28

the universe. Right, yeah. It's time

6:30

to meet this week's how-to expert.

6:32

who doesn't exactly solve mysteries of

6:34

the universe for a living, but

6:37

she does help people become what

6:39

they are truly meant to be.

6:41

My name is John Graham. I'm

6:43

a career coach, a licensed psychologist

6:45

and former career director at the

6:47

Wharton Executive NBA program, and I

6:49

help people switch careers. So essentially

6:52

people are looking to change their

6:54

function, their industry, or both. And

6:56

a lot of the people that

6:58

want to do that find themselves

7:00

mid-career. So many of the traditional

7:02

job search techniques don't necessarily work

7:05

for them. And so that's really

7:07

what I do is I help

7:09

them recreate their brand and recreate

7:11

basically their tools and strategy for

7:13

landing a job. Don's book is

7:15

called Switchers, how smart professionals change

7:18

careers and seize success. It's aimed

7:20

at people just like Mike. experience

7:22

professionals who want to make a

7:24

major pivot, and it incorporates concrete

7:26

career strategies with other advice drawn

7:28

from Don's background in psychology. And

7:31

just like a surprise game show

7:33

contestant who we've hidden backstage, Don

7:35

has been listening to Mike's story

7:37

this whole time. We'll get her

7:39

reaction and learn more about what

7:41

it means to be a switcher

7:44

in just a moment. Stick around.

7:55

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card. We're back with our

9:50

listener Mike, who's ready for a

9:52

midlife career change, but doesn't know

9:55

where to start. And with Don

9:57

Graham, author of the book Swishers.

10:00

As a licensed psychologist, when I

10:02

learned in school about career theory

10:04

and everything, we had these life

10:06

stages, and they've been completely blown

10:08

out of the water. It wasn't

10:10

that long ago that Mike would

10:12

have been considered an outlier. Someone

10:14

who wanted to change careers in

10:16

their 50s might have been viewed

10:18

as delusional, or maybe even damaged

10:20

goods. Someone who didn't have the

10:22

dedication to earn that gold watch

10:24

for 40 years of service. This

10:26

idea of start a career work at

10:28

a company retire that's that's gone I

10:30

mean you're gonna hear about people who

10:33

never retire You're gonna about here about

10:35

people who make major pivot start a

10:37

company go back to a company take

10:39

five years to have and an adventure

10:41

overseas. And these are going to become

10:44

the new normals. It's really helpful to

10:46

remember that, you know, I get to

10:48

create my path is really what switching

10:50

is about. And quite frankly, I think

10:53

we're all going to have to shift

10:55

our mindset to that direction because it's

10:57

going to impact all of our careers

10:59

in one way or another, if not

11:01

next year, definitely in the next five

11:03

to 10. So we all need to

11:05

be really thinking about the fact that

11:07

there is no normal anymore. Don says

11:10

she wrote switchers because so many people

11:12

were coming to her for advice and

11:14

she was telling them the same thing.

11:16

To make this kind of change in

11:19

midlife you need to do some self-examination

11:21

and a little rewiring. You not only

11:23

have to have all the right tools

11:25

in terms of your resume and everything

11:27

else that aligns with the job search,

11:29

but as we're hearing here today, there's

11:31

a lot of psychological processing that goes

11:33

into it. There's a lot of research

11:35

that goes into it, exploration to give

11:37

out what you're willing to give up,

11:40

but you're not willing to give up.

11:42

And so I realize that if so

11:44

many people are looking to switch, then

11:46

there needs to be a roadmap to

11:48

help people do that successfully. What I

11:50

saw is a lot of people who

11:52

are trying to go through a normal

11:54

job search as a switcher and

11:56

giving up too early because their

11:58

strategies weren't working. Yeah, it's really daunting,

12:01

right? And in your work, Don, have

12:03

you seen mid-career people who really, really

12:05

want to switch but are worried about

12:07

leaving a comfortable situation? Like Mike, you

12:09

know, he has a solid university job,

12:11

right? Like, I think this is the

12:13

whole golden handcuffs thing. So I think

12:16

loss aversion in general, and loss of

12:18

version is the human tendency to weight

12:20

losses, more so than gains of the

12:22

same quantity. People get very excited about

12:24

the idea of becoming an architect or

12:26

a lawyer and then they start to

12:29

get into the reality of it. Okay,

12:31

I have to spend three years in

12:33

school. I have to spend... thousands of

12:35

dollars on the degree. I have to

12:37

network and spend my time maybe even

12:39

relocating or going through the steps of

12:41

starting at the bottom and maybe reporting

12:44

to somebody who's a lot younger than

12:46

me and giving up the autonomy that

12:48

I had because I was very established

12:50

in my career. So for a lot

12:52

of people, they just start to believe

12:54

that the tradeoffs aren't worth it. But

12:56

a lot of times there's other ways.

