You’re Not Too Old, It’s Not Too Late Part 2(with Cheryl Sparks)

 Last week, Nora set out to prove that no one is ever too old and it’s never too late to try something entirely new. The mailbox was so full of amazing, inspiring stories that Nora knew there had to be a second part with Cheryl Sparks, an amazing fashion influencer who got her start later than you might think (@ifitstuesday on Instagram).

Watch us on Youtube here!

Get this episode ad-free here!

Listen to Geoffrey’s album on Spotify and Apple!

Shop my favorite bras and underwear at ⁠⁠SKIMS.com⁠⁠. After you place your order, be sure to let them know I sent you! Select “podcast” in the survey and be sure to select my show in the dropdown menu that follows.

Check out ⁠⁠Indeed.com⁠⁠ for all your hiring needs!

Protect your data and privacy with ⁠Nord VPN.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcripts may not appear in their final version and are subject to change.

---

Hi, everybody, it’s Nora McInerny, and this is Thanks For Asking.

This is a call-in show, so I’m just a regular show about what matters to you.

I take topics, I take questions, I take your calls, your voicemails, your texts, and this is part two of You’re Not Too Old, It’s Not Too Late.

Or is it It’s Not Too Late, You’re Not Too Old?

I can’t remember what we named the prior episode, I just know that we had more to say, because every time I open the Instagram question box, I get a variation on the question that kicked off that first episode, which is, I’m X years old, I have this kind of life, I don’t want to live this kind of life anymore, is it too late for me, give me a pep talk.

So today I have a different special guest.

This is Cheryl, I know her on Instagram as at, if it’s Tuesday, I have said for quite a long time that Cheryl is one of my top influencers.

Cheryl is, as the date of this recording, 69 years old, by the time you hear this, she will be 70 years old.

She might not fit the profile of what you imagine when you think influencer.

And that is why I chose to have her here today, because, yeah, she’s almost 30 years older than me.

I truly cannot do math.

She’s almost 30 years older than me.

And she is an influence on me online.

I want to dress like Cheryl.

I want to act like Cheryl.

I want to be a sophisticated East Coast woman.

Unfortunately, I am a Midwest born, Southwest living, semi dirtbag.

And that’s okay.

That’s okay.

But Cheryl was not born an influencer.

She actually had an entire life, an entire career before she made this pivot.

And I wanted to get her story out here.

Wanted to introduce all of you to Cheryl.

And I wanted to introduce all of you to Cheryl.

And I wanted to, and I wanted to keep that conversation going about how we can keep an expansive view of our lives, of our place in the world, how we can encourage one another to see beyond what is right in front of us.

So here is my conversation with Cheryl, also known as If It’s Tuesday.

Cheryl, I am so excited to be talking to you on the podcast because I have just been such a fan of you.

And if anybody follows me on Instagram, they know that I refer to you as, you know, honestly, one of my top five favorite influencers, truly.

Like, when I imagine myself in the future, I imagine myself as you, even though I know that I’m more of a dirtbag.

Maybe, you know, quite a bit.

Well, it’s so funny because, you know, grief brings people together.

And I knew of you before If It’s Tuesday even began.

So I had your books.

I followed you long before this was.

So it is, you know, grace that brought us together.

So it is.

It is.

It is.

My sister in sorrow is what it is.

Like, eventually, everyone will join and we will welcome them with, you know, open and reluctant arms at the same time.

I, the impetus for these episodes is that more than once, Cheryl, I’ve gotten messages from mostly women who say, you know, I’m X years old.

It’s always younger than me.

I’ll say that.

I’m 31.

I’m, in a recent case, 24.

I want to change my life or I want to change my career, but I’m afraid that it’s simply too late for me.

And I know that feeling, and I wish that I could reach into people and remove it from them.

But I think really all you can do is kind of try to shine your flashlight around in the darkness and say, look, there’s more ahead of you.

I promise you that 31 is not too old to do to do pretty much anything, you know.

And you don’t want trauma, you don’t want trauma to force that.

You want them, you don’t want them to do it out of, out of, you know, a forced reason.

You want them to do that because they can, because they have joy in their life.

My life changed because of, because of extenuating, you know, circumstances.

You don’t want that.

You want them to look into their lives and say, oh, what are my, what are my gifts?

What are the things that I can do?

What are the things that I love?

And what are, what are the things that I can share with other people?

You know, my circumstances were so different.

So, you know, yes, and, you know, do it, do it because you get to do it.

Don’t, not because you have to do it.

Right.

I was talking to a friend recently about young people that we know, and she said, the sooner that they realize that you make decisions or life will make them for you, the better.

And I think for a long time, I think life was making decisions for me.

What my assumptions about what was possible were making decisions for me.

I want to talk about who you were, what you did, what your life was like before, if it’s Tuesday.

Okay.

I was, so prior to all of this, I was a dental hygienist by trade.

That was my career.

I loved it.

I loved it.

I loved it.

Because I got to know people.

I really, you know, the one-on-one time with people, and people always say, Oh my gosh, my dental hygienist.

But I was, I was really tricky.

I knew when to ask questions, and I knew when they were able to answer.

So I really got to know families.

They became a part of my life.

I love my dental hygienist.

Okay.

I will say right now, Dr.

Troy Stansberry in Phoenix, Arizona.

Yes, your name sounds fake.

I think you’re operating under an alias, but nicest dentist, great guy, best hygienist team.

I truly, I love going to the dentist.

