Ep. 165: You Don't Need a Total Overhaul: 3 Truths That Would've Saved Me Years of Spinning

Today, we're talking about something I see constantly in midlife...the endless cycle of Sunday night planning and Wednesday morning surrender. But instead of giving you another system to try, I want to share something even more powerful: the truths I wish someone had told me sooner.

Because sometimes the most helpful thing isn't a new planner...it's hearing someone say, "You're not the problem. The old ways just stopped working."

I'm breaking down the three mindset shifts that saved me years of spinning my wheels...shifts that helped me stop managing the chaos and start leading my actual life.

Let's dive in.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Breaking the Cycle of Overwhelm
• 0:27 Embracing Small Changes for Big Impact
• 4:32 The Need for a Small Reset
• 14:48 Self-Awareness Over Discipline
• 27:04 Permission to Be Human

Transcript

Well, hey friend, welcome back to the Intentional Midlife Mom podcast. I'm your host, Jennifer Roskamp, and if you're tired of feeling like you're managing your life instead of actually living it, this episode is gonna be for you. So before we dive in, I want you to picture something with me. It's Sunday night, you're sitting there with your planner, your good intentions, and that familiar feeling in your chest. You know the one, that mix of determination and dread. You're gonna get it together this week. You're gonna wake up earlier. You're gonna eat better, be more present with your family. You're finally gonna tackle that project you've been

you've been putting off. And so you've got your color-coded schedule, your meal prep planned, your morning routine mapped out. This is the week when everything changes. And then Monday happens. And Tuesday. And by Wednesday, you're already behind, already making excuses, already telling yourself you'll start fresh next week. Here's what no one tells you about midlife. It's not that everything is broken.

It's really that the old ways of coping have finally stopped working. The systems that got you through your 20s and 30s, the sheer willpower, the ability to push through exhaustion, the capacity to just figure it out as you go, these things just don't work anymore. And instead of admitting that, we double down, we try harder, we do more, we convince ourselves that we just need better systems. We just need more discipline or we need one more planner that will finally be the magic solution.

But what if I told you that the problem isn't that you need to try harder? What if the issue is that you've been approaching this whole thing backwards? What if the answer isn't another overhaul, another Monday morning fresh start, or another attempt to become the woman who has it all together? So today I'm sharing the three truths that really I wish someone had told me before I spent years spinning my wheels, burning myself out, and convincing myself that I was the problem.

Know that these aren't tips or hacks. They're mindset shifts that will help you stop managing the chaos and start leading your actual life. And I'm speaking from experience here. I've been where you are. I've tried to fix everything at once. I've convinced myself I just needed more discipline and I've spent years pretending that I was fine when I was anything but. So grab your coffee, grab your tea, settle in.

And let's get real about what it actually takes to move forward in midlife without burning everything down.

So I've got some truths I'm going to be sharing with you here today. And this is truth number one. You don't need a total life overhaul. You need one small reset.

Here's what happens, midlife hits and suddenly everything feels overwhelming. Your morning routine that used to work perfectly, it feels impossible now. And your body doesn't respond the way it used to. Your relationships have shifted. Maybe your kids are more independent. Maybe they're more demanding. Maybe your marriage feels different. Even your own interests can feel foreign to you. Like you don't even know what you enjoy anymore. And the pressure, it's intense. We feel

Like our only options are to burn it all down and rebuild from scratch. We feel like we're supposed to start over completely, become someone new. I see this all the time with my clients, these smart, capable women who think the answer is fixing everything all at once. One particular client comes to mind. I'm going to call her Sarah. Sarah kept trying to overhaul her entire life every single January. And I mean everything.

new diet, new workout plan, new morning routine, new evening routine, new organizational system for her house, new budgeting method, new approach to parenting. She'd spend weeks in December researching. She'd find the perfect morning routine from some productivity guru that she found, right? She'd sign up for meal delivery services. She'd buy new workout clothes and a gym membership, and she'd download three different apps.

that would all help her track her habits. And every time, every year, it ended the same way. Complete exhaustion, zero sustainable progress, and that familiar shame spiral of, can't even stick to my own plan. So then by February, she'd be right back where she started, overwhelmed, behind, and convinced she was the problem. She'd tell herself she wasn't disciplined enough. She just wasn't motivated enough, and...

she wasn't strong enough to change. Does this sound familiar? So here's what Sarah and I had to work through together and really what I learned the hard way by myself. You don't need a total overhaul. You need to pick one area that's causing you the most friction, one pain point that's stealing your energy and you need to start there.

