Ep 20 - Feeling Lost in Midlife? How to Reconnect With Your Core Values

This week on Midlife Audacity, I’m celebrating a milestone - 20 episodes since launching the podcast on November 1st, 2025. And instead of brushing past it like so many of us tend to do, I’m taking a moment to actually acknowledge the win. Women deserve to celebrate their progress - big and small.

In this solo episode, I’m sharing a personal reflection sparked by a recent conversation about core values. After revisiting an exercise I first did with a coach eight years ago, I decided to do a new values audit using Brené Brown’s list from Dare to Lead. What I discovered was eye-opening: the values I thought defined me years ago have shifted as I’ve grown, evolved, and stepped deeper into midlife.

We talk about:

• Why women often skip celebrating their accomplishments
• How your core values can change over time
• The power of radical honesty when identifying what truly matters to you
• The surprising difference between what we say we value and how we actually spend our time
• The “rocks and pebbles” metaphor that reveals why so many of us feel overwhelmed and disconnected from ourselves

If you’ve ever found yourself wondering “How did I get here?” or feeling like your life has drifted away from what truly matters, this episode invites you to pause, reflect, and reconnect with your deepest values.

When you put the rocks in first, the things that truly matter, everything else finds its place.

I also share details about my Soul School Book Study Seminars, a new space for women who love personal development books but want guidance on actually applying those insights in real life.

✨ If you’re ready to realign with what matters most, this episode is for you.

Resources mentioned:

• Brené Brown’s Core Values list (Dare to Lead)

Connect with Celeste:
Follow along and learn more about Soul School and upcoming programs.

Soulful Sunday Newsletter:  Each week, you’ll hear from me in a way that’s simple, intentional, and easy to stay connected to.

Book Study Seminars:  Soul School has opened up new room called, Book Study Seminars.  This room meets four times a year to read, study and unpack not only the words, but our lives, together.  Our spring theme is identity expansion and we start May 7th. For four weeks, we’ll study together using, The Big Leap by Gay Henricks, as our anchor text. Together, we will explore what has been keeping you in your upper limit, how your identity may be capping your expansion, and how to begin feeling safe stepping into your next level self.

Soul School: A curriculum for midlife women who are ready to remember their wisdom, protect their energy, project their power and come back into alignment. You don’t need fixing. You need to remember. Open for enrollment NOW.

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Transcript

Welcome back to midlife audacity. I'm your host Celesta Donna, teacher writer speaker, and guide for women who are to rise into their next chapter boldly, soulfully and unapologetically. All so before we dive into today's episode, I have a couple of announcements to make the first one being that today is my 20th episode. I know, it seems really weird but I have recorded and published 20 episodes since starting this podcast November 1st 2025 and I want to just acknowledge that for a minute. I think too many women, especially, women don't take the time out of their day to acknowledge and celebrate their wins. Even micro wins ladies, we need to stop pushing aside the things that were doing even if they're little and we deserve to celebrate them. we do, we are not being a bi or arrogant. When we share our accomplishments, our successes, our journey, our our, you overcoming of obstacles. These things are inspiring, they are worthy of Celebration, they are worthy of taking a moment and acknowledging what you've done and I think that in general we need to just do that a bit more often. So I am definitely taking this moment to celebrate myself because I am darn proud of putting out a podcast. So low, you know what I Like, no Tech help. No VA a Help from chat gbt once in a while but more or less. It's me doing this project and you know what, I actually just find lot of joy and being able to either share insights and things that I'm feeling or noticing, or want talk about. And I also find a lot joy in bringing on guests. That can share their own Journeys, their inspirational, you know, experiences and their knowledge. Because one of the things that I have been sitting with this week is, Really leaning into my core values and assessing. What those are and I had done this. Probably. Eight years ago with a coach and we went through like 10 Universal core values and we had like rate I had to rate them of where I felt like I was in those core values in terms my daily life and it was very eye-opening for me when I did that back then. And I decided recently to dig into that work a bit more and I was using Bernie Brown's list of values to kind of go over. What are my core values? Where do I Stand right now. Like what are the things that are really the heart and soul of who I am. And How do I use those as guideposts? In my daily living. And it was a really It was a really profound and Powerful exercise that I sort of took on. Accidentally. Actually, it stemmed from my conversation, with Christy last week. We were talking about core values. And I had said on that episode, that I knew, My core values and I use those core values to pull me out the mock. They're like the vines that I use to lift me up out of situations and experiences, where I am dipping below the line where I am dipping into a funk where I am dipping in my frequency and my energy levels. And so, So after that episode aired, and I was like listening back to parts of it. I said to myself, I think that this is a really good time in life to take a bit of an audit. and, See. Where am I when it comes to my core values? Do I have the same core values that I had? Eight years ago, do the same things that valued. Eight years ago. Um, still aligned with me today. In middle life. Because a has happened in these last eight years. And so what I did was I dug into my old journals if you know me, you know, that I am a writer. I love to write, I love to journal, I've been doing it. Ever, since I had diary, probably at eight years old, I still remember, literally what my diary looked like it was like white with like all these different color polka dots. And it this little gold class with key and I used write it, like, all the time. I probably still have that diary up in attic. I'm not gonna lie. I know one other things about me is that tend to keep a of nostalgia around and I have slowly been getting rid that that's a nother episode. But going back to what I was talking about. So I dug into my journals and I have bunch of journals you can imagine over the years and I found the journal that had my aligned core values at the time. With this coach that I had worked with for a short period of time, and I dug those out and I was looking at them and I'm gonna pull them up for you now because I took a picture of them and I just thought was really interesting. So he had me evaluate where I was in these 10. Most common values. So the ones that he had me evaluate were Family, Independence health, Money. Contribution. Joy fun laughter that's sort of thing, love and kindness. Growth. Orderly neat, organized. And then spirituality. and, It was so eye-opening to see where I was. This was actually March, 6th isn't ironic March 6th. And now, eight years later, I went back and looked at this very same list and it is March 7th. When am recording this, so, you what? Nothing is coincidental nothing. 