I love getting my teeth cleaned.

And I’ve never had anything but like a delightful experience with those dental hygienists.

And that was how I felt.

And I worked full time and then I had my two kids and I was able to do a part time, which was a gift.

And then my husband was diagnosed with frontotemporal dementia.

So I stopped working so I could care for him.

And I cared for him for five years.

He stayed home with me.

And that was a choice that I made, that we made together.

He died after five years.

And the trauma, the PTSD, holding our family together, I didn’t know what to do after that.

So I knew I didn’t want to go back to being a dental hygienist.

And that was trauma for me because I didn’t want to go back to seeing my patients.

I didn’t want to have to explain all of that.

That was me dealing with my trauma.

Yeah, Cheryl, when you, like, we’ve done stories back on Terrible Thanks For Asking about frontal temporal dementia.

It’s truly of the many horrifying things that can happen to the human mind and body, that has to be top, top five.

It really is.

How old were you when this happened?

Kenny and I…

What were the signs that something was on?

I always laugh and say, Kenny was just 50, just in his 50th year.

So it’s so very hard.

He lost his ability for word retrieval and executive skills.

That’s how it played out for him.

And I had a daughter who was just starting college, a son who was in high school.

We were managing those years.

And I always laugh and say, when he would forget a word, I’d be like, oh, get your shit together, because I don’t have time for this.

And so it was that kind of stuff.

So, but then we realized that something was off.

And our nurse practitioner, God bless her, when Kenny and I just sat down and wrote down all of the things that was like, oh, a little bit here, a little bit there, a little bit here, we were like, oh, something is really off.

And we went in and, and so it was probably a couple of years, bits and pieces that we realized that things were very much off.

Yeah, and that’s so many turning points at once for a family too.

Like so many big transitions.

You know, you want to launch your kid into college and have that just be a exciting time for them.

You want to wrap up your other kids’ high school years and have that just be a really happy time for them.

And that’s just not how life happens for everybody.

I think you’re really, really lucky if you have a born life.

You know as well as I do that life doesn’t promise happy.

And that is just the truth of the matter.

It doesn’t.

And I don’t think when you’re in the thick of things like that, do you realize that things are chipping away at everything?

I always say that living with FTD was for all of us, death by a thousand cuts.

It was just for all of us, for him, for me, for Graham and for Alexandra, for each one of us in very different ways.

Yeah, yeah, it is.

It’s a thousand tiny cuts.

It’s a thousand tiny funerals, like you just lose somebody so slowly.

I think the thing that’s so frightening about diseases like that is the loss of like who a person is, right?

Like who you know them to be.

And I can only imagine how like frightening that would be to know it’s happening to you.

It’s happening in, you know, your own mind.

It’s just so much so.

I mean, I really relate to life blowing up, life falling apart and just not being able to go back to the way things were.

And I’ve railed against, you know, these sort of definitions or ideas of resilience that require us to continue on as though nothing has happened when really, you know, we have to instead learn how to live a life that has completely changed shape.

You can’t go and be the old version of yourself because that old version of your life doesn’t exist.

So how does that Cheryl from dental hygienist to caregiver become an influencer?

This was not on my bingo card.

Let me tell you that.

Yeah.

Also, my door just opened.

So is it Penny?

Okay.

Is it Erin?

Who is coming to visit us?

It could be either one of them.

Interestingly enough, there were years of PTSD, truthfully.

There were years of me really not knowing who I was at all.

Because I went from daughter to wife to mother to caregiver, mothering Kenny, and then he was gone.

And truthfully, Kenny was bigger than life.

Kenny was the center of attention.

He was the extrovert.

I was the introvert.

So I got to enjoy life through him and then draw back as an introvert.

And so I really did have to get to know who I was and get to learn who I was after that, and grieve and learn how to grieve.

And I remember going to my therapist, and people were like, Oh, Cheryl, you’re not healthy, you’re not this, and you’re depressed and everything else.

And my therapist said, You’re not depressed.

This isn’t depression.

This is trauma, that you’re surviving.

Just take care of yourself.

So that was really a few years of doing that.

And I worked with a non-profit, which got me out.

I was working with young children and doing that.

And that was really, really great.

So that got me out into the world a little bit.

And I love doing that.

I still do that.

I still work with the non-profit.

I love doing that.

During COVID, I still got dressed.

I love clothes.

I still got dressed.

I still did all of that.

Alexander gave me Dudley Stevens.

I don’t know.

Yeah, I think so.

I know what you’re talking about though.

One of those police thingies.

And she gave me a gift of something and I’d never worn one before.

And I reached out to an influencer who wore those.

And I said, is this how this is supposed to fit?

And I took a picture.

And her response was, oh my gosh, that looks so great.

Do you have, do you, you should post that on your site.

And I was like, what?

I don’t, so I screenshot the comment, sent it to Alexandra and said, ha ha ha, how funny is this?

And her response was, maybe you should.

You get dressed all the time.

Maybe one day a week, you should just post.

And I, we sort of went back and forth.

She is truly one of my best friends.

I identify with you because like your relationship with Sophie, Sophie, right?

Is just, it’s a gift.

And so we, I was like, okay.

And I assumed her friends would be the ones who looked at it.

And, and so once a week, I just started posting clothes from my closet, what I was getting dressed in.

And that’s what happened.

And then Alex Mill reached out, Rose from Alex Mill reached out and said, can we send you some clothes?

And I said, sure.

And I assumed I would have to send them back.

