Are you ready to press reset?

Find Your Superpower newsletter 102

Read time: 5 minutes

Topics covered: Career transition, professional growth, identity shift, Brand Builder Mastermind

Have you felt stuck or restless lately?

Have you felt quietly disconnected from the successful career you built?

I know this terrain intimately, having made a few career transitions myself from university professor to communication agency boss, and now to branding and storytelling coach.

It wasn’t just about mustering the courage to submit a resignation letter and let 15 years of scientific training the US and the UK go to naught. I had to question my entire professional identity, reimagine a brave new future, and find a way to translate my existing skills into a completely different niche.

That journey, with all of its uncertainty, fear and reward, mirrors the journey many of my clients go through. In my VIP Brand Builder Mastermind, I work with many industry experts who are contemplating or undergoing a career transition themselves. 

In fact, some of them have since left their previous careers after joining my Mastermind (correlation or causation!?). I personally believe they already had that seed of an idea in their mind, but joining my Mastermind also gave them fresh perspectives, a newfound sense of confidence, and superhero new skills. All of that, plus the support of ~200 Mastermind members.

This is the structured framework and supportive community I wish I had seven years ago when I resigned from my university job.

How do you know what to change or where to change?

Contrary to what social media tells you, pressing reset doesn’t need to be dramatic. You don’t have to sell your apartment, break up with your partner, quit your job, or move to Bali.

The “burn it all down” narrative persists because it is what we read about on social media. But these stories rarely reflect the messy reality of how change occurs.

A simple way to start the process of change is to notice where the friction is.

Friction is your gut, your inner voice, your instinct highlighting misalignments between who you were and who you’re becoming. Instead of ignoring these signals, get curious about them. For example, you could ask yourself:

• What drains you that used to excite you? What tasks or responsibilities that once excited you now leave you depleted?
• What do you feel obligated to perform? Where do you feel you’re maintaining appearances rather than expressing authenticity?
• Where do you find yourself shrinking to fit?  In what situations do you find yourself maintaining a professional identity that feels increasingly constraining?

In my case, I first observed this friction as energy depletion rather than clear dissatisfaction. I noticed that I was exhausted by activities that once energized me (such as troubleshooting failed scientific experiments), and that I needed increasingly longer recovery periods after completing major projects (such as submitting a research paper for peer review). I found myself dreading opening my email inbox. I found myself showing up for work feeling tired and uncreative.

It really didn’t help that I had two babies at home under three years old. That said, when I started my own business in 2018, I found Mondays to be my favorite day of the week, and I gained a newfound sense of energy, babies or no babies.

Hindsight is 20/20, and only many years later was I able to connect these physical and emotional signals and realize how this friction was nudging me to press reset.

The reset starts with accepting yourself 

I believe that the very recognition that something needs to change is itself the beginning of change. It suggests that your awareness is awakening. Just to be clear:

• No, you’re not a failure
• No, you’re not depressed (or in my case, postnatally depressed)
• No, you’re not having a midlife crisis

American psychologist Carl Rogers once wrote that “the curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change.” For real growth and transformation to take place, we have to first accept ourselves fully and completely, which may feel paradoxical at first.

This acceptance includes acknowledging that you’ve outgrown a version of yourself that may still look successful from the outside.

Honestly speaking, pressing reset isn’t about finding a job or a new career. It’s about reclaiming the right to realize the full potential of who you could possibly be.

And if that feels scary, good. That means it’s real. That fear suggests that you are about to stretch yourself beyond the familiar.

As one of my favorite thinkers Brené Brown notes, the emotional terrain of growth always includes vulnerability and authenticity (and even shame). The question isn’t how to avoid fear (and shame) but how to be comfortable with its presence and move forward alongside it.

My own transition from science to communication and branding wasn’t something I did overnight. It involved a gradual shift that began with finding industry mentors, testing new ideas, building skills in my new niche while still employing my scientific background, and slowly expanding my new professional identity alongside my established one. Today, I bring the best of my past (my scientific training, evidence-based approaches, rigorous data analysis) into my work with clients navigating their own career transitions.

Over the next few Find Your Superpower newsletters, I plan on delving into the psychology of identity and change. We’ll question limiting beliefs that might be keeping you stuck. And we’ll look at how to build a coherent professional narrative and personal brand that integrates your past, present and exciting future.

But it all begins inside of you: the honest recognition that you’re ready for change. This journey will ask much of you but also offer profound rewards.

Welcome to your reset.

Ready to press reset?

For those looking to press reset this year, consider joining the June 2025 intake of my Brand Builder Mastermind when we next open enrollment on Wednesday, 14 May (Waitlist here).

In my 12-month VIP program, I provide a structured framework to help you:

✅ Build a powerful brand
✅ Learn to speak confidently
✅ Learn to write high value content
✅ Monetize your skills & expertise

Every week, without fail, my clients get featured on LinkedIn News highlights, receive keynote speaker invites, and win professional opportunities they never could dream of before. PS: I have the receipts if you want them.

Over 200 professionals are inside.

Come for the content, stay for the community.

Rooting for you,
Juliana your rocketship captain 🚀 

PS: Happy Mother’s Day to all the moms reading this!