Tag Archive for: Career Change

3 Reasons why Career your Transitions is Stalling (And How to Get Back on Tracks)

3 Common Reasons Why Your Career Transitioning Isn't WorkingAlexandra Humbel

Congratulations — you’ve decided to take charge of your future.

You have the experience, the skills, and the desire to move toward a new professional chapter. So why does everything suddenly feel harder than expected? Why are you feeling stuck, discouraged, or drained? What happened to the motivation that once felt unstoppable?

Career transitions rarely unfold in a straight line. In this article, I explore three common reasons why a career change can stall — and how to regain momentum.

1. Do you lack flexibility?

We rarely give enough credit to the power of having a plan — and sticking to it. I am a big believer in planning. That said, real life has a tendency to interfere.

Especially during a career transition, unexpected events are inevitable. Resistance shows up. Doors close. Opportunities shift. The key question becomes:
Is this a temporary hurdle — or a signal to reassess direction?

Life doesn’t pause while we redesign our careers.

Perhaps your partner receives an unexpected job offer abroad.
A promising lead falls through.
A baby arrives.
Health issues demand attention.
Or an unforeseen opportunity suddenly appears.

Whatever the situation, the challenge is to adapt without losing sight of your deeper intention.

When you are clear on your values — what truly matters to you — flexibility becomes easier. Your vision acts as a compass. You may adjust the route, but you don’t lose direction.

When you stay anchored in your why, you become less attached to the how. And this is often where new, unexpected opportunities emerge.

2. Are you feeling lonely?

Career transitions can be surprisingly lonely — even when your life is full.

You may have a supportive partner, family, and friends. You’ve shared your plans and received encouragement. Yet day after day, you find yourself alone with your laptop, navigating uncertainty and self-doubt.

Motivation has a limited lifespan. Discipline eventually gives way to anxiety.

This is normal — and it’s also a sign that you shouldn’t do this alone.

What helps enormously is connecting with people who understand what you are trying to build. Peer groups, professional communities, alumni networks, entrepreneur circles, training cohorts, mastermind groups — both online and in person — can radically shift your energy.

When you find your tribe:

  • You gain perspective and feedback

  • You exchange expertise and feel useful again

  • Your confidence grows through connection

  • Your network expands organically

  • You return to your project with renewed clarity

Career transitions thrive in community. Isolation weakens momentum.

3. Are you stuck in a mental pit?

You started out like a champion, tackling the first steps of your transition like the kick-ass professional you are. Then things started to slow down, hurdles began to accumulate, and your energy started lacking. Self-doubt and guilt are center-stage, draining your emotions and clouding your skies. Positive thinking doesn’t help when the fear of failure is running the show.

The first truth to keep in mind: A career transition always takes more time than expected. Resistance is what you meet most, starting with your own human inclination to cling to the status quo. A change of perspective is needed.

The prescription? Radical honesty and self-compassion. Radical honesty means taking a 360° look at your current reality — without judgment. Revisiting earlier decisions. Checking whether your goals still reflect who you are today. Acknowledging how far you’ve already come.

Self-compassion means recognizing that at this stage of life, you no longer need to prove that you can overachieve. You already did.

Now the invitation is to become a better achiever — one who values emotional and physical health as much as professional success.

Sometimes progress doesn’t mean choosing between “all or nothing.” It means creating transitional phases, parallel paths, or temporary arrangements that restore energy and open space for clarity.

A Final Thought

Career transitions are not linear. They are deeply human processes — shaped by values, identity, fear, desire, and timing. If your transition feels slow or confusing, it doesn’t mean you’re failing.
It may simply mean you’re in the middle of redefining your second act.

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Reinventing Work After 50: A Conversation About Purpose, Freedom, and Longevity

Meet an inspiring ground-breaker and achiever, a leader who is changing the culture around age, work, and living a purposeful second act of life.

Ed Kushins is an ex-US Navy submarine officer, entrepreneur, startup investor, social innovator, sharing economy trail-blazer, people connector, avid traveler, and good life lover.  Please join me for a fascinating conversation on a sunny Californian beach with my ex-boss, mentor, and friend, a man who makes his most strategic decisions barefoot in the sand.

