Carol Gardner was put out to pasture by her husband who filed for divorce when she was 52. She felt invisible and untouchable. Her lawyer suggested she “get a therapist or a dog.” She got both. As a former advertising copywriter, she entered a local Christmas card contest with a picture of her bulldog and a funny quip about how she’d traded her husband in for this lucky pooch. She won. The win inspired Gardner to start a greeting card company, which she named after her dog, Zelda Wisdom. By her 65th birthday, Carol’s company was worth $50 million.
54% of small business owners in the US are over the age of 50, and older entrepreneurs are twice as likely to be successful as compared to a 30-year-old. 15% of these older entrepreneurs launched a business because they’d lost a job, but 42% did it to pursue a passion from the past, 36% started a business because “the opportunity presented itself,” and 22% did so because they were just plain unhappy working in corporate America.
Being in a pasture isn’t the worst life, unless it’s forced and unwanted, in which case, maybe it’s time to take a little of that sunlight and fresh air, then you use your past to mold your future.