Standout Reinventions is where I document what starting over actually looks like from my move to Costa Rica, to the memoir I’m writing about it, and the conversations with creatives who’ve reinvented themselves too.
What happens when the thing that defined you for most of your life suddenly isn't yours anymore?
Bridget Baker has reinvented herself so many times she’s started to consider herself an expert in it. Her reinvention journey spans a car accident at 21, a Las Vegas tiger show, five years in a travel trailer, and a writing group she started on a whim that’s almost two years old.
She’s a brand and website designer, a creative coach, and the host of a brand new podcast, The Deep Dig. But before all of that, she was a ballerina, and the story of how she got from there to here is anything but a straight line.
Highlights
Reinvention isn’t always a choice.
Bridget was at the peak of her dance career when a serious auto accident changed everything.
“When I was 21, I was like at the peak of my career, the peak of my physical ability and strength. And I got in a very serious auto accident... my injuries were very severe.”
She didn’t frame it as a tragedy. It was just the first in a series of reinventions.
There’s the reinvention you choose. And there’s the reinvention that chooses you. Bridget has lived both.
Losing her body taught her to see other people differently.
While Bridget was recovering from her injuries, she learned how to draw it out of others through choreography.
“It had me actually appreciate the uniqueness of each dancer more and go, what is their unique skill set? Like, what are they good at that maybe they’re sort of like the underdog and no one’s seen them do this thing on stage?”
Whenever you lose one part of yourself, you evolve in different ways.
Her shift from performing to perceiving became the throughline of everything she’s done since. Her coaching, branding, and writing all come back to the same question: what’s already in this person that the world hasn’t seen yet?
She went back. And then she left again.
After the accident, Bridget rehabbed and returned to the ballet company. People cheered. And almost immediately, she knew it wasn’t right.
“I’ve made it back. And then I thought, yeah, I don’t think this is it anymore.”
That’s something no one talks about. Sometimes you have to return to something confirm you’ve outgrown it.
She left dance. Went backstage into costumes. Worked with Siegfried and Roy in Las Vegas. And even there, surrounded by live tigers, she felt the same pull.
This isn’t it either.
Your environment will resist your change.
Bridget’s father introduced her as “my daughter, the ballet dancer” for fifteen years after she left the stage.
“Your environment sometimes does not support your change... it affects your friendships. You have to start hanging out with new people.”
The people who were a big part of your life aren’t trying to be rude. They just identify with who you were, not who you are. Their relationship was with a previous version of you. When you change, it’s unsettling, because if you can change, so can everything.
Don’t try to convince people of who you are. Find people who are comfortable with who you want to be.
Write Shit Thursdays and the habit that came back around.
Bridget and her husband used to go to a different coffee shop every Thursday in Los Angeles. They didn’t have an agenda. They just put words to page.
“I don’t have anything to say. I don’t have anything to say. That’s all I’d be writing... And then at some point it would build on itself and I’d go, oh my gosh, I just wrote a thousand words.”
But that habit eventually faded. They decided to live in a 24-foot travel trailer for five years and her writing fell off.
Then one day she asked herself a simple question: can I call myself a writer if I’m not writing?
She started Write Sh*t Mondays. Invited people to write with her. It’s been almost two years. Now it’s evolved into writing coaching programs and retreats. It transformed into something she didn’t even know she was building.
Some things don’t leave you, they’re just waiting to come back.
The handshake that started everything.
When Bridget’s husband first floated the idea of living in a travel trailer, she wasn’t ready. She pushed back. The idea nearly died.
Then, months later, she came back to it.
“I put out my hand to shake his hand. And he shook my hand. I’m like, I’ve never done that in my life, let alone with my husband. We’re gonna shake hands on it. And then the rest was history.”
I’ve lived this moment too. On Valentine’s Day last year, Anita and I sat at a restaurant with chips and salsa and a notebook, and made our own version of that handshake. We were going to sell the house and move to Costa Rica. We were going to stop waiting for someday.
The handshake doesn’t mean you’re ready. It means you’re committed to figuring it out.
Keep it for yourself first.
When you’re in the middle of reinventing, the instinct is to tell everyone. To make it real by saying it out loud.
Bridget’s advice is more careful than that.
“Start writing about it for a while and seeing what comes out of that. Like keep it for you for a while. Don’t publish it. Don’t give it away.”
Other people’s expectations can shape your reinvention before you’ve had a chance to shape it yourself. Their enthusiasm can push you faster than you’re ready to go. Their doubt can stop you before you’ve had a chance to find out if you believe in it.
Write it first. Sit with it. Let it be yours before it becomes a story you tell.
Closing Reflection
Bridget has been reinventing herself for thirty years. And she’ll tell you she’s more herself now than she ever was as a ballerina.
That’s the thing about reinvention. It isn’t about becoming someone new. It’s about shedding the versions of yourself that no longer fit.
“I’m still me. Probably a lot more me than I was back then.”
We don’t lose ourselves in reinvention. We grow into someone we couldn’t have imagined before.
If you’ve made a bold change: a move, a career shift, a creative leap, and you think your story could inspire others, I’d love to hear from you. Leave a comment and tell us about your reinvention.
Thank you Tomesha Campbell, Dharma Paige, and many others for tuning into my live video with Bridget Baker!