12:59

There's things in the book I talk

13:01

about called stepping stones, switches, which might

13:03

be taking an interim role that gets

13:05

you one step closer to where you

13:07

want to be without having to lose

13:09

your financial standing or without having to

13:11

go all the way back to the

13:14

bottom. So there's different ways to do

13:16

it. It might take a little longer.

13:18

You might have to sacrifice some things,

13:20

but probably not as much as you

13:22

think. Mike, is there a moment in

13:24

your day to day that you just

13:26

feel like, yes, this is why I

13:29

get up in the morning and what

13:31

are you doing in that moment? You

13:33

know that happens every once in a

13:35

while. I'm in the current job I'm

13:37

in because my previous job was more

13:39

of an administrative job and the job

13:41

I'm in now is very student facing.

13:44

I interact with students all day long

13:46

and when they nail something, when they

13:48

get through something that you've coached them

13:50

to do and it has an impact

13:52

on the audience, I mean those are

13:54

golden moments. That's the sort of thing

13:57

that keeps me in this job is

13:59

when that's kind of... thing happens. You've

14:01

also mentioned even in the short time

14:03

about kind of stepping back and peaking

14:05

into the journalism world and it's still

14:07

not where you want it to be,

14:09

but it almost sounds like if things

14:11

were the way they were when you

14:13

were in the heart of it, that

14:16

you still would be pursuing that. Yeah, I

14:18

mean, I think if newspapers were still today

14:20

like they were 20 years ago, I

14:22

think at some point they would have

14:24

sought to find another newspaper job. One

14:26

of the frustrations of a job like

14:28

mine is that I'm working with students

14:30

who don't know very much and my

14:33

career was in situations where I was

14:35

working with a lot of professionals who

14:37

knew a lot. So I've gone from

14:39

being an editor at newspapers, you know,

14:41

reading a lot of great journalism and

14:43

perfecting it to being an instructor in

14:45

a journalism school and reading a lot

14:48

of really terrible journalism. And so

14:50

that can be very disheartening and

14:52

grinding. But I do still hear

14:54

that that pull. And I think when

14:56

I talk to people who want to

14:58

switch, often it's their situation that has

15:01

switched, not necessarily their interests. And I

15:03

think something else that I'm getting from

15:05

you is you have a lot of

15:07

passions and things that are fascinating to

15:10

you. And a lot of people, when

15:12

they are thinking, hmm, I'm ready for

15:14

something new, look to those. But I

15:16

also find that sometimes what makes them

15:19

so appealing as a hobby. makes

15:21

them actually dreadful as a

15:23

career. I love something that

15:25

Don just said there, which

15:27

feels so accurate. The context

15:29

might change, but not a

15:31

person's innate passion. The things

15:33

we find satisfying at work,

15:35

those things remain pretty much

15:37

the same. It's the work

15:39

itself that shifts. It sounds like,

15:41

Mike, when you think about what

15:44

really drives you, the variety that

15:46

you had in your work, those

15:48

aha moments, getting to explore a

15:50

lot of different topics in the

15:52

moment. Those are all the same

15:54

things that really drive you. It's

15:57

just the industry has changed to

15:59

where the things aren't being fulfilled.

16:01

So one of the things I suggest

16:03

is when people are thinking about a

16:05

switch is focus on the heart of

16:07

what has driven you before and then

16:09

ask yourself where can I find those

16:12

things perhaps in a different industry or

16:14

in a different role? It makes me

16:16

think of the notion of asking people

16:18

instead of like what do you want

16:20

to be when you grow up, how

16:22

do you want to be when you

16:25

grow up and like trying to understand

16:27

for Mike. how he's happiest and then

16:29

applying that in whatever field he can

16:31

figure out to get paid for, right?

