Career Congregation: Stories of Reinvention

Ep. 52 - Career Change, Entrepreneurship & Finding Work That Fits, feat. Jeff Shafritz, Strategic Franchise Advisor

In this week’s episode, Meghan is joined by Jeff Shafritz, Strategic Franchise Advisor, founder of Franchise Guidance, and franchise consultant with FranChoice. With more than thirty years of experience in franchising, Jeff has worked across multiple sides of the industry, leading franchise development for major brands, owning and successfully exiting a top-performing fitness franchise, and advising hundreds of executives, investors, and career changers exploring business ownership. What emerges throughout the conversation is a broader discussion about how people define success and the assumptions many of us carry about work. For some, success means financial freedom. For others, it means flexibility, autonomy, family time, or the opportunity to build something of their own. Jeff argues that many career decisions go wrong when people chase status, prestige, or someone else's definition of success instead of understanding what genuinely matters to them. The discussion challenges the common belief that passion alone should determine career choices. Sometimes the activities we love most are better left as hobbies, while the most fulfilling careers emerge from understanding our strengths, preferred lifestyle, and the way we want to spend our days. Rather than asking what industry sounds exciting, Jeff encourages people to think carefully about how they actually want to work and live. There is also a thoughtful exploration of career reinvention. Jeff reflects on the unexpected twists that shaped his own path, including a major setback following the economic disruption of 9/11, when he found himself unemployed, raising a young family, and forced to reconsider his future. What initially appeared to be a professional crisis ultimately became the turning point that led him to the work he still does today. The conversation also looks at entrepreneurship through a more realistic lens. Rather than glamourising business ownership, Meghan and Jeff discuss the trade-offs involved, the importance of understanding your motivations, and why self-awareness often matters more than the business model itself. Whether someone is considering a franchise, a side business, or an entirely new career path, the principles remain remarkably similar: know yourself, understand your priorities, and build around the life you actually want. This episode explores career change, entrepreneurship, work-life balance, self-employment, family priorities, resilience, and the practical realities of building a career that aligns with your values rather than external expectations. It is a reminder that fulfilling work rarely arrives through a perfect plan. More often, it develops through curiosity, experimentation, and the willingness to follow opportunities that initially make very little sense. CONNECT WITH JEFF: Website: franchiseguidance.comEmail: jeff@franchiseguidance.comLinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/franchiseguidance Chapters: 00:00 Following unexpected career paths 12:00 Passion versus practicality in career decisions 28:00 Entrepreneurship, franchises and work-life balance 51:00 Career rock bottoms and rebuilding after setbacks 01:00:00 Lessons from the pandemic and adapting to change WORK WITH MEGHAN: If you are interested in working with Meghan 1:1, you can book an intro call with her here: https://app.paperbell.com/checkout/packages/223411 [https://app.paperbell.com/checkout/packages/166602] GUEST SUBMISSIONS: If you think you know someone who would make a great guest, email Meghan at: hello@meghanfitzpatrick.com [hello@meghanfitzpatrick.com] SUPPORT THE SHOW: If you’d like to support the show and the work of Career Congregation, you can do so here: https://ko-fi.com/meghanfitzpatrick [https://ko-fi.com/meghanfitzpatrick] Keywords: Career, Career change, Career transition, Entrepreneurship, Entrepreneur, Business ownership, Franchising, Franchise business, Self-employment, Work-life balance, Purpose, Fulfilling work, Coaching, Mentor, Personal development, Motivation, Authentic career paths, Money, Resilience, Small business, Side hustles © Copyright Meghan Fitzpatrick 2026

Endings are beginnings. Starting over. Season 3 opener with Meghan.

Welcome to season 3 of Career Congregation! In this opening episode, Meghan looks at the power of starting over, and how it's never too late to change course. Reflecting on the previous 2 seasons, Meghan draws on the theme of reinvention and how inner child work can help you reconnect with your true passions – in life and career. Meghan looks at her own personal journey, especially over the past year, and reflecting on the guests stories over the past 50 episodes. How major setbacks—whether losing a job, relocating, or hitting a personal low—often unlocks the door to a more authentic and joy-filled life. In this episode, Meghan uncovers the hidden opportunities behind these pivotal moments. She shares her own journey of transformation—moving (again), being in nature, shedding layers of doubt and more. All the stories reinforcing that it’s never too late to start again. She emphasises: your ‘end’ is almost always the beginning of something extraordinary and new. Key Insights: * How reconnecting with childhood passions and inner joy can guide your new path * The common patterns behind reinventions—from heartbreak to relocation—and how to leverage them * Reconnecting with your inner child to unlock clarity and confidence * Embracing change in a world that rewards stability * Why fear and skepticism are just signs you’re on the verge of your next big chapter Whether you're contemplating a career switch, navigating a personal crisis, or looking for some inspiration, this season will offer many stories of reinvention to inspire you. Meghan’s insights equip you to see setbacks not as failures, but as ground for growth. WORK WITH MEGHAN: If you are interested in working with Meghan 1:1, book an intro call with her here: https://app.paperbell.com/checkout/packages/166602 GUEST SUBMISSIONS: email Meghan at hello@meghanfitzpatrick.com SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://ko-fi.com/meghanfitzpatrick Reinvention, inner child, career transformation, personal growth, starting over, authentic life, overcoming setbacks, embracing change, new beginnings, and life journey. © Copyright Meghan Fitzpatrick 2026