Progress is never going to come from changing 20 things. It comes from changing one thing consistently. Let me say that again. Progress does not come from changing 20 things. It comes from changing one thing consistently. And so for Sarah, it wasn't her entire morning routine that needed fixing. It was just one specific piece.

She was trying to wake up at 5 a.m. to have quiet time before her family got up. This sounds reasonable, right? Except that Sarah is naturally a night owl. I talk about this like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole, right? We're kind of sold this bill of goods that everyone's supposed to be a morning person. And if you don't wake up at the crack of dawn and get started, well, you're never going to have your days amount to much of anything. And this is really what Sarah had fallen into. So,

The problem Sarah had was that she's actually this night owl who also has teenagers who often need her help with homework or want to talk late at night. And so she wasn't getting to bed until midnight most nights, which meant she was trying to function on just five hours of sleep. And you know, when we're younger, maybe we can do that. I know, cause I could too. But in reality now with where Sarah was now in her life, no amount of discipline.

was going to make that 5 a.m. wake up call actually happen long term. Not when midnight was the bedtime most nights. And so once we adjusted that piece, we moved her quiet time to 6 30 a.m. instead. And honestly, we also accepted that some mornings it might be seven or even a little bit later. And that was OK. Everything else once we made that shift, everything else started to fall into place.

She had the energy to be present with her family. She wasn't fighting her natural rhythms. And she could actually maintain that habit because it worked with her real life. She wasn't fighting against it.

But really here's the thing that was keeping her stuck. And maybe you can relate to this. Sarah thought that if she couldn't do it perfectly, it didn't count. She couldn't wake up at 5 a.m. every single day. And so then she was failing. If her morning routine got interrupted by a sick kid or an early meeting, then the whole day was shot. And this is where that perfectionistic thinking, this is where that turns into self-sabotage.

By the way, I find that of the women I survey, more than 80 % of them identify with perfectionistic tendencies. And so this perfection turned into self-sabotage. And when you're already at capacity, trying to change everything at once, it isn't ambitious. It's setting yourself up to fail. Your brain can only handle so much change at a time. And when you overwhelm it with too many new habits, too many new systems,

Too many new expectations, it just shuts down. That's not a character flaw. That's biology. That's physiology. So think about it this way. If you've ever moved to a new house, you know you're not going to try to unpack every single box on that first day. You start with the essentials. Maybe it's the kitchen, the bedroom, the bathroom. You get the basics functional, and then you tackle maybe one room at a time.

And so your life works the same way. When everything feels chaotic, you don't need to fix it all at once. You need to fix the one area that if it worked better, it would give you the most relief. Maybe for you, maybe it's like Sarah, maybe it's your morning routine, but maybe it's just the first 10 minutes of your morning routine that needs adjusting. Maybe it's your evening wind down or how you handle dinner prep or when you check your email or how you manage your calendar.

I had another client who was overwhelmed by her house. Every room felt like a disaster and she wanted to declutter and organize everything. But when we really talked about it, the area that was causing her the most stress every single day, it was her kitchen counters. She couldn't cook, she couldn't find things, she couldn't function because the counters were always covered with mail, school papers and other random stuff. And so instead of trying to tackle the whole house,

We focused on just the kitchen counters. We created a simple system for dealing with papers as they came in. We found homes for the items that always ended up there. And we established a quick five minute evening routine that would help clear all that stuff off.

And in reality, that change, it was so awesome to watch it unfold because that change, just the counters, it gave her back so much mental energy that she naturally started tackling the other areas of her house. I call this starting with the biggest domino. Because in reality, all of that, all of that other decluttering that she was able to do, it started with that one small, one small sustainable change.

that gave her a quick win and some breathing room. So here's what I want you to do this week. Ask yourself, what's the one big thing, that big domino, that if it worked better would give me back 10 % of my energy? Not 50 % of your energy, that's too much pressure, just 10%. It's just gonna give you back a little bit of your energy. It's gonna make you feel a little bit better.

