Rebranding Middle Age

Join a community of growth-minded midlife women: https://www.alifeinprogress.ca/community/

This is Part one of a two-part series on learning to hear and trust your inner voice. In this episode, we’ll lay the foundation by exploring what inner wisdom can sound, feel, and look like, how to distinguish it from fear and conditioning, and the stages we move through as we develop self-trust.

What if the next step in your growth isn’t finding more answers outside of yourself but learning to listen inward and hear your inner wisdom?

If you want to heal, grow, become, and lead your life from your True Self, you need to learn how to recognize, develop, and trust your inner voice.

But that can be easier said than done.

There are so many voices competing for your attention: fear, old stories, conditioning, your inner critic, other people’s expectations, and the constant noise of the world around you. And when you’ve spent years looking outside yourself for answers, it can take time to learn what your wisdom actually looks, sounds, and feels like.

In this episode, we’re laying the foundation for that work.

We’ll explore what inner wisdom can look, sound, and feel like and how to begin discerning it from fear, urgency, conditioning, and habitual thought.

You’ll also learn about:

• The conscious mind, subconscious mind, and unconscious mind.
• Or you can think about multiple sources of wisdom available to you as mind, heart, body, soul/True Self, and spirit.
• Why inner wisdom may show up as a deep knowing, a physical sensation, an image, a sudden thought, a sense of direction, or even a voice in your mind.
• The qualities that can help you recognize genuine wisdom: it tends to feel loving, grounded, clear, and powerful and it leads toward healthy, wise action.
• Why your conscious mind can quickly jump in with objections after you receive a piece of inner guidance and why capturing that wisdom immediately can help you develop self-trust.
• The difference between living from conscious awareness and recognizing the deeper patterns, beliefs, and intuition operating beneath the surface.
• The four stages of growth, from living on autopilot to having your True Self become your more natural way of being.
• Why awareness and self-compassion need to companion each other if you don't want to quit when you must navigate the uncomfortable parts of change.
• Why growth and healing aren’t linear, and how deeper self-trust can open the door to unexpected shifts in understanding and freedom.
• Why learning to listen inward is essential if you want to create a vision for your life that actually reflects you rather than what you’ve been conditioned to want.

NOTE: In this episode I share the concept of the conscious mind being responsible for a very small percentage of your behaviour. The precise numbers cannot be proven. The point is to consider how much of your life is driven/motivated by beliefs and habits/patterns that you are not even aware of. And, how your agency and freedom expands when you do the work to bring awareness to some of these deeply rooted beliefs and patterns.

The goal is to become more familiar with your own unique way of receiving wisdom, so you can begin trusting yourself, and walking in more freedom and joy.

And the more you listen, the more you learn to distinguish your True Self from the voices that have been shaping your life for you.

Ultimately, this is about creating a different relationship with yourself. One rooted in awareness, compassion, a commitment to messy practice, and the freedom to be who you truly are.

So, what happens when you get quiet enough to listen? What has your inner wisdom been trying to tell you? And what would change if you learned to trust your inner wisdom and act on what you hear?

Resources

Registration for Autumn Session of the Brave + Beautiful Community is now open! Become a member. We begin our new session on October 12th.

Connect with Krista:

• Instagram: @a_life_in_progress
• Facebook: @alifeinprogressca and @rebrandingmiddleage
• YouTube: @ALifeinProgress
• Website: alifeinprogress.ca

Subscribe and Review

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Join a community of growth-minded midlife women: https://www.alifeinprogress.ca/community/

This is Day 4 of the Quiet the Noise Challenge.

Years of over-functioning, overriding our own needs, or not honouring the truth of who we are and our wiring and capacity, create significant wear and tear on our minds, hearts, and bodies. This often leaves us depleted, discouraged, and running on autopilot.

This level of “wear and tear” is not resolved in a week. If you are experiencing burnout or deep exhaustion, it may not be resolved in a year. But you need to start somewhere. You need to slow down, shore up leaks, clear what you no longer want to carry/tolerate/practice. And you need to create the space/spaciousness in your days, weeks, and year to listen inward and respond with wisdom to what you hear each step of the way.

I hope that you will walk away from this four-day challenge feeling relieved, seen, and inspired. That you’ll leave with a renewed sense of clarity about how to come back into alignment with the life you truly want and the pace you honestly need.

Day 4 invites you to look back, look forward, and live present.

Resources

Registration for Autumn Session of the Brave + Beautiful Community is now open! Become a member.