16:33

I love that. And the reason I

16:35

love that is because often when we

16:38

are looking to make a switch, we

16:40

start looking at titles, right? So we

16:42

start looking at lawyer, architect, astronomer, but

16:44

that can be really limiting because then

16:46

you start to think about all of

16:48

the complicating factors such as, well, I

16:51

need to make this much money, so

16:53

maybe this profession isn't going to work,

16:55

or I need to go back to

16:57

school for three years. But the question

16:59

I like to ask is what problem

17:01

do you want to solve in the

17:03

world today? and it strips away all

17:06

of those factors that might distract us

17:08

from really getting to the answer. So

17:10

it strips away title, it strips away

17:12

prestige, it strips away the financial piece.

17:14

So you can really get to the

17:16

heart of what you're looking for. And

17:19

not to say those other things don't

17:21

matter. Mike, you have a budget you

17:23

need to meet, but what problem do

17:25

you want to solve in the world?

17:27

Oh, that's a really good question. I'm

17:29

in journalism and so I see this

17:32

journalism problem of people no longer trusting

17:34

the news and I feel like I

17:36

am picking at that problem a little

17:38

bit by training the next generation of

17:40

journalists, but it feels really indirect. One

17:42

of the reasons I was kind of

17:45

you know have thought about the law

17:47

a lot recently is that a lot

17:49

of the journalism problems are going to

17:51

be solved at a legal level at

17:53

some point. I think there's a lot

17:55

of pressure on journalists that that we

17:58

can see coming in the second Trump

18:00

administration and a lot of those battles

18:02

are going to be fought in the

18:04

courts. And that stuff fascinates me in

18:06

the constitutional questions of free speech and

18:08

how we can protect that while still

18:11

protecting all the other things we want

18:13

to protect. I mean, that's really interesting

18:15

to me. And the reason I love

18:18

that answer, Mike, is because it is

18:20

a very real problem. It's very tangible.

18:22

It's happening, how it happens. I think

18:24

you're going to get a lot of

18:26

variety out of that if you pursued

18:28

that. And it taps into the expertise

18:30

that you ready bring to the

18:32

table. And I understand that the

18:35

legal side may not be in

18:37

your background, but the question becomes,

18:39

can you close that gap? So

18:41

you're not straying so far from

18:43

where you've come being an architect

18:45

or an astronomer, which is very,

18:47

very much of a hard pivot.

18:50

But taking the experience and the

18:52

passion that you know. and really

18:54

solving a problem in the world

18:56

that is happening right now in

18:58

this moment. Answering a question like,

19:00

what problem in the world do

19:03

you want to solve, might not

19:05

be easy to answer. It's a

19:07

big one, right? Dawn suggests spending

19:09

time with this question, journaling about

19:11

it every day for a week,

19:14

and looking for the themes and

19:16

patterns that emerged from that inquiry.

19:18

Mike told us that he's been

19:20

thinking a lot about going back

19:22

to school. which is understandable, right?

19:25

The fields he's interested in, law,

19:27

architecture, astronomy, they all have very

19:29

clear educational paths. And those paths

19:31

usually involve a lot of time and

19:33

a lot of money. So, should someone

19:36

like Mike, a guy in his 50s,

19:38

go back to school in order to

19:40

change careers? As a switcher that should

19:42

never be your first step because if you're

19:44

not quite sure what's beneath the surface so

19:47

Courtney if your dad hadn't taken you to

19:49

the office and you spent three years in

19:51

law school just to have your first day

19:53

out of law school be in that office

19:56

saying I can't believe I just spent three

19:58

years to spend all day on. the phone.

20:00

That's what I see happen a lot

20:02

of times. Now the reason school feels

20:05

really appealing is because it's structured, it

20:07

makes sense, it's easy in the sense

20:09

of I feel like I'm being productive

20:11

toward a goal, but the challenge with

20:13

that is you're still going to have

20:16

a very tough job search when you

20:18

get out because you're still a switcher.

20:20

Just because you've spent time getting a

20:22

degree doesn't mean you have the applied

20:25

experience that people are necessarily looking for.

20:27

of my life in school. It's a

20:29

great networking opportunity. There's so many positives.

20:31

So I'm not shooting down the idea

20:33

of school, but that shouldn't be the

20:36

first step. And for many who are

20:38

mid-career and have families, financial concerns, or

20:40

other things, it's a very tough step.

