My real story of building a second career from scratch—and the steps that actually helped.

I was a wedding photographer for 10 years. Then the world shut down.

No more bookings. No more deposits. No backup plan. Just me, a camera bag collecting dust, and a lot of time to think.

It would be easy to say the pandemic made me change careers. But the truth is, it just gave me the space to admit I was already ready. I had been running on burnout for years—missing weekends, missing time with family, pouring everything into a job that gave me beautiful memories but left little room for the rest of my life.

What came next wasn’t a magical pivot or an overnight success. It was terrifying. Career switching—especially when you’re changing industries entirely—can feel like staring down a long, foggy road into nowhere. 

There’s no map. No signs. Just you, your doubts, and the question: Now what?

The Life I Built Was Beautiful. It Also Broke Me.

There’s something quietly terrifying about realizing the career you’ve spent a decade building isn’t going to carry you any further.

I had been a wedding photographer for 10 years. I built a reputation. I got to travel, work with incredible clients, and be part of the most important days of people’s lives. It was creative. It was emotional. It was everything I thought I wanted.

And then, for the first time in years, everything stopped. The weddings. The travel. The urgency. And in that stillness, I had to face a truth I’d been pushing down for a while: I didn’t want to go back.

Even if the world reopened tomorrow, I didn’t want to keep doing this. I was tired. Burned out. And I wanted something more stable—something that didn’t leave me feeling like I had to give away pieces of myself to make a living.

I wasn’t looking for something better. I was looking for something different.  I wanted work that left room for the rest of me. For family. For weekends. For a version of myself that wasn’t always stretched thin.

But realizing you want to change your career and actually doing it are two very different things. 

It Felt Like Looking Into the Abyss

Let’s be honest—career switching can feel like standing at the edge of a cliff. You can’t see the bottom. You don’t know where it leads. And jumping means leaving behind everything that’s familiar, even if it’s no longer working for you.

That’s where I was. I didn’t know how to talk about my experience outside of photography. I didn’t have a degree in anything “relevant.” I wasn’t 22 and fresh out of school. I was 30, with bills to pay and no clear next step.

And yet—I knew I had more to offer. I just needed to figure out what that more looked like.

Step 1: Take Inventory of Who You Are

The first thing I did was brutally simple. I sat down and made a list. Not of jobs. Not of industries. Of me.

• What am I good at?
  
  

• What do I like doing?
  
  

• What drains me?
  
  

• What energizes me?
  
  

• What do people come to me for help with?
  
  

• What kind of problems do I like solving?
  

Then I started writing down job titles that seemed remotely interesting. I wasn’t picky. I just let myself imagine.

Then I cross-referenced. What roles overlapped with my skills and interests? Where were there patterns? For me, that pointed to marketing.

It made sense—I liked storytelling, problem solving, psychology, data, and creativity. I’d already run my own business, written my own content, built my own brand. I just didn’t know how to talk about it in “corporate” terms yet.

Step 2: Learn Like It’s Your Job (Because It Kind Of Is)

Once I landed on marketing, I knew I couldn’t walk into interviews with just a portfolio of pretty photos. I needed fluency. I needed context. I needed proof I was serious.

So I turned my curiosity into action. I:

• Taught myself HubSpot and got certified
  
  

• Took free Google Analytics and Google Ads courses
  
  

• Read marketing books—consumer psychology, brand theory, copywriting, growth hacking, all of it
  
  

• Studied content from people actually working in the field, not just textbook theory
  

I treated this phase like a second job. Nights, weekends, early mornings. Not because someone told me to, but because I wanted this. And if I was going to convince someone to take a chance on me, I had to take that chance on myself first.

Step 3: Swallow Your Pride. Get In the Room.

This is the part no one likes to talk about. I applied for an internship. At 30. After a decade of being a business owner.

It was a hit to the ego, sure. But I knew I needed something on paper that signaled “I’m serious about this career.” I needed to get in the room.

That internship gave me exposure. It gave me a manager who mentored me. It gave me language—how to talk about metrics, how to pitch ideas, how to present myself not as someone “new to marketing,” but as someone who had been marketing differently all along.

And it gave me the chance to prove myself. To show I could take initiative, learn fast, and deliver.

Step 4: Stay Hungry and Ask Better Questions

From there, I didn’t coast. I stayed curious. I asked questions. I watched how senior marketers made decisions. I read the briefs they wrote and the decks they presented. I said yes to projects that scared me. And I started carving out a place for myself—not just as a former photographer trying to “make it,” but as a marketer with a point of view.

Eventually, I landed my first full-time role. Then another. And now I work in strategy, digital marketing, and content creation—building campaigns that drive real results.

I’m not an intern anymore. I’m not a “former photographer.” I’m a professional who rebuilt their career from the ground up. And I wouldn’t trade that journey for anything.

I Cried. I Doubted. I Almost Gave Up.

Let’s not skip past the hard parts.

