Spicy Midlife Women: Real Talk, Raw Truth, and Bold Moves for Women Over 40

4.  Five Empowering Tips for Midlife Women Looking to Break Free from Stereotypical Expectations

• Episode 4

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Julee and Michele kick off a bold new series with a powerful conversation on what it really means to live midlife on your own terms. In this episode, they challenge outdated norms and share five essential mindset shifts to help women ditch the rules that no longer serve them. From redefining success to owning your voice, this episode is your permission slip to be unapologetically YOU.

Whether you’re craving more joy, considering a big life change, or just wondering if it’s “too late” to start something new—this one’s for you, spicy sister.

What you’ll hear:


  • Five mindset shifts to help you reclaim midlife as your most empowered chapter
  • Why success might mean something totally different now—and how to embrace that
  • How to challenge ageist narratives and stop apologizing for who you are
  • The power of prioritizing self-discovery over external approval
  • Building a supportive, like-minded community (and a sneak peek at one coming soon!)
Speaker 1:

Hey all you spicy ladies out there. It's Jules and Michelle here, your two spicy midlife women sharing our real life stories and having no BS conversations with all of you. Right, shelly.

Speaker 2:

That's right here to help all you midlife women redefine your relationships, ditch toxic cycles and reclaim your power. One episode at a time, let's get into it.

Speaker 1:

Let's get into it. So what do you think? Are we going to talk about, maybe, rewriting the rules? Redefining, rewriting yeah, giving everybody an idea of what that really looks like, because midlife isn't a crisis, it's a calling. That's what we've determined, I know. So we purposely come up with this topic because we really want to discuss ways you can live your life on your own terms, and this is the very beginning of a series of things that we'll be discussing that are hopefully going to get you into that place where you're feeling really empowered to do so.

Speaker 2:

Specifically, the tips we're going to share with you today are going to be breaking free from and stepping outside of those stereotypical expectations that there seem to be out there now. They probably always have been, but when you get to midlife they're more recognizable if you seek that with intention, right yeah, and I think that the women today have been in the place where you know.

Speaker 1:

okay, barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen is not necessarily this generation, no, but you get the idea right. Kind of the BC to not heard, with the kids being the ones that are maybe hearing that. But women have been in the past, and traditionally more. Would you use the word subservient or your favorite word, jules? No, it is Submissive. Submissive, we'll be getting into that toomit submit.

Speaker 2:

Well, anyways, we wanted to, in this episode, again share with you five tips on ways that you can identify and really start to, to dive in and maybe do some of this and recognize. So, first one being what, julie?

Speaker 1:

You know, it's really about redefining what success means to each of you, because in midlife we have our priorities, that shift. We have things that we have done before, that we don't necessarily do anymore, that don't serve us anymore, and so success doesn't always have to be anymore, and so success doesn't always have to be. You know, what we envision in our lives is like climbing the corporate ladder, getting you know that boost, paycheck being well. Well, what's the word I'm looking for? Being, you know, focusing all on your work or your career, and I think that's actually something that I always did too, and I think that's actually something that I always did too, and I think there's other things that probably fell by the wayside because of it. But it's really kind of determining what defines success for you and to you and about you. You know what your decisions are. You know going into this next phase of your life.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I would say midlife is a time to be able to reevaluate some of those things. Yeah, because certainly there is all the busyness and things that you know lead up to midlife, whether it is having a family, climbing the corporate ladder, different societal ideas of youth and beauty and focusing on those things. There's you know. So when you kind of enter into and start evolving into that midlife time frame, definitely a time for re-evaluation on what sex is Sex.

Speaker 1:

Where's your mind, girl?

Speaker 2:

What success?

