Ep #186: Midlife Reset: How to Stop Feeling Stuck and Start Moving Forward

Have you ever looked around at your life in midlife and wondered why everything feels harder than it should? Maybe your children are growing up, your relationships are changing, or you simply no longer recognize yourself. If so, I want you to know something important: you are not broken.

In this episode, I walk you through a simple midlife reset process that helps you stop feeling overwhelmed and start getting honest about what is really happening in your life. I share how to take an honest inventory of the areas that are draining you, identify where you feel most depleted, and choose one aligned step that can create meaningful change.

You do not need to blow up your life or fix everything at once. You already have everything you need inside of you to rebuild intentionally and move toward greater clarity, freedom, and self-trust.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• How to take an honest life inventory in midlife

• Why self-neglect often leads to resentment and exhaustion

• How to identify the most depleted area of your life

• A simple one-focus, one-action plan for lasting change

• How small non-negotiable habits create momentum

If this episode speaks to you and you're ready to create real movement in your life, reach out and book a clarity call with me. https://calendly.com/coachwithmikki/clarity_call

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Full Episode Transcript:

What if the reason your life suddenly feels so misaligned in midlife isn't because something is going wrong, but because something inside of you is finally waking up? Well, welcome to Led From Within. I'm Mikki Gardner, and this is a podcast for women who are done outsourcing their authority and are ready to claim a life aligned with who they are today. Because midlife doesn't need to be a crisis. It can be a return to yourself, to clarity, to courage, and to inner authority. So let's begin.

Hi. Welcome back to the podcast. I'm glad that you're here, because today we're talking about something that I think all of us feel a lot of times. And what is that? It's like we're broken.

I just had a conversation with a client today where she said, you know, it should have been different. I shouldn't be in this phase of life. Right? The children are getting older. They don't need me. In the same way, things should be easier. Why does life feel so hard?

I had a client the other day that I was talking to, and she said, you know, I've been divorced eight years. It should be easier by now. Or we get to that moment in life, in sort of midlife, where we realize all of a sudden, ugh, I just don't feel like myself. I feel ragey. I feel intense. I feel resentful. I feel like I don't even know who I am in my skin. I look in the mirror, and I don't know who I am anymore. Right.

Do any of these things sound familiar? Because I know that I can kind of raise my hand to all of them. And I want you to know something. You are not feeling this way, and you are not feeling stuck or trapped in a life because you're broken, because you're not. You're feeling stuck and trapped because you just don't know where to start. And when you don't know where to start, that's the moment that everything feels overwhelming. And oftentimes we do nothing or we think we have to change everything, and it's just too much. And that's where most women, you know, in this midlife journey, they live somewhere between silent suffering and then wanting to blow their entire life up.

I can't even count the number of times I have a conversation with a prospective client, and it's either I just have to suffer in silence and just fantasize about living in a house or a condo or an apartment all by myself. Right. M. But those are not the only two options. But Too many times we think in these extremes because that's what our brains do.

You know, oftentimes we think that the problem is maybe the relationship or the marriage or the job or the weight that we've gained or the situation that we're in. But most of the time, the real problem is, is that you never actually stop long enough to take an honest inventory over your life. We talked about this on, um, the last one, right? That honest appraisal, that inventory. Right.

This is the first foundation of the work that I teach. Because we cannot change what we are not aware of. So we actually have to stop and take an honest inventory of our life. Not the life we think we should have, not the life that we've been, uh, maintaining, but the life that we're actually living. Because you can't change what you cannot see clearly. And so I want to do that today.

I had a woman reach out the other day, um, after her first session, and she said, you know, that one hour of this kind of work moved more than months of talk therapy. Right. And that's a really common thing because, listen, talk therapy is amazing. I am currently getting my master's in counseling. I am all in for talk therapy. I am also all in on the actions that we need to take to actually move the needle. It's one thing to be aware of something, but it's another to change it. And so that's where we really where coaching and this sort of self growth and this work through the midlife journey offers us this perspective to not just talk about the issue, but to change it.

