Practice self-awareness — Engage in self-reflection to help visualize what this new phase will look like for you as it assists you to be more compassionate. It enables you to experience higher levels of happiness, more confidence, and to better manage and regulate your emotions. Recognizing your own strengths and weaknesses are like going through psychotherapy by yourself which makes you stronger and independent. If you don’t know yourself, you have got no shot to enjoy your new beginning because you will be caught in the cycle of the spinning your wheels syndrome.
Many successful people reinvented themselves in a later period in their lives. Jeff Bezos worked on Wall Street before he reinvented himself and started Amazon. Sara Blakely sold office supplies before she started Spanx. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson was a WWE wrestler before he became a successful actor and filmmaker. Arnold Schwarzenegger went from a bodybuilder, to an actor to a Governor. McDonald’s founder Ray Kroc was a milkshake-device salesman before starting the McDonalds franchise in his 50s.
How does one reinvent themselves? What hurdles have to be overcome to take life in a new direction? How do you overcome those challenges? How do you ignore the naysayers? How do you push through the paralyzing fear?
In this series called “Second Chapters; How I Reinvented Myself In The Second Chapter Of My Life “ we are interviewing successful people who reinvented themselves in a second chapter in life, to share their story and help empower others.
As a part of this interview series, I had the pleasure of interviewing Bonnie Frankel.
Bonnie was uncertain of her life’s longevity diagnosed with breast cancer at thirty-two. After a lengthy self-reflection, she decided to start a new phase in her life by taking baby steps. Blessed with chutzpah, she gave it the old college try by reinventing herself through trial and error.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we start, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your childhood backstory?
Looking from the outside most people would say,” I had it made in the shade.” Living inside our house was a different story. There was a lack of empathy and considerable commotion between family members. We were nestled on top of a hill in the Holmby Hills neighborhood. I was raised by a housekeeper in my early years as my mother struggled with periods of mental depression. I performed the role in my early years as an active listener, not wanting to rock the boat terrified of being abandoned because my mom could leave unexpectedly to a rest home because of her illness and receive shock therapy. When I reached the age of ten, I developed into a voluptuous young lady inheriting a gene from my mother’s side of the family known as fibrous cystic breast disease. One of my mom’s sisters later in life possessed the gene and because it was hard to decipher what was malignant or benign, she was diagnosed with stage four breast cancer which eventually led to her death. I was also diagnosed with a blood disease as a youngster and had to have blood tests weekly for a period of time. Memories of my fear of abandonment added with a concern of health issues were to re-create significant changes later in my life that led to a new chapter.
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?
“Nothing in the universe can stop you from letting go and starting over.” — Guy Finley
When I was in the throes of fighting for my life battling breast cancer with the possibility of it spreading, I was subconsciously unaware that I was going through major changes that were leading me to begin an unexpected new chapter in my life. It took me about seven years to gradually transform into a new me which led me to let go of what I had and find out what I desired to do with my life. I terminated my marriage, gave up a prestigious lifestyle, surrendered my career, gave up my health insurance with the scare of not being insurable, and gave up a false sense of security. What made me give it all up was the fact that I didn’t want to look back and have this mirrored image of myself regretting that I would be in this same place down the road.
You have been blessed with much success. In your opinion, what are the top three qualities that you possess that have helped you accomplish so much? If you can, please share a story or example for each.
Optimism creates a positive mindset. I approach challenges with a can-do attitude in search for solutions to replace the dwelling over the fear of problems to sustain a positive attitude if unexpected complications arise. A joyous mindset guides me to stay motivated and resilient in the face of adversity, which is essential for me to continue to engineer my goals. Possessing emotional resilience also encourages my positive nature to respond to stressful or unexpected situations including crises. This graces me to extend my ability to connect better with others, enjoy open communication. It also strengthens my confidence as it strengthens my competence. Emotional resilience is a trait that encompasses my art of living that is entwined with my self-belief, self-compassion, and enhanced cognition. This trait enables me to bounce back from stressful encounters and prevents it from affecting my internal motivation. When I fail at a targeted goal or handed an unexpected issue, this element enables me to be more resourceful to discover an alternative way to forge ahead. The last quality, yet the most important is exercise which serves as an umbrella for optimism and emotional resiliency. Being physically active improves my quality of life to secure my accomplishments. It boosts my concentration as it guides me to learn at a faster pace, improves my memory, and enhances my creativity. Since I have learning disabilities, physical activity has proven to be a God Sent to assist me to move forward like lightening. Being a fitness guru guarantees me to possess an enormous amount of energy in everything I attempt. Exercise transfers into my professional and personal life as it enhances my communication skills, keeps me disciplined, and assists my skill in time management that are crucial factors in all areas of my successes. It also contributes to my perennial optimistic nature which strengthens my psychological resilience.
