It’s Never Too Late to Reinvent Yourself

In this episode of Rollin’ with the Dolans, Patrick and Tamekia talk about what it really means to reinvent yourself, especially when life, work, business, and technology keep changing.

They share personal stories about moving from the corporate world into entrepreneurship, building a brand through social media, starting new opportunities later in life, and learning not to wait until everything is perfect before taking action.

This conversation is for anyone who feels stuck, uncertain, or like they may need to start again. Whether you are thinking about a new business, a new career, or simply a new mindset, the message is simple: don’t underestimate yourself, write things down, take small steps, and remember that done is better than perfect.

Don’t miss an episode—subscribe to our podcast on your favorite platform.  Find more at rollinwiththedolans.com or search #rollinwiththedolans on social media to join the conversation. 

Transcript

Welcome to Rolling with the Dolans. I'm Patrick Dolan. And I'm Tamika Dolan. Our podcast focuses on the joys and challenges of blended families, our interracial marriage, parenting children of multiple ages, and the journey of entrepreneurship.

We share our daily life experiences with a positive but real perspective. Today's topic is reinventing yourself.  Okay. So I'm gonna start with a question. And basically has there been a time in your life that you feel like you've completely different... more focused on business and your career, where you had to feel that you had to reinvent yourself.

Oh, you mean with my profession right now? When did I feel like I needed- Any time. Are there different points where you felt that you had a significant change in what you were doing before? That's a good question. Okay. I would say probably when I was teaching at Penrose, and everyone was so heavy on social media, and I was so against it because I felt like it was just too much trying to have two different pages and your personal page and your hair page.

And so I decided to only have one page, but to post regularly on that one page, and now realize that was creating my brand. But that was hard to pivot to because having to post frequently is not something that I love to do. So social media-wise, you indirectly created your brand by- Yes ... would you agree? And we're- Yeah. And were you influenced by the younger generation at then? Yes, absolutely. Yes. Okay. Does that make sense? Yeah. Okay. What do you think about all that?  I think that you've done a lot more than that. I think, I feel like you're constantly evolving and looking for new opportunities and pivoting, all of the time. Did you think a year ago that you would have a class that's focused on, high schoolers- that are interested in doing- That's true ... that's reinventing yourself. You're constantly- I agree ... you're finding new ways and new things to pivot and go different directions that, that you see an opportunity in. I agree. I agree. So that's more of what I see as the reinvention, inventing versus...

The one that you're saying is almost a more or less a habit or a, a, something that you do, a task that, that's new that you introduced, in your profession. Okay. I agree with that. And so this, one of the things that I wanna get into is the fact that a lot of times, the biggest thing for me was going from corporate world to entrepreneurial.

And that's a huge adjustment, what year did you transition? It was slow because I did it more or less where it was a side hustle. The funny thing is that we didn't use the word side hustle. What word did you use then? I just had a business. It was like- Yeah ... yeah, like what, yeah, but I think side hustle is so commonly used these days- and it's different. But that's effectively what it was, so it was a slow, two, three years where it was a side hustle that, eventually I left and did that full time for a while. Yeah. Yeah. And y- here's an interesting stat, and then we can get... I have some more questions for you. I did not realize it, you look at people who might be in their 40s, 50s thinking, "Oh, what am I gonna do because I just, lost my job.

What am I gonna do now?" There's something that's really encouraging, and I saw this stat from a study. I think it was the basically a Harvard study and it said that you have a 1.8 times, almost twice as likely to succeed if you're at a startup if you're over 45. Okay, I think I did read something similar to that, and I remember one of the reasons, or I guess it's probably the main thing that stuck out to me, it's like, it's because you're more driven and you're like, you're realizing like you don't wanna like fail. It, th- that's probably a good part of it. I didn't, like- You didn't read the whole thing?

Yeah, I was pulling stats and different things- Oh, okay ... going into it. And I referred to the article and the things, but the, one of the biggest things that, that they said was you also have the experience. Okay. So a lot of people who are like the 20-somethings didn't learn things the hard way.

And they, and I think they might have- You know a different perception of how to do things that makes a lot of sense. Okay. I have a question for you. Okay. So if someone listening right now feels stuck, what's the first small step they could take this week to begin their own reinvention? Oh, that's a really good question I knew it

I like that. So- What is something, what is a very small step they could take this week to begin their own reinvention? I think it's one of the things that, that we can, we were talking about earlier this week is writing things down. So d- starting to list- You mean like goals?

Y- yeah, you're getting a little ahead of me. Okay, go ahead. But yeah we love goals, and we always focus on goals. But the biggest thing is just start exploring different ideas, different thoughts that you have. Just write them down. And you might not know what to do with them just yet, but get your mind thinking.

One of the biggest things that happened is I never thought I'd have creativity to do and create some of the products that I did, ever. I was like, I always thought that I was gonna be... I was suited for more more consultative type, projects and things like that.

And I never thought that I could just create. And once I started creating products, my mind didn't stop. So if you can start, having your mind and, thinking just think, and just write down what you're thinking, and then you start exploring what some of those thoughts are in more details over- Yeah, but when you say just think what...

