Unraveling: Navigating Midlife
“Midlife isn’t a crisis, Midlife is an unraveling. Midlife is when the universe gently places her hands upon your shoulders, pulls you close, and whispers in your ear: I’m not screwing around.”
Do you feel bombarded with the reality that time is running out? How will I feel about my life when my children leave the nest, when I am faced with retirement? Will I have regret that I let anxiety dictate my every move or lack of? Will I regret not fighting harder in my marriage or perhaps staying too long in a lifeless marriage? Will I question whether or not walking away from my career potential to choose a path that was more conducive to raising my family was the right choice? Will I regret not adjusting my career path to raise my family differently? Will my feelings of inadequacy ever go away? Will I feel proud that I armored up and played it safe to protect my soul from perceived uncertainty? Has my armor protected my heart and soul at the expense of an adventurous and joyful life? Or will I feel shame that I cared too much about what other people thought?
I don’t know about you but those questions had become a constant companion in my life over a decade ago. I felt so much guilt for questioning a life that from onlookers appeared to be perfect. Why did I feel like a caricature?
Before I navigated the midlife waters, I thought it was just folks fearing getting old and that if you bought a sports car, found a younger lover, traveled more the questions would go away but none of those options appealed to me. Instead, I jumped into the deeper waters of self -exploration and deep healing work. This lead to the universe not so gently guiding me to my greater truths. Where have I been, where am I going and deciding if I had enough courage to be me or continue the façade I had been portraying for years.
I chose the first option. The more I began to embrace myself for all my flawed complexity, the more strength and conviction I felt in my chosen path. I left my marriage and changed careers. In doing so, I chose my own happiness over some ideal of perfection. I’d be lying to you if I said it was easy. In fact, these experiences were some of the hardest of my life thus far, and, given the opportunity, I’d do them again a hundred times over to reach the place of self acceptance and purpose I’m in right now.
At its core, midlife forces us to come to terms with our mortality. The protective glaze of youth we enjoyed has faded, and we are left with the honest reality of our lives. These lives have been marked by decisions we’ll never be able to change, but we’re not at the end of the road. We still have places we want to go and we won’t have forever to get there. Once we’ve unraveled enough, we might see that we’ve created a road forward, one that leads somewhere truly beautiful. And maybe we’ll own a BMW, too.
As an executive wellness coach, my calling is to help people like you process your midlife transition and offer guidance and support towards finding the stronger, kinder and more fulfilled version of yourself. If you’re interested in learning more about my process, I’d love to talk. Schedule a free 30-minute consultation session on my website, sign up for my 14-week Aligned: Chakras for Business course or 3- to 6-month executive wellness coaching program. I can’t wait to meet you.