And so today I want to talk about kind of a midlife reset process, because I'm going to give you a simple process to go through. Not to fix your entire life, but to help you move the needle in one area. Because when we can do that, we start to feel better and we start to gain momentum. And m. That's what this woman, when she reached out to me, it's like all of a sudden I have some movement for the first time in years. And that's what I want for you after today's episode.

So today we're going to take kind of a life inventory again, that honest appraisal. So before you make any big decisions, you need some data. And so we're going to look at life buckets. You can sit down if you have a piece of paper and write them down. Just keep it really simple.

So we are going to look at relationships. Maybe that's marriage, partnership. We're going to look at parenting. If You're a parent. Working career is another bucket. Your home and your environment, huge important thing. Connection with others, friendships, relationships with other women, right? Those connections are so important. And a bucket that has to be inside of this is self, right? This is your mental health, your physical health, your emotional health and your spiritual health.

So when we have all of those sort of uh, buckets listed out, I want you to look at it in two ways. Ask yourself the question, who have I been in this area? And what I mean by that is what is the role that I'm playing, right? Are you the fixer? Are you the peacekeeper? Are you the over functioner? Are you the one who goes last? Really looking at like what are the roles that I play in each of these areas of my life can be hugely informative.

Another option when you're looking at these life bucket resets is to look at it from an energy perspective. So what is this area of my life actually costing me? Is it filling me up? Am I energized, uh, by it? Is it draining me? Am I exhausted by it? Is it sort of on zero or is it pretty neutral? Right? And a lot of times what we want to do is if you have the each of them and you have like a little bucket or a circle, you can actually kind of fill up. When you think about the energy, how much energy is going in that? Is it a quarter of a bucket? Is it a half a bucket? Is it a full bucket? And once you have this, you can start to see what is actually going on.

If you're like me and you love a journal prompt, maybe you can look at each area and you can just ask some questions. Where am I exhausted and why? Where am I over giving? Where am I quietly resentful? Where do I feel most like myself? You can look at it from those areas.

Okay, so once you've done that, now we're going to go into step two which is to start to look for the imbalances, right? Because this is where it gets interesting and this is where it actually gets honest. Because a lot of times we might think that the relationship or this is the problem or a uh, marriage is the problem or, or our children might be the problem, but maybe our self bucket is totally empty. If everything is being poured into other areas outside of ourselves and we wonder why our identity feels like it's gone. It's not really that big a question. Because the loudest problem in our lives isn't always the root of the problem. It might be the one screaming and making the most Noise, but it doesn't mean that that's where it's coming from. And so if you're being honest, you have to look at what area of my life is being most neglected right now. What am I blaming everything on that actually might not be the root of it and start to get curious. Okay?

So now step three, this is the part that most of us kind of get a little off kilter on. Because either one, we look at it and we're too overwhelmed, right? We think, oh, there's too many things to do here. And so we end up, like I said at the top, not doing anything. So instead step three, what we're going to do is we're going to choose one area. One, one, one, one. Not more than one, one. And I'm saying that because a lot of times we're like, no, it's all a mess. But we've got to just focus on one thing. You don't need an entire life overhaul, but you do need to make one aligned decision.

So I want you to stop and ask yourself right now, if I could shift one of these areas in the next 30 days, what would it be? And maybe you ask, what would actually create some relief for me right now if one area could feel different, could I bring some ease and some relief to my life?

And now we're going to move to step four, which is build a simple plan. Right. Again, simplicity. It's an underrated concept because we often want to change everything. We want to feel good, right? We just want things to be easier, right? We want things to not be so hard and so complicated. But again, we can't get lost in the bigness of it. We've got to come down to a simple plan. And this is where clarity gets built through the action of a plan.

