The last television appearance we had was on NBC-Nashville. The segment aired that Friday night, and even though I didn’t see it, Linda Harrison in Hermitage, Tennessee did.

Linda went to our website and submitted her story. She wrote:

“I am currently a Fainting Goat Rancher but have a business degree with an accounting major. I am a LONG way from my first post graduate job of working for a major CPA firm. A few varied pit stops along the way and now I raise goats and have never been happier. Ranching is my passion and goats are my dream. Raising goats is by far the most rewarding thing I have ever done. Don’t leave Nashville before coming to see me…”

I received her submission early Monday morning, and, having little on the schedule that day, ran the idea of interviewing a goat rancher by Zach. I caught him in a sleepy stupor and with a little convincing, we were off for a day on a goat farm.

In Hermitage, where rural and residential are intertwined, Blessed Green Pastures has goats, chickens, dogs, sheep, and bees that bask in sycamore shade. What started as a natural way to reduce the workload of mowing lawns, Linda and Brian have seen their original crew of a few sheep and myotonic goats blossom into a nationally recognized goat breeding operation.

And it all started because the accountant Linda, who worked in corporate cubicles to begin her professional life, just wanted to be outside.

Besides being a single mother raising four kids, Tracy Boyce’s full time job is a feng shui practitioner.

Originally an accountant, Tracy never knew something like feng shui existed. The seeds for her profession were planted after receiving a home consultation twelve years ago, and were sowed once a divorce became eminent.

With a settlement that barely covered the mortgage, Tracy decided that her part time feng shui practice did not have enough of a steady income to support a family. Falling back on a part time bookkeeping position to pay bills, she found that her time was being consumed by calculations, and not by color coordination.

Overwhelmed and overworked, Tracy walked into her boss’s office one day and requested that she be compensated fairly for the extra workload she was assuming. The next day she was a full time feng shui consultant, fired from her bookkeeping job.

“I guess my ex-boss did me a great favor by firing me. I’m not sure if I would have taken that step on my own. It was a pretty scary thing to do, financially. No one was offering their support to me or even help. From the vantage point of now, he was my biggest supporter.”

Going from accounting to design isn’t necessarily the recommended career course for designers, but as the feng shui practice preaches, it was Tracy’s “path.”

Check out Tracy Boyce at http://www.tracyboycefengshui.com/

From a young age Mary Gilbaugh knew she wanted to work in professional sports, but her corporate accounting career path took a few bends before her childhood dream would be realized. After running track for two years at USC, Mary confidently entered the world of corporate accounting only to realize the fifteen hour days were not for her. On November 11th, 2004 Mary’s longtime friend, USMC 2nd Lt. JP Blecksmith, was killed in Fallujah, Iraq.

Allowed a leave of absence, Mary took the opportunity to co-found the JP Blecksmith Foundation which sponsors an annual memorial 5k in San Marino, California. After returning from the leave of absence, Mary took another corporate job, always alert however, to other opportunities in her field.

What began as a “why not” application has left Mary the controller for one of the best and most exciting teams in the NBA. Although Ms. Gilbaugh enjoyed each of her previous employment opportunities, the Phoenix Suns allowed her a normal life; the responsibility in no way watered down, Mary now has free time after work to run her foundation, work out, or bring her father to Sun’s games. Her parents, both employment loyalists, were skeptical of her decision to leave, but Mary knew what she wanted, and went out and got it.

She offers this advice to those who feel career pressure from their parents “Just because it’s something [parents] don’t understand doesn’t mean that it isn’t right for you.” A job will always be repetitive, but if you are passionate about what you do and where you do it, repetition does not have to be boring.

Al Greenberg never had a passion for accounting; he even tried to talk me out of going into accounting when I told him my future plans. His passion is New York City.

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It’s funny how we can become so blinded by responsibility that we don’t realize how out of wack our priorities have become. Katie had her epiphany when she realized that she was rushing her daughter back to bed so that she could return to her open e-mail account. She realized then and there that she was putting Corporate America ahead of her own family. She needed a change.

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Dan Fumai is the Vice President Controller for the San Diego Padres. after spending eleven years with the accounting firm PriceWaterhouseCoopers. His goal while attending Boston University was to become a partner in an accounting firm. Interestingly enough, he was one year away from accomplishing that goal when he left the firm for the Padres after eleven years of service. When asked why he left, he still wasn’t sure but said that it was aonce in a lifetime opportunity that he could not resist.

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