Episode Transcript
Hi everyone. Welcome to How to Live, a podcast that explores ways to live a good life. I'm your host, Sharad Lal. This is episode 30. How should we reinvent ourselves? This is more relevant than ever with so many of us changing career tracks, starting businesses, and taking time off to discuss this, we have a very special guest, Sarah.
Sarah's a business owner, CEO, and advisor, and I'm very proud to say that Sarah is my wife. She's also mother to Gia and Ava.
She successfully reinvented herself many times in different roles, industries and countries. From starting her first business in university to a corporate career in financial services to artist, FinTech leader, coach, and entrepreneur, Sarah successfully transitioned between diverse roles.
She served in four advisory board positions and received multiple professional accolades. She's been listed among the top 30 female tech leaders in Singapore
Top FinTech influencers in Asia, and has been profiled in two books, Stories of FinTech Entrepreneurs and Encyclopedia of Successful People in Singapore.
In our conversation, we talk about how to prepare for big transitions, setting a vision for our future, crafting our reinvention story, and a lot more before getting to the interview. Thank you for your support. With your support. We are now listened to in 80 countries, almost 700 cities worldwide, and are ranked in the top 5% in the world. If you haven't already, please do consider subscribing. If you really enjoy this podcast, please do consider giving us a rating on Spotify, Apple Podcast or wherever you're listening to this. Thank you in advance. Now, here's the interview.
Sharad: Hi, Sarah. Welcome to how to live. How are you doing today?
Sarah: Oh, I'm so happy to be here. Very excited.
Sharad: This has certainly been the interview I'm most excited about. I've got a bird's eye view of all the success that you've created, heartiest congratulations on everything.
Sarah: Thank you. Thank you so much.
Sharad: We worked a lot together as well, on our businesses, on our family. And recently we co-created this podcast, which is now just over a year old. So I'd love to hear your thoughts about the podcast. What do you think? How's the experience been?
Sarah: It blows my mind when I think about how much we've created since we met only a few years ago. And it's been such a pleasure watching this podcast evolve and our other coaching business, my life has evolved, both from ideas and to see them come to life has been an incredible experience, challenging also of working with one's spouse is never, always gonna be easy, especially when we've had strategic differences or creative differences, but it's been also thrilling and exciting.
And I'm used to being in the background on this podcast.
So I'm a little nervous coming on as a guest, for sure, but very excited.
Sharad: Great.
Now, when I met you, you referred to that back in 2017. That's the time you were leaving a solid career with ANZ bank and you left that to co-found your own business, a FinTech startup. What was the experience like setting up a startup in a country you would just move to a few years back?
Sarah: Oh my God. It was one of the best experiences ever. And it was one of, it was a big reinvention that I had to do. Moving into startups, it was equal parts thrilling and terrifying because at that time, Singapore was the FinTech hub in Asia and FinTech was a huge industry taking off all around the world.
There was lots of energy and daily media coverage, and many countries were having their governments just invest. So much money into the space. So it was a very supportive environment for growth and innovation and lots of exciting people working in that space. I was pretty thrilled to move into FinTech right place, right time.
I'd been in the corporate world for a while, been at ANZ for at least six years. And I just felt. I'd gone as far as I could go, time for a change. So this opportunity came up, was co-founder CEO role and.
My gosh, I was like pretty scary going from the predictability and the nice salary of a corporate job into the startup community, which is quite competitive. And I remember my first week on the job, I was just getting my head around the business model, but I was negotiating contracts with large bank.
And then soon after that pitching business to investors, which I'd never done before hiring a tech team, getting on stage at events and public speaking is not my strength. So I was definitely pushed and stretched, which was wonderful. Both personally and professionally, but I had to lean on every tool that I had at that time to get me through and do the best I could.
Sharad: Wow. As I'm hearing you talk about this and I remembered when you were going through it, hitting the ground, running takes a completely different connotation. When you're in a startup, like you said, in the first week itself, you were stretched so much now to do all this. Of course you would, you knew moving from ANZ to a startup, it is gonna be challenging.
Like you said, how did you prepare for it?
Sarah: So I've had quite a few changes through my professional life and transformed myself a few times. And what I've found each time, I actually go into a state of nurture and protect where. When the dream is fresh, when you're about to embark on something, that's a great adventure.
It's the most fragile time your confidence is growing. It's a time when the dream could get squashed or you could run into some big roadblocks that feel insurmountable. So I tend to go a bit insular in that time I nurture, I protect and I branch out to people that. I admire people that I trust and I keep that inner circle quite tight and they really become like my advisors or my mentors that see me through that transition.
And you were one of those, someone I leaned on and really, because you had built, a long running business and I spoke to you and I spoke to other people that had already built successful businesses from startup into something that was self sustaining so that was something that I did to protect the dream and have that support.
And there were a few other things that were really helpful. Anytime I do a big shift, education is something I love to do risk assessments, making sure I'm not taking too many big risks, especially financially. I look at my overall situation and then make a plan, just how is this gonna be practical and how can I execute this in a way that makes sense and covers my basis.
Sharad: I love the whole metaphor of nurture and protect and then branch out. So you get your safety, you have people who are on your side. You protect your dreams and then you go out in the open with confidence. Love that. That's beautiful. And like you alluded to earlier, this FinTech story wasn't a one off. You've been reinventing yourself every three to four years, what's driven that?
Sarah: Growth and creativity. For me personally, happiness comes a lot from progress. I like that feeling of growing and something new in my life. And I love to learn and get out of my comfort zone if I really am frank, I think anytime I've got very comfortable, I'm not having fun anymore.
It's like I really need a new challenge and I need to have new experiences. So that's something that my whole life ever since I was a kid, all the way through to. Corporate career and running businesses and then our beautiful daughters I'm always looking for. Okay, what's the next thing that can happen here.
And how can this be fun? So creativity's been a big part, but it doesn't necessarily get easier. But I certainly now have found some tools and techniques that have made it smooth.
Sharad: If you could talk a little bit about the tools and techniques that have made it smoother.
Sarah: Something I've learned to do is master the story. What's the story that we're gonna tell ourselves? And then what's the story that we're going to tell the world. They're two different stories because when you are embarking on that dream, I feel like we can talk ourselves out of it.
I've had so many moments where I've been sinking into insecurity. What are people gonna think of me? Am I gonna fail? I'm not good enough to do this. The voice in my head can drown out the dream and that has delayed me, in many instances. And I remember this time quite a few years ago when I was making one of my first really big changes.
I'd been in the corporate world for a while in financial services. And I was getting into the creative field. I was doing art. I was painting. I loved it, but it was very different to anything that I'd ever done. And no one knew me that way. Everyone knew me as Sarah. This is her job. This is what she does.
And I think we all get boxed in like that. And I was like, how am I gonna tell people now suddenly I wanna paint. On the side, be an artist, like that's a big jump from financial services to art. Who's gonna understand that. And so I was very insecure about it. I remember one time I was telling my sister all about this and she said something that was so helpful.
I'm never gonna forget. It was a little brutal to be honest, but it's been so helpful. She said to me, “Sarah, no one cares. No, one's looking at you. Close enough. To be thinking about what you're doing, wanting you to fail, worrying if you fail, if it doesn't go well, it's fine. People will forget. And if it goes well, then, Hey, amazing. You've done this new thing.”