Speaker 1:

is. That was what we would call a Freudian slip there Spicy, a spicy Freudian slip. It's funny. I was talking to a friend of mine yesterday and she is a little younger than us corporate girl. We knew her at Nordstrom and everything and she is still a powerhouse, but in the business world has been quite the powerhouse and really stepped back from the career, went and tried some different things and then came back to it because, you know, the economy was what it was. So now she's back in the corporate world but she looks at it totally different. And she was sending me pictures of her grandbaby brand new grandbaby and she was saying this is what my life looked like the last few days and it was pictures of the other grandbaby that she was watching while her daughter was in the hospital.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and I was like oh my God, remember that. And she was like I have no idea how we did all that stuff. I'm exhausted, yeah.

Speaker 2:

Now you can give them back, right? I know it is. You get to that point. That's how it is. When I have my grandkids I'm like, oh my gosh, how did I do this?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, With four all the time. So, anyway, redefining what success means to you could be a plethora of things. Really. It's, you know, involving your family, it's involving you, it's involving what makes you tick and what you want to do and what you want to learn. Really, you know, I look at that a lot like okay, don't laugh, but I've been looking at West Coast Swing dance lessons, what I know. But I've been watching them on Instagram and I've been like this is like fun, sexy dance.

Speaker 1:

It's fun, yeah but it's like but I just think about how intimate it is which we'll talk about that with some other episodes and stuff it's really super intimate. It's like I don't know if I could be like that intimate with someone I don't know and I don't know it just feels weird.

Speaker 1:

Oh, you just gotta like feel that vibe man, exactly so I think it would be really good for me because I might set some of those things aside. Anyway, total side note yeah, I digress here, but anyway, so that's number one, really redefining what success means to you.

Speaker 2:

Really think about that and think about what you would do differently To create your own definition of fulfillment and getting the things aligned within that, not just what others are expecting, but what you want. So there's that.

Speaker 1:

Well, I think that we have a tendency to see people that are comfortable with who we are, who we've been, how we've projected ourselves, not wanting you to change, you know, and not wanting you to get out of that quote box that they're putting you in. And so when you do it's, they question it. And this we're talking family, friends, whatever, you know, even even like I was thinking about something I was wearing, wearing and it was a little bit, not as off the cuff as what Michelle might wear, but a little bit more racy for me maybe. And someone saying, oh, that's different than what you would normally, and I'd be looking at them going, yeah, so what?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, you know but they're used to seeing things a certain way certainly and don't necessarily like seeing it differently.

Speaker 2:

So you have to really put those voices out of your head when you're trying to decide what your life is going to look like well, that's a great segue into the, the number two tip that we have here to chat about, and that is challenging those ageist narratives. Right, push back a little bit to your point that you were just talking about, because society often implies that midlife women should slow down, fade into the background. Right, be invisible, be invisible. Yeah, you know, quiet down because you're not so involved with all the things anymore.

Speaker 1:

Just go to your book club and don't do anything else it does not have to be that way.

Speaker 2:

Push back on that Challenge, those narratives.

Speaker 1:

And some of that comes with it. We talk spicy. When we're saying spicy voices, having a spicy voice, just like, why is it that you feel the need to fulfill what other people's expectations are of you and why do you feel that it's not okay to do things that you desire to do because you think that they're meant for someone else?

Speaker 1:

maybe someone who's younger or someone who's in a different, you know, part of their life. Yeah, I was telling someone the other day which I'm going to say this out loud it's like I really want to go see eminem and he's not even touring right, but this is something that most people in my world would be looking at me like really, you really want to do that and I really do.

Speaker 2:

I don't know why I just do and it's, and I'm gonna, but you know I'll probably be the oldest person there, no doubt.

Speaker 1:

I know I'm probably gonna drag you with me, but you know I I've gotten the big like eye roll question mark kind of thing when I have mentioned that to people before and they just kind of look at me like really you want to do that, that doesn't surprise me.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, but yeah, I know you. Yeah, and it's not because I'm trying to be, you know, like Eminem's age or anything like that, I don't know. I just like the music. So I don't have to apologize for the fact that I want to hear it. But. So I don't have to apologize for the fact that I want to hear it, but I mean, some of those things can be even starting a new career.