And so I saw where I actually gave myself, he told me to score them, so I I see exactly where I scored myself in those categories, back then. Um, and then today. or I should say these last two weeks, I have really been leaning in to Where, where do I? Where do I fall today in 2026? As a 52 year old woman, you turning 53. What are the values that speak? The loudest to me. Right now. And what the values that I really lean into the most? That are really at my core, you that are really at my core of, who I am and what I'm all about. And when I was doing this work, it was very interesting because I, Struggled, I struggled with. looking at all of these words and brene, brown has a wonderful list you could go to What's her website daring to lead? I think and you can access a list from her of all of these different words. and, Then kind of do an audit for yourself to see. What are the ones that Speak to you the loudest. What the ones that sort jump? Off the page for you. And so I was really struggling with all of the word choices. Really. It was a overwhelming because there were so things that could say. Well I value this, I value that, in fact, I think a of us would say that we value a of these things, but when it comes to your Aligned values, your core beliefs. It's not all of them even though we may think that it's all of them, it's not all of them. They're are a handful of them that or maybe two handfuls. I would say I kind narrowed it to 10. That really? Are the essence. Of Who You Are. And this requires some radical honesty. radical honesty there, because there part of me in doing this exercise and this was like a self-initiated exercise, but there a part of me in this exercise where I was Feeling guilty. and I don't like to live in guilt at all, but I will own the fact that guilt definitely Creeps in and Gets the mic a bit more than I would like to admit. So there was some guilt that was creeping in. 

Thinking about some the values that I wasn't picking. So I'll you a prime example. 

so, one the Values that is listed on Brene, Brown's list is family and that also is one of ones that was talked about when I was coaching all those years ago. And when was looking at this list and and really digging into my core values. it's funny, because Family wasn't one that I had initially picked and, it made me question that a bit because and I think Christie talked about this too on our podcast, like family didn't Jump out at me as a core value. Obviously, I love my family, I hold them in very high regard and they do play a huge role in many of the decisions that I make, but if I were really be honest and think about myself and who I am I think it's family that drives me, you know, that's that's really at heart it. And so I was trying to figure out like well then what is it, like, what is it? That's at core. Of who I am. That possibly has family as a part it like that that underneath it. Like underneath the The Heading family would fall on under it. And so I was thinking about this and I noticed that there was belonging on here And think belonging. Belonging to something. I think is probably. My core value. I feel most aligned with belonging to something. And then I noticed well isn't that interesting? Because if my core value is belonging then, of course, family is important to me because belonging to family and being a part of a family. Matters. Um, being a of a good friend group. Matters. That is something that definitely that matters.  Belonging to organizations belonging to communities all of that rings true me and always has always has. And so, when I think about like what? What drives me, it's the sense of belonging. And so, of course, all of these other things fit, very nicely under that umbrella, you know, family and friendships and organizations and communities and even Starting communities. And that was another core value. That noticed was popping up for me was leadership. you know, and that's something that I've always felt very drawn to is leader ship. And it makes sense. It makes sense that I'm a teacher, it makes sense that I wanted to. Lead groups. And start groups and start communities um, and Lead teams when I was in the health and wellness company that I was in That all speaks. To me that all speaks to me. So this is just an example. I don't need to go through all of my core values by when I doing this assessment, what noticed is that while a of these look Great and could say, absolutely, I stand for that. I stand for this. I Stand For That. 