50. Career Congregation feat. Tori DaCosta, Business Owner & Bestselling Author: From Identity Shocks to Empowerment

This week guest Tori DaCosta joins host Meghan Fitzpatrick for episode 50 of Career Congregation, the season two finale. Tori is the bestselling author of No Name Bastard: How Our Lives Teach Us What We Can Control, Manage and Influence; she is also a Fortune 50 business leader, executive coach, and founder of Journey Stone LLC. Meghan and Tori look at identity, purpose-driven work, and what alignment actually feels like in practice. They also explore trust and stillness in decision making, processing emotions versus bottling them up, and what it takes to write the kind of book that changes how people see their own lives. Main Topics Covered: Personal development, how life's hardest moments can serve as the biggest catalysts for growth and purpose, the emotional process of letting go of pain, listening to life's "whispers", mental health, emotional processing, self-awareness, the power of storytelling and writing as a method of healing, and the significance of alignment and pursuing what energises you. CONNECT WITH TORI: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/toridacosta/ Instagram & Facebook: @ToriDaCostaLeadership Website: www.journeystone.com BUY HER BOOK: Hardcover: https://a.co/d/05gcgbCL Kindle: https://a.co/d/0e0FdEwE Audiobook: Audible | Spotify | Apple Books | Barnes & Noble | Libro.fm | Chirp WORK WITH MEGHAN: If you are interested in working with Meghan 1:1, you can book an intro call with her here: https://app.paperbell.com/checkout/packages/166602 GUEST SUBMISSIONS: If you think you know someone who would make a great guest on the show, feel free to email Meghan at hello@meghanfitzpatrick.com SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://ko-fi.com/meghanfitzpatrick KEYWORDS: Career, career change, career transition, personal development, mental health, purpose, fulfilling work, motivation, entrepreneurship, coaching, mentor, authentic career paths, rock bottom, personal narrative, building a brand, long-term growth, success stories, inspiring careers, burnout, therapy, identity, forgiveness, self-awareness, emotional resilience, executive coaching, work-life balance Timestamps: (00:00) - Intro to Tori da Costa and her book's significance (01:38) - How the podcast became an anchor and reflection space (04:33) - Cultural background and early influences (06:36) - Hardships shaping personal growth (07:16) - The story behind her unexpected name reveal (09:50) - Discovering her father’s last name and identity shock (11:16) - Emotional response to identity revelations (16:36) - Moving from pain to forgiveness and letting go (26:19) - The healing power of sharing vulnerable stories (32:43) - The first "whisper" to write her book (57:04) - Embracing challenges and growth through adversity (58:35) - The importance of living aligned with your purpose (61:10) - How to connect with Tori and purchase the book © Copyright Meghan Fitzpatrick 2026

49. Career Congregation Solo Episode with Meghan Fitzpatrick: Intuitive Whispers, Expats or Immigrants, and Trusting the Journey

In this solo episode, Meghan reflects on her journey over the past year and the quieter instincts that can shape major life decisions long before they make logical sense. Meghan speaks about the reality of living through the uncertainty of career and relocation decisions in real time. Leaving London, restructuring her business, reconnecting with Europe through Ireland, and exploring the possibility of building a life in Portugal. All things that required movement on her part, long before certainty existed. The episode explores what it means to follow something instinctive while still navigating fear, bureaucracy, financial pressure, and the realities of starting over again. There is also a strong focus on the emotional side of relocation. Not the romanticised version often presented online, but the administrative exhaustion, the waiting, the loneliness, and the repeated experience of rebuilding the basics from scratch. Meghan reflects on the strange position many internationally mobile people occupy, existing between countries, cultures, and identities while trying to create a sense of home. The conversation also examines the language around migration itself. Meghan unpacks her complicated relationship with the word “expat”, having lived as both an American immigrant in the UK and now both a British and American immigrant relocating again within Europe. Rather than offering simplistic conclusions, she questions the class, political, and cultural assumptions attached to terms like “expat” and “immigrant”, particularly in an era of increasing global instability and migration. Trusting the process of your own life, even when the path ahead is incomplete is a larger episode theme. Sometimes the next step only becomes obvious after you have already taken it. Sometimes you need the lived experience before you can fully understand what is right for you. The episode challenges the pressure to have every answer in advance and instead makes space for experimentation, uncertainty, and changing direction. This episode explores relocation, intuition, entrepreneurship, nervous system regulation, immigration, reinvention, career change, self-trust, and the emotional reality of building a life across multiple countries. It is a reminder that major life decisions are rarely linear, and that uncertainty does not always mean you are on the wrong path. WORK WITH MEGHAN: If you are interested in working with Meghan 1:1, you can book an intro call with her here: https://app.paperbell.com/checkout/packages/166602 [https://app.paperbell.com/checkout/packages/166602] GUEST SUBMISSIONS: If you think you know someone who would make a great guest, feel free to email Meghan at hello@meghanfitzpatrick.com SUPPORT THE SHOW: If you’d like to support the show and the work of Career Congregation, you can do so here: https://ko-fi.com/meghanfitzpatrick [https://ko-fi.com/meghanfitzpatrick] Chapters:00:00 Intuitive whispers and long-term instincts06:00 Leaving London and rebuilding within Europe14:00 Portugal, nervous system regulation, and feeling at home21:00 Expats, immigrants, and the politics of language28:00 Trusting uncertainty and making life-changing decisions Keywords: Career, Career transition, Relocation, Immigration, Expat life, Nervous system regulation, Therapy, Therapist, Coaching, Personal development, Mental health, Entrepreneurship, Self-trust, Purpose, Work-life balance, Authentic career paths, Life transitions, Reinvention, Digital nomad, Portugal © Copyright Meghan Fitzpatrick 2026