Let’s now shift to the main part of our discussion about ‘Second Chapters’. Can you tell our readers about your career experience before your Second Chapter?
I was an owner of a flourishing hairstyling business called Bonnie’s Place located inside the Burbank Studios. This art form and the experience of this type of business evolved from working with the late Jay Sebring as his office manager of Sebring Inc., his personal assistant, and watching many of his hairstyling demonstrations. He was the pioneer of men’s hairstyling launched in the fifties. My everyday people were on the list of who’s who in America and internationally. Piggybacked with this career was my marriage to an OB-GYN, one of the pioneers of natural childbirth. I served as his wife, assistant, raised his son, and played the role of his version of the Billy Jean King of tennis. I re- built a hairstyling shop with a poor location and created it into a thriving small business that had wings to grow, and ran two households, one in Beverly Hills, and the other in Lake Arrowhead with no previous experience. After all, I was raised a Jewish Princess.
And how did you “reinvent yourself” in your Second Chapter?
By courageously re-entering the educational system where I discovered I could excel in academic learning whereas in my younger years I struggled. As a youngster, I had undetected learning disabilities. This educational institution facilitated me to question a few subjects that interested me: political science, and theology. My major was studio arts, and later minored in political science. What really pivoted my life was when I explored a running class and fell in passion with this form of movement, and noticed the significant difference it parlayed in all areas of my life, emotionally mentally, and physically. Since the art of running had such an impact in my life, I was committed to continue and learn why. Transferring to a division one college to continue running, I ran unexpectedly into a roadblock, whereas I elected to become an activist to fight for the older females who were denied competition in a division one collegiate sport. I prompted a campaign to overturn a woman’s eligibility rule.
Can you tell us about the specific trigger that made you decide that you were going to “take the plunge” and make your huge transition?
The period when I went through breast cancer spirited the launch to begin the beginning of my exploring independently the bucket list was the deal breaker. I got a taste of what life could be without the emotion of feeling controlled — a people pleaser. I was beginning by experimenting to enjoy life because it provided me the benefit of having more breathing room to kindle the feeling of being liberated to discover what lights my fire. It inspirited the feeling that a new life was in the wind, because my life as it existed, was dying a slow death. I executed to plunge.
What did you do to discover that you had a new skillset inside of you that you haven’t been maximizing? How did you find that and how did you ultimately overcome the barriers to help manifest those powers?
Taking a chance by joining a running class when I was enrolled in Santa Monica College coached by legendary Tommie Smith. One of my younger chums suggested we take a running class, and drop ballet. I thought, why not. Running wasn’t foreign to me because I used it in various physical activities. When I implemented running exclusively, it hypnotically moved my body and soul to a feeling of exhilaration as the wind grazed my face. I immediately experienced my breathwork to become significantly enhanced which positively affected all areas of my life. Tommie Smith would tell the other runners, “Follow the lady with the white hair.” He told me, “You are going to be the next George Foreman of running.” Although running isn’t considered a team sport, I relished the feeling that my performance made a difference to assist my team win. The barrier came when I moved forward to a four -year college after receiving my AA degree with honors, and wanted to continue to pursue my running. I explored this desire and found that my “time clock” expired so I was denied the prospect to join the cross-country team to compete. Feeling frustrated, I surprisingly decided to fight to challenge to change and the gentleman I contacted at the NCAA insisted that attempt would be futile. Despite feeling discouraged, I decided to fight back. I was glowing as well as growing into believing in myself by experiencing new experiences. My competitiveness took flight, and discovered and invented there are many ways to skin a cat.