There were days I felt like an imposter, like I was pretending to belong in rooms I hadn’t “earned” my way into. There were moments I stared at job postings and thought, Who am I kidding? They’re never going to hire me. There were nights I cried on the couch because I didn’t get the interview. Or the offer. Or the reply.

There were times I seriously considered giving up and going back to what I knew. Not because I wanted to—but because it was easier.

The truth is, I was proud of my work as a wedding photographer. I met incredible people. I captured joy for a living. It was creative, personal, and deeply human. That job gave me more than a paycheck—it gave me stories, friendships, and unforgettable moments.

But over time, the life around the work started to wear me down.

I worked while everyone else rested. While the people I cared about were together on weekends, I was hauling gear into another venue. I lived in hotel rooms. I spent so much time in airports that I forgot what it felt like to stay anywhere. I’d wake up on planes, unsure of which city I had just landed in. The chaos became normal—and that scared me.

I wasn’t chasing a better title. I was chasing time. Presence. A schedule that didn’t leave me straddling two worlds—one where I built my career, and one where I actually got to live.

So I made the choice to want something else. Not because what I had wasn’t good—but because I was ready for a different kind of good.

And here’s what I’ve learned:

You can be grateful for the life you had, and still be ready to leave it. 

You can respect what it gave you and still want something else. That isn’t failure. That’s growth.

When the ache for change gets louder than the fear of starting over, that’s your signal.

Listen to it.

So If You're Thinking About Switching Careers,  Here's My Advice:

1. No one’s coming to hand you the answers—start anyway.
Your dream job won’t knock on your door. You have to go after it. That doesn’t mean having it all figured out—it just means picking a starting point. List your skills. Name the roles you’re curious about. Find the overlap. Then move. Clarity comes from doing, not waiting.

2. You are allowed to start small.
Taking an internship or entry-level job isn’t “beneath” you. It’s a bridge. Use it.

3. You are not behind.
I started this journey at 30. You might be 25. Or 40. Or 60. The timeline doesn’t matter. What matters is that you want it—and that you’re willing to work for it.

4. Learn like you’ve got something to prove—because you do.
You don’t need a degree. But you do need fluency. Learn the tools. Learn the lingo. Learn how to frame your experience in the context of the job you want.

5. Your past experience isn’t holding you back—it’s what sets you apart.
I didn’t erase my years as a photographer. I leveraged them. I talked about brand-building, client experience, campaign execution, and content. Everything I did translated—I just had to change the language.

Start With Curiosity. Build From There.

These steps didn’t come to me all at once. I didn’t wake up one day with a plan—I built it slowly, from curiosity, trial and error, and a whole lot of Googling. If you’re at the beginning of your own career pivot and you have no idea where to start, here are a few things that helped me get unstuck:

• Look at people who already have the job you want.
  Search for them on LinkedIn. Study their titles, skills, and certifications. How do they describe their path? What tools or experience show up over and over? Use that as a blueprint—not to copy, but to guide where you focus your energy.
  
  

• Follow thought leaders in the space you're exploring.
  People who write, speak, or post about the work you want to do can teach you a lot—about trends, tools, challenges, and language. The more you immerse yourself, the more familiar the space starts to feel.
  
  

• Make a short list of skills you already have—and what you need to learn.
  You don’t need to start from zero. List out what you’re bringing with you, and get honest about where the gaps are. Then start filling them, one piece at a time.
  
  

• Get hands-on, even if it’s unofficial.
  Build a portfolio. Volunteer. Create a personal project. Experience—even unpaid—helps you practice the work, speak the language, and show proof of what you’re capable of.

• Translate your past experience into new language.
  You likely already have transferable skills—you just need to reframe them. Think about how what you’ve done maps to what you want to do. Client management becomes stakeholder communication. Creative direction becomes brand strategy. It’s all about learning to speak the language of the job you want.
  
  

• Pick one skill and go deep.
  Don’t try to learn everything at once. Choose one tool, one certification, or one core area of knowledge to focus on. That first bit of fluency builds confidence—and gives you something concrete to show in interviews, portfolios, or your resume.

The Hardest Part Isn’t the Learning. It’s the Leap.

There’s something we don’t say enough: It’s okay to love what you used to do. And it’s okay to want something else now.

You’re not betraying your past by choosing a different future. You’re honoring how much you’ve grown.

That was the hardest part for me—accepting that both things could be true at once. That I could be proud of the career I had, and still want a new one. That I could carry everything I learned with me, even while letting the rest go.

Switching careers doesn’t require perfection. It doesn’t require certainty. What it does require is the courage to try. To start small. To learn loudly. To take everything you’ve built in one part of your life and find new ways for it to matter.

If you’re standing where I once stood—tired, uncertain, curious, and maybe a little bit afraid—I want you to know this: it’s not too late. You’re not too far behind. You’re not making it up. You’re building something real.

Give yourself the room to fail. Give yourself the room to fly. You won’t get either unless you take a step off that cliff. But once you do, you’ll realize—you were always capable of the landing. You just hadn’t met that version of yourself yet.

And I promise, they’re worth meeting.