coach4womeninmidlife.com

By the time a woman reaches her midlife she has shed many of the idealistic and romantic notions that her previous goals and dreams were founded on. The middle years can bring unwelcome revelations about a woman’s marriage or relationships, health, career path, spirituality and overall personal development. So it’s not too surprising that seeking success in midlife is both a touchy subject and a hot topic. 

While you may not be convinced that all the symptoms of middle age are to be enjoyed, there is reason for a positive outlook.  If you look you’ll find significant scientific and anecdotal evidence supporting the fact that the midlife years can be used for unusual personal growth and development. “In a 1997 survey by the North American Menopause Society, more than half of American women aged forty-five to sixty viewed menopause as the beginning of a new and fulfilling stage of life.” Women who tend to feel successful during the midlife years are those who are able to use their struggles as an impetus for change. 

• Transforming Struggles into Success in Midlife

From menopause to illness and death, midlife tends to pile on the responsibilities and burdens.  This happens at a time when many women expect to be enjoying greater freedom and rewards for their years of hard work. For instance, your own experience may seem to suggest that life is just a struggle and you need to accept it. 

Yes, life is hard. But successful midlife women find a way to use their struggles to better their lives. The first step is to acknowledge and accept fully your discontent.  Then start turning to what would make you smile. It could mean a new and more fulfilling career, a better relationship, better physical condition or an improved financial state.  

• Defining Success for Women in Midlife

Success-coaches find that most women know exactly what they don’t want in their lives: e.g., poverty, loneliness, illness. However the key to building a successful midlife experience is to invest fully in gaining with full clarity and detail the vision you want to create.  Coaching women through midlife has become one of the fastest growing careers because permanent change is so hard to implement. Just think of how many struggle and fail trying to lose weight, manage money or start exercising.

When a woman seeking success in midlife employs a life coach to guide her they both will need to take some very specific steps regardless of the individual journey. Since all permanent change is rooted in your underlying beliefs you must be willing to examine your preconceived notions about your self and the world. For instance, if your mother raised you to believe that a healthy woman “has a little meat on her bones” your attempts to lose weight are combated by your subconscious believing that that is an unwise move. We are full of beliefs that don’t serve us. 

Most of us cannot see ourselves without bias, which is why a life coach can add clarity and perspective to this process.   Once you have identified your coach she needs to have the resources to help you rewire key thoughts so you won’t recreate the past.  Also from your dreams and list of “wants” for your life, you need to dig deep to find out what the best idea of your life purpose is.  What goals would be in line with this life purpose? Then you and your coach will need to outline an action based on achieving those goals. Finally, you will embark on the journey with your coach guiding, prompting and helping you along the way. 

• Build a Community for Success in Midlife

The concept of a life coach really goes back centuries. They were referred to as wise elders and given much respect. We have lost that tribal connection, and women need to build community and seek out mentors in other ways. One of the benefits of choosing a life coach is that you can seek out someone who has already been down the path that you are traveling and can point out both barriers and shortcuts to midlife success. 

In addition, you can look for or create a support group of midlife women within your community, church or other organization.  Having other women who intend to create the best opportunity for themselves in their present challenges are good to have on your side.  Mastermind groups as described by Napoleon Hill in Think and Grow Rich are a specific form of a support group. 

The challenges of the midlife years can be seen as a wake-up call.  Stop to take a long look at your life and the path you are traveling.  Remember Lao-tsu said:  “If you do not change direction, you may end up where you are heading.” Your struggles can be transformed into the power to pave a new path that leads toward a more fulfilling future. Midlife offers a huge opportunity if you are willing to invest in you and adopt new ways of thinking. 

By Anne Uemura, Ph.D.    

We have all grown up with dreams of the princess bride fairy tale. Every woman, no matter how sensible, has been indoctrinated since birth with Disney-esq. romantic notions about marrying Prince Charming and living happily ever after.  

Many women who find themselves in the already turbulent and transition filled midlife years have to face another reality:  the gradual decay of the marriage myth which seems to come to a head somewhere right around 50 years old. It seems that when midlife women begin to seek their power and independence, marriage becomes…optional. 

• Setting Them Up for Failure

 There are two large factors that contribute to the steady rise of divorce rates among the long term marriages of people in their 50s. First of all, many when young succumbed to the popular myths about marriage such as: 

• We expect the same things from a marriage.  Instead there is often a huge clash when family cultures and expectations collide. 
• The good will get better and the bad will disappear. Rather, one learns that you can’t change him/her.
• He will complete me.  Instead, what seemed like a complementary fit becomes annoying.