How are things going with this new initiative? We would love to hear some specific examples or stories.
The new beginning excites me to continue to grow personally by using self-awareness. This rare quality not only improves my relationship with me as well as it enables me to create better communication skills to gain healthier personal and professional relationships. It encourages me to revisit situations that I thought were a done deal, and then discover a missing link of the puzzle to shift my opinion or action to a more desirable one. When I think I know me, I don’t know me at all. There are moments I miss my ex-husband because he was so adventurous and possessed a brilliant mind. Then I realize that those are traits that I can find in others, because his controlling nature was not copacetic with mine, a free spirit. I live a life that is simplistic which suits me just fine and enables me to become more flexible, stand up for what is right, be particular, and resilient in my adventures of choice. I am my own unique person, not a people pleaser.
Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?
When the judge finalized my divorce, he asked me,” What are you going to do with your life”? He was aware of my suicide attempt. The fact that he took a personal interest in me was impressive and heartfelt. He suggested that I re-enter the educational system to find out what I wanted to do with my life. His suggestion set in my mind for a bit, and I decided to give it the old college try. By taking his advice, I discovered my unique brilliance, my athletic gift, and discovered a healthier fit body and mind. More important, I would be able to pass the torch to share my experiences and knowledge with others.
Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you started in this new direction?
My willingness to be open to confront failure in order to succeed. There were times that I experienced losing before I could win. When I divorced, the feeling that I failed with a relationship was overwhelming which led to my suicide attempt. When in fact, the failure and the loss taught me to rediscover who I was, an independent driven woman in search for the right path. I never would have considered to become a world class runner or an athletic activist, coach, writer. My independence is my backbone. It is the most precious quality because it instills in me that it is my responsibility to take control of my life. This realization assisted me to fight for what was important for me and for others. An example of this is when I was head cross-country coach at Loyola Marymount University. The assistant athletic director and another lady unexpectedly demanded that I join them to them in a meeting. They told me that I had to put on a bra or my job was on the line. Being a survivor of breast cancer, and having implants, I remember my doctor telling me that I would never have to wear a bra again. The audacity that someone was looking at my breasts perturbed me because they were looking at the wrong place. Taking this situation to heart, I let them fire me because didn’t want this to happen to another woman because at that time there were only 10% women that were head coaches in a division one collegiate sport. The Los Angeles Times did an article on the matter and embarrassed them. Standing up what I believe was getting to be habit that was going to have wings: changing an NCAA eligibility rule, and standing up for harassment.
Did you ever struggle with believing in yourself? If so, how did you overcome that limiting belief about yourself? Can you share a story or example?
The most relevant challenge was to uncover the strength of my faith to create a course of action and maintain my stance to convert a law that affected not only myself, but other women. This is when I decided to rise and move in waves against a previously male dominated NCAA organization to overturn an eligibility rule for women. I structured a campaign utilizing the media to reveal my life story and found a loophole discovering that the NCAA didn’t govern women’s sports when myself and others were previously enrolled in college. I forged onward to contact our West Coast Conference Commissioner for his support, the Vice president of Student Affairs, and the Athletic Director at Loyola Marymount University to seal the deal. It was an overwhelming challenge but it demonstrated my underlying emotional resilience that was buried deep inside me. I would go on to dispute other issues that was significant to me and continue my building self-awareness.
In my own work I usually encourage my clients to ask for support before they embark on something new. How did you create your support system before you moved to your new chapter?
The best support system was to trust my intuition as well as my best friend ‘s level-headedness. I would confide my fears to her because she is blessed with traits of being trustworthy, familiar with my patterns, and serves well as an active listener. I began early in my years to engage in self-help techniques. Using mindfulness helped me to further my awareness in implementing self-efficacy that assisted me to challenge my comfort zone. Exercise was another method that helped me to achieve a joyous state of mind and body which added even more might to my emotional intelligence. This method sanctioned me to build trust in my sixth sense to build my self-reliance. When all is said and done, it is me who makes the decisions. Sometimes I would fail, and through failing, it would lead to successes. Group support, therapy, and taking anti depressive pills were not helpful to me. However, self- hypnosis was.
