Last Night I Realized, My Education Wasn’t Enough

The “Tea” section publishes long-form personal essays that can be read in the time it takes to sip a cup of tea.

I remember it like it was yesterday. I was sitting in my hotel room, unwinding from a flight from Dublin, wondering where I would be meeting my sorority sisters for dinner when reality hit me. I was running, and the last few months’ dread and anxiety had finally found me…all the way in Paris.

There I sat, an accomplished twenty-something with a seemingly perfect life. I had the “right” husband and zip code, and a pretty impressive CV, but still, I was terrified.

You see, I had been working my way (more like trudging) through a prestigious graduate program that promised me a solid career upon completion. Yet here I was wondering how much this latest jet set would set us back.

That was the night I stopped being nice, and started being real. I knew it was time to quit.

I had to quit playing by everyone else’s rules, waiting for professors and my academic field’s gatekeepers to give me permission to strike out on my own. Licensure was light years away, and student loan repayments were closer than I cared to admit. I decided to enjoy Paris, but from the perspective of a strategist.

So, I turned down for the night, and promised myself tomorrow would be different.

The next morning I got up, freshened up, and dressed. However, this time, I imagined myself dressing as if I were going out to meet my new boss. I was, in fact, dressing for the job I wanted to have. I put on my best fitting pencil dress, a great pair of heels, and a huge pair of sunnies and headed out, notebooks and computer in tow.

I texted my sorority sisters to let them know something had come up, and that Notre Dame would have to wait. Instead, I got my taxi driver to drop me off at his favorite place to have lunch, and asked for the quietest seat their patio had to offer.

Between Parisian people watching and the world’s most sumptuous baguette and marmalade, my consulting business was born.

Writing My Own Rules

It was in those not-so-quiet moments that I faced a few of my biggest fears, and had my first real laugh at myself. I realized how all these years I had been following a how-to manual that was written in the dark ages. I knew that I would never be able to return to my easy life of full-time study.

Sitting in a classroom being dictated to by balding men and feminist women was no longer an option for me. I realized the prognosis—I was not getting an education in business acumen, life 101, or hustling. I was literally being taught how to be someone else’s version of a professional, not an entrepreneur.

Since I had no blueprint, I decided to write my own manifesto (aptly called a ‘Pink Print’). My Pink Print outlined what I figured I would need to make each year in order to live comfortably, while completing school, and helping Mr. Stepford contribute to the bottom line from the comfort of our well decorated home.

Though I was going the non-traditional route, I knew it had to have some structure, so I even factored in potential circumstances like lay-offs, pregnancies, and unexpected travel.

A 10-Year Plan Is Born

In essence, I created my own financial 10-year plan, business plan, and an airtight set of action steps toward financial freedom outside of my academic goals. For the first time in my life, I felt a lightness of being I would never felt.

Though I had not yet launched my business, I knew I had a solid foundation on which to build it. I Face-Timed Mr. Stepford to tell him the news, and he was overjoyed to hear what I’d come up with. When he asked what prompted this change of heart, I simply said, “Paris.”

He laughed and said he could not wait to go with me next time; there was no telling what we would conjure up together.

Many years and many revisions later, my business plan is still in use. Now days I have a much more concrete set of fiscal goals and milestones, coupled with a broad clientele. I am still plugging away at my doctorate, but these days, I have no doubt that I am in the driver’s seat of my financial future. As a result, my labor of love, Stepford University was born.

Anything Is Possible

Though she is still in her elementary phases, she is a living breathing thing. In addition, most of all, I have the privilege and honor of working with women from all over the world helping them to rewrite their own success stories daily.

Whether they are coming to me to process lost (or sometimes elusive) love, career conundrums, baby blues, or dating dilemmas, my coaching service menu has something to offer every woman at every phase of life. Most of all, I am my own boss babe, and each day I do exactly what I love—on MY terms.

Though life in graduate school has not always been a professional crystal staircase, one thing is certain; I have found my own niche and have used it to create my own path to success.

To learn more about Andrea Ortiz please go to www.stepforduniversity.com. 

Originally posted 2020-10-01 08:00:46.