2. Think Outside Your Fishbowl

Reinventing your worklife does call for an act of imagination.

After years of being identified as a salesperson, lawyer, dentist, accountant, or office assistant, it's challenging to see yourself in a different light.

If you're fed up and ready for a serious change, listen to your inner voice and seek out a new direction.

If you're satisfied with the content of your career but want more freedom, fewer hours, or a different job, you may have to create your own opportunities. For instance, you might pitch a new flex-time work arrangement to an employer who has never considered one before.

To find meaningful work and get paid to do it, you might need to get creative. In other words, think outside your fishbowl.

There are many ways to redirect your work life toward more meaningful work

1. Career Recyclers

You can use your expertise in one field to transition to the next. Like a salesperson who becomes a development director for a nonprofit organization. Or a truck driver who becomes a driver for disabled citizens. Or someone like Kaye Warren, a long-time computer specialist who launched a satisfying new career teaching computer science at a community college.

2. Career Changers

The uncertainty and excitement of starting fresh has a certain appeal. For instance, Brigadier General Michael P. Mulqueen left the Marine Corps 14 years ago to take the top job at the Greater Chicago Food Depository, one of the nation's biggest hunger-relief outfits, and has attracted national attention for the ways he's improved, even revolutionized, services there.

Or Carol Harris-Mannes, who gave up a long career in acting, went back to college, earned a master's degree, and became a social worker with The Actor's Fund in New York City.

3. Career Makers

Other people figure out how to take a lifelong interest and parlay it into a job that helps others, provides some financial compensation, and offers the joy of being engaged in a favorite activity.

Emily Kimball lived her dream at 62 – to ride her bike across the United States – then joined the lecture circuit, earning a small income speaking to older adults about the improtance of being active.

Jo Manhart had a successful career working with a trade association. After leaving that career, she started an employment agency in her Missouri hometown to help older workers find jobs.