Advice from Joan Rivers made me totally change my life

In this week’s episode of HELLO!’s Second Act podcast, host Ateh Jewel meets comedienne, podcast host, and author Cally Beaton.

Known to her 230k Instagram following as the woman behind the ‘Namaste Mother*******’ podcast, of which she has a new book by the same title, the high-flying corporate TV executive completely turned her life around at 50 thanks to advice from the late Joan Rivers.

Ateh and Cally chatted on HELLO!’s Second Act podcast

Advice from an 81-year-old

“Not everyone gets their second act ushered in by a feminist celebrity,” 56-year-old Cally jokes. “I sat on the board of some big TV companies and used to meet some of the people who would front our shows – and one I had the immense pleasure of working with was the late, great Joan Rivers.

“We were having dinner, and she said I should try stand-up. I said, ‘I’m a single parent of two kids. One of my kids has special needs. I sit in the boardroom every day, it’s too late.’

“She looked at me and said, ‘Cally, I’m 81. What’s stopping you?’ And then she died two weeks later.”

Life is short

The combination of the conversation and realising that life is so short, propelled Cally to do her first-ever stand-up gig before quitting her prestigious day job the year she turned 50. Now a successful comic, podcast host and number one best-selling author, she has never looked back.

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Cally Beaton was inspired to change her life in her fifties

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“I’d like to say I’m a recovering perfectionist,” Cally says of her approach to life now. “I don’t need a vicelike grip on life to prove anything to anyone else. Just keep moving forward in whatever way feels good.”

Joan’s advice certainly helped Cally along that path, but she notes: “What was really important about that story was not that it was Joan Rivers, it’s that it was an 81-year-old woman with wisdom who took the time to see something in a younger woman and tell me what was what from her perspective. That was the real power of that moment.”

Now approaching her 60s, Cally has found a deep sense of happiness in her own skin.

“I am consciously happily single and have never felt like that before. I love romance and sex, but for now, I am happy working on my relationship with myself so that feels liberating.”