Fiona Shilton has been awarded the SA Woman Emerging Business Woman award in recognition for her work changing the conversation around death, wills, and estate planning and creating a legal practice that focuses on kindness, care, and bravery.
"We can only live our lives as fully as possible even if it is based on a mistake."
When Jill Lathlean died in 1985 someone awesome added this epitaph to her grave marker.
I don’t know Jill Lathlean but from the moment I accidentally discovered her final resting place in a forgotten corner of Norton Summit cemetery I’ve really wanted to sit down and have a cuppa with her…
What was the mistake? Was it really so big it warranted a death bed up-yours? Did you leave instructions in your will to have this message placed on your grave? What is a mistake anyway? Surely it’s just a “take” that didn’t quite go as expected…
Then I’d go on to tell her a bunch of things about me. Because this conversation would pretty much go like the hundreds of estate planning chats I’ve had over the past 2 years – a bit about you, a bit about me, and some answers in the middle.
I’d let her in on the secret that Your Estate Lawyer came about as the product of a mistake. The mistake of spending over a decade of my life thinking that I was cut out for dispute-focused law and believing that empathy, care, and vulnerability weren’t welcome in lawyering (I was wrong).
I’d tell her that when I was asked to leave my “real lawyer job”, instead of driving into a tree, overwhelmed with the shit-show my life had become I decided to be brave and do something I’d never even considered an option...
I started a business.
I’d probably admit that whilst I’ve helped other people make brave decisions, it’s taken until now to realise that being brave has helped me live life more fully than I ever thought possible.
I’m pretty sure Jill would think the SA Women I have had the pleasure of meeting over the past two years and their willingness to support, share, empower and marinate me in their awesomeness has been as invaluable as I do.
I don’t know Jill Lathlean, but I want to tell her she’s right; we can only live our lives as fully as possible even if it is based on a mistake.
Thanks to SA Woman I have ‘emerged’ from my mistake and am facing a future where I keep changing the conversation