Join the Challenge live and get the notes and prompts here: https://www.alifeinprogress.ca/quiet-the-noise/

Connect with Krista:

• Instagram: @a_life_in_progress
• Facebook: @alifeinprogressca and @rebrandingmiddleage
• YouTube: @ALifeinProgress
• Website: alifeinprogress.ca

Subscribe and Review

If you loved this episode, hit subscribe and leave a review. Reviews help more growth-minded midlife women like you discover this show.

Join a community of growth-minded midlife women: https://www.alifeinprogress.ca/community/

This is Day 3 of the Quiet the Noise Challenge.

Be as honest with yourself as possible about what is no longer serving you. What you want to let go of. Even if you feel afraid. Even if you don’t yet know HOW something could be possible for you. Name it anyway.

Before we add in, we must clear or create space.

Clear mental, emotional, physical, financial space/capacity for what you truly want. For what brings you joy, keeps you healthy, helps you feel fully alive, excited, on purpose.

For example, you may need to let go of relationships, distractions, habits, or physical clutter that prevent you from living fully or on purpose. Say no to wonderful opportunities because they don’t support the vision you have for who you want to be or become or the life you truly want. Let go of inner judgment – all the “shoulds” and doing things out of obligation or to keep the peace even though your health pays the price. Or release your old people-pleasing, comparing, self-judging patterns.

Day 3 invites you to Name the noise. Take action to quiet or clear the noise. Notice how you feel and continue listening inward for wisdom and direction.

Resources

Registration for Autumn Session of the Brave + Beautiful Community is now open! Become a member.

Join the Challenge live and get the notes and prompts here: https://www.alifeinprogress.ca/quiet-the-noise/

Connect with Krista:

• Instagram: @a_life_in_progress
• Facebook: @alifeinprogressca and @rebrandingmiddleage
• YouTube: @ALifeinProgress
• Website: alifeinprogress.ca

Subscribe and Review

If you loved this episode, hit subscribe and leave a review. Reviews help more growth-minded midlife women like you discover this show.

Join a community of growth-minded midlife women: https://www.alifeinprogress.ca/community/

This is Day 2 of the Quiet the Noise Challenge.

If you don’t believe that you deserve safety, love, kindness, and good things, you will persist in old patterns of over-functioning, being hard on yourself, not resting, or overriding your own wants/needs. Pouring out until you are empty and then judging yourself for being depleted.

If you want to walk in freedom, health, and joy you must be a good friend to yourself. You must give yourself permission to be who you really are and move at the pace you honestly need.

No one else can do this for you. This is your right and responsibility.

Day 2 invites you to practice remembering who you are, giving yourself permission to be your True Self, and receiving what you want and need. All three are required to befriend yourself.

Resources

Registration for Autumn Session of the Brave + Beautiful Community is now open! Become a member.

Join the Challenge live and get the notes and prompts here: https://www.alifeinprogress.ca/quiet-the-noise/

Connect with Krista:

• Instagram: @a_life_in_progress
• Facebook: @alifeinprogressca and @rebrandingmiddleage
• YouTube: @ALifeinProgress
• Website: alifeinprogress.ca

Subscribe and Review

If you loved this episode, hit subscribe and leave a review. Reviews help more growth-minded midlife women like you discover this show.

Join a community of growth-minded midlife women: https://www.alifeinprogress.ca/community/

This is Day 1 of the Quiet the Noise Challenge.

The world is noisy! It can be hard to hear yourself in the middle of it all.

But if you want to live with freedom, health, and joy then you must slow down and create enough spaciousness and quiet so you can recognize and then trust your own inner voice.

Day 1 invites you to practice three interrelated steps: slow down, create space, listen inward for wisdom.

You don’t need perfection. You simply need “enough” spaciousness for this season. You simply need to start somewhere.

Resources

Registration for Autumn Session of the Brave + Beautiful Community is now open! Become a member.

Join the Challenge live and get the notes and prompts here: https://www.alifeinprogress.ca/quiet-the-noise/

Connect with Krista:

• Instagram: @a_life_in_progress
• Facebook: @alifeinprogressca and @rebrandingmiddleage
• YouTube: @ALifeinProgress
• Website: alifeinprogress.ca

Subscribe and Review

If you loved this episode, hit subscribe and leave a review. Reviews help more growth-minded midlife women like you discover this show.

Join a community of growth-minded midlife women: https://www.alifeinprogress.ca/community/

The world is noisy and it can be hard to hear yourself in the middle of it all.

There are the obvious sources of noise: the demands on your time, endless responsibilities, other people’s needs, the clutter around you, and the constant stream of information coming at you.