Speaker 2:

I know I started a new career in midlife, me too, and it was a big, big one and it felt good. But yeah, starting a new career in midlife I Write a book, if you have thought about doing that you can do, that. You can take the time and do that. Travel by yourself. Start lifting weights.

Speaker 1:

Learn a new language, whatever it is that feels good.

Speaker 2:

Start a podcast. Right, just do those things. Yeah, start a podcast. Yeah, do it.

Speaker 1:

You can you know a little tidbits on that is you know maybe start following or looking at inspiring midlife role models who are breaking boundaries Right.

Speaker 2:

I can think of a handful of those from women in the past, like Marilyn Monroe, Coco Chanel, Right Madonna not saying she's a role model, but definitely breaking boundaries.

Speaker 1:

Well, I think she's a role model for breaking boundaries whether you would break the same ones Right exactly, you want to talk about someone who lives up to zero expectations of other people. I mean, would I live her lifestyle? Probably not, but I admire the fact that she's just got that FU attitude about whatever it is that she wants to do and how she does it. Yeah, and I admire that.

Speaker 2:

I admire that about her Because even though in midlife, your life is still expansive and evolving, even in midlife. So challenge those ageist narratives.

Speaker 1:

And they're all around us all around us, in your clothing, in the music you listen to in the places that you choose to frequent. In the music you listen to in the places that you choose to frequent, in the company that you keep.

Speaker 1:

Frankly, you know, there's a lot of things that limit us and a lot of it's just limiting beliefs that people have that we succumb to, or limiting beliefs that we have that we haven't gotten past. So, yeah, very, very important. Along with that, I would say with this tip number three is owning your voice. First of all, you got to have a voice to own right and you start seeing little bits and pieces of people speaking up and starting to, you know, question the narratives around them. And I love that man, I love seeing that when it's not like women coming at you and trying to create dialogue, that is confrontational, necessarily, but more asking questions about things and not being so agreeable about things just because yeah, you don't have to stay quiet and agree or people please.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, you do not have to do that, especially as you're aging. I think that's somewhat of what's expected by some people in our lives Not all, but some but it's definitely not that time, because I don't know about you, jules, but as I've gotten older, I definitely don't give as many fucks. She gives zero fucks. She gives zero fucks. You know, I definitely don't. You know you do and you don't. There's a balance. But it's definitely a time to be able to speak up and, you know, give opinions and make things known that maybe you don't agree with, or things that you do agree with. All of those things, things that you do agree with.

Speaker 1:

All of those things. One thing I've noticed about our voice and I've actually picked up on this a lot recently is how much women apologize yeah Without even realizing how much they apologize. They're constantly sorry yeah, oh, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry I shouldn't have said that. Or I'm so sorry I didn't mean to put you out. Or I'm so sorry I shouldn't have said that.

Speaker 1:

Or I'm so sorry I didn't mean to put you out, or I'm so sorry. That was like not very. Whatever the case may be, you know and apologizing is that's a problem that you're feeling like you have to apologize constantly for whatever it is, except if you're late.

Speaker 2:

I'm sorry for being late difference. I actually had an experience recently where I spoke up, I gave my opinion, I said how I was feeling, and then it was a few days after it wasn't in the moment.

Speaker 2:

I think what we're talking about. A lot of times it's like that. You know, apologetic in the moment, being sorry all the time, but you know if there's a situation it happens, and then you know you have a day or two to think on it. I think there are times where it's okay to say gosh. You know I've been thinking about this. I know I said this. I'm glad I said it. It wasn't my intention to make you feel. You know there's a different way to go about the apology after there's thought to it. But I know what we're talking about here is, you know, in that moment there are those people that are constantly apologizing, actually for everything.

Speaker 1:

I know I ran across that with someone who is an older woman and she's constantly apologizing, saying you don't need to apologize and it's the way she has come up in the world. It's too old. She's too old, more than likely now, it being in her 90s, to change how she does that because it's ingrained so heavily in her. But my response to it is you don't need to apologize. It's okay to have your opinion or whatever you know. So I think that practicing you know what you want and saying what you want and saying what you need without apologizing is something that is a learned behavior. It's not something that you do automatically.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, you have to intentionally think about that, but I would say, yeah, my challenge to you listeners is to practice that. Practice saying what you want, like Julie said, without apology, because your experiences and your insight are valuable.