And I was like, oh my God, ding ding. Like That is so true. No, one's watching what I'm doing that closely. Live my life, do what I'm doing. And so I've replayed that advice from her time and time again, when I have made big shifts that get out of my own way just go and do it.
And, very soon after that I started posting and putting things up and selling my work on Etsy. And one thing led to another and had an exhibition and ended up with 50 works. And it was really great. Part of my life, but I did have to get out of my own way. So that was the story that I was telling myself.
But then there's also the story that you tell others, because you have to help your change, make sense for other people. And around this time, One of the things I wanted to do was go part-time in the corporate world because I had so many other interests and I was also bent out. I’d been working really hard. I was worried about the perception of me. If anyone was doing those things, they were seen as not serious about their career.
And I was very serious. So I really had to create the story for others to accept. That I was gonna go part-time and it wasn't that I wasn't serious about my career. So the story became: I still love my job and I still love my career, but I do want to be doing those other things, which will also help in my career and give me new skills. it could make sense for people. So you have to work on that also, how is your transition going to be perceived by others and how can you help them along in that?
So it's something they can respect and accept and, in the best case scenario, admire.
Sharad: Thank you for that. That was such a deep answer. There's so many takeaways for it. The first thing is what many of us would associate ourselves with that we get caught up in our head. What are people gonna think? And in reality, nobody cares. So it's about going ahead and not getting in your way and doing your stuff.
So I like that. I also like this thing. Stories you tell yourself, which is confidence building. So you keep going and stories you tell the other world to other people because you are shifting and changing and it somehow needs to make sense. So that was great to hear. One of the things I was very curious about and I really liked about you, even when we met for the first time, is moving from a financial career from a bank.
To art, which was, and this is art, which is actually painting on a canvas. How did that come about? Like, how did you think of making that move? What happened?
Sarah: Oh, how did that happen? I think actually I got inspired by, I was watching a movie what's that, Woody Allen movie with Penelope cruise.
You know that one, what's it
Sharad: And where they're Vicky Christina Barcelona.
Sarah: Christina Barcelona. That's the one I was watching. And there's this one scene where Penelope Cruise's character is in the backyard of her ex-husband and painting wildly. Like she's wearing these overalls and she is just painting freely in her hair. Then she just looks so fabulous and it looks amazing.
And I'm like, I wanna do that. So I went and bought a big canvas and some paint, and I just went in the backyard and started painting like that. And that's where it started. And from there, I was just always painting in the backyard and then I started with different techniques and I was watching things online and learning new techniques and eventually wanted to learn a little bit more.
And so when my sister was getting married in Italy, I stayed on a bit extra and did a course on art in Italy. And now I use my creativity, really a lot with the kids but when I have the time, I would love to get back into it. And it's something I just lose myself, lose all sense of time and it's a beautiful thing.
Sharad: Wow, it's beautiful. And I know the time that we met just before that, when you moved to Singapore and you'd moved single, and then painting was something you took homage in. And if you could talk a little bit about what was it like moving to Singapore the initial years and how did that experience go through?
Sarah: That was a very interesting time in my life because I was just coming out of a long term relationship. I'd always wanted to live overseas. It had been a dream I'd had, so it was like, okay, now's the moment. Like I'm free to go.
I could move with the company I was with. I pitched to them to get me a job over in Singapore and eventually that worked out. And the first six months were fabulous. Singapore. Oh, it was just so much fun to be had. And I had family here and friends here and went straight into having a friendship group and there's dinners every night.
It was just wonderful. But then after around six months I really hit a wall where suddenly I was. In a new country with a whole new culture to learn. I was single in my early thirties in a place where nearly everyone was married or at least in a serious relationship. There were not that many single people.
Many people are starting to have kids. I felt it was a bit of a sad time as well as being an adventurous time because I was travelling a lot and I was working hard and making great friends, but it was difficult. And I think about what I learned through that.
Stage is that when difficulties come and you're making an adjustment in your life and you're on a new path where you will hit roadblocks, you will hit difficulties. And for me, that was my time of difficulty. And for others you'll have your own. it's really worthwhile to sit in that for a while.
I made the decision that, okay, here I am, I'm not feeling so good every day. But I'm just gonna sit with this and I'm gonna do the work, whatever it takes, because I've been given this moment to really confront things that I wanna improve about myself. Things that I'm not happy about, any kind of shadow work.
Any kind of education I wanna get, and I wanna do that work. And so I did, and I would spend the evenings painting, I'd go to work through the day and then out for dinner at night with friends. And then at night my creativity switches on. At around 11:00 PM I'd be listening to Hanzi.
Up loud and this epic music and painting. And I just lose track of time. Could have been 10 minutes. It could have been three hours. I wouldn't have been able to tell you when I was in that kind of zone. That was very healing, it also really gave me a lot, gave me something. And so you've gotta find those things for yourself when you hit those dark patches that are.
Give you energy and make you feel like you're reconnecting with something really good within yourself. Because then once I came through that, I was just able to now create the life that we are living together. At the end of that road, I'd done that work probably took me six to 12 months. As I emerged, I suddenly felt ready for everything. And I started just putting it out there into the world with such clarity. I was saying to my friends, all right, now I'm ready to meet someone. Do you know anyone? And I said that to a small number of friends and one of them introduced me to you.
I was also ready to have a change in my career. So I was speaking to my mentor and saying to him, I'm ready for change. What's the next thing? And he encouraged me to do a FinTech course with MIT, which I absolutely loved. And then at the end of that, it was telling me he's creating a FinTech needs a co-founder CEO.
And did I know anyone? And I just said, me, I should do it. I'm ready. If I hadn't done that work, I wouldn't have been able to so clearly meet you and have, create this life together as well as go and make that big change in my career that was full on and needed me to be strong. I know it's never easy to be in that dark stage, but if you're there, then you will come through and when you come through, it will be something to look back on as being thankful that, okay, you were there and you'll learn all these things and now life can become closer to the dream life that you want.
Sharad: Thank you for describing that. Very few people talk about their dark stages, but like you said, you nested, you were isolated, you found painting that is something that helped you at that time helped you get your energy at that time. And you did that work. And once you are done, Time that's when you were at your best and you were ready for a relationship, you were ready for a new job, and then you brought your best self into it.
That is so awesome. And then of course, as serendipity hits, I had done my own work as well. And I remember I was coming out of ver pasta, which was meditation and I was ready for a relationship and we met each other and thank you to Lela who introduced us.
Sarah: You were very Zen. You were.
Sharad: I was very Zen. You were very. Energetic. If I could say you're ready to hit the world and it worked well, very nice to hear you talk about that. I think it's gonna be extremely useful to people that dark times do happen and we need to take time off. We need to do whatever we need to do, whatever works for us, and then we can emerge and go back to the world.
Sarah: I actually feel like every time of brilliance and pure joy has a corresponding time of darkness, because I feel like that's the balance of life then once you accept that, that's the case. It makes it easier to accept the dark time as it's happening.
Sharad: absolutely. We have to go through the darkness to be able to appreciate the light. Now, one of the things that one does when we move on from one experience to another and are reinventing ourselves, we often try to build off previous experiences versus starting a new one. How have you done that as you move to something new every three to four years.
Sarah: I think previous experiences are very important. For me, I haven't focused too much on that. Personally, the trick has been building new skills. I'm always looking for what's next. What's the new skill? I worry less about job titles. And I'm looking for what new ability can I get from this next opportunity?
