This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Renee Devore. It has been edited for length and clarity.
In 2022, I was working in Anthropologie in the mall when a woman approached me, looking surprised, and asked me why I was working in retail. She recognized me from my previous life as the principal at her child’s school.
“I’m not a principal anymore,” I told her, smiling.
I had worked in education for 25 years before I decided to give it up to pursue what was next, not knowing what that next was.
I followed my dad’s footsteps
Growing up, my dad was a teacher. A there weren’t many other options I knew of when it came to the career I would have, I decided to follow in his footsteps.
By 21, I had graduated from college and started teaching. Within three years, I wanted to try something else other than teaching, feeling it wasn’t right for me. I moved to San Diego and very quickly found that teaching was better than the jobs I was being offered — jobs that would land me behind a desk. I resorted to teaching again.
Although I’d made the decision to keep teaching, I sought adventure in traveling to new places, exploring worlds that were unknown to me, where I felt slightly out of my comfort zone.
After getting my master’s degree, I applied for an assistant principal role in a suburb of Los Angeles and got it at the age of 32. A year later, I became a principal. That goal I had made for myself at 17 — to pursue a career in education administration — had been fulfilled.
I felt like I had no support
I was leading thousands of high-achieving people, allowed ample creativity to build and develop the school and community. But when I changed school districts, around the same time my dad died, it felt like my walls started caving in.
Although I was capable, there was no one developing me or supporting me to stay afloat. I wasn’t the person the job expected me to be. I was bubbly, kind, creative, and a peacemaker. But that isn’t the person I was when I was working. I was wearing a mask all the time. It was exhausting.
In 2017, and 10 years into my leadership career, I went to Mexico for a short vacation. I met a man there who had taken a three-month hiatus from work without pay. I was jealous and returned to work asking people if it would be crazy if I did the same. No one thought it sounded crazy.
I sold my condo, car, all furniture, and all my clothes, and went to find myself and what I’d do next in Puerto Vallarta. Today, this isn’t so unusual, but hardly anyone was doing this kind of thing then.
I had a panic attack
I had high expectations for what would happen in Mexico, thinking I would come back knowing what my next steps were. That didn’t happen. Although it was a peaceful year of painting (a new hobby I had picked up), I didn’t have clarity and came home at the end of a year, back to education. I felt like I was stuck in a box, that teaching and education administration was all that I could do.
After a year of being back in the education world, I had a panic attack. It felt like having a heart attack or stroke. I had no idea what was going on. I phoned my therapist, bringing her out of retirement. She helped calm me down and we decided together that I would take FMLA for a month and figure out what was next.
During that month, I knew there was no way I could carry on in that job. I told my boss I wouldn’t be coming back, finishing in June 2022. There was no plan. There was no inkling of what I should do next. There was no partner to provide financially.
I just knew I could never go back to feeling trapped, to that pressure, to wearing a mask to work every single day. I was done.
I had my 401(k), I had some savings. But most importantly, I knew I would figure things out. I had figured things out before, and I would do it again.
I went to the mall to get a job
My first job was at Anthropologie. I walked into the mall two months after I ended my 25-year career and asked to see the manager. I awkwardly said to her that I had just left my career as a principal. She asked if I was looking for a job.
“Yes,” I said. “I guess I am.”
She told me I had to apply online and two weeks later I started working part-time at Anthropologie, a store I loved and had frequented weekly for years.
Working there become a chance for stillness, for me to settle. My identity didn’t need to be wrapped up in my title as principal or in my salary. I learned there that I was enough — just me.
For months, I allowed my nervous system a chance to settle, to decompress. I worked a job which wasn’t intense. I played. I had fun.
It took a long time — more than a year — but I finally decided on what was next, which ended up being a mix of life coaching, motivational speaking, and owning my own business.
That unravelling after such a long, intense career doesn’t happen overnight, at least it didn’t for me. But once it did, I could finally see where I wanted to go and what I wanted to do.
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