By: Sarah Kiran
Ever caught yourself wondering what would happen if you stepped away from the life everyone else thought you should be grateful for?
You are definitely not alone.
In Episode 6 of Beautiful Me, we sit down with Wati, the founder of Three Hungry Cats, for a raw and honest conversation about courage, reinvention, and what it really means to start over.
In her 40s, Wati made a decision many people would find terrifying. She left behind a well-paying senior corporate role and stepped into the unpredictable world of F&B. But to her, it was never about walking away from success.
As she puts it, “I don’t think I walked away from the corporate journey. I see it as simply making a left turn.”
And that is what makes this episode so powerful. It is not a story about giving everything up. It is a story about choosing a different path when your heart knows it is time.
What is the difference between stepping away from success and making a left turn?
In her 40s, Wati made an intentional choice that many would find terrifying: leaving behind a well-paying senior corporate role to step into the unpredictable, capital-intensive world of Food & Beverage (F&B). However, she explicitly reframes this change, noting:
“I don’t think I walked away from the corporate journey. I see it as simply making a left turn.”
For many professionals across Southeast Asia, the 40s are treated as a period to protect hard-earned stability. A prestigious title, a comfortable salary, and a familiar routine feel far too precious to risk. Wati understood that exact fear; her decision was not made overnight. The idea had been brewing for a very long time, shaped by financial concerns, intense work commitments, and a heavy fear of the unknown.
But eventually, a foundational long-tail query kept returning: If not now, when?
She realized that there may never be a perfect window of total certainty. As she shares: “This really isn’t the right time, it’s just the time. When you know it, you know it.”
Giving Herself One Year
Before stepping fully into independent creator entrepreneurship, Wati built a disciplined, calculated operational runway:
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Establish a Time-Bound Runway: She set aside a specific financial cushion and committed to a strict timeline. To her, a brief three or six-month window was entirely too short to gauge meaningful market traction or product-market fit. A full year provided the space needed to accurately assess the commercial viability of her new adventure.
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Brace for Market Humbling: Real-world operations instantly test even the most calculated business model templates. “You can only plan so much and you have to be ready when the curveball hits you,” she notes.
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Practice Ruthless Operational Honesty: True mindfulness in business requires knowing precisely when to press forward, when to pause, and when to step back. Growth relies on recognizing when to let go of an operational path, no matter how difficult or emotionally challenging it proves to be.
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Why is transparent craftsmanship and team welfare crucial in purpose-driven business?
Three Hungry Cats originally launched from an authentic desire to scale Wati’s mother’s home-based food recipes into a larger, commercial space. Instead of remaining an insulated home-based setup, she chose to rent a dedicated commercial kitchen to completely master the end-to-end realities of the commercial food landscape.
The baseline economic numbers were incredibly eye-opening:
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Operational Variable Cost Pressures |
Real-World Ecosystem Impact |
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Fixed overhead & logistics |
Rent, utilities, platform delivery fees. |
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Supply chain fluctuations |
Fluctuating ingredient prices and sourcing constraints. |
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Human centric capital |
Fair staff wages and team protection frameworks. |
Wati quickly discovered her initial cost projections were about 20% off—not below budget, but far above it. For anyone looking in from the outside, the food ecosystem looks deceptively simple: you order, you eat, you enjoy. Behind the scenes, however, lies a long chain of physical labor, financial pressure, and deep care.
This experience built a massive respect for F&B workers who stay on their feet 12 hours a day or more, working weekends and public holidays while others rest. That is why she places the welfare of her team and the high quality of her ingredients above pure profit margin maximization.
Learning to Move On
One of the most honest parts of Wati’s story is how much she had to learn by doing.
There were moments when she bought too much stock. Moments when ingredients could not be used in time. Moments when she had to throw things away because she refused to serve anything that was not good enough for her customers.
It hurt, but she learned not to dwell on it.
“You just have to move on,” she says. “Learn and optimise, learn and optimise.”
That mindset applies far beyond business. Life will always come with mistakes, miscalculations, and moments where things do not go according to plan. Growth comes from learning quickly, adjusting, and continuing with more wisdom than before.
When Starting Over Feels Like Falling Behind
Starting a business in your 40s can look, from the outside, like taking a step back. Wati admits this honestly. “The fear of being left behind as your peers move forward and progress in their career is real.”
But over time, she has learned to reframe it. Progress does not always mean a bigger title or higher salary. Sometimes, progress looks like “learning something new” or having “the courage to do something that most people could only dream of and talk about but never take the chances to do it”.
As she says, “ I don't think I walked away from the corporate journey. I am just making a left turn.”
Your path does not have to look like anyone else’s to be valid.
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Redefining Success on Her Own Terms
Toward the end of the episode, Wati shares a phrase that feels like the heart of her journey.
She said, “So what if you have to call it quits, right. You've done your best. You can tell yourself, I've done my best.”
As Wati puts it, “You’ve done your best. You can tell yourself, I’ve done my best. I put my heart and soul into it.”
At least you tried. At least you gave it your heart. At least you do not have to live with the haunting question of “what if?”
That is what makes Wati’s story stay with you. It is not about having everything figured out. It is about knowing why you started, giving it your best, and being brave enough to see where the road takes you.
If you need a reminder that it is never too late to redefine your path, be sure to tune in to Episode 6 of Beautiful Me.
Catch Wati’s full, heartfelt story and let it remind you that courage does not always look loud.
Sometimes, it looks like starting again, one honest step at a time.
Discover how another conscious creator found true happiness by intentionally stepping out of her comfort zone in Episode 4 of the Beautiful Me Podcast.