And what's it going to bring into my life? I think it's just so good. The best thing ever is to just do anything new and do your very best at it when you do your best, it just attracts opportunity. It's like a magnet, it's like irresistible and there's many ways of doing this.
Education is one and I've leaned on that nearly every single change I've had, but volunteering and horizontal shifts at work are fabulous also.
I feel like we all get quite addicted to the progress of promotions and wanting the next job title, wanting the next grade, wanting the next pay rise.
It is very addictive. I've been there for sure. But if you can get out of that cycle a little and say, okay, how can I broaden my experience so that eventually I'm gonna make a two step change. That's something I've done a few times and it's been amazing because I've loved to just create new abilities, create new skills and you meet new people too, which is great.
Sharad: I love that. I love that mindset where it's not necessarily thinking about, “Hey, what experiences do I have and how do I leverage it?” It's a growth mindset. That's the way the growth mindset is defined where it's a learning mindset. You're looking at what skills can I build? What can I learn?
And whatever skills you've already had will always come into play. But if your mindset is looking ahead at what you can learn, which need not be going up the ladder. It could also be going sideways and width and breadth are also ways to learn skills.
Sarah: They'll come together.
Sharad: and they'll come together.
Sarah: One day they'll come together. You don't know how yet it's, it doesn't make sense yet. But one day you'll have such a range of skills and experience and knowledge and abilities and passions, and suddenly an opportunity will arise. And you'll just be able to step into that with a lot of confidence in a unique way that is unique just to you, because no one else has created those skills altogether.
Sharad: Absolutely. And that's the way Steve jobs also describes that the dots will connect and that speech of his, where he talks about he'd done a course in font, something to do with typography. And then when he was launching a Macintosh. He created a design oriented machine, which was because of the course he had done earlier and that helped him differentiate in the market.
So exactly what you said, you never know what the end purpose of what you're doing, but if you do it with the mindset of learning, the dots will connect at some stage and you'll be able to bring it all together in a very unique way, which no one else can do.
Sarah: Yeah. I never thought that you and I would be designing our own graphics and websites and visual assets and everything for our companies. I would've always, like if I would've always thought I would be outsourcing such a thing, but because of how much time I spent doing creative things, it built the muscle to be able to do all that visual work.
And then it was just so much fun, even that itself, learning new skills on how to build a website. You don't know how all these little things you're doing over the years, how they're going to play out and come together until eventually you're like, oh wow.
I can do that. Yeah. That's easy.
Sharad: That's such a great mindset to have, especially if you're reinventing and trying different things. From the sidelines, I've also noticed something which I really admire about you. There's so much, but one of the things that I really admire is your networking and getting the right mentors.
So if you can talk a little bit about how that works for your networking and mentorship and how should other people go about it?
Sarah: With every new stage or reinvention in my life I have leveraged my network and leaned into my network. At first, I didn't know I was doing it. It really was something that just came a bit naturally, but I became more mindful of it during my time with ANZ bank actually. Because what started happening is I really wanted to grow and there was this one project I was on where the executive was like super, super senior and very intimidating, very tall and very wise and smart and commercial and scary. And I, but I really looked up to this person I was speaking to a colleague and said, oh, I want to reach out, but I don't know. And she just said just ask or ask you not going to know, so that's what I did.
I just reached out and. I'd already worked with this person for a while, so they knew who I was and there was some connection there, but I just said, look, I really admire you, really look up to you. I'd love to know more about your career. How did you get to where you got to? And, I'll take you for a coffee for 20 minutes.
Anytime you say, I'll be there. I don't wanna take too much of your time. And I was just very respectful. Very humble. Show up on time and just be there and be ready. So that was something that I did. And I found that actually, and then it worked out and this person just gave me so much of their time and ended up really helping me and sponsoring me in my next moves in my career and everything.
And I just felt it was just so enjoyable, but I also realised it was enjoyable for them. I feel senior executives don't always get asked about their experience, their career because people are a little afraid of them. I realise. They were happy to share. Also, they've had so much experience and they wanna share their wisdom with someone who's willing to learn and someone who's keen to learn.
Once I realised that I started doing it very much. Mindfully and with intention and whenever I was ready for a change, I would really branch out and see who around me I thought was doing amazing things and I'd reach out to them or I'd ask for introductions and just be there and hear their sorry.
If it felt right and the moment felt right, I would ask at the end of the meetings, if there's anyone else I should be speaking to, or if there are any introductions they could make if I was on the cusp of change and I knew I was, I would also let them know and I'd say, look, I am ready for this change, and this is what I'm looking for.
So if you hear of any opportunities or do think of me and do keep me in mind. So actively building a network in that way is a lot of fun and it's something that I've enjoyed and done now throughout my career. And it's not always in this mentorship way. You can also do it peer to peer and build your peer network and have a community of people that you can lean on as you're going through your professional life.
And now for me, my mum's life has got a great community around me, of women. I just adore it. It's something that I think is very enriching.
Sharad: I love that especially that insight where these people who've done it all, they're happy to share. And if you go with a curious mindset to just understand how they've done, what they've done, that itself is something they'd be happy to do. Often for me I'm worried that I need to ask the right questions.
I need to ask something smart about myself and make that time useful. But I don't need to make it about myself. I can make it about them and just learn from them and be curious. And that's a great way to meet and learn from brilliant people. Who've walked the path before you. So thank you. That's a great insight for people as they're and that way you can build skills and knowledge about new spaces that you're getting into better than reading or any courses that give you real life experience.
Sarah: Yes, and can lead to real life opportunities. Like I can see the dominoes of my life and who those people are. One after the other, I see how those conversations and those connections led to the next thing. Because ultimately at the end of the day, it's mostly about people when it comes to professional life and personal life.
It's about connection. It's about people. So really leaning into that in a way that is intentional is what I would encourage.
Sharad: Absolutely. You never know what possibilities can arise. Now, one of the things that you've done well, like of course when we think of reinventing ourselves, sometimes we think we are just floating and doing many things. And you did say that the dots connect, but one of the things I've seen you do is despite reinventing and trying different things, you set a vision.
You set a place of where you want to get to you, put it out in the universe and that gives you a direction to move towards. Can you talk a little bit more about that?
Sarah: Yeah. I don't know who said this quote, but I love this. Start with the end in mind. Like you have to know your objective.
Sharad: Steve Covey. The seven habits of seven habits of highly effective people.
Sarah: Oh, I love that. That's where I got it. Okay. You have to know because, or else either you're gonna float around or other people are going to choose for you, so you need to choose your own destination.
one of the things I learned. I think probably my mom encouraged me to do dream work visualisation. So I've been doing this really since I was a teenager. I absolutely love it. I really enjoy it. Something so surprising happened very recently where I was back in Australia and I was cleaning out the story under my parents' house.
And I found my box of journals and I've been journaling since I was 13 years old. So I've got so many of them and I was just flicking through casually, like reliving the days. And I couldn't believe what I found. I am at the back of one of my journals. It was an old vision statement that I would've written around 20 years ago.
it just blew my mind because as I saw it, I remembered it, but I had forgotten about it this whole time. And it really blew my mind because the vision I had written in this long vision statement has now pretty much come to pass and it's taken all this time to get there, but. It was just wild.