20:42

I would also just interject quickly done.

20:44

And Mike, I feel like this is

20:47

a particular trap for nerds. Like I'm

20:49

a nerd like you and when you

20:51

said getting to do. like your first

20:53

year in college again, I'm like, yes,

20:55

like there's so many anthropology classes I

20:58

didn't take, you know, and if you're

21:00

a journalist, you're probably a nerd, and

21:02

like you were made for school, like

21:04

a lot of us who are journalists

21:07

love novelty, we love taking a lot

21:09

of different subjects, you know, so I

21:11

bet there's a lot of folks like

21:13

us who do this particularly often, don't

21:15

you think? first there really resonate with

21:18

me too. It's like, you know, one

21:20

of the reasons I guess I'm defaulting

21:22

to thinking about going back to school

21:24

is that I would like to be

21:26

led through the process again. I want

21:29

to stop having to worry about and

21:31

think about it and just like experience

21:33

it. Going back to school, it's all

21:35

prescribed for you. You know what the

21:37

path is and you know what you're

21:40

going to get when you get to

21:42

the end of it. Without that, I

21:44

feel really lost. That's a really interesting

21:46

point. So it's not just the novelty

21:49

of different subject matters and learning, but

21:51

it's the structure that you're craving. Yeah.

21:53

That's another great point. Humans love structure.

21:55

We like things to fit in boxes.

21:57

We tend to stray towards something that

22:00

feels comfortable to us. And that's again,

22:02

not a bad thing. It's a great

22:04

survival mechanism. But you have to ask

22:06

yourself, is that going to get you

22:08

where you want to be? Now I've

22:11

worked with many, many switchers and that's

22:13

what they ended up doing. They ended

22:15

up getting an NBA or going to

22:17

law school or even going to nursing

22:19

school. So it might actually be the

22:22

path you decide to take Mike because

22:24

you like school and you like structure.

22:26

But my question is, how do you

22:28

know then if it's law school

22:31

or architecture? degree or astronomy

22:33

degree? Yeah, that's one of the

22:35

basic problems, right? My interests are pretty

22:38

diverse. And so I don't have one

22:40

thing that I'm like passionately thinking I

22:42

really should have done or want to

22:44

do. I just know I want to

22:46

do something different. Yeah. So one

22:49

of my thoughts is you're talking

22:51

is a lot of the careers

22:53

that are going to emerge that

22:55

are emerging today didn't exist five

22:57

years ago. Many that will emerge

22:59

by 2030 didn't exist last week.

23:01

So a lot of what you're

23:03

talking about strikes me as an

23:05

emerging profession and sometimes that means

23:07

being a pioneer and actually creating

23:10

a role like this for yourself

23:12

through your networks, through your connections,

23:14

through how you fill in your

23:16

gaps, it would be interesting to

23:18

know if that, how you feel

23:20

about that, what's your initial reaction

23:22

to that. You know, in the back of

23:24

my mind, I know that's what I

23:26

should be doing, right? Like, the whole

23:28

journalism world is in flux now, and

23:31

I have the experience that I could

23:33

do something different and innovative in that

23:35

space now because the environment seems right

23:37

for it, right? And I guess I

23:39

come back to a couple of things

23:41

as one, I guess I'm not really

23:44

that pioneer risk taker person. And I

23:46

don't have the financial security, you know,

23:48

to like set aside my job. and I don't

23:50

feel like I have the free time to

23:52

where I could pursue something like this on the

23:54

side. So let me ask a question then,

23:56

how would law school work if you decide

23:59

to go that route? That's an awesome question.

24:01

My thought was it was part-time and

24:03

I would have to squeeze that into

24:05

my spare time for sure. I know

24:07

what that looks like because I've seen

24:09

other people do it. But that's one

24:11

of the reasons I haven't pulled the

24:13

trigger on it is because I am

24:16

reluctant about adding that obligation of being

24:18

in school and meeting all those deadlines

24:20

and doing all those assignments to my

24:22

life as it exists now. Hmm.