I didn’t, I didn’t understand any of this.

And everybody said, no, that that’s not what happens.

You keep those.

And I was in shock, in shock that I got to keep this outfit.

And then, and then I started just to shoot, post twice a week.

So I still just post twice a week.

And then from there, somebody reached out who worked with a modeling agency in DC and knew an agency in Boston.

And I do some modeling.

So both things happened because of this.

Yeah.

Again.

Yeah, yeah.

Never in my wildest dreams.

Yeah.

And you’re so good at it.

And I love your recommendations.

And I, like I said, I hope to start to build a wardrobe and a life that looks and feels like elegant and put together.

And, you know, it’s actually really inspired me to start like getting dressed more often.

I think that that’s part of the thing is that I, like I do get dressed every day, but I don’t get dressed in unrealistic things.

I mean, no, no, it’s just stuff like I don’t.

I mean, trust me, I have clothes now that like my closet is busting out.

I am so fortunate and it’s shocking to me.

And and still companies reach out to me that I say no to because I would never wear those things.

I would never wear those things and I’m grateful that they’re that they think of me.

And I also say no, thank you more, way more than I say, yes, please.

So when you’re getting started, you know, I think it can be very scary for people, myself included, to start something new, because sometimes I will assign voices and thoughts to an imaginary audience that lives primarily in my head.

And, you know, to try to do something new can be scary for that reason, right?

You’re like, oh God, like, what are people gonna think?

Like, what are people, what are strangers gonna think?

What are people that I know gonna think?

Did you have any, like, fears, trepidation, and how did you overcome those?

Well, let me just say this.

I told nobody that I did this.

No one.

No one.

My family didn’t know.

My daughter knew.

I don’t think my son knew.

Maybe he did.

But, so my immediate family did, but my extended family, I told no one that I knew.

I think people ended up telling my family, people were like, oh my gosh, your sister is doing this.

And that’s how they found out what I was doing.

But that was too scary.

And I also, I didn’t want to be judged.

And I didn’t, you know, I grew up, I also grew up in a time where you didn’t draw attention to yourself.

And that felt, you know, putting myself out there felt as though I was saying, oh, look at me.

And this Instagram feels like a place that that’s what you’re saying is, look at me.

I do this and I do that.

And that’s not what I’m saying, you know?

And yet I also know that that’s how it can be construed.

And so.

But also pause.

Why would that be bad?

Why would that be bad?

Why are we not allowed to say, look at me?

Why are we not allowed to want any kind of attention?

Like, why is that bad?

Why are we conditioned to believe that that’s like a negative thing?

Listen, I am turning, you know what?

I am turning 70, Saturday, and I am, my daughter said to me, we are celebrating you, we are having a party for you.

And I thought to myself, and she said, that’s what we’re doing.

And it has taken me a month to embrace it and say, oh my gosh, yes, yes.

But it does take some undoing all of that to recognize that, oh my gosh, there are so many people that I want to spend this day with.

And if they choose to spend this day with me, wow.

Wow.

Yeah, wow.

Yeah, exactly.

Great.

So, what you’re saying is 100% correct, but it is society, it is how we were raised, it is all of those things.

And I would never judge anybody else for doing that.

So why do I do that to myself?

What is that voice?

What is that voice?

Yeah.

Yeah.

And every time I have been judgmental of a woman, right?

It’s because, like when I really think about it, like when I’m judging a woman who is like, I don’t know, like doing something like, oh, God, who does she think she is?

I’m like, oh, it’s because you don’t think you can think highly of yourself.

Like, why would you begrudge another woman confidence, self-esteem, pride in herself and her work?

Like, get a grip, get a grip.

So, but I love that and I love that, you know, it sort of happened.

It sounds like it just happened organically.

And, and it’s grown, like significantly, like you, it’s a real thing.

Yeah, yeah, it, it has.

And, like, I don’t talk very often on, on there, only, only because I get sick of listening to my own voice.

So, so I’m like, no one really wants to hear my voice.

Um, but I do think that, that, um, I, I just think, one of the things that I think was instrumental to me is the people that I was following were the people from the UK and they don’t do a lot of chatting.

The, the, the, the women, um, influencers over there don’t do a lot of chatter and, and that’s what I like.

And maybe it’s the introvert in me as well.

Like, I, I just like to look, so, so I enjoy that.

So that, that was part of it.

Once in a while, I do, um, now, you know, four years later, um, five years later, I do a little bit, but not, not all that much.

So it’s, it, again, it’s growing.

Um, I said in the beginning that as long as I’m enjoying this, like, people would say you have to post every day, you have to do this, you have to do that.

And I was like, I don’t have to do anything.

I don’t have to do anything.

And I think that’s been the key for me, is I’ve done what I’m comfortable doing.

So initially I just posted once a week.

That’s it.

I didn’t really do that much in stories.

Then I started posting twice a week.

And then I started doing stories more.

So I did it to my comfort level.

So that’s what I would say to anybody, you know, as long as you’re finding joy in what you’re doing, do it, do it.

You know, don’t…

I’m also hearing like you don’t have to have every bit of it figured out.

Oh, I had none of it figured out.

I didn’t know what I was doing at all.

I didn’t know how to link anything.

I didn’t know how to do…

I did not know how to do anything.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And look at you now.

Like there’s so many things that you’ve like learned how to do and that had nothing to do with your background as a dental hygienist.

Not a thing.

No.

You know?

I’m truly floored.

