As a child, I was a true “Jean Louise Finch”, a nonconformist, curious and courageous tomboy with an unconventional upbringing. Being the youngest of four, I was the less complicated and more free-spirited child who enjoyed the company of my own imagination. I spent much of my childhood tinkering away with tools at the jeweller’s bench and learned how to manipulate metal at the touch of fire and oxygen, recognize the smell of various chemicals, and eventually, fashion jewellery with precision. Working with people’s most precious possessions taught me to value precision and quality, and to appreciate the uniqueness of every piece. As a young girl, I learned the fundamentals of human formation: pressure, patience, and precision. These early experiences shaped how I see the world—not as something to be managed, but something to be carefully restored.

After a long career in jewellery—including two internationally recognized publications—I began to feel a quiet dissonance. I had mastered my craft, but something in me was restless. I returned to school to study finance, followed by an MBA in Spain, knowing it was time to move into a different field. What I didn’t anticipate was how difficult it would be to break into a new industry despite academic credentials and diverse experience. The job hunt itself became surreal. Eventually, I wrote a widely circulated article titled “Online Resume Submissions: The Black Hole”, critiquing the impersonal systems that reduce people to keywords and templates. It was a way of reclaiming my voice—naming what so many others were experiencing in silence. Reinvention, I learned, isn’t just professional. It’s spiritual. It strips away illusion, ego, and pretense—and refines what remains.

During Covid-19, I took a job at a local garage, earning $19 an hour at the front counter. I knew nothing about cars, but I was mechanically minded, physically strong, and good with people. Within two months, I was promoted to manage one of their flagship locations, a store that hadn’t turned a profit in four years. Within a year, I made it profitable again. Not because I followed a playbook, but because I listened, worked hard, restructured, and treated the work and the people with care. My confidence didn’t return all at once, but it was rebuilt, one season at a time. I became known, somewhat ironically, as the “Queen of Reinvention.”