We don't stand for everything. And so when I got really clear, on the ones that Are at my Essence, really? At my heart and soul. I noticed that a of these others very nicely fell on underneath them. And that was pretty cool to see. And when looked back at how I rated these initial 10, that this coach had given me, I noticed that. The scores that I gave my self in those categories. Eight years Or not the scores that would give myself. Right now. So isn't an interesting how we evolve and grow? At least that's the goal, right? That's the goal to evolve and grow. By the way, growth happens to be something that is one of my core values, for sure. And underneath that is Learning and knowledge, and all of these other things. Personal development that so if this episode speaks to you, then I invite you to go on to brene Brown's website of dare to lead and Print out the list of values that she has. This is not the only lists out there, but this happens to be the list that I pulled from and take a bit of an inventory of where you are. I think that midlife is a time where Most women. Question. Where they're at? And how they got here. They sit in this. Pause and go. Where, where am I? Like, I don't even recognize myself, or how, how did my life get so far away, from what I really? Want. and it's not too anyone's full like life gets really busy and responsibilities pile up and work. Becomes a focus and day-to-day tasks become a focus. And we lose sight in all of this busyness of our true. Essence of what really drives us of what really matters to us. And and this is why I think that a of women during perimenopause and menopause when their hormones start to dip, they say enough is enough, like I am no longer available for X, Y and Z and They are open to taking. their life back and I would encourage you if you are in that place to pull this list up and not just say I'm fed up, I'm done. I'm not, I'm not doing this anymore, but sit down and really think about Well. Why am I feeling this way? How How was my life? Happy going right now? Compared to what really matters to me at my core level. and, you might notice that a of things that you're doing on a daily basis are not the things that you value the most, and so isn't that interesting to 

Take notice of that. And one of the activities that I have women do in my membership or we're going to actually be doing this in my book, study group is to Take a jar. And fill it with a ton of Pebbles. And this is what ends up happening. For me for you for everybody like we fill our jar with all of the Pebbles that are life responsibilities, all the tasks that we have to do all the things that have to get done. and before, you know it, our jar is completely filled with obligations And then we go and we try to squeeze in. The things that we really value. And guess what? The things that we really value. If we were to Metaphorically call them the Rocks. Well, the Rocks aren't going to fit if your jar is filled with pebbles. Right. There's no room. There's no room and that's why a of us. Function. In this high level of stress and frustration and resentment because we already filled our jar. With all of the crap that doesn't necessarily make us happy. And then we go and to fit in the things that do bring us joy and the things that we do really value. And they don't fit, there's no room. Ha. Now, I would encourage you to pour the Pebbles out of this jar and would encourage you to fill that jar with the rocks. Put the rocks in first ladies, put the rocks in. What do you value? What makes you happy? What brings you Joy? Where are you functioning at your best? What are the things that allow you to function at your best? 

Put the rocks in. and then, Start pouring in the Pebbles. Well, what do you know this? All those Pebbles find their way in all of the nooks and crannies between the Rocks, don't they? They find their way. In. Because you have filled your cup. With the things that matter most. And everything else just kind of folds into place. Divinely orchestrated. To fit. 

So, I do that exercise with the women in my membership because I want them to see that how quickly. We can fill our days or weeks, or months or years with busyness. Instead of things. That bring us joy and pleasure. And keep us. At the frequency. that we can operate best at. and when we are operating at that, high frequency, when we are operating from a place of joy, and, Alignment. 

Then we become a magnet for things to come to us, attract. We attract all of the things. That we want. 

It's it's quite interesting how that happens and that is by Design. That is by Design. so, that is what wanted to share with you today. I have been doing that work. These last two weeks on a personal level and I thought it would be important or valuable to share with you guys because maybe you're at a and your where you Are saying what the hell happened? How did I get here? and so, what I would encourage you to do is take a bit of an inventory / an audit on your life, and reconnect with your highest values, your core values and start filling your jar with the rocks before you fill it with the pebbles. 

This conversation leads beautifully into my second announcement, which is my book study seminars, which is opening up in for women who are reading books have stepped into the world of personal development. But then our stuck because they really don't know how to take that information and really apply it to their everyday life. So, while all of these amazing books exist from incredible thought leaders, we often grabble with well. Now, what, okay, these all sound really great in theory. But how do I apply these Concepts into my daily life? How do I take, what I'm learning in these books and consuming in these books and then really put it into practice. And that's exactly why I opened up this new room inside of Seoul school book. Study seminars is a chance for a small group of women to together and diving into. Not only the words, but the lessons in the books and apply them into our daily life. so, if that speaks to you, if you feel the calling to join, Membership is open. We are starting next week. And I can't wait. To see you inside. All right. Bye. Bye for now.