 Unrealistic expectations and misguided beliefs about marriage constitute a recipe for dissatisfaction and frustration. The problem that really kicks this issue into high gear is that many women were raised to avoid conflict rather than to speak up when there is a problem.  By midlife this has resulted in a mountain of resentments that have been harbored and nursed for years.  

• Why Women Leave

 Midlife can be a time for serious re-evaluation and assessment of a woman’s life. And it seems that many women in this age group find their marriages to be seriously lacking. According to a study commissioned by the AARP of people divorced in their 40s, 50s, and 60s, 66% of the divorces were initiated by women.  Fully a third of these women considered divorce for 2 years before mentioning it, and 10% gave it at least 10 years worth of thought. While you might think their husbands would be aware, 26% of these men claim they were completely blindsided by their wife’s divorce request.  

So why are these women leaving in such numbers? The top reason they give is the need for self-identity. 

• What Does This Mean for Women in Midlife?

 Clearly there are huge gaps between our expectations of marriage and the realities. There is also a huge communication gap between women asking for what they want and men hearing them. Finally, there is the ever-present problem of women who give their heart and soul to the nurturing of everyone around them and have nothing left for themselves.  

If you are women in midlife, you must learn what it means to take care of yourself. However, reversing a lifelong pattern is a huge challenge.  Do you even know what you want? Can you clearly visualize the future you are trying to create?  Coaches for midlife women are very popular right now because there are thousands of women trying to figure out what they want and how to get it. 

• What Does This Mean for the Midlife Marriage?

 Successful marriages involve partners who support each other in their growth and development. Your part in this equation is to make sure that you have realistic expectations, listen to your own needs and wants, speak your truth and treat yourself as kindly as those around you. Marriages that thrive usually have two partners who don’t try to complete each other; rather they respect each other and their differences. 

• What Does it Mean if I’m Divorced?

 First of all, studies show that divorced people go on to live as happy and fulfilling lives as those who have never experienced a divorce. Whether you are divorced or married, midlife can be a pivotal time for a woman to reinvent herself and create the life she really wants. And it’s time to pay attention to the needs of her soul.  

If you find yourself in these circumstances, surround yourself with supportive women friends. Stop looking and wishing for rescue.  Rather find your own solutions. Create a life that is based on your authentic power rather than the myths of childhood.  75% of women who divorce in their 50s will find themselves in an exclusive relationship within two years. But many of these women will not choose to remarry.

Neither marriage nor divorce is set up as happily-ever-after scenarios. However, whether it is marriage or divorce midlife presents an opportunity to learn, grow, and take steps to creating the life you really want. That part is no fairy tale and it is about creating your dreams.          

 One of my earliest memories is when I was about 6, looking up at the night sky and wondering, “are you there God?”  Feeling bad and feeling guilty, I was looking for comfort and a deep reassuring “presence.” As a teenager I was attracted to some caring folks who were talking about Jesus and “being saved.” They touched some longing in me that I didn’t know was there so I became a Christian. 

For me, however, “being saved” quickly led to fears and guilt about doing things “wrong.”  Such as, was it okay to sit in our traditional family Buddhist ceremonies?  However, the fears dissipated and I enjoyed the ready friendships in our Christian groups and churches through my teens.  

My inquiring mind was activated in college and it burst my bubble.  I began to question whether or not this Christianity that I had embraced, was uniquely feeding my soul.  I decided it was not.  

Married in my 20s, a young guru’s message found me way up in Maine.  We were initiated and I started to do the  “secret” meditation thing.  I never found what was promised but rather discovered what most beginning meditation students find:  an incessantly chattering mind.   Then I stopped searching. 

Too much life was pouring in:  family, work, divorce, single parenting, Ph.D. studies and career. Some time in my 50s a break from fulltime work allowed me to explore new subjects such as alternative medicine, health, nutrition, herbs and healing.   In the course of these studies, as a 3^rd year student in healing school I was reminded of my past.  The focus for the year was introduced–relationship to the Divine.  Almost immediately I remembered the longing I had when I was six.  Gratefully and tearfully I began my journey with this longing as my beacon.  