48. Career Congregation feat. Bronte Le Marquand, Anxiety, Trauma & Grief Psychotherapist: Grief, Anxiety & Career Changes

Career Congregation is your weekly gathering for all things career, a space to explore the highs, the lows, and the incredible stories of people who have navigated career challenges, stepped through fear, and found success and growth on the other side. Hosted by Therapist and Coach Meghan Fitzpatrick, each episode offers real-life inspiration for reclaiming confidence and direction in your work. Like most psychotherapists, Bronte Le Marquand didn’t arrive at psychotherapy through a straightforward route. Early roles in recruitment, HR and corporate environments never felt sustainable, particularly while she was navigating grief and anxiety. It was through her own experience in therapy that things began to shift. Learning about boundaries and recognising how much her environment was affecting her wellbeing gave her a different reference point for what work could look like. What began as an interest in coaching gradually developed into a move towards psychotherapy, shaped as much by lived experience as it was by formal training. There is a clear thread running through this conversation around misalignment. Not in a vague sense, but in the lived reality of staying in roles that chip away at your wellbeing. Bronte speaks to the physical and psychological toll of working in environments that don’t meet your needs, and how easily that can be mistaken for personal failure. Anxiety, overthinking, burnout. These aren’t always individual problems. Sometimes they are signals that something around you isn’t working. The conversation also pulls apart the idea of security. Stable jobs, predictable income, clear progression. On the surface, these offer comfort. In reality, they can come at a cost when they keep you disconnected from what you actually want. Both Bronte and Meghan explore what it takes to walk away from that structure, and the discomfort that comes with building something of your own. There is nothing polished about that process. It is uncertain, exposing, and often misunderstood by others. What stands out is the shift from external validation to internal trust. Learning to make decisions without needing approval, tuning out the noise of other people’s opinions, and recognising when the cost of staying outweighs the fear of leaving. It is not a quick transition, but it is a necessary one if you want to build a career that feels sustainable. There is also a broader reflection on the state of modern work. Redundancy, lack of progression, poor management, and workplaces that struggle to meet even basic human needs. Rather than accepting that as the norm, this conversation offers a more proactive approach. Creating your own sense of stability, exploring side paths, and staying connected to what energises you, even in small ways. At its core, this is about learning how to move forward when you feel stuck. Not by solving everything at once, but by focusing on the next step in front of you. When everything feels uncertain, that is often enough. CONNECT WITH BRONTE: Instagram: @therapywithbronte Website: www.therapywithbronte.com [http://www.therapywithbronte.com/] Email: therapywithbronte@gmail.com [therapywithbronte@gmail.com] WORK WITH MEGHAN: If you are interested in working with Meghan 1:1, you can book an intro call with her here: https://app.paperbell.com/checkout/packages/166602 [https://app.paperbell.com/checkout/packages/166602] GUEST SUBMISSIONS: If you think you know someone who would make a great guest, feel free to email Meghan at ⁠hello@meghanfitzpatrick.com [hello@meghanfitzpatrick.com] SUPPORT THE SHOW: If you’d like to support the show and the work of Career Congregation, you can do so here: ⁠https://ko-fi.com/meghanfitzpatrick [https://ko-fi.com/meghanfitzpatrick]⁠ KEYWORDS: Career, Career change, Career transition, Mental health, Therapy, Therapist, Anxiety, Grief, Burnout, Life after burnout, Nervous system regulation, Personal development, Coaching, Purpose, Fulfilling work, Authentic career paths, Career challenges, Emotional resilience © Copyright Meghan Fitzpatrick 2026