It read something like Sarah's an international coach, helps hundreds of people around the globe achieve their goals, enjoys travel, lives the majority of the year in a beautiful house. The rest of the year, she travels with her husband and two children. I was like, oh my gosh. That is basically my life.
And I just couldn't believe it. So I think there's a lot to be said for setting your intention, having a vision, putting it into the world, putting it in writing, putting it into images, whatever works for you. For me both worked. I also remember doing a dream board, like a mood board where there were lots of photos from magazines of the life I wanted to be leading when I was all grown up, you know? So that's, What I made. I have no idea where that is now, but I can still see it. I know what those images were, that's the life I have now. It's just so powerful. So I really encourage people to spend the time thinking about what they want five, 10 years from now, and then do that work and put it into the world.
And don't, you don't have to show anyone. Doesn't have to be for anyone else just for you, but you'll know, and subconsciously your work towards it. Even if you forget that statement consciously you'll know, deep down what that dream is. Oh actually let me just get this book. There's this thing I wanna read. So one of my favourite books is The Alchemist. I read it probably once a year or once every two years. It's so amazing. So there's this passage I love. Where is it? Here? It is. Okay. Everyone when they are young knows what their personal legend is at that point in their lives, everything is clear and everything is possible.
They are not afraid to dream and to yearn for everything they would like to see happen to them in their lives. But as time passes, a mysterious force begins to convince them that it was impossible for them to realise their personal legend. To realise one's destiny is a person's only real obligation and people are capable at any time in their lives of doing what they dream of. I love that.
Sharad: I think that is beautiful. That is beautiful.
Sarah: It was a great book.
Sharad: Absolutely, Alchemist is a great book. And like you said that life comes in the way as you get older limiting beliefs come. And we forget our dreams and being able to put it out early in life somehow stays with us in the subconscious and we may not realise it, but maybe 20 years later, 30 years later, we might be living that dream because of what we put out there.
Sarah: And doing the exercise routinely, it can be done on a small scale from one job to the next, and it can be done on a big scale. With life. And I'm at a point now where I'm now living the life I dreamed of 20 years ago. So I'm at a point where very soon I'm gonna need to do it again. Because what does the next 20 years look like?
There was this other analogy I heard I have no idea where, but it stuck with me something around this tree where say you are driving along a highway.
And rather than looking at the road, you're looking off in the distance to the right, at a tree. Eventually you're gonna start veering the car towards that tree and go off track. Having that vision statement or having something around you that keeps the dream in plain sight, it would just help you to course correct every so often.
Cuz the veering is gonna happen in life. We all get busy and things happen, distractions and challenges and that's natural, but just to keep course. Correct. So eventually you will land closer to where you were hoping.
Sharad: and this becomes even more important when you're reinventing and doing different things and then you have that vision that you're working towards. You've done so many roles and one of the latest roles that you're doing right now is a mother and you've taken on that role wholeheartedly.
And luckily you've had the luxury where you can do that. So if you can talk a little bit about this role and how it's been different from all the other roles that you've.
Sarah: Ah, oh my girls. Ugh. , they're so cute. Oh, it's the best. It's the hardest, most challenging thing I've ever done. Because it matters to the heart more than anything else, and it's tiring. But my gosh, the love that we get from them, it's just the best thing I've ever done. I now can barely remember life before having our girls because they have enriched our day.
So fully. We are so busy and there's just so many moments of love and tenderness and fun and playfulness. They bring out your inner child. They also, I feel, becoming a parent forces you to confront your own stuff. I want to, I don't want to carry over any of my own personal baggage or stuff onto them or into their life.
I wanna minimise that so that they can just build from their own foundations of love and safety and build their own story and life. So I'm having to do my own work, if I'm rubbing up against things we both are, that's been a good opportunity and being a bit older, having the kids a bit older, I think has led to a lot of the ability to do that work.
We're not in our early twenties. Just figuring out who we are, we know who we are, but we also have been through life.
Sharad: Absolutely. Absolutely. It's been, for me on the other side, fatherhood. I always thought, Hey, let the kids grow up and then I'll get involved. But I think these initial few years, however difficult they are, they're very rewarding as well. I'm with you. When you're actually looking at them, you have to be more conscious of yourself and that's the work we all need to
Sarah: Yeah.
Yeah. It's amazing. And it's so good because I feel you will grow through that process. Also as an individual, like parent parenthood is a new job and it's one we're not prepared for. No one goes to school and learns how to be a parent. Yet we get all this training for everything else in life, even driving, you have to do some kind of course or something.
Parenthood, there's no preparation. And yet it's the greatest responsibility. When you bring home, there's tiny little infants that can do nothing without you. You suddenly get a sense of the bigger meaning of life
Sharad: absolutely. Now, as we close this out, I'd love to get what's the one piece of advice you'd give to folks who are looking to reinvent themselves change, careers, change tracks. What's the one piece of advice you'd give them?
Sarah: It's never too late. It doesn't matter how old you are. And it doesn't matter. The background and the life you've lived. It's just never too late. You can always start at some point to pursue what fires you up, even if it's as a side project or as a hobby or as a new skill or or just being around other people that are in that space.
I love a quote from I think it's Earl Knighting Gail that said, “Never give up on a dream just because of the time it will take to accomplish it because the time will pass anyway.” So the time of life will pass anyway. So you may as well just chip away at it bit by bit. And then those dots will come together and then suddenly something will happen and things will come together.
So that's what I would encourage people to do.
Sharad: That is so good. Because very often when we are even older, we have a range of skills that become available to us as we are shifting tracks and trying something new. So it's very empowering for people to know that. I have time for one more question, and that's the question I ask everyone at the end of your life, how would you know, you've lived a good life?
Sarah: If I've loved and been loved. Think that's it. How I all know I've lived a good life. If I've given lots of love to the people in my life. If I've given lots of love to any of the projects I've worked on, if I've received love in return and. It really comes down to family. Now for me, like family's the number one thing, and to be surrounded by my family and close friends and have them in my life and have my children in my life, then I think that's to me, everything now.
So that would be a good life.
Sharad: And you're on your way. Thank you, Sarah,
for such a wonderful conversation. I thought it'll feel weird. Yeah. I thought it'll feel weird. It didn't maybe at times it did, but overall it didn't and loved talking with you and loved. I got to know a little bit more about you. To be honest, there are lots in there that I knew.
But I got to know a little bit more and hopefully people who know you will also get to know a little bit more about you.
So thank you very much.
Sarah: Thanks for the opportunity to share. It's been wonderful. Really wonderful talking all of this with you. Thank you so much.
Thank you, Sarah, for such an inspirational, engaging conversation. I love the visual. You described Penelope Cruz painting in a garden, which inspired you to paint. It's so true. Sometimes certain visuals touch us so deeply that they bring out something in us that has been silent for way too long.
Here's one action step we could all consider. What's an area in life you've secretly wanted to pursue but have put away for some reason or the other?
What about it excites you? Is there an image or energy about it that motivates you? What skill can you develop by pursuing it? How can it help you grow? What holds you back from taking your first. And in what way can you pursue it now or in the near future?
Take some time, find a quiet spot, and enjoy this exercise. Another action you could consider is writing a vision statement for yourself. If you enjoy this episode, you could consider listening to episode two where we talk about achievement versus fulfilment. That's it for today's episode. I hope you enjoyed it.
We will be back with another episode two weeks from now on December 20th. Hope you join us for that. Till next time, have a wonderful day ahead. Bye bye.