In the past five years I have appreciated studying the writings of many spiritual teachers, who basically teach from a non-dualistic, inter-faith perspective.  Because of my commitment to becoming a fully conscious being I now understand so much more about my longing and my connection to Spirit.   I understand how fulfilling responsibilities became a single-minded focus of my adult life as a single parent and fulltime professional.   However, sometimes the need for love or for partnership silently intensified to disrupt my focus during this midlife period.  Many “mistakes” were made that taught me about myself and about having relationships. 

The most important lesson was this:  the love I sought from this man or relationship was not to be found coming from the outside.  Ultimately the only love that sustains and relieves suffering is found within. I understand the difficulty I had in answering the question,  “How do you see your life in 5 years?”  I did not know.  I hadn’t found my “life goals” or “life purpose” yet. I considered a number of things including possible changes of career. 

Today, although I still cannot answer that question, I have an anchor to my explorations. I affirm my uniqueness and know that my purpose is based on my unique expression of Spirit within.   I understand that issues of feeling unworthy or undeserving and being alone or without purpose are real obstacles in the journey back to Spirit-Love-Peace.  There is no spiritual bypass.   

I understand that touching what is sacred and divine happens whenever we can be present to what is here.  It can occur at any time and no matter who we are.  When we lose ourselves in a rose or a sunset, in the freshness of the air, in the inspired performance of gifted artists, in the delight of a young child’s laughter, in the gaze of a loving look, we have stepped out of our ordinary humanity.   Consider that there is nothing more important in life than to experience your connection with Divinity, Spirit or Love.  Whenever you live with loving-kindness, compassion, love, wisdom and peace you are connected with this source.   

Please consider taking the time and space, right now and every day, to make room for discovering your longing and accessing the Spirit/Love/Peace within you. 

By Anne Uemura, Ph.D.    

One day an alarm starts to blare in your head. It says, “Wait a minute! This isn’t the life I planned. Is that all there is?”

You hit “snooze” on that annoying wake-up buzzer again and again but it goes off at so many times:

 ·        your body has betrayed you with strange new ailments,

·        your children leave the nest,

·        your marriage or lack of one bothers you,

·        your aging parents rely on you,

·        you’re not financially stable,

·        your career doesn’t exist or isn’t satisfying.  

Midlife may bring on challenges in every aspect of your life.  Is there a way to answer this call without smashing the whole clock to pieces? Is there any reason that you are given such struggles to deal with? Yes. Take a deep breath and relax.  

Your wake-up call is about to change from an irritating unrelenting buzz to softly playing music, gently but firmly nudging you down the path toward your best life. The best part is that the picture of “your best life” is completely yours.   

• Celebrating the Awakening of the Midlife Mind

 One of the amazing laws of the universe is that it tries constantly to keep us in balance. One way the universe performs this function is to send us various messages throughout our lives. When your body starts to experience menopause symptoms like hot flashes, decreased sex drive and insomnia–that is your body telling you to take a look at your nutrition, stress level and exercise.  

Your time spent in this midlife season is full of transitions and re-evaluations. You are given an opportunity to look at the life you have created and decide if that is the one you really want. What an amazing gift this can be for those women who choose to embrace this time. You have the choice to view a midlife struggle like menopause as a bother and inconvenience or as a chance to improve and take control of your life. Why not love it! 

• Finding the Support to Put You on the Right Path to Midlife Success

 As women at this midlife transition re-evaluate their current life, they may discover areas of great dissatisfaction with work, family, marriage, health, spirituality, plus overall personal growth and development. Life coaches for midlife women have evolved in response to the need for support during this time of phenomenal growth and change.  In order to make significant, lasting and appropriate changes to your life, many things need to happen.

First of all, you need the support of other like-minded women and mentors. In the past wise elders would mentor women in a family or town but we seem to lack this support system in our society. Many women find the elders in their family may not provide the example they are seeking to emulate. Other resources? Women’s peer groups like the Red Hat Society have started to take root. A life coach is a more intimate, trained and focused version of the wise elder.  A good life coach should help you gather your talents and resources from your past experiences, build a vision for the future and navigate the obstacles on the path to your goals. 

• How to Use Your Midlife Wake-Up Call

 Your midlife experience will not be exactly like that of any other woman.  Ground your explorations in affirming your uniqueness.  Embrace attitudes that will keep you positive.  Surround yourself with people and resources that uplift you.  Learn how to become empowered by circumstances and appreciate what you can learn rather than feel victimized.  Learn to ask questions and discover where your answers are. 

That doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t ever be sad, frustrated or tired on this journey. Rather it means being wise enough to seek out help when you need it. It means rewiring old ways of thinking and acting. It means embracing the years of wisdom and experience you have been accumulating to create your best life for yourself. Finally, answering your midlife wake-up call means acknowledging the full range of power you possess over your thoughts, actions, and life. 

By Anne Uemura, Ph.D.     

Remember hearing the instructions to put on your oxygen mask first before helping anyone with theirs? Every time you are on a commercial flight you hear a hint of this common error. Many women have to be reminded because their first response is to place others before themselves. Why does this happen? How is this an error?

I spent the last two weeks with my granddaughters, one almost 3 and the other almost 6. They are amazingly self-centered. They want what they want right now.

We were once like that. But our upbringing has resulted in our sense of self and our desires vanishing because we learn to attend to what others expect of us. Too often the efforts to civilize us succeed beyond what is necessary, and also “homogenize” us.

We have been bombarded with words that tell us how to feel, what to think, what to want, who we are, what is good, what is right, what to buy, where to vacation, and what is possible…

What are the results? Too often we are led to believe that happiness comes from the outside with fame, fortune and things. In our confusion too many of us ultimately believe that to get the love, attention and approval we want from others we need to put their needs first.

Over a hundred and fifty years ago, suffragist Elizabeth Cady Stanton objected:

Self-development is a higher duty than self-sacrifice. The thing which most retards and militates against women’s self-development is self-sacrifice.

If you don’t just love your life right now why continue on the same course and using the same attitudes and actions? As Lao Tzu warns:

If you do not change direction, you may end up
where you are heading.

In midlife, if not earlier, we have the opportunity to make a midcourse correction—to become less concerned about what others think and begin to discover what we really care about. If you don’t choose to do so, whose life are you living?

There are many heartbreaking stories of women who choose to live for others and cancer is their wake-up call. Psychologist Lawrence LeShan has a collection of them. Maya Tiwari, an Ayuvedic nutritionist, has a similar story with an inspiring conclusion of how she discovered how to live life on her own terms. A corrective reorientation requires an understanding of self-love. First, reflect on the person you listen best to, someone you give complete attention and respect to. Now here’s the test: Do you give yourself that quality of attention? Do you always know how you feel? Do you know your dreams? Your desires? Your longings? Are you paying attention to those aspects of you?

Many of us get distracted with the sentimental aspect of love. More basic than sentiment is the consistent non-judgmental attention and listening to the heart/soul. Your presence to yourself, as consistently as you can make it, is an important part of what it means to love yourself.

If joy and peace are not enough of your daily experience consider giving the light of attention to yourself so your heart/soul has a chance to grow.

Appeared in Open Exchange, October/November/December 2006

Why the World Is On Fire with Life Coaching

There is a “new” message spreading across the planet like wildfire. It has been publicized recently in a video called “The Secret”. Teachers of this secret have recently appeared with Oprah and Larry King, giving it international exposure.

The secret brought success to historic icons like Plato, Einstein and Newton. In our time Bob Proctor, Joe Vitale, Lisa Nichols, Michael Beckwith and others attribute their impressive successes to the secret.

Have you had your share of struggles and transitions in your life? If you’re reading this you probably have tried to change and improve, only to stop with frustration and self-flagellation as you failed to reach your objective. So you may understand why the recent revelation of the secret has led to a surge in the field of life coaching.

What is this secret, and how can you apply it to your life?

• Learn the Laws of the Universe

The secret has always existed. The wisest people on the planet have been able to learn and use it.

Bob Proctor explains the secret. It is the Law of Attraction based on vibrations, “You choose the vibration you live in by the ideas you are emotionally involved with.” In a simple example, you have experienced this often in your life when someone else’s energy either made you smile with warmth or shrink away from their negativity. This reflects a law of physics that states “like attracts like.”

• Understand The Sabotage of Your Subconscious Mind

Don’t be fooled into thinking that the secret is as simple as the power of positive thinking. On the contrary, positive thinking alone will leave you frustrated and confused when your hopes don’t come to fruition. There is good reason that most of your efforts at change aren’t successful. It is because what you do on the conscious level doesn’t bypass what is in your subconscious mind. And your subconscious mind has been programmed with limiting beliefs impressed on you repeatedly from the moment you were born.

