There Is Nothing Wrong with Wanting More

When I was four years old, I wanted to be a race car driver.

My dad loved cars. He watched NASCAR, took me to stock car races at our local fairgrounds, and was always building or rebuilding something in the garage. I was his oldest child, and before he had a son, I was his sidekick.

Then, at six years old, my dream changed.

School became my safe place during a difficult time in my childhood, and my teachers became some of the people who made me feel most secure. I knew I wanted to become a teacher.

But somewhere along the way, I also began learning another lesson: wanting more made other people uncomfortable.

When it was time for college, I received a scholarship to attend a private college away from home. Instead of excitement, I heard questions.

Why do you need to leave?

Why spend that kind of money?

Why not stay here?

You can get a good job here.

Life eventually changed my plans anyway. I became a young mother, attended community college, worked, raised my daughter, and kept moving forward.

But after earning my two-year degree, I still wanted more.

I wanted my bachelor’s degree. I wanted to become a teacher. At the time, I dreamed of teaching physical education, which would have required leaving home to finish my degree.

Again, I heard the questions.

Why do you have to go?

Why isn’t this enough?

And that time, I listened.

I stayed. I changed my major to elementary education. And while that decision ultimately led me somewhere wonderful, I also recognize today that part of it was made because I allowed other people’s fears to become mine.

Years later, when I couldn’t find a full-time teaching position in Iowa, it happened again.

Take the paraprofessional job.

Substitute teach.

Open a daycare.

You’ll still work with children.

But something in me had changed.

No.

I had worked too hard. I knew what I wanted. And this time, I wasn’t going to let someone else decide what was enough for me.

So we moved to Houston.

And yes, I mentally quit about every day for the first six months.

But I stayed.

And eventually, I thrived.

I became a strong teacher. I moved into leadership. I designed instructional programs. I became an assistant principal and then a principal. I led turnaround work. I earned my master’s degree. I studied at Harvard. I completed superintendent preparation.

Every time I allowed myself to want more, my world became bigger.

Then life changed again.

I went through a divorce. I lost myself for a while. And when I finally began finding myself again, I realized something surprising: I wanted more again.

Not necessarily more in education. Something beyond it.

So I explored.

Writing. Speaking. Coaching. Real estate. Designing. Entrepreneurship.

And for a long time, I felt guilty about it.

Education had given me a beautiful career and meaningful work. How dare I want something else?

When I stepped away from education in 2023 and tried building a business, it was hard. I failed. More than once.

I didn’t quit, but I failed.

And underneath those failures was a question I had heard in different forms my entire life:

Why isn’t what you already have enough?

Last March, something finally shifted.

I remembered the young woman who had packed up her family and moved to Houston because she finally decided that other people didn’t get to determine the size of her life.

And I realized she was still here.

So as I approached 55, I gave myself permission to want more again.

To become a designer.

To use my creativity.

To build UNCOMMON Jewelry into something bigger than I can currently see.

To create something that could become part of my family’s legacy.

Not because education wasn’t enough.

Not because my career wasn’t successful.

Not because I wasn’t grateful.

But because gratitude and ambition can exist in the same heart.

Wanting more doesn’t mean you don’t appreciate what you have.

It means you believe there may still be something inside you that hasn’t had its turn yet.

Your age doesn’t get to decide.

Your hometown doesn’t get to decide.

Your education doesn’t get to decide.

The people who don’t understand your dream don’t get to decide.

You do.

I’ve spent enough of my life asking whether I should want more.

Today, I’m asking a different question:

What if there is more, and I am brave enough to go find it?

There is nothing wrong with wanting more.

Sometimes, wanting more is how we discover just how much more we have to give.

Cheri