I thought when I asked you about your past career that you were going to say that you worked in marketing.

Absolutely not.

No.

So I hid my shock at finding out that you’re a dental hygienist, but when you look at your teeth, it does make sense.

And that was, that’s mother nature.

It does.

Same.

Same.

That’s nature.

That’s nature and orthodontics.

And for me, I didn’t even need, I used to pretend I needed braces.

I used to put elastics on my teeth because I was jealous of people who had braces.

So was I.

So was I.

That had got them a little too late socially.

You know, I got them in eighth and ninth grade.

Okay.

Everyone else had them in fifth.

Then I was like, that’s cool.

Different color bands.

Yeah.

Not cool to have had gear in eighth grade.

I’ll tell you that much.

Not cool to be like a six foot tall eighth grader.

My poor daughter had, she put her finger in her mouth and brought her teeth out.

Yeah.

Bless her heart.

Oh yeah.

Yeah.

She’s breathtaking.

We’re dealing with all kinds of.

She’s breathtaking and it was worth it, but oh man, it was a lot.

They don’t make it cheap.

They don’t make it cheap.

So Cheryl, all this in mind, all that you know, about to turn 70, what do you want to say to primarily women and our five male listeners?

Up to six, I heard recently, up to six.

Thank you for making yourselves known.

I should say straight male listeners.

Okay.

I would say this is mostly, mostly she’s, they’s and gays, but what would you say to people in their 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s who want to change their lives, who want to start over and feel like it’s just too late?

Like I said in the beginning, make the choice yourself and don’t let it be made for you.

That would be my most important thing.

Do it in baby steps.

Nothing has to be done urgently.

Dabble in what things bring you joy.

I think that’s the thing that’s most important.

What brings you joy?

You, not what other people think you should do.

I’m so tired of people telling you what you should do.

I was tired of people telling me what I should be doing.

Do what, figure out what you think will make you happy and then just do a little bit of it and do it that way.

If finances, for most people, finances are really important, so stay doing what is bringing in the money and then dabble in the things that make you happy and then see if that can parlay into something that will also bring you money.

So that’s what I would say.

It’s the things that bring you joy because at the end of the day, that’s what, I mean, to be perfectly honest.

Yeah.

What else is there?

Picking at somebody’s teeth wasn’t the part that brought me joy.

It’s getting to know the people that came in to see me and that looked forward like you do to come see your dental hygienist.

That’s the part that brought me joy.

And making somebody who was afraid to go to the dentist, want to come to the dentist, that’s the part that brought me joy.

So figure out what’s going to bring you joy and do it in baby steps.

Incremental, that’s a very good advice.

Incremental is good.

I think sometimes I do have an all or nothing attitude.

I love black and white thinking.

I love to burn a bridge.

And I would say that the times that I have, which is a topic for another time because somebody asked me about that.

But the times that I really like burned my life down, I didn’t have to necessarily.

I didn’t have to do all that.

I didn’t have to do all that.

And some of it was like extremely, extremely risky.

And yeah, changes can be small and you can always iterate.

Like nothing is a blood oath.

It’s not as though because you have spent five, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30 years as a dental hygienist, then you have to, you are not allowed to leave the profession.

You are allowed to leave.

And yeah, you can find what brings you joy.

And as an aside, I actually think the part that would bring me joy as a dental hygienist is the picking.

I love to pick at things.

I think, you know, when I can tell and I’m a flosser, okay?

I’m a flosser.

I love to floss.

But when they floss and I’m like, oh, you found something I didn’t.

I’m like, that was probably really satisfying.

I, sometimes I see people’s teeth and I can see the plaque and I’m like, get me in there.

Get me, get me to dental hygienist.

There is joy in that.

And yes, there is joy in that.

But it’s, to me, it’s like getting to know, getting to know the people.

Yeah, that’s because you’re a good person.

I would be like, this is sick, get over here.

Okay, like, the rinsing, I’d be like, this is some good stuff, buddy.

We would not be talking.

If I was your dental hygienist, we would not be talking because I’d be so locked in and I would be getting, I would just be, and I’d probably say, do you want to see this?

Because this is gross.

Just like, I mean, the minute my kids hit, you know, the stage where they’re getting like little, like clogged pores and dits, I’m like, hey, come here, come here.

I just want to get in there.

Just gross.

I’m a gross person.

That’s what I’m trying to say.

Trust me.

There’s that, too.

There is that part of me that I thoroughly enjoy.

I thoroughly enjoy.

But when you’re doing it all the time, you got to get to the other side.

You got to get to it.

There’s got to be more to life than harder build up.

Yes.

Yes.

As they say.

OK, so I have a couple of messages from people to read, people who have made big changes.

I’m going to read them out loud, and we’re just going to talk to them.

OK, so my name is Maureen, I’m a 50-year-old wife and mother to my 11-year-old son Asa.

I graduated from college back in 1996 with a degree in industrial engineering.

OK, aside Cheryl, I did not know when people said they were engineers.

I was well into my 20s when I realized I was not just talking to train conductors.

I was like, God, everyone loves trains, like what are we?

So turns out, I was like, well, engineering, everyone’s just, well, did I miss something or are we all supposed to be working in the train industry?

Anyways, industrial engineering.

Why did I get a degree in IE, you ask?

Because my dad’s an engineer and I was good at math and science.

Can I just say this?

Good at math and science?

I’m like, same.

When I hear somebody who’s good at math and science, I think must be nice when I see, I’ve cried helping my child with fourth grade math.

