Realizing the Advantage of Taking Chances

I recently turned 50. It’s been a good half a century. To be honest, I’m amongst the most blessed. Professionally, I do find it interesting how I got to this point.

If you had told me when I started college more than three decades ago that I would spend 20+ years “going to school,” I would’ve said you were crazy. When I started law school, if someone had predicted I would have my own consulting firm working with clients to raise money for amazing causes to help their communities, I wouldn’t have believed them. I would never have believed that studying leadership and public policy would so applicable day-to-day.  And, when I took that job in Minnesota, moving further away from my hopeful permanent destination, I couldn’t have imagined that those five years would bring me an opportunity to move back to the place I grew up.

While turning a half-century in age doesn’t make you any wiser, it does give you a chance to make some things maybe just a little bit more clear. All the education and all the different professional experiences have led me to one conclusion:

Sometimes it’s worth taking a chance to learn or to start something new, even if it doesn’t seem directly related to what you’re doing every day. 

Law school’s lessons have been invaluable in ways I never would’ve dreamed. I studied business and finance, both skills I use every single day. And I have a broader understanding of leadership and the concept that where government meets the general public is part of regular conversations with healthcare leaders, which is their focus on a daily basis. My career choices were more based on working for good people rather than salary, which has provided amazing mentors along the way.

Had I not taken a leap of faith at each one of these junctures, along with my desire to continually learn and be exposed to new things, I probably wouldn’t be where I am today. The safer route would have been sticking with the status quo. The more fun and profitable route turned out to be the one about investing in myself and taking a few chances along the way.