Maybe it's having clean dishes in the morning so that you can make your coffee without frustration. Maybe it's laying out your clothes the night before so you're not stressed about what to wear. Maybe it's setting a boundary around when you check work emails so that your evenings actually feel like yours. Start there, that's it. Not your whole life, just this one piece of it. And here's the key. Make it so small and so simple that it feels almost too easy.

Because when you're overwhelmed, easy is exactly what you need. You need a win. You need to prove to yourself that you can follow through on something. Essentially what you're doing in CoachSpeak world is that you need to rebuild that trust with yourself. The trust that you are going to show up and follow through, that you are going to do what you say you're gonna do. And then once that thing becomes natural,

It's just once that's part of your routine without requiring mental energy, then you can look at the next area, but not before. Progress is progress no matter how small it feels. Here's truth number two. You don't need more discipline. You need more self-awareness. So let's recap real quick. Truth number one, it was the fact that you don't need a total life overhaul. You need one small reset. All right.

So truth number two, you don't need more discipline. You need more self-awareness. Every midlife woman I know is convinced that if she just had more willpower, more discipline, or could wake up at 5 a.m. consistently, her life would finally work. I hear it all the time. I just need to be more disciplined. If I could just stick to things better, or I wish I had her willpower, but discipline isn't your problem. Honestly, I used to think this too.

I would look at women who seemed to have it all together, the ones posting their perfect morning routines on Instagram, the ones who never seemed to struggle with consistency. And I'd think, if I could just be more like that, if I could be more like her, more disciplined, more consistent, more motivated, then I would have what she has. And then I beat myself up for lacking willpower. I tried to force myself into routines that felt like punishment.

I'd white-knuckle my way through systems that made me miserable, thinking that is what discipline looks like. But that's not how it works. The real issue is self-awareness. It's recognizing the thought patterns that keep you stuck, the shame spirals, the unrealistic expectations, the way you unconsciously set yourself up to fail. Lean in close. This is one piece that you are going to want to hear.

And I want you to write it down on a sticky note. I love sticky notes. If you've not heard of my love for sticky notes, if you're of my coaching clients, you know, if you know, know, but if you're not grab, get some sticky notes. They're so helpful. Here's what to write down. You can't out discipline overwhelm. See what I mean? It's good. Right? You can't out discipline overwhelm. Your body and your mind will rebel.

every time. It's your body and your mind that is rebelling, not you. So let me tell you about what happened with Sarah, right? The same one I mentioned earlier. Her breakthrough didn't come when she became more disciplined. It came when she stopped shaming herself for being undisciplined and when she started getting curious about her patterns. Instead of just trying harder, she began asking different

questions. Again, if you know, you know, if you're one of my coaching clients, you know how important it is to ask the questions, the answers that you're looking for, the solutions that you're looking for, the ways to make things better. It starts with questions every single time. You need to start with the questions so that you can understand what's actually happening because it is never going to be what you think. So

Some of the questions that we had to ask were, what am I really thinking when I sabotage myself? What expectations am I setting that don't fit my actual life? Where am I trying to force something that needs to flow differently? And do know what she discovered? Imagine that Sarah wasn't lazy or weak-willed. She was setting herself up. She was setting herself up to fail with expectations that completely ignored

the reality that her life has become. It was a different season.

For Sarah, one of the biggest mistakes that she was making was she was trying to meal prep on Sundays when Sundays were already her most chaotic day with family activities, church, and catching up on household tasks. And she was planning to work out at 5 a.m. when she hadn't been to bed before midnight in months. Again, because that's when her teens were available. And then she was also scheduling deep work time during the exact hours that her kids were home from school.

and needed her attention. They needed her attention for all kinds of things. It's the homework, it's the snacks, it's the sibling disputes, it didn't matter. And so again, no amount of discipline was gonna make those things work because they were fighting against reality, not working with it. And so here's what I've learned through my own journey and in working with dozens of women. Discipline.

is what you need when you are forcing yourself to do something that doesn't fit your life. That's when you keep leaning into and trying to find discipline. But when you get honest about your actual capacity, your actual energy patterns, and your actual season of life, discipline becomes much less necessary.