But some of the loudest noise can come from inside you, too: self-judgment, worry, comparison, shoulds, perfectionism, and the pressure to keep pushing yourself to do more and be better.

And here’s the thing: not all noise needs to be eliminated.

Some forms of noise are depleting and pull you away from the life you want to live.

While other uncomfortable internal signals may actually be wisdom trying to get your attention. Calling you to disrupt old patterns and calling you toward greater freedom, joy, and alignment.

In this episode, we’ll explore eight different forms of noise: physical, mental, sensory, creative, emotional, social, spiritual, as well as the noise that comes from an unhealthy relationship with yourself. And how they may be showing up in your life right now.

You’ll also learn how to:

• Recognize whether the noise you’re experiencing is coming from inside or outside of you—and why that distinction matters.
• Identify what you can actually change, what you need to balance, and where you have power of choice.
• Create counterbalances when a source of noise can’t simply be eliminated.
• Compassionately witness nervous-system responses, grief, and other uncomfortable emotions rather than immediately trying to make them go away.
• Challenge the negativity bias by intentionally making space for hopeful and empowered possibilities.
• Create more spaciousness in your days so you can hear your inner voice beneath the cacophony of the world.

Because learning to truly value yourself requires more than knowing what you should do.

It requires slowing down enough to recognize yourself. To hear your body, listen to your inner wisdom, and begin building the kind of loving, respectful relationship with yourself that allows you to trust what you hear.

So, what form of noise is loudest in your life in this season? And what would it look like to lovingly quiet, soften, or balance it? Or what wisdom is calling for your attention?

Resources

Registration for Autumn Session of the Brave + Beautiful Community begins tomorrow! Become a member.

Circle of impact exercise: https://www.alifeinprogress.ca/the-circle-of-impact-exercise/

You can still join the Quiet the Noise Challenge (Sep 22-25): sign up here

Connect with Krista:

• Instagram: @a_life_in_progress
• Facebook: @alifeinprogressca and @rebrandingmiddleage
• YouTube: @ALifeinProgress
• Website: alifeinprogress.ca

Subscribe and Review

If you loved this episode, hit subscribe and leave a review. Reviews help more growth-minded midlife women like you discover this show.

Join the Community: https://www.alifeinprogress.ca/community/

One of the most common ways of thinking that keep midlife women unhappy, hard on themselves, and that holds them back from making slow and steady progress on what truly matters, is all or nothing thinking.

All or nothing thinking keeps you focused on lack or the gap between current reality and your perfect or ideal life vision. It makes you feel like you are never good enough.

It's a distraction from what you CAN do. Or from what IS going well, where you ARE making progress, and from all the beauty that is already present in your life.

If you're interested in living with more freedom and joy, then I recommend that you try "all or something" thinking instead.

When life is extra messy, a practice of all or something thinking will help you persist, stay focused on your vision, and feel more hopeful and empowered in your body and life.

Practicing “all or something,” or "more than zero," will help you reclaim your agency and thrive forward in every season of life, including the hardest of them.

Resources

Just Choose All or Something: read the post here.

Episode 66 about reclaiming your agency: listen here

I talk about lunar tracking in this episode. Lunar Abundance is my favourite book about lunar tracking: take a look

Join me free, Sep 22-25, for the Quiet the Noise Challenge: sign up here

Connect with Krista:

• Instagram: @a_life_in_progress
• Facebook: @alifeinprogressca and @rebrandingmiddleage
• YouTube: @ALifeinProgress
• Website: alifeinprogress.ca

Subscribe and Review

If you loved this episode, hit subscribe and leave a review. Reviews help more growth-minded midlife women like you discover this show.

Join the community for growth-minded midlife women:

https://www.alifeinprogress.ca/community/

The equinox is coming in two weeks. As a part of my seasonal living practice, I set aside time around each equinox and solstice to slow downward and listen inward.

(Slowing downward was the topic of last week's episode, in case you want to listen!)

My seasonal breaks and check-ins help me stay connected to my True Self. To what is most important to me in this season of my life and what I need for wholeness and joy.

But they also make space for me to sit with grief, or be with and process whatever is present for me.

I'm a feeling human, like many of you. And regular times of listening inward help me feel most at home in my body and life and this practice helps me thrive forward. Below, I've provided a resource you can use for your own seasonal check-in as you transition into autumn.

In this episode, I share about some themes and invitations of autumn, focusing on self-care for women in midlife season of life.

