I’m feeling stuck. Name changed as potentially outing.
Bit of background. I had my only son 4 years ago. After my maternity leave, I was made redundant and decided to start my own business. For various reasons, it hasn’t been a success and I’ve now closed it. I now need to figure out what to do for work. It was completely unrelated to anything I've done before. Online and wholesale product sales.
Most of my previous work experience is in property. I worked as an estate agent in my 20s and I did an RICs degree in Real Estate (MSc) when I was 29/30 with the aim to move into the Commercial Property sector. I worked for 2 years as an analyst in an entry level role for a asset management company and then I moved to a business development role where I was made redundant. Looking back, I can see that I really didn’t map out my career post qualification, I didn’t have much direction and I also lacked the confidence and know how to work out where I could/should go with this career. I’m now 4 years out of any experience in this field (you could even argue 5 as the business development role was more sales than anything). I could go back, but I don’t know where to start. I’m happy to do an entry level role, but all my knowledge and experience are gone. I'm not really in contact with any previous colleagues. I’d be competing with younger folk with fresh knowledge straight out of their Masters courses. I don’t even know how I could refresh my knowledge… I know that if I go back to this, I really need to have a better idea what I’m doing and also I need to go for my APC qualification to become RICS accredited surveyor. The positives I have going for me are that I am quite personable and I think I interview well and I have some life experience behind me.
If I don’t go back to real estate, I’ve identified a few totally unrelated things to try like PE teaching, sports coaching or outdoor education. I have zero experience of these things or working with kids, but getting some voluntary experience seems relatively straightforward.
How do I decide where to go from here? I think I’m feeling stuck because I’m afraid of making a mistake. I’m 38 and it feels like I’ve got to get it right this time as I can’t figure out what the heck I’ve been doing the last 20 years since I graduated from my first degree. Part of me wants to start completely fresh and do something new, but the other part feels like maybe I should give real estate one last push as if I don’t go back now, it really will be too late.
Also, how to do I get out of all this thinking and thinking and take action?! Has anyone used a career coach and was it worth it? Is the national careers service any good???