Hi everyone. Welcome to How to Live, a podcast that explores ways to live a good life. I'm your host, Sharad Lal. This is episode 30. How should we reinvent ourselves? This is more relevant than ever with so many of us changing career tracks, starting businesses, and taking time off to discuss this, we have a very special guest, Sarah.
Sarah's a business owner, CEO, and advisor, and I'm very proud to say that Sarah is my wife. She's also mother to Gia and Ava.
She successfully reinvented herself many times in different roles, industries and countries. From starting her first business in university to a corporate career in financial services to artist, FinTech leader, coach, and entrepreneur, Sarah successfully transitioned between diverse roles.
She served in four advisory board positions and received multiple professional accolades. She's been listed among the top 30 female tech leaders in Singapore
Top FinTech influencers in Asia, and has been profiled in two books, Stories of FinTech Entrepreneurs and Encyclopedia of Successful People in Singapore.
In our conversation, we talk about how to prepare for big transitions, setting a vision for our future, crafting our reinvention story, and a lot more before getting to the interview. Thank you for your support. With your support. We are now listened to in 80 countries, almost 700 cities worldwide, and are ranked in the top 5% in the world. If you haven't already, please do consider subscribing. If you really enjoy this podcast, please do consider giving us a rating on Spotify, Apple Podcast or wherever you're listening to this. Thank you in advance. Now, here's the interview.
Sharad: Hi, Sarah. Welcome to how to live. How are you doing today?
Sarah: Oh, I'm so happy to be here. Very excited.
Sharad: This has certainly been the interview I'm most excited about. I've got a bird's eye view of all the success that you've created, heartiest congratulations on everything.
Sarah: Thank you. Thank you so much.
Sharad: We worked a lot together as well, on our businesses, on our family. And recently we co-created this podcast, which is now just over a year old. So I'd love to hear your thoughts about the podcast. What do you think? How's the experience been?
Sarah: It blows my mind when I think about how much we've created since we met only a few years ago. And it's been such a pleasure watching this podcast evolve and our other coaching business, my life has evolved, both from ideas and to see them come to life has been an incredible experience, challenging also of working with one's spouse is never, always gonna be easy, especially when we've had strategic differences or creative differences, but it's been also thrilling and exciting.
And I'm used to being in the background on this podcast.
So I'm a little nervous coming on as a guest, for sure, but very excited.
Sharad: Great.
Now, when I met you, you referred to that back in 2017. That's the time you were leaving a solid career with ANZ bank and you left that to co-found your own business, a FinTech startup. What was the experience like setting up a startup in a country you would just move to a few years back?
Sarah: Oh my God. It was one of the best experiences ever. And it was one of, it was a big reinvention that I had to do. Moving into startups, it was equal parts thrilling and terrifying because at that time, Singapore was the FinTech hub in Asia and FinTech was a huge industry taking off all around the world.
There was lots of energy and daily media coverage, and many countries were having their governments just invest. So much money into the space. So it was a very supportive environment for growth and innovation and lots of exciting people working in that space. I was pretty thrilled to move into FinTech right place, right time.
I'd been in the corporate world for a while, been at ANZ for at least six years. And I just felt. I'd gone as far as I could go, time for a change. So this opportunity came up, was co-founder CEO role and.
My gosh, I was like pretty scary going from the predictability and the nice salary of a corporate job into the startup community, which is quite competitive. And I remember my first week on the job, I was just getting my head around the business model, but I was negotiating contracts with large bank.
And then soon after that pitching business to investors, which I'd never done before hiring a tech team, getting on stage at events and public speaking is not my strength. So I was definitely pushed and stretched, which was wonderful. Both personally and professionally, but I had to lean on every tool that I had at that time to get me through and do the best I could.
Sharad: Wow. As I'm hearing you talk about this and I remembered when you were going through it, hitting the ground, running takes a completely different connotation. When you're in a startup, like you said, in the first week itself, you were stretched so much now to do all this. Of course you would, you knew moving from ANZ to a startup, it is gonna be challenging.
Like you said, how did you prepare for it?
Sarah: So I've had quite a few changes through my professional life and transformed myself a few times. And what I've found each time, I actually go into a state of nurture and protect where. When the dream is fresh, when you're about to embark on something, that's a great adventure.
It's the most fragile time your confidence is growing. It's a time when the dream could get squashed or you could run into some big roadblocks that feel insurmountable. So I tend to go a bit insular in that time I nurture, I protect and I branch out to people that. I admire people that I trust and I keep that inner circle quite tight and they really become like my advisors or my mentors that see me through that transition.
And you were one of those, someone I leaned on and really, because you had built, a long running business and I spoke to you and I spoke to other people that had already built successful businesses from startup into something that was self sustaining so that was something that I did to protect the dream and have that support.
And there were a few other things that were really helpful. Anytime I do a big shift, education is something I love to do risk assessments, making sure I'm not taking too many big risks, especially financially. I look at my overall situation and then make a plan, just how is this gonna be practical and how can I execute this in a way that makes sense and covers my basis.
Sharad: I love the whole metaphor of nurture and protect and then branch out. So you get your safety, you have people who are on your side. You protect your dreams and then you go out in the open with confidence. Love that. That's beautiful. And like you alluded to earlier, this FinTech story wasn't a one off. You've been reinventing yourself every three to four years, what's driven that?
Sarah: Growth and creativity. For me personally, happiness comes a lot from progress. I like that feeling of growing and something new in my life. And I love to learn and get out of my comfort zone if I really am frank, I think anytime I've got very comfortable, I'm not having fun anymore.
It's like I really need a new challenge and I need to have new experiences. So that's something that my whole life ever since I was a kid, all the way through to. Corporate career and running businesses and then our beautiful daughters I'm always looking for. Okay, what's the next thing that can happen here.
And how can this be fun? So creativity's been a big part, but it doesn't necessarily get easier. But I certainly now have found some tools and techniques that have made it smooth.
Sharad: If you could talk a little bit about the tools and techniques that have made it smoother.
Sarah: Something I've learned to do is master the story. What's the story that we're gonna tell ourselves? And then what's the story that we're going to tell the world. They're two different stories because when you are embarking on that dream, I feel like we can talk ourselves out of it.
I've had so many moments where I've been sinking into insecurity. What are people gonna think of me? Am I gonna fail? I'm not good enough to do this. The voice in my head can drown out the dream and that has delayed me, in many instances. And I remember this time quite a few years ago when I was making one of my first really big changes.
I'd been in the corporate world for a while in financial services. And I was getting into the creative field. I was doing art. I was painting. I loved it, but it was very different to anything that I'd ever done. And no one knew me that way. Everyone knew me as Sarah. This is her job. This is what she does.
And I think we all get boxed in like that. And I was like, how am I gonna tell people now suddenly I wanna paint. On the side, be an artist, like that's a big jump from financial services to art. Who's gonna understand that. And so I was very insecure about it. I remember one time I was telling my sister all about this and she said something that was so helpful.
I'm never gonna forget. It was a little brutal to be honest, but it's been so helpful. She said to me, “Sarah, no one cares. No, one's looking at you. Close enough. To be thinking about what you're doing, wanting you to fail, worrying if you fail, if it doesn't go well, it's fine. People will forget. And if it goes well, then, Hey, amazing. You've done this new thing.”