24:24

All right. So if school isn't

24:27

the first step, and if Mike's

24:29

ideal role hasn't really been invented

24:31

yet, what's a midlife journalist to

24:33

do? Don will have some baby

24:35

steps for us in just a

24:37

moment. So stick around. Bored

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26:57

you listen. Before

26:59

we get back into the episode, we'd

27:02

love hearing updates from previous guests, and

27:04

we know you do too. So, we

27:06

wanted to share voicemail we received from

27:09

Lynn, from our episode on how to

27:11

move past your toxic X. My original

27:13

question was about how to get

27:15

over someone who'd betrayed you, and I

27:17

was struggling a great deal. There was

27:19

some part of me that felt wrong

27:22

for still loving this person and wanting

27:24

to resolve things, but what worked for

27:26

me was the validation in talking and

27:28

being able to share my story. I

27:30

felt heard and that was really important.

27:32

Being on the show really helped me

27:34

understand that I have a right to

27:36

feel exactly how I feel and that

27:38

the things that happened to me, they

27:40

were not good, they were wrong. My

27:42

advice for anyone working through a similar

27:44

situation. would be to recognize your

27:46

higher self and go with your

27:48

intuition and gut, you know when

27:50

something is not right, whether you

27:52

can describe it or not. Ask

27:54

questions of yourself, ask questions of

27:56

your friends that have been in

27:58

your life forever. or family, so

28:01

that would be my suggestion and

28:03

advice. Thanks to

28:05

Lynn for the update and for

28:07

sharing your experience with other listeners.

28:09

If you're going through something similar,

28:11

you can find our June 2024

28:13

episode, How to Move Past Your

28:15

Toxic Ex in the How -To

28:17

Archives. If you have a problem

28:19

that you want to talk through

28:21

and you think it could help

28:24

other listeners too, please send us

28:26

a note at howtoatslate.com or leave

28:28

us a voicemail at 646 -495 -4001.

28:30

We might just have you on

28:32

the show. More

28:35

now with the career coach

28:37

and psychologist Don Graham and with

28:39

Mike, who worked as a newspaper

28:41

editor for 20 years, then left

28:43

to teach student journalists. Now

28:46

he's ready to make another transition,

28:48

maybe into some aspect of

28:50

journalism and media law, but he's

28:52

not sure where to start. So,

28:55

Don, if we sort of follow this path a

28:57

little bit, what's the first

28:59

step? Would you suggest Mike try to

29:01

do an informational interview with someone who

29:03

works specifically in journalism law? Yeah, absolutely.

29:05

Not just one person, but three, four,

29:07

five, and hopefully everybody you meet will

29:09

be able to introduce you to somebody

29:11

else because everybody's going to have their

29:13

own take on it. Everybody's going to

29:15

be in their own space in it

29:18

and what they like and what they

29:20

don't like. And shadowing? Absolutely. Call up

29:22

somebody and say, hey, I'd love to

29:24

just, you know, if you have the

29:26

time. That's excellent advice. And what

29:28

it basically is, it's journalistic advice. This is exactly

29:30

how I tell my students to write a

29:32

story of something they're interested in. It's like schedule

29:34

a couple of interviews, get lunch with a

29:36

couple of people who know what's going on, feel

29:39

it out, see if you can, you know,

29:41

learn a few things by just interacting with people.

29:43

And I'm not sure why that didn't occur

29:45

to me to do in this situation, but it's

29:47

always easier to advise others than it is

29:49

ourselves. Right? Yeah, I was thinking that

29:51

also that once you're in that mode

29:53

day to day, because you're so used

29:55

to helping others, you can forget that

29:57

you could be on the other side.

30:00

too, you can ask people for help. And

30:02

I think also sometimes we forget that people

30:04

like to be helpful. You know, I think

30:06

at this moment in my life, also in

30:08

midlife, it feels like I'm asking for people's

30:10

time and energy and I'm so busy and

30:12

I know how busy they are and I

30:14

can sort of talk myself out of it.