Starting a new chapter usually means getting out of your comfort zone, how did you do that? Can you share a story or example of that?
I accomplished this by doing it in stages. By moving out of my comfort zone into the growth zone, I challenged myself to experience an exercise I was scared of performing. If I could conquer the fear of doing gymnastics successfully, that would transfer abstractly to new challenges in other areas of my life for me to attain and enjoy successes. Once I conquered one fear, my comfort zone was going to diminish as I would get more courageous in building up my adventurous nature.
What are your “5 things I wish someone told me before I started” and why?
1 . Period of adjustment — Be sweet to yourself because there is always going to be an interval of adapting to something new. Believe that you have the courage to dive into this new path and this can take time to get familiar with. Trust your intuition and forge ahead. Practice self-compassion because it assists you to experience a balanced approach to negative emotions if you should stumble. Remember to focus on building up your physical and emotional reserves to offset the impact of the change. Transforming can bring about significant stress and throw you off your regular self-care routine, so pay special attention to not neglect this. Search for lessons and gifts during this adjustment time by reflecting as you may experience greater appreciation of what you do possess and what remains constant in your life during a period of change. Keep in mind that everyone moves at a different tempo, it’s not a race.
2 . Exercise — My pet peeve. This activity stimulates your brain chemicals that will enhance your feeling happier, more relaxed, and builds up your self-compassion. It takes the edge off of your fear of making a clean break to start a new path. This also assists you to feel good about your appearance and yourself which boosts your confidence and self -esteem as you challenge a new birth in your life. Research shows by engaging in regular workouts boosts your mood, sleep quality which reduces your risk of stress and depression. Exercising regularly strengthens the connection between your mind and body which promotes a greater sense of self-awareness. As you engage in physical activity, you become more attuned to the signals your body sends.
3 . Practice self-awareness — Engage in self-reflection to help visualize what this new phase will look like for you as it assists you to be more compassionate. It enables you to experience higher levels of happiness, more confidence, and to better manage and regulate your emotions. Recognizing your own strengths and weaknesses are like going through psychotherapy by yourself which makes you stronger and independent. If you don’t know yourself, you have got no shot to enjoy your new beginning because you will be caught in the cycle of the spinning your wheels syndrome.
4 . Journaling — It’s important to jot down what your plan, priorities, and your big visions are. Writing releases your feelings on paper which can give you a different clarity about what you want and who you want to be in your new beginning before you take action. You may want to document your development to acknowledge the progress you have accomplished. This method is written in stone and gives you concrete evidence of how you truly view yourself. It serves as your bible. Self-awareness is improved by journaling.
5 . Find the joy — You will experience craziness and challenges, but keep in mind there is always joy and opportunity for infinite possibilities. As you slide into a new chapter, view it as an optimistic approach to reinvent yourself. Although it may bring a challenge wrapped in fear, there is bound to be more joy than you realize. The good news is that changes in our lives can decrease the illusion that we can control. Use meditation as a powerful way to modify your brain pathways to increase joy. Remember it is just as important to give yourself permission to take a few moments of pleasure when you feel a bit low. The longer you linger in a comfort zone, you will have more difficulty to start a new path. Once you take the risk, I guarantee you will thrive. Implement your joy triggers to boost your mood.
You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be?
Exercise to clarify your purpose.
We are very blessed that some very prominent names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them. :-)
Bo Jackson. His courageousness to re-invent himself.
How can our readers further follow your work online?
Bonniefrankel.com, Authority Magazine, face Book, LinkedIn
Thank you so much for sharing these important insights. We wish you continued success and good health!
About the Interviewer: Wanda Malhotra is a wellness entrepreneur, lifestyle journalist, and the CEO of Crunchy Mama Box, a mission-driven platform promoting conscious living. CMB empowers individuals with educational resources and vetted products to help them make informed choices. Passionate about social causes like environmental preservation and animal welfare, Wanda writes about clean beauty, wellness, nutrition, social impact and sustainability, simplifying wellness with curated resources. Join Wanda and the Crunchy Mama Box community in embracing a healthier, more sustainable lifestyle at CrunchyMamaBox.com .