Speaker 1:

So don't hold back, and we'll probably get into an episode on this in the bedroom too, because having your voice in the bedroom, I think, is really important. Which voice is she referring to? I'm not joking, though, because it's like nobody can really read your mind. Anyway, that's a whole nother topic, but it comes to mind because it's been like a discussion I had recently with somebody and I just have become more vocal with what's important to me. So I think it surprises people sometimes, because they're not used to.

Speaker 1:

they're used to guessing you know, what they want and or what you want, I should say.

Speaker 2:

Well, and along with owning your voice, like we were just talking about, and not apologizing, what that's part of is this next tip we're going to talk about, and that's the prioritizing self-discovery over approval.

Speaker 1:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2:

Right. So I think midlife is a powerful time yeah, powerful time to explore interests without the need to feel validated.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, right. Well, we're always in a position, especially if we have responsibilities towards other people, if we have, say it's a need, that you want to go like eat, pray, love, you know.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

You want to go climb a mountain, you got to get support from the people that are around you. It's not necessarily the validation, but you need support if you have responsibilities that you need to take care of at home. You know, and hopefully you're in an environment and in relationships where people are supporting you, even though they don't necessarily understand what it is that you're doing or why you're doing something you're doing, but they trust your judgment and can support you along those ways. So it's not the same, in my opinion, as validation. Validation is basically not doing anything until you get the blessing or permission of someone else.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, the green light, yeah.

Speaker 1:

Now I would say that there's times when you would do Sal this is maybe sounding kind of manipulative but where you would get that quote validation, but it's really very purposeful because you want someone to buy in and make you think it's partially their idea, so they do support you. That was kind of manipulative wasn't it.

Speaker 2:

See now this is the way I was raised. 100%, that's manipulative. You didn't do that shit canvas and drive up in the mountains and set it up on a hillside and paint a picture. Because I feel like, because I'm curious about that and I feel like it would bring me joy and just the experience, the thought of the experience, sounds exciting to me Really. I should act on that and do it. I don't need anybody's permission.

Speaker 1:

I'm just thinking about, like, spending money or, you know, going on trips, things like that, that are going to require, you know, someone else to be talked into something.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah, I mean. You know, we can be manipulative when we need to be.

Speaker 1:

I'm totally calling myself out here because I mean I learned from the master and it's like I totally have acknowledged that over the years. So I really try to be, you know, careful about that. I don't have anybody in my life right at the moment that I would be practicing that on, of course.

Speaker 2:

I think, though, as far as the self-discovery piece, I think the important thing that I would want you all to get from that is to spend time. Make sure you're spending time doing something that brings you joy, whether it's journaling or connecting in nature, so that you can spend time with your inner self and not worry about the version of you that other people are expecting, but really it's about what brings you joy, you know the one thing and do those things.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, like cutting out the noise.

Speaker 1:

Like you go to the beach or, like Michelle was saying, you go into nature, go on a walk or whatever. You've cut out all of the noise that's around you, and sometimes your mind and your thoughts are so loud. It's almost scary how loud they are, because it's like you can't ignore them. So that's a wonderful time for you to be able to really step back and ask yourself. It's like what is important to me, you know what about my future is something that I want to really invest my energy and my time in. And to your point as well, Michelle, it's like you don't need permission from people to evolve. You know they are not going to necessarily evolve with you.

Speaker 1:

And then that's where other issues come up, perhaps with relationships and such, but that's another topic altogether. But if people are in a relationship, a lot of the time they do a lot of these things together because it helps nurture their relationship. But that doesn't mean you can't do things independently from each other either yeah, With the level of support, of course, that you would hope for from a partner. So the one thing that I wanted to mention, too, was building a supportive and like-minded community is really important.