And I was like, oh my God, ding ding. Like That is so true. No, one's watching what I'm doing that closely. Live my life, do what I'm doing. And so I've replayed that advice from her time and time again, when I have made big shifts that get out of my own way just go and do it.
And, very soon after that I started posting and putting things up and selling my work on Etsy. And one thing led to another and had an exhibition and ended up with 50 works. And it was really great. Part of my life, but I did have to get out of my own way. So that was the story that I was telling myself.
But then there's also the story that you tell others, because you have to help your change, make sense for other people. And around this time, One of the things I wanted to do was go part-time in the corporate world because I had so many other interests and I was also bent out. I’d been working really hard. I was worried about the perception of me. If anyone was doing those things, they were seen as not serious about their career.
And I was very serious. So I really had to create the story for others to accept. That I was gonna go part-time and it wasn't that I wasn't serious about my career. So the story became: I still love my job and I still love my career, but I do want to be doing those other things, which will also help in my career and give me new skills. it could make sense for people. So you have to work on that also, how is your transition going to be perceived by others and how can you help them along in that?
So it's something they can respect and accept and, in the best case scenario, admire.
Sharad: Thank you for that. That was such a deep answer. There's so many takeaways for it. The first thing is what many of us would associate ourselves with that we get caught up in our head. What are people gonna think? And in reality, nobody cares. So it's about going ahead and not getting in your way and doing your stuff.
So I like that. I also like this thing. Stories you tell yourself, which is confidence building. So you keep going and stories you tell the other world to other people because you are shifting and changing and it somehow needs to make sense. So that was great to hear. One of the things I was very curious about and I really liked about you, even when we met for the first time, is moving from a financial career from a bank.
To art, which was, and this is art, which is actually painting on a canvas. How did that come about? Like, how did you think of making that move? What happened?
Sarah: Oh, how did that happen? I think actually I got inspired by, I was watching a movie what's that, Woody Allen movie with Penelope cruise.
You know that one, what's it
Sharad: And where they're Vicky Christina Barcelona.
Sarah: Christina Barcelona. That's the one I was watching. And there's this one scene where Penelope Cruise's character is in the backyard of her ex-husband and painting wildly. Like she's wearing these overalls and she is just painting freely in her hair. Then she just looks so fabulous and it looks amazing.
And I'm like, I wanna do that. So I went and bought a big canvas and some paint, and I just went in the backyard and started painting like that. And that's where it started. And from there, I was just always painting in the backyard and then I started with different techniques and I was watching things online and learning new techniques and eventually wanted to learn a little bit more.
And so when my sister was getting married in Italy, I stayed on a bit extra and did a course on art in Italy. And now I use my creativity, really a lot with the kids but when I have the time, I would love to get back into it. And it's something I just lose myself, lose all sense of time and it's a beautiful thing.
Sharad: Wow, it's beautiful. And I know the time that we met just before that, when you moved to Singapore and you'd moved single, and then painting was something you took homage in. And if you could talk a little bit about what was it like moving to Singapore the initial years and how did that experience go through?
Sarah: That was a very interesting time in my life because I was just coming out of a long term relationship. I'd always wanted to live overseas. It had been a dream I'd had, so it was like, okay, now's the moment. Like I'm free to go.
I could move with the company I was with. I pitched to them to get me a job over in Singapore and eventually that worked out. And the first six months were fabulous. Singapore. Oh, it was just so much fun to be had. And I had family here and friends here and went straight into having a friendship group and there's dinners every night.
It was just wonderful. But then after around six months I really hit a wall where suddenly I was. In a new country with a whole new culture to learn. I was single in my early thirties in a place where nearly everyone was married or at least in a serious relationship. There were not that many single people.
Many people are starting to have kids. I felt it was a bit of a sad time as well as being an adventurous time because I was travelling a lot and I was working hard and making great friends, but it was difficult. And I think about what I learned through that.
Stage is that when difficulties come and you're making an adjustment in your life and you're on a new path where you will hit roadblocks, you will hit difficulties. And for me, that was my time of difficulty. And for others you'll have your own. it's really worthwhile to sit in that for a while.
I made the decision that, okay, here I am, I'm not feeling so good every day. But I'm just gonna sit with this and I'm gonna do the work, whatever it takes, because I've been given this moment to really confront things that I wanna improve about myself. Things that I'm not happy about, any kind of shadow work.
Any kind of education I wanna get, and I wanna do that work. And so I did, and I would spend the evenings painting, I'd go to work through the day and then out for dinner at night with friends. And then at night my creativity switches on. At around 11:00 PM I'd be listening to Hanzi.
Up loud and this epic music and painting. And I just lose track of time. Could have been 10 minutes. It could have been three hours. I wouldn't have been able to tell you when I was in that kind of zone. That was very healing, it also really gave me a lot, gave me something. And so you've gotta find those things for yourself when you hit those dark patches that are.
Give you energy and make you feel like you're reconnecting with something really good within yourself. Because then once I came through that, I was just able to now create the life that we are living together. At the end of that road, I'd done that work probably took me six to 12 months. As I emerged, I suddenly felt ready for everything. And I started just putting it out there into the world with such clarity. I was saying to my friends, all right, now I'm ready to meet someone. Do you know anyone? And I said that to a small number of friends and one of them introduced me to you.
I was also ready to have a change in my career. So I was speaking to my mentor and saying to him, I'm ready for change. What's the next thing? And he encouraged me to do a FinTech course with MIT, which I absolutely loved. And then at the end of that, it was telling me he's creating a FinTech needs a co-founder CEO.
And did I know anyone? And I just said, me, I should do it. I'm ready. If I hadn't done that work, I wouldn't have been able to so clearly meet you and have, create this life together as well as go and make that big change in my career that was full on and needed me to be strong. I know it's never easy to be in that dark stage, but if you're there, then you will come through and when you come through, it will be something to look back on as being thankful that, okay, you were there and you'll learn all these things and now life can become closer to the dream life that you want.
Sharad: Thank you for describing that. Very few people talk about their dark stages, but like you said, you nested, you were isolated, you found painting that is something that helped you at that time helped you get your energy at that time. And you did that work. And once you are done, Time that's when you were at your best and you were ready for a relationship, you were ready for a new job, and then you brought your best self into it.
That is so awesome. And then of course, as serendipity hits, I had done my own work as well. And I remember I was coming out of ver pasta, which was meditation and I was ready for a relationship and we met each other and thank you to Lela who introduced us.
Sarah: You were very Zen. You were.
Sharad: I was very Zen. You were very. Energetic. If I could say you're ready to hit the world and it worked well, very nice to hear you talk about that. I think it's gonna be extremely useful to people that dark times do happen and we need to take time off. We need to do whatever we need to do, whatever works for us, and then we can emerge and go back to the world.
Sarah: I actually feel like every time of brilliance and pure joy has a corresponding time of darkness, because I feel like that's the balance of life then once you accept that, that's the case. It makes it easier to accept the dark time as it's happening.
Sharad: absolutely. We have to go through the darkness to be able to appreciate the light. Now, one of the things that one does when we move on from one experience to another and are reinventing ourselves, we often try to build off previous experiences versus starting a new one. How have you done that as you move to something new every three to four years.
Sarah: I think previous experiences are very important. For me, I haven't focused too much on that. Personally, the trick has been building new skills. I'm always looking for what's next. What's the new skill? I worry less about job titles. And I'm looking for what new ability can I get from this next opportunity?