Let me circle back and say that again, discipline is what you need when you're forcing yourself to do something that doesn't fit your life. So let me give you a personal example. I learned years ago that I'm not a workout first thing in the morning kind of person. So I had my workout scheduled for 7.15. And this worked pretty well for a while. I would get up at 5, somewhere between 4 and 5. And I wouldn't schedule my workout till 7.15.

But in more recent months, I noticed I was struggling to be consistent even with that timing. Life would happen, there'd be a sick kid, I'd have an early morning meeting, I'd have a late night, and I'd miss my workout, and I'd feel guilty about it. I'd spend mental energy beating myself up next. And I convinced myself I just wasn't disciplined enough to stick to my schedule, the one that I created, the one that worked. But then I tried something different.

I gave myself permission to work out whenever it felt like it would work that day. Sometimes it's still 7.15. Sometimes it's slightly later in the morning. Sometimes it's late morning or even in the afternoons. And do know what? This more flexible approach has been a game changer for me. First, I'm actually more consistent because I'm not fighting against my schedule or my energy levels on any given day.

We are never gonna be cookie cutter in our energy and our biology and our physiology. But here's the unexpected benefit that I discovered. A workout later in the day, it actually can serve as a pick me up during that afternoon slump or that late morning slump. I'm usually pretty motivated and on task in the morning anyway. So in some ways, the workout early in the morning was wasted in terms of the energy boost that it gives me.

I don't need a shot of motivation to just keep swimming early in the morning. I need it in the messy middle parts of the day more. So by changing from a rigid schedule to a more when I get to it approach, just to try to be more consistent, I've also gained this additional benefit of this motivation boost exactly when I need it. Maybe I'll get back to being a more strict morning workout person someday, but if I don't, that's OK too.

I can always change my daily schedule since I know how to create one that works. By the way, I teach all of my coaching clients how to create a daily schedule using a skill I created called purpose-focused time blocking. And it's exactly what it sounds like. It's focusing on the purposes for your life first. Then it worries about all the time blocked tasks.

If you're tired of trying to create a daily schedule that ends up never working and is torture to create, since you know you'll never stick to it anyway, creating a schedule in this way with a focus on the why before all the what's, you'll fill your day with all of the what's that you'll fill your day with, this will be a total game changer for you. But back to my story. So moving my workout to a more fluid, when it works today format is what I mean by working with

your life instead of against it. Sometimes the solution doesn't end up being what you would expect. Again, it's not about the discipline. It's about the self awareness. It was about me learning, you know what? It's just not working for me at this 7 a.m., 7 15 a.m. time slot all the time. I'm struggling too much to do it.

And this is what I mean by self-awareness over discipline. When you understand your patterns, your energy rhythm, your real capacity, your actual season of life, you can make choices that support you instead of fighting against you. But here's where it can get tricky. Most of us have been conditioned to believe that if something feels easy or natural, it doesn't count. We think struggle equals value.

We think if we're not suffering for it, we're not doing it right. And you know what? That's total garbage. The most sustainable changes I've made in my life have been the ones that have felt almost too easy. The ones that worked with who I am, not against who I think I should be.

Another client, Lisa, she spent years trying to force herself to cook these elaborate meals every night because that's what she thought good moms did. She'd find the Pinterest recipes and she'd make the detailed grocery lists and she'd spend her Sunday's meal planning. But by Wednesday, she'd be exhausted and ordering takeout, feeling guilty about wasting the groceries that she'd bought. And so when we dug into it, again, starting by asking the questions,

we discovered that Lisa actually enjoys cooking, but only simple things. She likes throwing together ingredients and seeing what happens. She doesn't like following detailed recipes or spending hours in the kitchen after a long work day. And so once she gave herself permission to simplify, to make simple, healthy, nourishing meals instead of Instagram worthy ones, cooking became enjoyable again.