Fifth grade math ended me.

Sixth grade math, full mental breakdowns.

100 percent, yes.

I was like, no one knows how to multiply a fraction.

No one.

It’s never been done.

Okay.

Oh, God.

Okay.

So good for this girl.

Okay.

Doesn’t mention trains.

Funny thing is, it turns out just because you’re good at something, doesn’t mean you will actually like doing it for the rest of your life.

At 26, after only five years working in the manufacturing engineering world, I remember telling a close friend I needed to find something else before I was 30 or I wouldn’t survive.

Fast forward 20 years, I was still part of the manufacturing machine, working 60 hours a week from home, with my then six-year-old son at home with me doing virtual kindergarten, that was a special kind of hell, with all of us trying to learn to live in a global pandemic.

Cue the midlife crisis.

So I did what any self-respecting midlife crisis girl does, I got myself a therapist.

Perfect.

I thought you were going to say she quit.

I honestly, and so many women primarily did leave the workforce in COVID because it was such an impossible task to keep a household going, keep your kids educated from home.

I was so bad at it, and also hold down a job.

Matthew had left his job the summer before COVID, temporarily, we thought, temporarily.

Then, oh, you’re having fun, take a couple more months, then COVID hits, sorry, bud, you’re home.

Now, this is what you do.

Now, you’re teaching preschool and second grade and middle school and monitoring a high schooler.

Good luck.

Okay, so two years in therapy.

Next two years helped me walk through a lot of crap I had left untended to over the years, one of which was my unhealthy attachment to killing myself in a job that did not show me the same respect and loyalty that I gave to it.

I was facing the reality that I was still 20 years from retirement.

I was working in an industry that was all about profits and dollars and did not take care of the people who were the ones who actually did all the real work.

And what I really wanted was a job that felt meaningful and one where I could help people.

Instead, I spent my workday stressed out over whether or not we could get our customer, their Pokemon toy dispensing machine on time.

Yes, for real, we made those.

You worked in a medical setting.

The emergencies that you were attending to were real when they happened?

The emergencies that so many of the office workers feel like are emergencies and are trained?

My daughter was, when Kenny was sick, she went to school for art history, worked in advertising when her dad was sick.

And the one line she said to me when she went back to school, so she was working and she said, Mom, I cannot do this anymore.

I cannot listen to one more person come at me because the color blue in the typeface is wrong.

There are more important things in this world.

And she left and went back to school to be a nurse practitioner, which she is now.

And she nearly lost her mind because, and granted the color blue was important, but not that important.

Not that important.

You can’t be having panic attacks over ad layouts and letter spacing and just the urgency that we were made to believe that everything was urgent, everything was important, and everything was like a truly a matter of a life or death.

Yeah, so I understand exactly what she’s saying because I remember Alexandra coming to me and saying, I need to leave this job and do something that matters.

Yeah, and when you are working, you’re working from home, you have a kid that you’re trying to homeschool.

The world is like crumbling around us and someone is like reaming you out because someone might not get their Pokemon toy dispenser machine on time and you’re like, yeah, yeah, got it, yeah, yeah, cool.

Great, great, great, great, great, great.

Okay, so I started to dream maybe for the first time in my life.

When I was in high school, I was deciding between going to engineering school or studying psychology, one of my fascinations.

But back then, my naive 16-year-old who, who let 16-year-olds make career decisions, excellent point.

My naive 16-year-old self thought the only thing that you could do with a psychology degree was go to med school, and that definitely wasn’t for me.

At 16, Cheryl, I did not know what any jobs were.

None.

None.

I actually, I thought, I mean, from the Richard Scarry book, which I keep on my bookshelf, I was like, Baker, Bricklayer, Plumber.

Mother.

Mother.

Post office.

I was like, Amen for that.

I don’t know.

My dad was a writer.

My mom worked, she laid out, I guess now I know she laid out catalogs, she worked in advertising.

But when people asked me what my parents did, I said, they’re freelancers.

I did not know really what they did.

My dad wrote commercials, my dad wrote eventually infomercials.

But again, who let 16-year-olds make career decisions?

Who let 17, 18-year-old, 19?

Sometimes I guess if you know, you know, and then sometimes you just think, or I think as a mother, I think, you know, life is long, babe.

It’s okay, you can relax.

You don’t have to have it all figured out.

Okay, so off to engineering school, I blindly went.

Now older and wiser and fresh off the positive experience I had with my counselor, I discovered that there are other options for people who might have an interest in how people’s minds work and how they interact with each other.

But could I really do that?

Could I really throw my career out the window and give up the reliable, steady, nice size paycheck I was getting?

I was 46 years old, isn’t that too old to change course?

My pandemic self-care was podcast, that’s how I found your show, and about the time I was doing a little bit of dreaming, but mostly convincing myself of the foolishness of a career change in my mid-40s.

I talked about this in the last episode.

Edith Eager was on Brené Brown’s podcast.

She was also on my podcast.

Was she?

I’m just going to say she was on this podcast, she was on this podcast.

And Brené Brown’s?

Okay, you have won, you’ve won the lottery.

Yes, I’ve won.

I heard her say the exact words you just posted on your IG reel, the quote Edith Eager, FYI, you’ll be 50 anyway.

That helped me kick into gear.

It’s now four years later.

I have 10 more months till I graduate with my master’s level degree in counselor education, after which I’ll start working as a marriage, couples and family counselor from engineer to therapist.