And what's it going to bring into my life? I think it's just so good. The best thing ever is to just do anything new and do your very best at it when you do your best, it just attracts opportunity. It's like a magnet, it's like irresistible and there's many ways of doing this.
Education is one and I've leaned on that nearly every single change I've had, but volunteering and horizontal shifts at work are fabulous also.
I feel like we all get quite addicted to the progress of promotions and wanting the next job title, wanting the next grade, wanting the next pay rise.
It is very addictive. I've been there for sure. But if you can get out of that cycle a little and say, okay, how can I broaden my experience so that eventually I'm gonna make a two step change. That's something I've done a few times and it's been amazing because I've loved to just create new abilities, create new skills and you meet new people too, which is great.
Sharad: I love that. I love that mindset where it's not necessarily thinking about, “Hey, what experiences do I have and how do I leverage it?” It's a growth mindset. That's the way the growth mindset is defined where it's a learning mindset. You're looking at what skills can I build? What can I learn?
And whatever skills you've already had will always come into play. But if your mindset is looking ahead at what you can learn, which need not be going up the ladder. It could also be going sideways and width and breadth are also ways to learn skills.
Sarah: They'll come together.
Sharad: and they'll come together.
Sarah: One day they'll come together. You don't know how yet it's, it doesn't make sense yet. But one day you'll have such a range of skills and experience and knowledge and abilities and passions, and suddenly an opportunity will arise. And you'll just be able to step into that with a lot of confidence in a unique way that is unique just to you, because no one else has created those skills altogether.
Sharad: Absolutely. And that's the way Steve jobs also describes that the dots will connect and that speech of his, where he talks about he'd done a course in font, something to do with typography. And then when he was launching a Macintosh. He created a design oriented machine, which was because of the course he had done earlier and that helped him differentiate in the market.
So exactly what you said, you never know what the end purpose of what you're doing, but if you do it with the mindset of learning, the dots will connect at some stage and you'll be able to bring it all together in a very unique way, which no one else can do.
Sarah: Yeah. I never thought that you and I would be designing our own graphics and websites and visual assets and everything for our companies. I would've always, like if I would've always thought I would be outsourcing such a thing, but because of how much time I spent doing creative things, it built the muscle to be able to do all that visual work.
And then it was just so much fun, even that itself, learning new skills on how to build a website. You don't know how all these little things you're doing over the years, how they're going to play out and come together until eventually you're like, oh wow.
I can do that. Yeah. That's easy.
Sharad: That's such a great mindset to have, especially if you're reinventing and trying different things. From the sidelines, I've also noticed something which I really admire about you. There's so much, but one of the things that I really admire is your networking and getting the right mentors.
So if you can talk a little bit about how that works for your networking and mentorship and how should other people go about it?
Sarah: With every new stage or reinvention in my life I have leveraged my network and leaned into my network. At first, I didn't know I was doing it. It really was something that just came a bit naturally, but I became more mindful of it during my time with ANZ bank actually. Because what started happening is I really wanted to grow and there was this one project I was on where the executive was like super, super senior and very intimidating, very tall and very wise and smart and commercial and scary. And I, but I really looked up to this person I was speaking to a colleague and said, oh, I want to reach out, but I don't know. And she just said just ask or ask you not going to know, so that's what I did.
I just reached out and. I'd already worked with this person for a while, so they knew who I was and there was some connection there, but I just said, look, I really admire you, really look up to you. I'd love to know more about your career. How did you get to where you got to? And, I'll take you for a coffee for 20 minutes.
Anytime you say, I'll be there. I don't wanna take too much of your time. And I was just very respectful. Very humble. Show up on time and just be there and be ready. So that was something that I did. And I found that actually, and then it worked out and this person just gave me so much of their time and ended up really helping me and sponsoring me in my next moves in my career and everything.
And I just felt it was just so enjoyable, but I also realised it was enjoyable for them. I feel senior executives don't always get asked about their experience, their career because people are a little afraid of them. I realise. They were happy to share. Also, they've had so much experience and they wanna share their wisdom with someone who's willing to learn and someone who's keen to learn.
Once I realised that I started doing it very much. Mindfully and with intention and whenever I was ready for a change, I would really branch out and see who around me I thought was doing amazing things and I'd reach out to them or I'd ask for introductions and just be there and hear their sorry.
If it felt right and the moment felt right, I would ask at the end of the meetings, if there's anyone else I should be speaking to, or if there are any introductions they could make if I was on the cusp of change and I knew I was, I would also let them know and I'd say, look, I am ready for this change, and this is what I'm looking for.
So if you hear of any opportunities or do think of me and do keep me in mind. So actively building a network in that way is a lot of fun and it's something that I've enjoyed and done now throughout my career. And it's not always in this mentorship way. You can also do it peer to peer and build your peer network and have a community of people that you can lean on as you're going through your professional life.
And now for me, my mum's life has got a great community around me, of women. I just adore it. It's something that I think is very enriching.
Sharad: I love that especially that insight where these people who've done it all, they're happy to share. And if you go with a curious mindset to just understand how they've done, what they've done, that itself is something they'd be happy to do. Often for me I'm worried that I need to ask the right questions.
I need to ask something smart about myself and make that time useful. But I don't need to make it about myself. I can make it about them and just learn from them and be curious. And that's a great way to meet and learn from brilliant people. Who've walked the path before you. So thank you. That's a great insight for people as they're and that way you can build skills and knowledge about new spaces that you're getting into better than reading or any courses that give you real life experience.
Sarah: Yes, and can lead to real life opportunities. Like I can see the dominoes of my life and who those people are. One after the other, I see how those conversations and those connections led to the next thing. Because ultimately at the end of the day, it's mostly about people when it comes to professional life and personal life.
It's about connection. It's about people. So really leaning into that in a way that is intentional is what I would encourage.
Sharad: Absolutely. You never know what possibilities can arise. Now, one of the things that you've done well, like of course when we think of reinventing ourselves, sometimes we think we are just floating and doing many things. And you did say that the dots connect, but one of the things I've seen you do is despite reinventing and trying different things, you set a vision.
You set a place of where you want to get to you, put it out in the universe and that gives you a direction to move towards. Can you talk a little bit more about that?
Sarah: Yeah. I don't know who said this quote, but I love this. Start with the end in mind. Like you have to know your objective.
Sharad: Steve Covey. The seven habits of seven habits of highly effective people.
Sarah: Oh, I love that. That's where I got it. Okay. You have to know because, or else either you're gonna float around or other people are going to choose for you, so you need to choose your own destination.
one of the things I learned. I think probably my mom encouraged me to do dream work visualisation. So I've been doing this really since I was a teenager. I absolutely love it. I really enjoy it. Something so surprising happened very recently where I was back in Australia and I was cleaning out the story under my parents' house.
And I found my box of journals and I've been journaling since I was 13 years old. So I've got so many of them and I was just flicking through casually, like reliving the days. And I couldn't believe what I found. I am at the back of one of my journals. It was an old vision statement that I would've written around 20 years ago.
it just blew my mind because as I saw it, I remembered it, but I had forgotten about it this whole time. And it really blew my mind because the vision I had written in this long vision statement has now pretty much come to pass and it's taken all this time to get there, but. It was just wild.