She stopped needing discipline to feed her family because she wasn't fighting against her natural preferences anymore. And so here's what I want you to understand. You're not undisciplined. You're trying to force yourself into systems that don't fit your actual life anymore. This week, instead of demanding more discipline from yourself, try demanding more honesty. Start paying attention to your patterns with curiosity.

Instead of with judgment, where are your expectations completely unrealistic for your current season? If you have toddlers at home, expecting to have deep focus time during the day might not be realistic. If you're caring for aging parents, expecting to maintain the same social schedule that you had before, it might not work. What would actually work with the capacity that you have right now, not the capacity you wish you had or

the capacity you'll have someday when life calms down, but the actual capacity that you have today. When do you have the most energy? Are you trying to do demanding tasks when you're already depleted? Are you scheduling important things during times when you're typically scattered or exhausted? What are you fighting against instead of working with? Your natural rhythms, your family schedule, your actual preferences, your real seasons of life. What are you fighting against? And here's the key.

Make it so simple that you can't not do it. If you're planning to exercise for an hour but only have 15 minutes, plan for 15 minutes. If you want to read more but you're exhausted at night, try audiobooks during your commute. If you want to eat healthier but you're overwhelmed by meal planning, start with just adding one vegetable to meals you're already making. What are you already doing that you can sandwich a new habit or routine with? This is what it looks like to work

with your life, not against it. And remember, the goal isn't to become more disciplined. The goal is to become more aware of what actually works for you and what doesn't. And then you build your life around that instead of trying to force yourself into someone else's template.

So truth number one is that you don't need to burn everything down. You don't need a total life overhaul. You just need one small reset. Truth number two is that you don't need more discipline. You need more self-awareness. And that brings us to truth number three. You don't need to keep pretending you're fine. You need permission to be human. Every single week, multiple times in my conversations with my clients, somewhere I say,

permission to be human. Here's what I know. Midlife women are experts at keeping it together. We've mastered the art of the brave face, the reassuring smile, the everything's fine response when people ask how we're doing. We check all the boxes, we show up for everyone else, we bury our feelings, and we tell ourselves we'll deal with it when life slows down. Except it never does. We've been conditioned to believe that struggle means weakness.

that asking for help means we're failing and that admitting we're not OK somehow makes us less capable or less worthy. But here's what I've learned the hard way. The performance of quote unquote having it all together is not only exhausting, it's actually keeping you stuck. I lived this way for years, completely burned out, anxious, not even wanting to do things that used to bring me joy. But I kept performing fine.

because admitting I wasn't okay felt like admitting I was failing at the one thing I wanted to do well, being a good mom, being a good wife, being a good person. And the truth is I was failing at taking care of myself. So let me tell you about one particular season that almost, really it almost broke me. My husband was back in nursing school in his early forties. This was a huge decision.

that meant no income coming from him for big chunks of time throughout a several year period while he was studying. Money was beyond tight. We had five kids with their own needs and activities and emotional stuff. And I was trying to keep this brand new business that I created running. And I was the primary breadwinner while also being the primary parent, the homeschool teacher and the household manager.

On the outside, I was handling it. I was showing up to every sporting event. I was keeping the house running. I was meeting with clients. I was posting encouraging content on my blog. People would comment about how strong I was and how well I was managing everything. Maybe you've seen that meme that says, you've managed that so well, and then the truth bomb hits underneath that. Well, that was me. Because I was actually drowning. I wasn't fine.

I stopped doing things I loved. I gave up my evening walks because I didn't have time. I stopped reading because I was too tired. I stopped connecting with friends because I didn't want to burden them with my problems. I was eating terribly because I was stress eating constantly. I was barely sleeping because my mind wouldn't stop racing with all of the things that I needed to do. I stopped being present with my family because I was so focused on just surviving each day.

I was physically there, but I was emotionally absent. I was going through the motions, but not really living. And the worst part of it all was that I was too ashamed to admit any of it because I thought that would mean that I was weak. I thought if I could just push through a little longer, if I could just try a little harder, everything would get better. But pushing through wasn't working. It was making everything worse.

