This isn’t what I planned to write about today, and it’s not the article I’d already begun writing. I received what I call a download in my sleep to write what I’m about to share. I always trust these downloads. When I run retreats I show up with a planned schedule, and if anything needs to change for the following day I’m told about it in my sleep. I’m not sure how well I’ll be able to articulate what I’m about to write because there are lots of pieces to pull together. So here goes…
Last year I engaged a business to build a new website for me. It’s a business that boasts it’s run by women who spend the time aligning with their clients’ mission and purpose. They sounded perfect. Their pricing was reasonable.
The process of working with them was rigid and frustrating. The promised four-week turnaround ended up being 13 weeks. The “bonus” copywriting (a red flag from the beginning) sounded just like everyone else’s content written by AI – as I expected. When I said it’s not at all aligned and I’ll use my own, they put a limit on the length of my writing because it had to fit their design, which, when it was delivered with much alleged excitement from them, took my breath away. It was terrible.
At that stage I considered cutting my losses and not investing any more time and energy in trying to achieve a result I’d be happy with. But I didn’t. I kept going. The project kept going. They came up with another design and the website was eventually handed over. I won’t ever use it.
They asked me for a review and I didn’t provide one. A month later the owner of the business emailed and asked for my honest feedback. I was deep in wedding season and set aside the email to come back to because I wanted to respond thoughtfully. When I did, I was trusting that this woman sincerely did want honest feedback, so I provided it and I was explicit. She wrote back and it felt like an attempt to appease, which riled me, I think mostly because she didn’t take responsibility. She said my feedback is important to her, and sounded just like the recorded voice says at the end of a phone call with an airline or electricity company. Then she ended the email with “xx” and her name, and that made me even angrier. I don’t want kisses from her, I want ownership. I paid for her team to produce a shit website.
I was cross with myself too. It’s not the first time I’ve fallen into the trap of working with people who think they know better than I do when it comes to my business.
Again, I vowed to do everything on my own terms and I couldn’t care less what that looks like to other people who claim to know better. I’m sick of being told (aren’t we all?) who we should be in this world and how we should do it. I refuse to be shoved in a box.
Genuine alignment is deeply personal. It’s powerful and can’t be faked. For the record, I don’t and won’t use AI to write anything here or on my website (which I now need to start all over again).
Reflecting on all this, my mind jumps to midlife and some things I’ve read about the hormone oestrogen being responsible for “pleaser” behaviour. Oestrogen didn’t write the email to the website woman. Oestrogen would have done everything it could to “keep things nice.”
I’m pretty sure I was once blessed with very high oestrogen levels, and as they diminish I’m becoming more fierce and less accommodating. This is something I love about us women as we age. We are forces to be reckoned with, and we have oodles of genuine compassion to match. We’re serious about making this world work better for all of us and we use our powerful voices to help us do it – without apology.
As I continue to focus on being essential instead of optional, I’ve made a list of all the things that are in the mix of optional and essential for me. I wonder if it’s helpful for you too?
Time being hijacked: So much of my energy and purpose can be spent on reacting and responding rather than being intentional and creating. There’s grief for me with this, for my days not feeling aligned and sacred to me
Longing for spaciousness and sovereignty: In an ideal world, my days would be spent walking in nature, making offerings, writing here, and running retreats. I’m craving less noise, fewer obligations, and much more room to breathe and listen to my inner voice and guidance. I want simplicity so I can be connected with my soul, my purpose, aliveness and joy
Parenting a young adult child: This feels like stepping in then stepping back, trusting, letting go, and intervening when necessary, while holding worry (the worry!), sorrow, protectiveness and restraint all at once. It’s emotionally exhausting
Nervous system strain: When care, responsibility and the emotional load outweigh replenishment and meaning, it means I’m in survival mode and something has to shift. My capacity is different these days and I’m having to learn this. When I find myself feeling depleted, edgy and flat, the only way through is to focus on what lights me up and set aside everything that’s not essential
Midlife mirroring: I’ve recently caught up with a few women friends who are deep in the midlife reckoning too. Their challenges and struggles mirror my own. Midlife strips illusions about our time, capacity, identity, relationships, bodies and purpose. We’re faced with all sorts of complexities and often having to make decisions that are the “least worst” rather than the “best.” We’re well aware of the doors closing behind us but the new doors haven’t opened just yet
Deep desire for flow and alignment: I know what it feels like to be lit up from within, and to move through my life with purpose, energy, devotion, aliveness – and joy. I know what to do to reclaim that. I know how to call myself back and help other women find their way home to themselves too. This is what we do in my retreats. Away from the noise and distractions of our busy lives, we come home to our magnificence, beauty, aliveness, purpose and joy (there are 2 spaces left for my Held retreat in Bali, June 21-26. Does one of them have your name on it? Reply to this email to say “yes please” and I’ll send you all the details)
None of these struggles is a failure. They’re part of an awakening, and our hunger for a truer life is nothing less than holy.
Midlife is like any other major transition. It’s a death then rebirth. Life is full of all sorts of endings. They’re always happening, from today ending with nightfall to the sun rising again tomorrow, to relationships being over, losing a job, a pet dying, or a version of ourselves that no longer fits. These are the cycles of life. We are cyclical creatures. It’s so easy to forget that.
At midlife in particular, when we emerge on the other side, we no longer need to live bound by old stories. This is the time to choose our next story – to mindfully and deliberately and purposefully and joyfully choose it – with the assistance of our brain and hormones that are no longer devoted to others’ needs and saying yes instead of no. We find the beauty. We make beauty.
Here’s the offering I’ve made to a truer life. It’s for you. May you discover what makes you feel most alive, and create ways to live in alignment with it:
At the weekend I officiated a beautiful commitment ceremony for two women in midlife. They met 10 years ago, and after they shared their first kiss in the woods four years ago, they had to unravel past relationships. It’s an understatement to say that it’s been tough. Together, they’ve walked through the fire. They’ve reformed their lives with a whole lot of love, persistence, patience and acceptance to create a new version of family.
At their ceremony they made a commitment to being together always, for the rest of their lives, and to meet whatever life brings – the challenges, the joys and delights, the quiet moments, and everything in between.
They committed to do that with deep love, care, and gratitude for one another. I’m so glad they found each other.
It made me consider that maybe that’s what we need to do too – for ourselves. Keep choosing love for ourselves while we meet the challenges of becoming essential. It is sacred work. It isn’t easy, but I don’t even want to imagine the alternative. I’m here for meeting it all so I can feel truly alive. How about you?
Tonight I’ll be on air with Amelia for the Peri-M Party show. She wants to talk to me about perimenopause. If you want to, you can tune in or listen to the recording afterwards here: Peri-M Party.
If you’re new here, welcome. This space is where I write about owning our power, with a focus on love, loss, beauty and the tender art of being human. It’s where I try to make sense of what it means to live with an open heart in a world that keeps breaking our hearts.
I believe our grief deserves reverence - not fixing, not rushing - but honouring. When we tend to it with care it transforms us. It brings us back to life. It brings us home to who we truly are.
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