30:16

But we all know how good we feel

30:19

when we help someone in an informational sort

30:21

of interview like that, right? And the funny

30:23

thing is, you know, you know, I know. three

30:25

or four journalism lawyers, like it would not be

30:27

a big lift for me to get them on

30:29

the phone or to email them and say, hey,

30:31

you know, let's grab lunch, you know, I

30:34

have these questions. Yeah, and you might

30:36

find out that a law degree isn't

30:38

necessary. Maybe there's a different path because

30:40

the other step I would say you

30:42

can do simultaneously is go to a

30:44

few law school orientations, talk to students

30:46

who are doing it part time, find

30:48

out what they like, what they don't

30:50

like, and then ask yourself the

30:52

question. All right, it's my graduation

30:55

day at law school. What happens

30:57

next? Yeah. Because this is

30:59

where the plan tends to fall

31:02

apart. Right. Right. So let's do

31:04

it. Like Mike, watch yourself walking

31:06

across the stage and your daughters

31:08

in the audience and she's cheering

31:11

for you and you come down

31:13

and and what are you doing

31:15

next week? Yep. I don't know.

31:17

I don't know how that works and

31:19

I, you know, my sense is that.

31:21

their journalism law is not an enormous

31:23

field. And so I don't know where

31:26

that means there's a need for journalism

31:28

lawyers or whether it's hard to break

31:30

into. So those are all questions

31:32

I should be asking. Yeah, and that's

31:34

what I mean when I go back

31:36

to say that school shouldn't be first

31:38

because when I ask that question about

31:40

graduation day, that's where that's where it's

31:42

difficult, right? But I've planned out the

31:44

next three to four years, so I

31:46

feel good about that, but I haven't

31:48

really thought beyond that. can do without

31:50

that law degree. You might find that

31:52

you love the study of law. And

31:54

even if you decide to go a

31:57

different route, you're going to get that

31:59

law degree anyway. So there's a lot

32:01

of unknowns at this point, which are

32:03

still exciting and undiscovered. So I think

32:05

that's the place to start. And then

32:07

obviously you've mentioned the financial piece. So

32:09

if you do go to school part

32:11

time, every time you make a switch,

32:13

I say there's always sacrifices. Sometimes they're

32:16

temporary sacrifices, but I always say if

32:18

you're not willing to lose, you're not

32:20

ready to switch. So in your case,

32:22

if you decide to go back to

32:24

school, it might be. you lose out

32:26

on some of your free time. It

32:28

might be lose out on some of

32:31

your savings. So what are you willing

32:33

to lose and what are your non-negotiable?

32:35

So what are those things that are

32:37

absolute, can't, budge, can't be flexible on?

32:39

I love how you're framing this too

32:41

because, you know, in my mind, I'm

32:43

thinking about trying to figure out what

32:45

the rest of my life looks like,

32:48

and it just seems like an enormous...

32:50

chore and a problem that's hard to

32:52

solve and so it's hard to get

32:54

started on it and the way you're

32:56

talking about it no it's this adventure

32:58

you could have where you're talking to

33:00

these people and exploring the world and

33:03

that in and of itself could be

33:05

a lot of fun and I just

33:07

I hadn't framed it for myself that

33:09

way and I need to. Yeah you

33:11

have to enjoy the journey because otherwise

33:13

you'll be regretting it every step of

33:15

the way. Right. Speaking of journeys, when

33:18

you're a midlife switcher, your career journey

33:20

is shorter than it is for someone

33:22

who's just entering the workforce. It can

33:24

be easy in this midlife moment to

33:26

think, this is my last great shot,

33:28

I have to make it count. I

33:30

asked on how far ahead we should

33:33

be looking. Five years, 10 years, 20?

33:35

What time frame is the most helpful

33:37

for switches to use? I think there's

33:39

two things I've pull out of this.

33:41

So years now are very different. I

33:43

feel like ever since the pandemic, years

33:45

or it's a weird time space continuum.

33:47

But the hard part about planning for

33:50

10 years, 20 years is the jobs

33:52

that exist today aren't going to exist

33:54

then. And so we have no idea.

33:56

First off, I would say we always

33:58

need to be planning and thinking about

34:00

this. It's continuing to build. our network.