It read something like Sarah's an international coach, helps hundreds of people around the globe achieve their goals, enjoys travel, lives the majority of the year in a beautiful house. The rest of the year, she travels with her husband and two children. I was like, oh my gosh. That is basically my life.
And I just couldn't believe it. So I think there's a lot to be said for setting your intention, having a vision, putting it into the world, putting it in writing, putting it into images, whatever works for you. For me both worked. I also remember doing a dream board, like a mood board where there were lots of photos from magazines of the life I wanted to be leading when I was all grown up, you know? So that's, What I made. I have no idea where that is now, but I can still see it. I know what those images were, that's the life I have now. It's just so powerful. So I really encourage people to spend the time thinking about what they want five, 10 years from now, and then do that work and put it into the world.
And don't, you don't have to show anyone. Doesn't have to be for anyone else just for you, but you'll know, and subconsciously your work towards it. Even if you forget that statement consciously you'll know, deep down what that dream is. Oh actually let me just get this book. There's this thing I wanna read. So one of my favourite books is The Alchemist. I read it probably once a year or once every two years. It's so amazing. So there's this passage I love. Where is it? Here? It is. Okay. Everyone when they are young knows what their personal legend is at that point in their lives, everything is clear and everything is possible.
They are not afraid to dream and to yearn for everything they would like to see happen to them in their lives. But as time passes, a mysterious force begins to convince them that it was impossible for them to realise their personal legend. To realise one's destiny is a person's only real obligation and people are capable at any time in their lives of doing what they dream of. I love that.
Sharad: I think that is beautiful. That is beautiful.
Sarah: It was a great book.
Sharad: Absolutely, Alchemist is a great book. And like you said that life comes in the way as you get older limiting beliefs come. And we forget our dreams and being able to put it out early in life somehow stays with us in the subconscious and we may not realise it, but maybe 20 years later, 30 years later, we might be living that dream because of what we put out there.
Sarah: And doing the exercise routinely, it can be done on a small scale from one job to the next, and it can be done on a big scale. With life. And I'm at a point now where I'm now living the life I dreamed of 20 years ago. So I'm at a point where very soon I'm gonna need to do it again. Because what does the next 20 years look like?
There was this other analogy I heard I have no idea where, but it stuck with me something around this tree where say you are driving along a highway.
And rather than looking at the road, you're looking off in the distance to the right, at a tree. Eventually you're gonna start veering the car towards that tree and go off track. Having that vision statement or having something around you that keeps the dream in plain sight, it would just help you to course correct every so often.
Cuz the veering is gonna happen in life. We all get busy and things happen, distractions and challenges and that's natural, but just to keep course. Correct. So eventually you will land closer to where you were hoping.
Sharad: and this becomes even more important when you're reinventing and doing different things and then you have that vision that you're working towards. You've done so many roles and one of the latest roles that you're doing right now is a mother and you've taken on that role wholeheartedly.
And luckily you've had the luxury where you can do that. So if you can talk a little bit about this role and how it's been different from all the other roles that you've.
Sarah: Ah, oh my girls. Ugh. , they're so cute. Oh, it's the best. It's the hardest, most challenging thing I've ever done. Because it matters to the heart more than anything else, and it's tiring. But my gosh, the love that we get from them, it's just the best thing I've ever done. I now can barely remember life before having our girls because they have enriched our day.
So fully. We are so busy and there's just so many moments of love and tenderness and fun and playfulness. They bring out your inner child. They also, I feel, becoming a parent forces you to confront your own stuff. I want to, I don't want to carry over any of my own personal baggage or stuff onto them or into their life.
I wanna minimise that so that they can just build from their own foundations of love and safety and build their own story and life. So I'm having to do my own work, if I'm rubbing up against things we both are, that's been a good opportunity and being a bit older, having the kids a bit older, I think has led to a lot of the ability to do that work.
We're not in our early twenties. Just figuring out who we are, we know who we are, but we also have been through life.
Sharad: Absolutely. Absolutely. It's been, for me on the other side, fatherhood. I always thought, Hey, let the kids grow up and then I'll get involved. But I think these initial few years, however difficult they are, they're very rewarding as well. I'm with you. When you're actually looking at them, you have to be more conscious of yourself and that's the work we all need to
Sarah: Yeah.
Yeah. It's amazing. And it's so good because I feel you will grow through that process. Also as an individual, like parent parenthood is a new job and it's one we're not prepared for. No one goes to school and learns how to be a parent. Yet we get all this training for everything else in life, even driving, you have to do some kind of course or something.
Parenthood, there's no preparation. And yet it's the greatest responsibility. When you bring home, there's tiny little infants that can do nothing without you. You suddenly get a sense of the bigger meaning of life
Sharad: absolutely. Now, as we close this out, I'd love to get what's the one piece of advice you'd give to folks who are looking to reinvent themselves change, careers, change tracks. What's the one piece of advice you'd give them?
Sarah: It's never too late. It doesn't matter how old you are. And it doesn't matter. The background and the life you've lived. It's just never too late. You can always start at some point to pursue what fires you up, even if it's as a side project or as a hobby or as a new skill or or just being around other people that are in that space.
I love a quote from I think it's Earl Knighting Gail that said, “Never give up on a dream just because of the time it will take to accomplish it because the time will pass anyway.” So the time of life will pass anyway. So you may as well just chip away at it bit by bit. And then those dots will come together and then suddenly something will happen and things will come together.
So that's what I would encourage people to do.
Sharad: That is so good. Because very often when we are even older, we have a range of skills that become available to us as we are shifting tracks and trying something new. So it's very empowering for people to know that. I have time for one more question, and that's the question I ask everyone at the end of your life, how would you know, you've lived a good life?
Sarah: If I've loved and been loved. Think that's it. How I all know I've lived a good life. If I've given lots of love to the people in my life. If I've given lots of love to any of the projects I've worked on, if I've received love in return and. It really comes down to family. Now for me, like family's the number one thing, and to be surrounded by my family and close friends and have them in my life and have my children in my life, then I think that's to me, everything now.
So that would be a good life.
Sharad: And you're on your way. Thank you, Sarah,
for such a wonderful conversation. I thought it'll feel weird. Yeah. I thought it'll feel weird. It didn't maybe at times it did, but overall it didn't and loved talking with you and loved. I got to know a little bit more about you. To be honest, there are lots in there that I knew.
But I got to know a little bit more and hopefully people who know you will also get to know a little bit more about you.
So thank you very much.
Sarah: Thanks for the opportunity to share. It's been wonderful. Really wonderful talking all of this with you. Thank you so much.
Thank you, Sarah, for such an inspirational, engaging conversation. I love the visual. You described Penelope Cruz painting in a garden, which inspired you to paint. It's so true. Sometimes certain visuals touch us so deeply that they bring out something in us that has been silent for way too long.
Here's one action step we could all consider. What's an area in life you've secretly wanted to pursue but have put away for some reason or the other?
What about it excites you? Is there an image or energy about it that motivates you? What skill can you develop by pursuing it? How can it help you grow? What holds you back from taking your first. And in what way can you pursue it now or in the near future?
Take some time, find a quiet spot, and enjoy this exercise. Another action you could consider is writing a vision statement for yourself. If you enjoy this episode, you could consider listening to episode two where we talk about achievement versus fulfilment. That's it for today's episode. I hope you enjoyed it.
We will be back with another episode two weeks from now on December 20th. Hope you join us for that. Till next time, have a wonderful day ahead. Bye bye.