In this episode, you'll discover:

• Why for many people, grief and melancholy arise in autumn (sometimes this begins in August), even when they haven't experienced an obvious loss.
• How you can listen to your difficult emotions as wise messengers rather than problems you need to fix or push away.
• Why autumn invites you to strip away, let go, and engage in truth-telling about what no longer serves you.
• The reason holding onto old identities and patterns keeps you stuck and how you can recognize when it's time to release them.
• How you can navigate the vulnerable "in-between space" when you've let go of what was but haven't fully stepped into what's next.
• If you love rhythm and routine but also have a rebel streak, I share one way you can honor both by building intentional breaks into your life.
• How you can use this seasonal transition as an opportunity for meaningful self-care and inner exploration.

In this episode I also talk a tiny bit about paying attention to how you respond to the inner and outer noise that is common to women in the midlife season.

This includes paying attention to how you respond to inner and outer expectations. And I share a quiz below that can help you learn more about your own patterns (the Four Tendencies quiz).

Resources

Free Autumn Self-Care Guide: https://www.alifeinprogress.ca/autumn-guide/

Quiet the Noise Challenge (Sep 22-25). We begin on the equinox: join free

Buy a seasonal mindfulness journal for Autumn. It can help you slow downward and listen inward: take a look

Gretchen Rubin's Four Tendencies quiz: https://gretchenrubin.com/quiz/the-four-tendencies-quiz/

Podcast episode about grief/Samhain: listen on apple podcasts

Connect with Krista:

• Instagram: @a_life_in_progress
• Facebook: @alifeinprogressca and @rebrandingmiddleage
• YouTube: @ALifeinProgress
• Website: alifeinprogress.ca

Subscribe and Review

If you loved this episode, hit subscribe and leave a review. Reviews help more growth-minded midlife women like you discover this show.

Join the community for growth-minded midlife women:

https://www.alifeinprogress.ca/community/

Slowing Downwards is a term I encountered years ago in Michael Mead's Why the World Doesn't End: Tales of Renewal in Times of Loss. His writing in general and this idea spoke to me deeply.

Slowing downwards refers to more than simply moving slowly.

As Mead writes, "it means growing down towards the roots of one’s being. Instead of outward growth and upward climb, life at times must turn inward and downward in order to grow in other ways."

In this episode we explore:

• What it means to slow downward and how this is different from regular rest.
• When we need to slow downward to listen inward and why it's so important to recognize when we need this.
• Why, if we're in a season of expansion, we need to first (or also) slow downward.
• The truth that life turning upside down, upheaval, or disruption is often the catalyst for you growing into or being your True Self and telling the truth about what you want and need.

Resources

Quiet the Noise Challenge (Sep 22-25): join free

Buy a seasonal mindfulness journal for Autumn. It can help you slow downward and listen inward: take a look

Free Autumn Self-Care Guide: https://www.alifeinprogress.ca/autumn-guide/

Connect with Krista:

• Instagram: @a_life_in_progress
• Facebook: @alifeinprogressca and @rebrandingmiddleage
• YouTube: @ALifeinProgress
• Website: alifeinprogress.ca

Subscribe and Review

If you loved this episode, hit subscribe and leave a review. Reviews help more growth-minded midlife women like you discover this show.

Join the community for growth-minded midlife women:

https://www.alifeinprogress.ca/community/

We all need deep soul rest at times.

Soul rest is the relief, restoration, and recalibration that we experience when we slow downward, listen inward (next episode), and trust our inner wisdom as it calls us back into alignment with the truth of who we are and what we need for freedom and joy.

Soul rest is not typically found in doing more.

On the contrary, it is often found in doing less. In quieting the noise, stripping away, shedding, rewilding, or returning to the core essentials.

Shaking off the old inner and outer expectations that keep us pushing past capacity or keep us in judgment. And rest that comes from simply meeting and befriending our True Selves and building a loving, respectful relationship with ourselves.

In this episode you'll learn:

• What soul rest is
• How it is different from other forms of rest
• 7 types of rest everyone needs and the missing piece
• What soul rest can look and feel like
• How to respond when you feel the need for deep soul rest

Resources

True Rest blog post and free resource (the types of rest you most need in your 40s, 50s, 60s, or 70s): go here

Quiet the Noise Challenge (Sep 22-25): join free

Buy a seasonal mindfulness journal for Autumn. It can help you slow downward and listen inward: take a look

Dr. Saundra Dalton-Smith: drdaltonsmith.com

Connect with Krista:

• Instagram: @a_life_in_progress
• Facebook: @alifeinprogressca and @rebrandingmiddleage
• YouTube: @ALifeinProgress
• Website: alifeinprogress.ca

Subscribe and Review

If you loved this episode, hit subscribe and leave a review. Reviews help more growth-minded midlife women like you discover this show.