34:02

It's continuing to build our skills, continuing

34:05

to have these informational interviews and meetings

34:07

regardless of whether you're at a pivot

34:09

point or not because you might unfortunately

34:11

be forced to be at a pivot

34:13

point because your company lays you off

34:15

or because there's a restructuring. But the

34:17

second part of that is what are

34:20

our limiting beliefs? Mike, do you believe

34:22

this is your last like hurrah, because I

34:24

don't think it is. I think if

34:26

you're going to continue working in some

34:28

form or fashion and follow your passions

34:30

and interests, you're going to have a

34:32

lot of different pivots left. Some might

34:35

not be as major as this one,

34:37

but I think the more we kind

34:39

of have a belief that I have

34:41

to pick the right thing because this

34:43

is this is my shot, the harder

34:45

it is to make that decision because

34:47

we've just boxed ourselves into one choice

34:50

when there's probably many. I

34:53

hear it in your voice that I

34:55

don't think architecture and astronomy are the

34:57

answer. I think those are amazing passions

34:59

and that I can see you taking

35:02

a month-long trip to somewhere to do

35:04

this in-depth astronomy class and loving it,

35:06

right? But I don't see that necessarily

35:09

being your career because if it's your

35:11

career, all of a sudden it loses

35:13

a little bit of that shine. But

35:15

I can hear your passion for

35:18

journalism and the work you do

35:20

and helping the next generation and

35:22

seeing a... that's happening with journalism

35:24

and getting kind of angry about

35:26

that and fired up. And I

35:28

say follow that because that's where

35:31

your professional energy is. That's where

35:33

your professional skill set can be

35:35

built upon. And I think as

35:37

interesting as it sounds to you

35:39

kind of pick a title and

35:41

go with it, and as scary

35:44

as it feels to maybe carve out

35:46

a little bit of your own path,

35:48

I just feel like that's where

35:50

your passion is leading you. Yeah. I

35:52

mean there is something to be said

35:54

for not starting from from zero. And

35:56

journalism is an interesting field in that.

35:58

I mean it applies. You can do

36:00

journalism in a lot of other fields

36:03

as well. I mean, it's not a

36:05

discrete thing. Will you talk up a

36:07

little bit about ageism? Mike, is that

36:10

something you're worried about being a more

36:12

mid-life person, applying to jobs in a

36:14

new field? Yeah, a little bit. I

36:16

mean, every once in a while you

36:19

see an interesting journalism job, but they're

36:21

looking for entry-level people, you know, in

36:23

my experience, there aren't a whole lot

36:26

of people looking for a 50-year-old journalist.

36:28

And part of me is wishing that

36:30

there were this infrastructure, like there is

36:33

for high school students, where, oh, you

36:35

should apply for all these scholarships, you

36:37

know, and everybody's falling. I think ageism

36:39

is real regardless of whether you're looking

36:42

for a traditional career path or switching

36:44

and for a variety of reasons people

36:46

make assumptions when they look at your

36:49

resume that you're going to want too

36:51

much or they're going to make an

36:53

assumption that you're not going to work

36:56

long enough and all of these have

36:58

been proven false but they're out there

37:00

and when the market is as flooded

37:02

as it is right now they get

37:05

to make those assumptions because there's so

37:07

many candidates unfortunately but the other thing

37:09

I would say to people who are

37:12

switching. even in a traditional job search

37:14

right now, is you don't have to

37:16

wait to be selected. And I think

37:18

that's another mindset that I can start

37:21

doing something on the side. One of

37:23

the people you know in journalism law

37:25

would say, hey, yeah, come on some

37:28

projects with me, help me out. Maybe

37:30

it's not going to be financially. lucrative,

37:32

but maybe you can learn a lot

37:35

and get to meet people and kind

37:37

of break your way in that way.