In a million years, I never would have thought I was the kind of person who would take a risk like this, especially so late in life.

But here I am.

Life can be quite the unexpected trip if you tear down the cages and let it.

I have chills.

I have chills.

I have chills.

Oh my gosh.

That is all you want.

And here’s the interesting thing about all of that is she knew at 16.

Yeah.

She knew at 16.

And as a parent, now a grandparent, listening, I was with Charlie all day yesterday and he’s such a wise little boy, such a deep, deep thinker.

And I listened to him and I just think, oh, what, who are you going to be as you get older?

Who are you going to be?

But just listening to him, I was talking to his mom this morning and she was thanking me for staying with him yesterday and I just said, it’s a gift because he has such gems.

And so I feel like, what was that book?

Was it Frederick?

The little mouse?

I can’t remember the name of the book, but I want to say in the winter he pulls out gems that he gathered during.

I can’t write love children’s books.

Okay.

You got to text me this book afterwards because I don’t know this book.

They pull out all the things that they gathered during the summer.

But that’s spending time with both he and Piper.

It’s just a gem.

It’s exhausting, yes, but it’s also a gift.

Listening to that 16-year-old and if someone had heard her and just encouraged her, not said, yeah, major, but just said, tell me more.

Tell me more.

Yeah.

Take a class.

Take a class and figure it out.

I really did treat college like a buffet.

I took a lot of different kinds of classes, but then I also was not paying attention and had to just slam my way through an English major at the end of senior year because I’d taken so many different kinds of classes.

That was the only degree I could finish conceivably.

College for me needed to have a purpose and I needed to get a degree and get a job when I got finished.

That was what was told to me.

Kenny and I said to the kids, liberal arts, it is an extension of high school.

Learn, learn, learn and then figure out what you want to do for post-grad.

Yeah, yeah.

And I love what you said about your grandchildren too because kids do think of the world so extensively and life and the realities of life really will constrict our ideas of what is possible and I love, oh great, good, let’s blow leaves right outside the window, okay.

I’ve changed the recording day so many times based on when this man’s going to be blowing leaves.

Can I tell you something?

I can’t plan around it.

Nothing drives me more.

I got nothing.

We don’t have leaves.

We’re in the desert.

I got rid of a lawn guy because he spent 90 percent of the time blowing leaves.

Reverse vacuuming.

Reverse vacuuming.

What are you doing?

Just raking, I think it also work.

I don’t know.

Just mow them.

Mulch them.

Mow them, mulch them.

That’s what the bees want.

We don’t have grass.

We don’t have leaves.

I don’t know what you’re doing.

Get a room.

Mulch them.

We could just broom it up.

It’s quieter.

Oh, God.

I don’t know what we’re doing.

So that’s going to be, that’s a little treat.

That’s a little like, you know, audio aural, aural, not aural, aural, A-U-R-A-L treat for the listeners.

Like you’re going to hear the guy just blowing his leaves.

I used to record on Tuesdays.

Then he was, he was doing it.

So I said, we’ll do it Wednesdays.

Nope, no, Thursdays.

Nope, I’m never safe.

He just knows.

I’m never, I’m never, he sees me go to work and he says, I got to fire up this leaf blower.

But back to the topic, which is kids are, kids sing of the world so expansively.

And I love, you know, my 12 year old does this a lot less often now.

My Sophie, our 19 year old does this never, right?

Like she’s decided on a path.

She feels really good about it.

That’s great.

I love that kind of confidence.

But our eight year old will still, you know, say, oh mom, you know, when I grow up, oh man, I’m going to be, I’m going to be a video game designer and a veterinarian.

Loves.

Loves.

It’s like perfect.

Perfect.

Yeah.

All right, great, great.

He’s just always, he’s always got a scheme and a dream.

And you know, he used to say he was going to live in my house forever and I support that.

I think that’s actually great.

I love intergenerational living.

But now I’m going to live in his house because he is going to have a five layer.

Five layer house.

I love.

And I’ll get my own layer.

Love.

We live in a one layer house now.

If you live in a two layer house, my kids think you are rich.

If you live in a three layer house, if you have a basement, you’re on another level.

Amazing.

They’re very impressed.

So he’s just trying to get more layers, layers to his life.

That is now my new word.

You know that.

Yeah.

Go to the go to the other layer, please.

Yeah.

What layer are we on?

Yeah.

That is now my new word.

I have one more story to share.

I’m sorry.

I booked you for an hour.

No, no, no, no.

I’m enjoying this.

I don’t want it to end.

Also, did I?

I think my watch is very off.

I got to, yeah, it’s not, it’s very off.

And I blame Matthew.

I can’t settle watch myself, okay?

As a woman, I can do anything except if I don’t want to.

And that’s what it comes down to.

Okay.

All right.

I have pivoted careers so many times just this year that I’m getting dizzy.

I mean, it’s incredibly exhilarating, but also stressful and makes me feel shaky.

I’m somewhere in my 40s, and I’m a writer and an editor, always have been and probably always will be in some capacity.

For money, I still work as a freelance copywriter for a large children’s media company.

For some reason, though, I decided to start a homemade pet treats company this past spring.

I don’t even have a dog.

Okay, great.

Great, okay.

Tear down those barriers.

Like, you don’t have to have a dog just to make treats for a dog.

Those of us who do, so appreciate that.

Because I’m not making dog treats.

Absolutely not.

I’m buying dog treats.

I’m buying dog treats.