'Cause you gotta start somewhere. What are you thinking? What are the top five things that you wanna achieve w- with your new job, or your new... what are the top five things that you wanna achieve if you want, if you- If you wanna start a new career

for an entrepreneurship. Okay. What's your goal? And that gets... once you come up with the top things, then you start getting into goals, like you said, and then you do the micro goals, you do the small steps. But a lot of it is, like what we talk about all the time is changing your mindset and just changing, your patterns.

Yeah. Okay. And speaking of- ... patterns- So what habits do you think are most eff- Effective? The biggest... The main habits that you have that, that help keep you on track as an entrepreneur and a small business owner. Ooh. Habits. That, in a good way? A good habit? Yeah. Yeah, I didn't... Yeah. Posting on social media.

That helps. Following up with clients. Those kind of habits you mean? Yeah, absolutely. Okay. Following up with clients. And do you have routines where you do it on certain times or anything like that? That would be a negative, but I need to be. I think for me, because I'm so critical of myself, I feel like there, it's easier for me to talk about the things that I wanna do better.

But I will say that I'm good at being present with my clients. Following up. What else would you say? I can't really think of the positive a lot of positives. No again, it's not necessarily part of the routine, but you're really good about coming up with new ideas and doing d- things differently.

You're very- You mean in the salon or with education? With anything. Oh, okay. You know what I mean? 'Cause you look at it, the salon is one out of I'd say five of your businesses. Yeah. Yeah. That's true. So when you're thinking about everything else you're balancing and doing a lot.

Yeah. Yeah. That's true. You got the braid bar that you did this year. You got the educational things, and there's two different things for education, salon education and then high school or- ... education. The ESA programs. Yeah. Okay. Obviously the doula part and the- Okay. Yeah, that's

Yeah, that's- ... five things ... different. Yeah, I don't know if it's always good to have too many things going on at once, but I'm just figuring it out as I go, right? Yep. Okay. Did you have any more? Okay, I do got one more question for you, 'cause I actually cheated and I went on ChatGPT and asked for a good conversation and some questions, and there's actually seven really good ones.

But we'll just do two. Okay, so you did the last one. Okay, so this one says, "What's one belief about yourself that you had to let go of in order to grow?" I think that goes back to what I was saying before Creativity? Yeah. It's like you... people get pigeonholed. They get put into a like this is what your role is this week.

And that's how I felt about myself. You have to break through some of the things that, that people expect of you and/or you expect of yourself. So that's the thing is a lot of people don't realize what they're really capable of until they start trying to do something new.

Okay, one more question that both of us can answer, and then we'll be done. What's something you wish people understood about reinventing themselves? Basically what advice would you give someone? Don't underestimate yourself. So I think that you can, people can do a lot more than they often think that they can.

I would say done is better than perfect. So you know how you said, like, when you wanna start something, write things out, and what happens is we get stuck. And "Oh, it needs to be perfect before I let, before I put it out there." And then next thing you know, three months went by, then six months went by, and then nothing has happened because you haven't put anything out there.

I heard on a podcast a while... Like maybe a year ago, that done is better than perfect. So like when I started my education thing, like even now it's not perfect, but I've just been learning as I go and going back and critiquing it as I go. Yeah. I always, and that's, this is where I was pre-entrepreneur, is I would always make things so complex.

All of my thoughts- -ideas for a business- -were, it just became too much. And that was one, one thing that I would do, and then the other one would be, effectively I always called it analysis paralysis. You would analyze things so much- Until you get stuck ... until you realize that no, this is not a good idea.

And you talk yourself out of it. Yeah. And that's where the... what you're saying is very accurate. You gotta get something out there. You gotta explore it, you gotta do something, and you can't wait till it's perfect. If it's w- if you wait till it's perfect, then you might find that there's not even an audience for that product or service.

And then you're wa- you put all that time and effort and didn't get any feedback. So getting things out there and getting that initial feedback is critical. But the main point is a lot of people have to, reinvent themselves. They have to come up with something new. AI is replacing people's jobs every day, and, it's like, what are you gonna do?

Are you gonna, be able to find the same job that you had last week? So there's the capability out there for y- you to reinvent yourself. Yeah. And one last takeaway is we talk about all the time how our age we're both in our 50s, and a lot of people our age don't want to reinvent themself 'cause they don't wanna be open to how everything is changing.

Some people don't wanna learn about AI, and it's okay, you're doing yourself a disservice. You're gonna fall behind. But I think it also helps 'cause we're open, but I think it really helps 'cause we have teenagers and young adults that, kinda keep us up on our stuff. Yeah. And you mentioned AI, and we can revisit it again, but the importance of social media as well.

I- I have been very open about how anti-AI I was, but now I'm very much involved with it. But again, we can revisit that one sometime.   📍 But for now, I think that we might as well wrap this one up. And so until the next time, if you found us on Apple or Spotify, wherever it is, click that button so you can find us again.

And I would say have a prosperous day. And have a glorious week. Ooh, glorious. How don't I got a topic? Glorious, prosperous ew. I don't know how to top that one. Okay. All right, until next time. All right, bye. Bye.