Darlene Proctor had never planned to be a nurse for the rest of her life. So when a friend reminded her about a dream she once had to start a bed and breakfast, she decided to figure out how to make a career change from hospitals to hospitality. "I thought I had to be rich in order to do that. Then I [realized] a lot of people find a more rewarding career path, and they're not rich. How do they do it? So, I started investigating and moving in that direction," says Proctor, a psyche nurse.
Proctor stumbled upon Vocation Vacations, a company that allows clients to test-drive their dream job. Through the program, she visited Chloe Tuttle, owner of Big Mill Bed and Breakfast in Williamston, North Carolina, and the experience taught her lessons about how to get started. Doing the same things day-after-day was one of Proctor's problems with working as a nurse. She also wanted to express herself more creatively. "I looked around my house and I had more cookbooks than I had nursing books," says Proctor.