Are You Ready to Bloom?

In the course of my travels, I speak to many women about my work as a “midlife blooming” coach and teacher. Often they’ll sigh with recognition, and will say wistfully, “Oh, I could use that!”

Then they tell me a bit about their story. Each story is different, but they also tend to form patterns,  fitting into one of several scenarios that I realize many of us are confronted with past the age of 40.

Is one of these your story too?

  • Your children have grown and left home, leaving a vacuum where your sense of purpose used to be.
  • Your marriage has ended, and you’re wondering if there’s life after divorce.
  • You lost your “secure” employment and don’t know where to turn, or who to be.
  • You’re stressed and bored at your job and hope there’s more to life.
  • You’re facing retirement and dread the emptiness.
  • You’ve had a brush with illness, and are feeling a renewed commitment to how to use your precious time.
  • You’ve put everyone else’s needs ahead of your own and you’re questioning if it’s too late to live YOUR life, to put YOUR work out into the world.
  • You had a vision once to create something beautiful and meaningful with your life, and that vision is haunting you now.

Whatever the reason, if you’re like the women I speak to, you’re feeling adrift and wondering where your purpose and joy have gone, and how to find them. You know you’re capable of SO much more – but what exactly that looks like may be eluding you. . . .  Continue reading

Late Bloomer or Midlife Bloomer?

Who is a late bloomer? A midlife bloomer?

I am both, for I only started fully blooming in the second half of life. As a result,  I am passionate about helping other women bloom later in life. Because really, there is no age limit to what I mean by blooming

My concept of late blooming has changed over the years. I no longer think of it merely as a chronological delay according to the expected “norm.” Not only are there many people whose “normal” follows a different pattern, but the patterns are changing in our society as a whole. Adolescence is extended, marriages happen later, women have their first babies in their forties! What is normal now?

My definition of late blooming has changed, as I said. Now what I mean is the feeling that there is something inside us that wants to bloom but hasn’t yet; the desire  to give birth to something, to bring something forth from our soul that we’ve not yet been able to birth. . . . Continue reading

Money & Soul – the journey begins

I’m about to launch a personal project that I expect may be of interest to quite a few out there: I’m planning to tackle my money issues – in public!

I have decided to use my life as a living laboratory. I want to credit Molly Gordon (author of The Accidental Entrepreneur) for expressing this concept in a recent interview with Isabel Parlett (the “Soundbite Shaman”). Molly said she decided to be transparent about areas of her life where she might have felt shame or defensiveness, and that made for rich learning and teaching for herself and her clients and followers. I felt relief when I heard her say this, of not having to pretend to “have it all together.” The idea of someone in public modellng being honest, vulnerable, and human seemed both courageous and healing.

So in the interests of Science, in the spirit of curiosity and experimentation, and with whatever degree of transparency I am able to muster, I am embarking on an exploration of this biggest bugaboo of my life. . . . Continue reading

Finding One’s True Work After Fifty

Swan Flying med

On Being a Late Bloomer

I’m a late bloomer. It sometimes seems I’ve lived my life backwards. I like to say I took an early retirement (minimal employment and lots of leisure), and now that I’m of retirement age, I’m fired up and cracking to start working.

I mean really working, working at my true work, the work I was meant to do.

What took me so long? Well, for one thing, any original work that blends multiple gifts, life experience, and acquired wisdom, must take time to ripen. It’s not available to young sprouts or saplings, but only comes to fruit on a mature tree.

In addition, there are no role models or career counselors to point us in the direction of our unique work. So I had to wait to evolve and develop before I was ready to discover it for myself.  . . . Continue reading