37:39

I think there's a lot of ways

37:41

we can create our own path, and

37:44

it is a little bit scary if

37:46

we, you know, we like structure and

37:48

we prefer to have somebody pick us,

37:51

but that's the thing. I think if

37:53

you're a switcher, the most successful switcher's

37:55

don't wait to be selected. They start

37:58

creating the role they want. people do

38:00

it after work or in other spare

38:02

time or even take vacation time to

38:04

do it, but trying to break in

38:07

other ways often will be better in

38:09

the long term because you're not going

38:11

to lose all those time and resources

38:14

that you might have spent otherwise. And

38:16

secondly, you don't have to go throughout

38:18

that emotional roller coaster of feeling like

38:20

you're constantly getting rejected because people can't

38:23

see the value you bring because you're

38:25

not a traditional candidate. So

38:30

might give us a little bit of an

38:32

impression in terms of how is this sitting

38:34

with you? Are you feeling like you have

38:36

a little bit of a clearer vision about

38:38

the path and next steps you might

38:40

take? Absolutely. You know, I had kind

38:43

of approached this from the idea that,

38:45

you know, the right answer for me

38:47

is just to start over completely, like

38:49

blank slate. And I can see how that

38:51

maybe is a recipe for me ending up

38:53

in a similar situation I'm in now. I

38:55

like the idea that, you know, you know, this

38:57

isn't... this enormous project that I have to

39:00

figure out all at once. You know, I've

39:02

gotten some steps here now that I can

39:04

take that are pretty low stakes and easy

39:06

to achieve that would start me down the

39:08

road and that's what I need to do

39:10

I think is just get started. I have,

39:12

you know, I want to solve this all

39:15

in advance and then set down that path

39:17

and that's not how it's going to work

39:19

clearly. Yeah, there's a comfort with

39:21

ambiguity that comes with this process and,

39:23

you know, realizing that, hey, I might

39:26

have spent the last two weeks going

39:28

down the wrong path and now I

39:30

have to pivot and that feels really

39:32

unproductive and uncomfortable, but that's what I

39:35

tell people. If you're, if you're not

39:37

hitting dead ends and making pivots, then

39:39

you're probably not exploring as deeply. And

39:41

part of this process is the process

39:44

itself and you do need to feel

39:46

uncomfortable for a few months as you're

39:48

going through it. might be moving towards

39:50

the wrong answer, like popping to school

39:52

because it's structured. Think about where that's

39:55

going to get you, but that's the question.

39:57

What problem do you want to solve in

39:59

the world today? and

40:01

then start thinking through that very

40:03

broadly without limiting yourself to title,

40:05

salary, or all the other issues

40:07

that are rolling around in your

40:10

head that tell you you can't.

40:12

Just put those aside. This has

40:14

been really helpful. I really appreciate

40:16

it. Thank you, Dawn, and thank

40:18

you, Courtney. Thanks, Mike. Well, thank

40:20

you. I love being here, and

40:22

I'm excited for you, Mike. I

40:25

think you have a lot of

40:27

possibilities, and sounds like you've got

40:29

a great plan, and I'm excited

40:31

to hear where you go. Yeah,

40:33

and if you just win the

40:35

amazing race and get rich, then

40:38

you could still change the field

40:40

of journalism just as a philanthropist,

40:42

right? Yep, there you go. Thanks

40:44

to Mike for sharing his story

40:46

with us and to Don Graham

40:48

for all her useful advice. Her

40:50

book is Switchers, how smart professionals

40:53

change careers and seize success. We'll

40:55

link to it on our show

40:57

page. On our next show,

40:59

we recently asked listeners to tell

41:02

us about the big changes they're

41:04

making in response to their November

41:06

elections and the new presidential administration.

41:08

Connie is a stay-at-home mom who

41:10

wants to get active in her

41:13

community, but she has zero experience,

41:15

doesn't know where to start, and

41:17

to boot, she's an introvert. We'll

41:19

talk about how to speak up

41:21

and get involved wherever you live.

41:24

Now, with all this talk of

41:26

new jobs, getting active, all that

41:28

kind of stuff, here's another fresh

41:30

start. To celebrate the New Year,

41:32

Slate is offering an extended free

41:35

trial of Slate Plus, exclusively on

41:37

Apple podcasts. As a Slate Plus

41:39

member, you'll get ad-free listening on

41:41

every Slate show, Culture Gab Fest,

41:43

Deer Prudence, Death Sex and Money,

41:46

and Yes, How Too. And starting

41:48

this month, How Too is releasing

41:50

bi-weekly bonus episodes exclusively for Slate

41:52

Plus members. That means more advice,

41:54

more experts, and more stories to

41:57

help you tackle life's challenges head

41:59

on. Don't miss out, try Slate

42:01

Plus for free now on Apple

42:03

podcasts or visit slate.com/how-to-plus

42:05

to get access

42:07

wherever you listen.

42:10

How Two is produced by Rosie Belson

42:12

with Kevin Bendis, who not only

42:14

produces this show, but produced a

42:17

new baby. Congratulations, Bud. Joel Meyer

42:19

is senior editor and Derek John

42:21

is executive producer. Merit Jacob is

42:23

senior technical director and composed our

42:26

theme music. Charles Dewig created the

42:28

show. Carbell Wallace is my co-host.

42:30

I'm Courtney Martin. Thanks for listening.