Okay.

I make doggy donuts, s’mores, peanut butter treats, carob chip cookies, black and white cookies, and more.

Oh my gosh.

My company is called Live Laugh Woof.

Oh, God.

Then a few months ago, I finally started a Substack newsletter, which is kind of like my Julie and Julia, where I’m working my way through the tarot deck by pulling one card a week and writing about it within the context of my personal life.

It’s called Tarot Minded.

This is, you are a copywriter.

You are a copywriter, okay?

I was just going to say, this woman is brilliant.

Brilliant.

I love this.

I also finished a children’s book manuscript this year.

I’ve sent it to two agents, both of whom rejected it, but that’s not going to stop me.

I might ask an artist friend to illustrate it and just self-publish it at some point.

It’s about a neurodivergent elf in Santa’s workshop who saves Christmas because she thinks differently than the other elves.

I know everyone is biased toward their own work, but I genuinely believe this story is sweet and good and will benefit neurodivergent kids and their families.

Okay, here’s what I’m hearing in this, Cheryl, which is what you said to try stuff.

What?

And what brings you the most joy when you do it?

Yeah.

Yeah.

And if you hit a block, okay, so two agents don’t want the book.

You still want the book, right?

The number of people who self-publish.

It grows every day.

It’s grown while we’ve been speaking.

While we’ve been speaking, several books were self-published.

Exactly.

Okay.

So earlier this year, I decided to get my yoga teacher certification with the intention of creating yoga flows based on literature and poetry.

Again, try stuff based on what you like.

Here’s the thing.

This boggles my mind because I don’t have that kind of a brain.

I am in awe of somebody who does, who is thinking that creatively and willing to try.

I am not that.

So when I see somebody like that, when I hear about somebody like that, I am just gobsmacked.

It’s like, oh, wow, like that is wild.

Yeah.

Yeah, it is.

It’s so wild.

It is so wild.

Okay.

I consider turning this into a YouTube series, but I feel super itky about becoming some kind of YouTube fitness guru.

Guru, guru, guru, guru, guru.

I’m learning Italian.

I will pronounce everything with an Italian accent.

Okay.

I feel super itky about becoming some kind of YouTube fitness guru.

That is a persona I do not think would be my size if I tried it on.

So my husband actually had a great idea because sometimes men have good ideas that I have now grabbed with both hands and run away with.

He suggested I interview book authors while I guide myself and the author through a yoga sequence, kind of like hot ones for author interviews and yoga flows.

And now I’m doing it.

It’s called Book Nerd Yoga.

I have a YouTube channel just waiting to be filled with videos.

I filmed the first episode with my author friend, Laura Hankin.

She has published five novels and now also has a screenplay in production with Adam Sandler’s daughter playing the lead, and it was so much fun.

If I may toot my own horn, it’s a really fun concept and very cute and endearing to watch.

I might also make the audio available as a podcast.

For the yoga sequence, I designed it to include references to Laura’s books, such as Stargazer pose for her book, The Daydreams, which is about a 90s pop star in the paparazzi.

Here’s my request for you, would you join me on Book Nerd Yoga for a yoga session and author Q&A someday?

You know what?

Can I get to New York City or Philadelphia?

Probably.

It’s a yes.

It’s a yes asterisk.

When I’m in New York City or Philadelphia, of course I would do that.

And I actually, we’re going to give some unsolicited advice here, Cheryl.

I don’t think just because you make yoga flows that are, that reference literature, you’d have to be a YouTube fitness guru.

I think that could just be a fun thing for people to read.

Yeah.

I think that’s a cool, I think they’re all great ideas.

I cannot imagine living in her head, but with the amount of ideas that she’s coming up with, like I cannot imagine living in that head of hers.

Like, oh my gosh.

Like, isn’t that great?

She’s, like, she’s just got it.

She’s got it.

She’s got it.

And you know what?

I, I love, I love ideas.

I love when people try ideas.

I love when I love making a plan.

I love when a plan comes together.

I love making a plan and then never doing anything with it.

So this is a woman after my own heart.

And I actually think this is, I’m so glad we got to read this one because it’s not as though, you know, they all, they all work out.

And I think that, I mean, this is where, like, for me, like fear, like most of the time when you come up with ideas that are, you know, seem convoluted or seem like, like it stays in your head because you’re so filled with fear that you just don’t take that first baby step.

And I think that’s, I think that’s the thing.

And getting back to your question way back in the beginning is, don’t let fear, you know, and the, oh, you know, who does she think she is?

And that all of those things, like here’s a woman with so many ideas and she’s willing to take that first baby step and try.

Doesn’t matter whether it works or doesn’t work.

Like you can tell there’s a little tiny bit of fear there, but she’s still working through it.

And for anybody who wants to start a new career, just don’t let that fear stop you.

You know, you’re, you know, you, just take those baby steps.

Just take those baby steps.

Yeah.

And there’s, there’s really no shame in quitting something.

You know, in quitting something that doesn’t work and just saying like, oh, yeah, I tried that and, you know, it didn’t pan out.

I have tried many, many things.

I made a video one time of like all the things that I like attempted to do that failed, but I’ll tell everybody right now, you know, I have like nine jobs at any given time, right?

Like that is the reality.

I would never tell somebody like, just like quit your job and like, you know, go try to like make a living on the internet or whatever your thing is, because like it’s actually really hard to do, you know?

And so I would never, I caution people to trust influencers whose main job is influencing you to become a like seven figure creator or a six figure creator.

