What happens when the role you have built your identity around no longer makes sense, but nothing has replaced it yet?

When your work has shaped how you introduce yourself and how the world sees you, loosening your grip on that role can feel deeply unsettling. Instead of clarity or excitement, you may experience doubt, a drop in confidence, and a strange sense of emptiness.

In this episode, we explore the overlooked phase of professional transition where old identities fall away, familiar measures of success stop working, and you find yourself between who you were and who you are becoming.

• Understand why disorientation and low energy often follow the decision to step away from a long held professional identity.
• Recognise the quiet loss that comes with leaving a role that once provided certainty and status.
• Learn why this in-between phase is not something to fix, but something to move through.

Listen now to make sense of the space between identities and to understand why you are not meant to feel finished yet.

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Support the show

Career transition and career clarity podcast content for midlife professionals in career transition, navigating a career change, career pivot or second career, starting a new venture or leaving a long-term career.

Discover practical tools for career clarity, confident decision-making, rebuilding self belief and confidence, finding purpose and meaning in work, designing a purposeful, fulfilling next chapter, and creating meaningful work that fits who you are now. Episodes explore personal development and mindset for midlife professionals, including how to manage uncertainty and pressure, overcome fear and self-doubt, clarify your direction, plan your next steps, and turn your experience into a new role, business or vocation that feels aligned.

To support the show, click here.

Ever feel like your career transition is “going nowhere”… even though you’re doing all the right things?

If you’re in that messy in-between of job loss, burnout, values mismatch, or a pivot that’s taking longer than you expected, this episode will feel like a deep exhale. Michelle Schafer (two-time restructuring survivor turned career coach) breaks down why this phase feels so uncertain, why confidence takes a hit, and what to do when the “sprout” hasn’t shown up yet… even though growth is happening under the surface.

• Learn practical ways to manage the emotional rollercoaster of uncertainty (without pretending you’re fine).
• Discover simple, repeatable actions to rebuild confidence, especially if job searching feels harder than it used to.
• Get a clear career-transition strategy: how to define your target, create a plan, and stop wasting energy on unfocused applications.

Press play now to get a grounded, step-by-step approach that helps you regain clarity and confidence, so you can move toward work that energises you and aligns with what you believe.

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KEY POINTS AND TIMESTAMPS:

01:40 - Michelle’s background and restructuring experiences

03:30 - The planted seed: discovering coaching

07:00 - The seed and gardening metaphor for career transition

09:48 - Navigating uncertainty during transitions

13:54 - Emotional regulation and building supportive practices

16:18 - Confidence dips and practical reflection strategies

21:10 - Strategy, clarity and planning your career direction

27:45 - Resources, final questions and concluding insights

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MEMORABLE QUOTE:

"Use your network more. Look through your network, not just at it, because every connection opens the door to many more."

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VALUABLE RESOURCES:

Michelle's website: https://mschafercoaching.ca/

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Coaching with Agi: https://personaldevelopmentmasterypodcast.com/mentor

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🎙️ Want to be a guest on the podcast?

Message Agi on PodMatch: https://www.podmatch.com/member/personaldevelopmentmastery

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Conversations and insights on career transition, career clarity, career change and career pivots for midlife professionals, including second careers, new ventures, leaving a long-term career with confidence, better decision-making, and creating purposeful, meaningful work.

˚

Support the show

Career transition and career clarity podcast content for midlife professionals in career transition, navigating a career change, career pivot or second career, starting a new venture or leaving a long-term career.

Discover practical tools for career clarity, confident decision-making, rebuilding self belief and confidence, finding purpose and meaning in work, designing a purposeful, fulfilling next chapter, and creating meaningful work that fits who you are now. Episodes explore personal development and mindset for midlife professionals, including how to manage uncertainty and pressure, overcome fear and self-doubt, clarify your direction, plan your next steps, and turn your experience into a new role, business or vocation that feels aligned.

To support the show, click here.

Are you stuck in a career that no longer fits, but still haven’t taken a real-world step to change it?

If you’ve been quietly contemplating a career or life transition for months (or years) without moving forward, this episode will speak directly to you.

It’s not about confusion. It’s about why high-achieving professionals often stay silently stuck, even when clarity has already arrived.

Discover why your current approach might be the very thing keeping you circling in place.

If you’ve been carrying this quietly on your own, listen now to discover a new, more sustainable way forward.

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VALUABLE RESOURCES:

Book a 1:1 conversation with Agi: https://personaldevelopmentmasterypodcast.com/mentor

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Support the show

Career transition and career clarity podcast content for midlife professionals in career transition, navigating a career change, career pivot or second career, starting a new venture or leaving a long-term career.

Discover practical tools for career clarity, confident decision-making, rebuilding self belief and confidence, finding purpose and meaning in work, designing a purposeful, fulfilling next chapter, and creating meaningful work that fits who you are now. Episodes explore personal development and mindset for midlife professionals, including how to manage uncertainty and pressure, overcome fear and self-doubt, clarify your direction, plan your next steps, and turn your experience into a new role, business or vocation that feels aligned.

To support the show, click here.