Speaker 1:

Like having a really good circle of friends, and I'm not just saying like the friends you grew up with. There might be friends that are in different parts of your life. Maybe, like I mentioned book club earlier, maybe you have a book club, you know, where you have people that you're speaking to on a more intellectual level, but that's the type of relationships that you have with them. You don't have the same type of relationship with someone else. So there's different types of relationships you're going to have with people. But building a community where you know you're surrounded by people who have similar interests or have similar ideas but you can learn from them, I think would be really important.

Speaker 2:

So finding those people, yeah, I was just going to say I think that takes exploration. I was just thinking of my own self in earlier midlife when I was evolving and trying to figure some of these things out. You know kind of experimenting, if you will socialize time with different types of people. You know whether it was at the time I was attending church you know there was. I was getting into a career, so it was work relationships, sometimes in the community, with you know other moms that my kids were, you know, involved with sports with just different things to see kind of what vibed with you. Honestly, none of that shit did.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, but now you know but now that you have to do.

Speaker 2:

I think, for me, I had to do those things to really figure that out, right? So it's definitely a time of exploration and trying to figure out. Whatever it is, though, find a like-minded community, and it will take a little bit of exploration on your part. Maybe it's the birds and the bees up in the mountains while you're painting and it's not anybody particular. Yeah, that could be.

Speaker 1:

Well, maybe you're just becoming more comfortable with yourself when you are alone with your thoughts.

Speaker 2:

You know, there's midlife women's groups, there's entrepreneurial networks, there's online communities focused in authenticity, there's all kinds of things. And, you know, coming in the near future, we are going to be building a community as well for all you spicy midlife women. So just know that that is something to look forward to. Here, we will be building a sisterhood community for midlife women, so you can ask questions about things that you wouldn't necessarily ask.

Speaker 1:

Feel comfortable doing it because you will be among like-minded people and yeah, there are a couple of Facebook groups out there that I've noticed that are their private groups, where women everything's done anonymously but they feel comfortable asking questions about things that you wouldn't necessarily ask other people and the kind of answers you get. I mean it's more like wow, I kind of thought about myself, let's see what everybody has to say about it.

Speaker 2:

Right, I know, because there are so many things that I think we as women we think about as time is evolving, circumstances are changing, relationships are shifting, all of those things and it's a big time. There's a big, it's a lot that goes on that I think we don't even necessarily identify in the moment. So hopefully some of what we share helps with the identification of that. Again, these tips for you know, helping you redefine what midlife is, the first one, redefine what success means to you, the second one means to you.

Speaker 1:

The second one challenge those ageist narratives. The third one own your voice. Fourth one prioritize self-discovery over approval. And then the fifth one we've talked about is building a supportive, like-minded community. So all of these things are topics or phrases or things that you can really dive into deeper on your own personal level, because it's going to mean something different to you than it maybe would to Michelle or to me or what have you, but it really is about you and what works for you and how you take this information and really apply it in your life. Because you are a midlife woman if you're listening to this, more than likely and there is a difference between being a spicy, empowered midlife woman and not apologizing and being complacent, really, and kind of staying in a place where you feel safe, and it's okay to do that if that works for you. What we want to do is be able to help you, enhance your time, enhance your effort and bring joy really in a lot of ways to the life that you're already leading, and really just lead it purposefully.

Speaker 2:

Yep, and then it's okay. Give yourself permission to think outside the box If you're asking those questions, break free from stereotypical expectations, and that would be our ask of you. Think about some of those things this week. Relisten to what some of these tips are, really dig deep and ask some of those questions and start taking action on some of those things. We are here. Like I said, you can expect a community here real soon. We're excited about that. You can find us on Facebook, instagram, all the socials. We are out there and we just look forward to sharing more spiciness with you in your mid life.

Speaker 1:

That's right and for all of you women out there. We hope you enjoyed this episode and we look forward to chatting with you again next week.

Speaker 2:

Until then, stay spicy sister, bye, bye.