If they were so good at it, why would they be online all the time trying to convince you to pay hundreds or thousands of dollars for a course to do what they do?

If they’d already made their money, they would just be enjoying it, truly, and vacationing.

Like that’s, let’s be so real.

It’s hard to do.

Like not every, I think everybody could do it.

It does not work out for everybody.

It just doesn’t.

And I have, you know, one of my careers, one of my side quest careers is, you know, screenwriting, and I have sold projects, you know, I adapted my first book into a screenplay for like a major studio.

It will never get made.

It will never get made, right?

So is that like a failure?

Or is it like, you know, like, I mean, that was for a while, that embarrassed me for a long time.

I never brought it up.

I never, you know, like didn’t announce and didn’t tell anybody because like, oh, if it doesn’t happen, I’ll feel some kind of way.

I did it.

I was just going to say that you still did it.

Things, you know, things don’t go smoothly all the time.

And nor should they, but I think with this, where we’re online so much and with social media and everything else, people, I mean, and we say this all the time, what you see is the highlight reel.

And that’s just not how it is.

That’s never how it is.

But I think, you know, like I say to Graeme, you don’t need to hear from your mommy that that business that failed wasn’t really a failure at all.

You know, it’s just a pivot, and you learn from what you would do differently.

But let me just tell you that that’s the case.

Yeah, yeah, you just learn everything.

Everything you do is something that you can learn from.

Everything, even if you don’t see it, is like a step towards something else.

You don’t always know where you’re going.

If you’re me and you can’t read even a Google map that is guiding you along the path, I can’t, I’m like, I don’t know what direction we’re going.

Oh, missed the turn.

That’s the story of my life.

You know, truly being like, whoa, how did I get here?

I’m like, my whole life is me walking into a room and being like, why did I walk in here?

No idea.

Let me walk back out, come back in again.

Here we are, here we are.

So I just find so much comfort and hope in these stories, and I hope that listeners do too, and thank you for being here with me.

It was a joy.

I hope you know.

You’re so wonderful.

You’re so wonderful.

I’m Nora McInerny, this has been Thanks For Asking.

That was Cheryl.

Our Instagram is ifitstuesday, we will link it in the description.

You can see pictures over on our Substack, which is noraborialis.substack.com.

You know what, like Cheryl, I have not always had it figured out.

I still do not always, I still don’t have it figured out.

I mean, I am still many days just flying by the seat of my pants, and I needed that reminder that that’s like, that’s kind of okay.

I don’t know really anyone who has it all figured out.

And if they tell you that they do, they’re probably full of it.

They’re probably full of it.

I will always want your stories of starting over.

I will always want to hear about times that you burned it down, pivots that you made.

You can always call us.

You can always email us.

That is 612-568-4441.

It is thanksatfeelingsand.co.

If you are a subscriber to the Substack, you get episodes ad free.

You can also join our little community over there.

You can comment.

We’ve got like a real friendly group of people over there.

It’s really wonderful.

So again, that will be in our episode description as well.

But you know what?

That’s not in the cards for everybody.

Not everybody can financially support this show.

We appreciate everybody listening to the show is supporting it.

Sharing is supporting it.

Shopping, our advertisers is supporting it.

Existing in this world is supporting it because honestly, guys, it’s hard out there.

It’s hard out there.

All right?

So when I thank the supporting producers of this episode, you should know that these are people who are paid subscribers who are supporting this show.

You can do it monthly, you can do it annually or like these supporting producers, you can kick in a little more and say, you know what, I’m gonna pledge a little bit more to this show, keep it going and you know what you get in exchange?

My undying affection and your name in the credits.

Your name in the credits.

So here we go.

We have a big thanks to Nancy Duff, to Jenny Medein, Jordan Jones, Sheila, Kathleen Langerman, Ben, Jess, Michelle Toms, Tom Stockburger, Jen, Beth Derry, Stacey Demaro, Emily Ferriso, Stephanie Johnson, Faye Barons, Amanda, Sarah Garifo, Jennifer McDagle, Elia Filiz-Milan, Lindsey Lund, Renee Kepke, Chelsea Cernick, Car Pan, LGS All Caps, Stacey Wilson, Courtney McCown, Kaylee Sakai, Mary Beth Berry, Joe Theodosopoulos, Mad Abia Rose, Elizabeth Berkley, Kim F, Melody Swinford, Val, Lauren Hanna, Katie, Jessica Letexier, Crystal Mann, Lisa Piven, Kate Lyon, Christina, Sarah David, Kate Byerjohn, Erin John, Joy Pollock, Crystal, Jennifer Pavelka, Jess Blackwell, Micah, Jessica Reed, Beth Lippem, Kiara, Jill MacDonald, Jen Grimlin, Alexis Lane, David Binkley, Kathy Hamm, Virginia Labassi, Lizzie DeVries, Jeremy Essin, Anna Brzezinski, Robin Roulard, Nicole Petey, Monica, my best friend Caroline Moss, Rachel Walton, Inga, Bonnie Robinson, Shannon Dominguez-Stevens, Penny Pesta, I love you, Kaylee, Dave Gilmore, my best friend from college, and Jacqueline Ryder.

Thank you guys so much.

Marcel Malekibu produced this episode.

Grace Berry does so much for us, including editing all of our videos.

And that’s the team here at Feelings & Co, where you know what, you got feelings, so do we.

See you soon, probably next week.

Let’s say next week.