Braving Change after Forty
As a coach I’d love for you to understand and believe in change. I am talking about feisty, effort fuelled, gritty change. Because beautiful things can come from change, so long as you know what you want, you’re ready for work and you are prepared to flex with the forty plus pressures.
The reality is that if you want to radically shift your life, your relationship with yourself, your habits or your view on the world, you need to fundamentally understand that change is bloody hard. It challenges on every level. From the daily senses of touch, taste and smell, through to the deep-seated core of safety and vulnerability and belonging.
And the crushing truth about 40+ change is that whatever you choose, you must carefully position your project on top of the 842 variables of your life. Which may also right now be a life of less energy, waves of non-explicable numbness and a frequent desire to scream ‘someone throw me a fricking bone!’.
Tumbling tears
Tuesday morning and I’ve got juicy tears bouncing off my cheeks. I wasn’t upset about the kids going to a new school or regretting our choices. I wasn’t overwhelmed, anxious or lost. I was brimming with the overspill of emotions from the radical enormity of change we’ve been through and are still amidst bringing to fruition as we relocate in another country for the second time.
When my Tuesday tears subsided, I felt a tad numb. My head said we’re on track. The vitals look good. Children are eating, smiling and sleeping. The two adults less so. We bounce through the night, waking from a ‘to do’, a fear, a niggle or an unfamiliar noise. Our conscious and sub conscious minds do loops on what we’ve done, not done, what we can edit, erase and repeat to make it all the best it can be.
I want to share this so you can maybe drop your shoulders. If you’re crushed by your new career choice or wobbling over the what-have-I-done of a big move, maybe you can lean into this wisdom. Take solace in these five truths about change.
1. It will always be harder than planned
Have you ever seen the smooth episode on Grand Designs? The one where the couple design and launch their immaculate home within time and budget, and it far surprises their expectations? No? That’s because it doesn’t exist. That’s because courageous change involves a myriad of sizeable dodgeball moments, plus health strains and financial pressure.
Change affects us on a macro and micro level, both big picture and cellular. As our heads instruct us to march on and commit, our bodies and fears scream at us to retreat. To hide back in the comfort of the known. For me the comfort of the known features an immaculate quintessentially British home, smooth home delivery, familiar field walks, hygienic beds and belongings, jolly loving local villagers and hugs that feed the soul. And the change is messy and clunky with complicated processes, challenging conversations and unfathomably steep learning curves.
The single only certainty of change is the uncertainty. It will always be harder than expected. It will go wrong more times than it goes right. Expect hard weeks, less sleep and a degree of chaos and you’ll be able to appreciate the bright moments of magic, when decisions land and people smile, and your senses tingle at the reminder of what makes it worth it.
2. Stay light of plan, but put wellbeing first
I advocate planning. I have helped oodles of clients with put logical steps in place to help scaffold their big decisions. But the key with change is that being nimble leverages instinct. The more we depend on accuracy and alignment to something in our heads or paper, the more frustrating the whole experience becomes. Things will go wrong. People will let you down. Timings will slip. Heavily researched scenarios will turn out to be completely different to how you envisaged.
For forty plus change, worry less about spreadsheets and more about wellbeing. Foolproof plans from a health and wellbeing perspective are more important than else in this era. As simple as it sounds, ensure that sure you know how to take care of your nervous system and stay sane.
If you’re taking on colossal change but wondering if you’re hormone levels are ok, don’t park the tests till after. If you feel that you’re jangling, don’t hold back to pause till you are around the next corner. Weaving wellbeing into your life change is both do-able and critical, requiring discipline and self-respect.
Contrary to popular belief, mid-forties is not the time for martyrdom. It’s time for self-preservation and prioritising health.
3. You don’t have to do it
Change is glamorous. Like big careers and flashy possessions, there’s something sexy and bold about people who brave change.
However, change is also massively impacted by personality type. I work with a lot of clients who don’t suit enormous change. Who would be best steering away from seismic shifts, because they’re safer and happier as they are. They evolve through iterative changes in their perspective and behaviours. They win from turning the dial more delicately, from pacing it in their own way, to the calm beat of their own drum.
If this is you, embrace your own truth. Don’t pursue a big dream to be like the rest. Don’t chase rainbows to fit in or keep up or be in the land of adventurous. Perhaps you’re exactly where you should be. Big change is for those who are missing something. Those who know they’ll regret the jump if they never have a go.
Be you. Big change or iterative growth. Loud bang or melodic tune. Do it your way and you’ll be exactly where you should be.
4. There will never be a perfect moment
As a coach of 40+ females I hear about this all the time. The children might struggle if you change your life now. Your partner or parent may benefit more if you pause. There’s a window after the dog dies, a perk from your next bonus and a chance the housing market might chivvy up in the next eighteen months.
As a supporter of many and a champion of all, you will never create change that pleases all, that aligns perfectly with the weather, the seasons, the emotional readiness of your people. And you can choose to surrender to this or to own and pioneer with your progress.
Change is uncomfortable, messy, disappointing at times and painful for those who get caught in your path.
But if you imagine yourself in 20 years’ time regretting staying the same, then for heaven’s sake unleash your warrior and drive this thing forward. You will never be as young, fit and capable as you are today. You will never have more bouncebackability. The moment is never right, the moment is now.
5. The right change is worth it
It all comes down to understanding what change is worth it. What change is worth turning things upside down for. If you get giddy at the prospect but jangle with the fear, which will you allow to win? For you get to decide. Whether you believe that or not. Your choices lead the way in the end.
I’ve been trying to understand what my family’s change is about. Whether it’s about our ‘freedom’ or more a desire to ‘belong’. It’s probably both. When we are here in this spot, we feel more aligned, to each other, the landscape, the people the places. It feels ‘whole’. And whether true or not, I buy the belief. And that is always enough.
It’s been way harder than I hoped, but the pace of my heart feels steadfast. I am well versed in self-care and discipline, in compassion and courage. Our rhyme is etched into my soul and no fleeting wind will discourage us from sailing this change to shore. And we will dock. We will finally drop the anchor and rest. For a while.
If any of this resonates. If you feel lost at sea or ready to set sail but in need of support, please get in touch for a no obligation ‘hello’.