How did your 50’s look professionally?

In my 50’s I was running two businesses in parallel. One was a family scrap metal recycling business, Fairway Salvage, that I subsequently built from 2 to 55 employees. I had a partner on board, which allowed me to run the company without spending too much time on it.

The other one started more as a hobby than a business but ended up becoming much larger. I had been on a home exchange vacation with my family and came back enthusiastic about the concept. The owner of that company declined my offer of some free marketing advice, so I started my own company in competition. The game-changer was taking the service from paper to digital, making HomeExchange one of the first online communities in the nascent sharing economy.  In 2006, the romantic comedy “The Holiday” propelled home exchange into the spotlight. The success of the movie was a booster for the company, which started to become profitable.  The same year, I sold Fairway Salvage to focus on HomeExchange.

From day one, I ran the company from my home near the beach in Southern California, never from an “office”. It was a conscious decision that when building the Team, I recruited Reps, Customer Service, and even my Partners exclusively from our community of Members. I figured they would be satisfied users who could relate personal experiences and would know everything about the home exchange process with almost no training.

To help our 60+ Team members (who all worked remotely around the world) bond together, I invited them every year with their families to a half-work, half-vacation retreat somewhere fun, usually on the beach… Evian, Croatia, Greece, Biarritz, Hermosa Beach, Myrtle Beach, Mt. Tremblant, Taormina, and more! With the input of my Team and partners, HomeExchange continued to grow until we sold it to a competitor in 2017.

When you sold HomeExchange you were hitting 70. What was next for you?

I was happily retired for 6 months, then a new idea kicked in. I am a networking guy, I’m always looking for ways to connect people. My new website, VacationPropertyPartners.com, connects two families to partner to split the cost and enjoy the benefits of a vacation home. We “hold their hands” until they buy the vacation home together.
Besides VacationPropertyPartners, I make myself available to help business owners with their marketing strategies. I am an active member of the Rotary, where I contribute to 3 to 4 projects. As an ex-Navy officer, I am part of an initiative that helps veterans re-enter civilian life. I am also active in an investors’ group focusing on startups.

Do your professional engagements support other aspects of your life?

Totally. I’ve made a conscious effort to not only keep a balance between the time and energy devoted to the professional and personal areas of my life but to use each of them to enhance the other. Terry and I love to travel and I actually chose to concentrate on HomeExchange because it allowed me to create more opportunities to do so for business and pleasure. For me, learning, meeting people from around the world, building a successful business around a product, culture, team, and members that I believe in, have all been incredibly satisfying.

Along the way, I’ve developed some habits and rules I try to follow:

  • Keep my work, personal life, and health in balance.
  • Prioritize my tasks so I know what I want/need to do each day/week/month/year. Sometimes “Go to the beach” is on the list. It’s OK to get away from the computer for a while.
  • Appreciate my customers and try to keep them happy.

I’ve got 5 long-term priorities… “The journey of 1000 miles”  that I’m taking the first steps on:

  1. Appreciate my wife and always try to make her happy
  2. Do what I can to stay healthy
  3. Launch my new website, VacationPropertyPartners.com
  4. Write (or dictate) a memoir
  5. Finish my long-in-process (only 35 years) book about the personal decision-making process. Becoming aware of how you make personal and professional decisions, however big or small, is a super-power.

What is your definition of success and how would you evaluate your success on a scale from 1 to 5?

Definitely 5/5. My insight into how and why I’ve made the choices I’ve made allows me to accept and feel comfortable with what I’ve done.  I accept the result of choices and actions that I’ve made along the way, given my expectations of the risks and rewards, as well as the work, time, effort, and sometimes money I’ve followed through with.

Life is good. Every night I go to bed grateful and excited for another day.

