If you love your work, if you enjoy it, you’re already a success.

I first met Sharon Hulce when she was twenty-six years old. She was working as a district manager in the state of Wisconsin for a women’s clothing company headquartered in North Carolina. I was brought in to work with ten “high potentials” — performers that the company felt had all the right stuff, were performing well, but given some extra coaching and mentoring could really transform their business.

I spent three days with this group. Sharon was a standout, but not because she was the most polished. In fact, she was pretty green. But she had heart. She had tenacity. She had that desire to win.

I lost track of that group. It wasn’t until many years later that I would hear the impact of my work.

Fast-forward twenty years, I learn that Sharon had a goal to share her knowledge of the phenomenon I have now come to know as “A Well Done Professional Midlife Crisis” via writing a book. She had been writing this book for about five years and was seeking knowledge and inspiration on getting it done.

Once a year I conduct a four-course Train the Trainer (TTT) program where we coach individuals who are looking to launch a writing and speaking career. Unbeknownst to me, Sharon and I would meet again, with her as a TTT participant.

It wasn’t until the second session of TTT that Sharon “reintroduced” herself to me. I learned that the group I had coached and mentored in North Carolina all ended up in the top ten in the country the next year, with Sharon landing in the number one spot. Sharon also shared how the impact of the advice I gave on “Everything you want is on the other side of fear” transformed her life. Sharon absorbed that, and as she matured into her forties, she acted on that advice.

A Well Done Professional Midlife Crisis is a culmination of a lifetime of work for Sharon and her team. They truly understand the impact that passion and happiness have on a career. Anyone who works with people can attest to witnessing when leaders or teammates become disengaged in their careers. They have lost the passion they once had, and they struggle to figure out how to get that energy and passion back in their work lives. Monday mornings become unbearable. We now have a practical book to change that.

After reading Sharon’s book, I can tell you that throughout my whole career I have witnessed people in their professional midlife crises. From all outward appearances, they have been wildly successful. They have nice homes and cars and provide a wonderful lifestyle for their family. But I also have seen this inner sadness that Sharon explains in the book. More often than not, it is the guilt they feel for being so inwardly focused that holds them in this pattern. My TTT classes are filled with these very people.

Let this book serve as your launching pad to thinking about all the options available to you to bring passion and energy back into your career. As you are about to see, Sharon leaves no stone unturned, and the journey is a thoughtful one.

— Jack Canfield,
coauthor of the Chicken Soup for the Soul™ series and author of The Success Principles™: How to Get from Where You Are to Where You Want to Be