So you have to choose one. Focus. What is the one thing that I'm going to work on? If your self bucket is depleted, maybe you know that you're exhausted, you're not sleeping, maybe you're not feeling like yourself and you just really want to go get some movement or yoga or do something. I want you to just break it down to what is one thing that I'm going to work on. It might be sleep, it might be drinking more water, it might be saying no. Even when that's uncomfortable. It might look like blocking time for yourself, right? Not over explaining your decisions. Right? These are all examples. Getting to bed on time, you know, setting a bedtime and then sticking to it.

So what you're gonna do in this plan is you're gonna have one focused, one action and then create a non negotiable. So the one focus is, what is the one thing that I'm going to be working on? And then you ask yourself, what is the one action that I can take this week, maybe not even this week. What is the one action that I can take today? What is the one action I can take right now when I get done listening to this podcast? And then the third question is important because this brings up the non negotiables. These are the little daily habits that we do without fail. These are the little promises that we keep to ourselves. And this is where the magic lies.

We have to ask ourselves, what has to change in my behavior to support this? Right, that one action. Let's say that it's blocking time for yourself. What has to change in your behavior to do that? Consistency, maybe following through. If it's having one honest conversation, what has to change in your behavior to do that? It might be being willing to actually sit down and have it. It might be scheduling it, it might be brainstorming what you're going to say. There's many things here, right? So one focus, one action, and then the non negotiables, those things in your behavior that are going to support the focus and the action.

And it's important at this point in the process, right, is to ask yourself kind of, uh, what is one thing that I've been avoiding that I know would move me forward and what would it look like if I followed through on it this week when we start to get really honest with ourselves and we break it down into small, doable chunks? You can do more and experience more and have more relief and freedom than you even think possible. But it starts with those actions, those focus and the action on one thing.

But what I can promise you, my friend, like without a doubt, is that you are not broken. You are whole and loved and worthy and creative and resourceful and you, huh, have everything you need already inside of you. I know this to be true. And oftentimes when I talk to women who feel like they might be the problem, they might be broken, they did it wrong. It's just not so. Most of the time they are just living a life that hasn't been fully questioned yet. And midlife gives us that opportunity and we don't have to blow it all up. We are able to rebuild it. When we do it intentionally, you don't need more time, you don't need to overthink it, but you do need an honest look at what is going on and then taking one aligned, uh, move in the direction you want to go. It is simple. I'm not saying it's easy, but it is simple. And it requires us to get really honest with ourselves and then be willing to take the small, doable actions to get us where we want to go.

And if you want help doing this, like actually sitting down and mapping it out, that's exactly what I do. Inside my clarity calls with people, one hour together, where we get really honest, we get really clear, and we build a plan that gets you out of feeling trapped and stuck in your life, because you don't need to stay stuck.

So I want you to do something for me. Do something for your kids, do something for your partner, do something for you and pick one area. Actually sit down and take an honest look and then pick one area, not five, again, one, and take one action that moves you forward towards what you want within the next 24 hours. That's how it starts. And if you need the accountability to do that, I am here. And so there's a link in the show notes. You can book a clarity call. I will help you do this. I will help you create the plan.

Because just like the client who came back and said, after literally one hour, I had more movement than I had in eight years and this is possible. Your life is waiting for you to get clear, to get honest, and to start making movement towards becoming the woman, the having the freedom, the liberation, the joy, the passion and the fun back in your life. Just remember, you get to choose. You do, nobody else. And I'm here rooting for you every step of the way. I'll see you on the next episode.

Thanks so much for listening to today's episode. I hope that it spoke to you and you found something useful to take away from it if you did. I would be so grateful if you would take 2 seconds to subscribe to the show, which will help help you because you won't miss another episode. And it would help me because you would never miss another episode. And if you are in the giving spirit and would take 30 seconds to rate and review this episode, it would do wonders for the show and for me. Thanks so much for being here and I can't wait to talk to you again next week.