The grass on the other side may be Astroturf — V. 2

How to determine if your desires and fears are well founded and how to make the shift.

Marilyn Tam
4 min readJun 27, 2023

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A scenic garden with a flower archway leading into the distant green mountains and semi cloudy blue skies.
The other side may look alluring, how do you decide whether to take the leap?

I touched a nerve! My blog on whether the grass on the other side is actually better got a flood of responses from people who shared their stories. Some took trial runs on what they dreamed of doing and realized that the reality is not as good as they imagined. Others were delighted that they made the jump and are happier than they even envisioned. While another group reviewed their reluctance to move and recognized that staying put may not always be the safe bet. Best of all everyone seemed to have gained insight from viewing the other side as potentially AstroTurf.

Common questions were: How can I tell if I am attributing good or negative qualities to the alternatives that may not be there? How would I go about making the change? Or, I want to stay, how can I improve where I am? Is it possible to make where I am now better if I remained in my current situation?

One reader shared how he took a six-month sabbatical from his law practice to work at a nonprofit, but realized that he missed his clients, his colleagues, and his litigation work. He returned to his company, more at peace and happy to be a litigation lawyer until he retired 20 years later. Now he…

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Marilyn Tam

Marilyn Tam, global speaker, best selling author (The Happiness Choice), business leader and humanitarian. Formerly the CEO of Aveda, President Reebok, VP Nike