And the breaking point came one evening when my daughter asked me a simple question about her day and I snapped at her for interrupting me while I was trying to work. And the look on her face, it was this mix of confusion and hurt. was like a punch to the gut. That night after everyone was asleep, I sat in my car in the driveway and cried. Not pretty tears, ugly, exhausted, desperate crying. I felt like I was failing everyone, including myself.

But really that moment of complete breakdown, was also the beginning of my breakthrough. Because when you finally stop pretending, when you get honest about what isn't working, there's immediate relief. Not because everything gets easier. Let me say that again. You'll get relief not because everything gets easier, but because you stop wasting your energy on the performance.

If that hit hard, it's okay. It did for me too. And so now when you step into that phase, when you stop wasting your energy on the performance, you can finally see that the problem isn't your worth or your character or your capabilities. It's the unrealistic pressure and it's the systems that were never designed to fit your real life, at least not anymore.

And really when I finally admitted that I was struggling first to myself, then to my husband, then to a few close friends, amazing things started to happen. This is really when I discovered coaching, by the way. This is when my life was transformed by coaching.

And so back to my reality at that point, when my husband, who had been so focused on school, heard what I was actually experiencing, it was mind blowing to him. Because he had been so focused on school that he had completely checked out of pretty much everything and he didn't even realize it. He had checked out of household. He had stepped out of anything he was doing to help around the house. And so he had

When we finally had this talk, he finally heard what was going on. And so he stepped up in ways that I hadn't even asked for. He started handling dinner on his study break most nights. He took over, this was huge, he took over the bedtime routines so that I could have some of that time in the evening to myself. My kids who I thought needed me to be perfect and strong all the time, they actually became more helpful and more emotionally.

really emotionally mature, when I let them see that I was human. My teenage daughter started helping with the laundry without being asked. She always did her own, but she helped with others. My younger kids, they stopped expecting me to entertain them constantly, and they learned how to take more responsibility for themselves. My friends, the ones who I thought would judge me for not having it together, they offered support I didn't even know I needed.

One started bringing me coffee once a week just to check in. We'd hang out for 15, 20 minutes. It was game changing. Another friend, she offered to carpool my kids to activities just two nights a week so that I had one less thing to manage. But more importantly, I stopped trying to fit my life into someone else's template. And I started building something that actually worked for me and my family.

I gave myself permission to lower the bar in some areas so I could focus on what really mattered. We ate simpler meals. The house wasn't always perfectly clean. And I said no to activities and commitments that weren't essential. I started asking for help before I was desperate. I started saying no to things that drained my energy without feeling guilty.

These things that really were not adding real value to our lives. And I started prioritizing my own needs, not above my family's needs, but alongside them. I started prioritizing my own needs, not above my family's needs, but alongside them. And so here's what I want you to understand. You don't have to have it all together to be worthy of value and respect.

You don't have to be perfect to be a good mom, a good wife, a good person. The people who love you don't need you to be perfect. They need you to be present. They need you to be real. They need you to model for them what it looks like to take care of yourself, to ask for help when you need it. They need to see you be human. And the people who actually expect you to be perfect all the time, those aren't your people.

And so this week, I want you to practice brutal honesty with yourself. Call out, name what's not working out loud, even if it's just to yourself. Maybe you'd say, I'm overwhelmed, and I don't know how to manage everything on my plate. Maybe you'd say, I'm resentful that I'm carrying more than my share. Maybe you'd say, I don't know how to ask for help without feeling guilty. Or maybe you'd say, I'm tired of pretending that this is all working.

when it's not. Maybe you'd say, I miss the person I used to be before I got buried underneath all of these responsibilities. Calling out this truth, it's not complaining. It's the first step to building something that actually works. You don't have to have the solutions yet. You don't have to fix everything all at once. You just have to stop pretending that everything is fine.

when it's not, because here's the truth. You can't change what you won't acknowledge. You can't fix problems you won't admit exist. And you can't build a sustainable life on a foundation of pretending and pushing through. I feel like I need to read that again. I want to get this exactly right. So I'm reading directly from my notes. You can't

change what you won't acknowledge. You can't fix problems. You won't admit exist. And you can't build a sustainable life on a foundation of pretending and pushing through.