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COVID-19: 7 Things to Rediscover While in Home Confinement

COVID-19: 7 Things to Re-Discover While in Home Confinement - Alexandra HumbelAlexandra Humbel Coaching

While are all gradually assigned to stay at home, due to containment measures, experiences differ considerably according to our personal situations. For those who have no kids at home, the sound of silence can be vastly disturbing, and loneliness painful. Here are 7 simple things to re-discover while in home confinement.

1. Binge-read

Groucho Marx once said: “I find television very educating. Every time somebody turns on the set, I go into the other room and read a book”. Netflix is not the only growing value boosted by COVID-19. Books are too. Even though you are in home office mode, the time freed by the absence of commuting is yours. Precious extra time, scarcely available even during weekends, that you can now enjoy in the comfort of your home. The only problem is to give yourself permission. Does it feel better if someone else does? Famous author George R.R. Martin said: “A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies… The man who never reads lives only one.” That’s enough for me.

2. Fix the kitchen cabinet door

It is interesting to see one’s own home in a new light. Not weekends’ light. Working hours’ light. For some reason, disturbing realities are suddenly claiming your attention. The stain on the living room carpet. The pile of dusty magazines you will never read (unless today is the day? See point 1) and the sofa which cringes each time you sit. You think: “I’m on home office, I am not supposed to tinker.” Sure, you are not. But consider this: At the office, you would take more pauses than you even know. Chat at the water cooler. Walk 10 minutes to join a meeting in another building. Wait at the meeting room door until occupants evacuate. Minutes of unproductive time add up during an ordinary workday. So technically, you are entitled to a pause. Optimize your break. And fix the damn kitchen cabinet.

3. Love grocery shopping

Who would have thought, that grocery shopping would be the highlight of your day? Now that you get one permission a day, you are not going to miss that chance. Going to the closest supermarket becomes a secret expedition with a purpose. Officially, to fill the fridge. Secretly, you are on probation. Appreciate every moment. Breathe the air on your way to the store. Walk every alley. Pick up your favourite yoghurt flavour. Ponder to buy tissue paper and instead mentally start a shopping list for tomorrow. On the way back, resist the temptation to go for a road trip in a steal-blue cabriolet, hair in the wind, “Thelma and Louise” style.

4. Experience slow motion

Seriously, how can days be so long? When locked at home, time stretches in a bewildering way. The uneasy feeling starts with the radical offset between our usually speedy, efficient, “let’s not waste a second” self and the reality of our limited and quiet space. The truth is, should you not slow down, you would soon be bouncing on the walls. The strange combination of limited space, extended time and deprivation of buzzing sounds of life are profoundly disturbing. The interesting outcome is that your productivity is not diminished. Your useless agitation is.

5. Meet your neighbours and bow

Relationships between neighbours can be awkward, especially in big cities. We salute each other politely and engage in some small talk when inevitable (elevator). COVID-19 may change the dynamics. If you are confined at home so are your neighbours. Chances are, you will meet on your way back from probation (shopping). This is when your neighbours feel closer, even buddies. Brotherhood stops at the regulatory distance to avoid contamination, but still, the ice is broken. You share the news, exchange survival tips and promise each other a giant pot-luck dinner when it is all over. Then you bow and go home.

6. Re-discover the phone

With the predominance of texting, we totally forgot that in a not so distant past, we called each other for everything and nothing. The phone ring was intrusive, listening to messages a chore and calling back obligatory. With texting, we freed ourselves from a nuisance, but we lost two essential things along the way: the human voice, with all its nuances, that emoji will never replace, and conversation, in the sense of a musical improvisation, where two people pick up on each other’s words and tone of voice. While we do converse in writing, many notes are lost along the way.

7. Ask “How are you doing” and mean it

A conventional expression of civility, which in normal times, does not require an actual answer, is now reloaded with a ton of meaning and intention. Because now, you do want to know how your people are doing in the global pandemic world. You care for cousins you see once a year, friends from college and ex-spouses. You care enormously for your grandparents and elder relatives. You care for colleagues, in other countries, that you never met but who became, in just a few days, brothers and sisters in arms against the virus. You listen to the regretted Stevie Wonder “I just call, to say how much I care”.

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