going off away from my notes now for a second, need to say a couple of other things. You need to give yourself permission to be exactly where you are right now. Give yourself permission to be overwhelmed. Give yourself permission to feel tired. Give yourself permission to be struggling. Give yourself permission to be imperfect. These things, they're not failure.

these things, it's what makes you human. And that's where we started with truth number three, permission to be human. And that place of honesty, that's really, when you are in that place of honesty, that's where the real change can begin. And in reality, if you're not in that place of honesty, that guess what's also true? Change can't begin. Change can't begin if you're not honest.

And man, my coaching clients do not like to hear it when I say that to them, but they know it's true. And it's so freeing. It's brutally honest, but it's so empowering at the same time.

So here's everything that we covered today, and I want you to really hear this. You don't need to change everything at once. You need to pick one area that's stealing your energy, that's stealing your joy, and start there. Start small. Consistent progress is going to beat dramatic overhaul every single time. Also, you don't need to be more disciplined. You need to become more aware of your patterns.

more aware of your rhythms, and most importantly, more aware of your real capacity. And then once you have this understanding, remember asking the questions. When you understand the problem, you can solve the problem. And in this case, when you understand these things, your patterns, your rhythms, your capacity, then you can build systems that work with your life, not against it. And?

Another thing to remember is that you definitely don't need to keep pretending that everything's working when it's not. You need permission to be human. You need permission to struggle, to need support, and to build something that actually fits your real life. Real progress isn't about perfection. It's about getting honest. It's about getting clear. And it's about taking one sustainable step forward. Midlife doesn't have to be a crisis. It can be a reset.

One that's honest, one that's sustainable and finally built around who you actually are, not who you think you should be. So here's your homework for this week. And I want you to commit to this. First, pick your one area. What's the one thing that if it worked just 10 % better, it would give you back some energy and some joy? Maybe it's that morning routine.

Maybe it's just how you handle your coffee in your quiet time. Maybe it's your evening wind down, or maybe it's how you manage dinner, or when you check your phone, or when you deal with email. Just one thing. Maybe like me, it'll be like, it'll be when you do your workout. Just one thing. Second, get real about your capacity. Where are you setting expectations that fight against your real life? What would actually work with the energy?

and the time that you have right now. Not the energy and the time you wish you had. I say this all the time to my coaching clients. If you're struggling to get stuff done, it's because you're not working with the time you have, and that's the only option you have.

And then third, give yourself permission to be exactly where you are. Name one thing that's not working. Say it out loud, write it down, and stop pretending it's fine when it's not. Again, that's not complaining. That's the beginning of real change. And then take one small step from there. Not 10 steps, not a complete overhaul, one step. Because here's what I know after years of working with midlife women who feel stuck. You're not broken.

You're not behind. You're not failing. You're just ready for something different, something that actually fits your life instead of fitting against it. And if you're tired of trying to figure this out alone, if you want support, if you want support in building a life that actually works for who you are right now, this is exactly what we do in my world. I help women get out of the backseat of their lives and into the driver's seat without burning everything down.

We work together to build real life structure that supports you instead of overwhelming you. We address the mindset stuff that keeps you stuck and we create sustainable systems that fit your actual life, not some Pinterest perfect version of it. If this sounds like something you need, I want you to reach out. One of the easiest ways to reach out is to send me a DM on Instagram. I read every single message and I'll respond to you.

I'm the intentional mom blog on Instagram. You can also join my email list where I send out daily encouragement and practical insights for midlife women who are ready to stop managing their lives and start actually living them. We'll put a link for my I'm fine decoder down in the show notes. It's an amazing free resource that will enlighten you and it will get you on my email list. Again, those daily insights and updates much like we talk about here. That's what happens there.

And if you want to keep listening, check out another episode. I'm here. I'm showing up consistently every single week because I believe in you and I know that you can do this. You don't need a perfect plan. You don't need more discipline. You don't need to wait until you have it all figured out. You just need to start right where you are with what you have one small step at a time. That's it. Thanks for listening, friend. I'm here cheering you on.