For example, if you grew up being told that “Money doesn’t grow on trees”, and “Rich people are greedy” then all your conscious efforts to make and keep money will be sabotaged by your core beliefs. The same is true for weight loss, relationships, and any other significant changes you may try to make.

• Build Your Vision of an Abundant Universe

The secret explains how most people get what they don’t want. By focusing or worrying about what they don’t want in their lives, “I don’t want to be fat/ poor/ unhappy,” they attract it. Unless your picture of the life you desire is positive and is imprinted with absolute clarity and captivating detail you cannot begin to work towards it. Once you have created this vision, however, the universe will move you towards it with amazing efficiency.

• Using a Life Coach for Guidance and Clarity

One secret about The Secret is that you need to support yourself by surrounding yourself with others who share and uphold your vision. Teaming with a life coach is one way to be accountable, set clear goals, clarify and enhance your vision, and work through any obstacles in your way.

Another secret about The Secret is that working with the Law of Attraction is only the beginning and not a magic silver bullet. There are more laws to study and absorb.

“The Secret” is being touted as heralding a “new era in humanity.” Indeed, just think how fortunate we are to live in a time when access to the greatest minds on the planet is literally a mouse click away. Best of all, “the Secret” has given millions of people hope.

Join in. Start to picture the future that you desire to welcome into your life. The Laws of Attraction and Vibration are just waiting to help you create the life you have always wanted. But make sure that you have a qualified life coach to provide the proper support to create your major mindset change.

Written by Anne Uemura, Ph.D, www.coach4womeninmidlife.com

Summary: An empty nest offers women in midlife a fresh opportunity to focus on what they want from their lives.

If you have spent years guiding and preparing your children toward independence you might expect a sense of freedom and accomplishment when they left home. You can acknowledge that some important work is done as your children move onto college, marriage or a life of their own. Yet many “empty nest” parents, mothers especially, are left feeling adrift, abandoned and lonely.

This doesn’t have to be the case. By knowing how to deal with the unexpected emotions of the “empty nest” syndrome, you can transform this transition into one of the most meaningful times of your life.

• “Empty Nest” Emotions

Empty nesters are likely to feel torn in different directions. While 58% of empty nesters claim they are ready for the kids to fly the coop, those numbers are significantly less for women (55%), than for men (70%). On the one hand they have more time and freedom to do the things they’ve wanted before having children. Yet many women who have focused all their time and energies on raising their families may have no idea of what they want now, some 20 or so years later.
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Another issue that makes it difficult to sail on a breeze into these years of freedom is that many women are burdened with other challenges. Some face other difficulties such as divorce, moving, menopause, or care of aged parents at the same time the nest is emptying. For example, 40% of empty nesters expect that their children will move back in with them and 30% anticipate having their parent move in with them.

• Filling the Empty Nest

Whatever situation accompanies your “empty nest” experience there are steps you can take to make this transition easier and life enhancing. First, look at this change for its tremendous opportunities. Many women have chosen to concentrate on their work and have explored new careers. Others who have dealt with divorce and empty nest simultaneously have been stopped in their tracks—long enough to explore their own wants, needs, and desires for the first time ever.

After dealing with this transition, women at this age generally report feeling more confident than in their younger years. By embracing this opportunity to pay attention to your own financial, physical, emotional and professional needs, the empty nest stage could lead to the most fulfilling stage of your life.

• The Empty Nest: A Time to Turn Inward

A great place to start on this new journey is to learn to listen to your body. If you are experiencing signs of menopause or perimenopause this is your body’s way of telling you to take care of you. What changes must you make in areas like nutrition, fitness and stress management?

Another important focus is to learning to listen to your heart. For years, you as a woman, have been taught that it is selfish to take care of or focus on you. Since women tend to be nurturers by nature it is easy to fall into the trap of focusing all your energy on those you love.

It’s time to heed this lesson: by neglecting your own physical, spiritual and emotional needs you limit your ability to be there for anyone. Do you remember the fatigue and irritability brought on by running yourself ragged for your family? Now is the time to treat your self as well as you treated them.

Your emotions may be up and down due to lack of direction, loss of routine, hormonal changes or other life events. Here are other suggestions to help you get the most out of your empty nest experience.

• Listen to your emotions so you will know what you need and want. For this you may need to commit to spending time alone and writing in a journal.
• Experiment with new experiences so you can learn more about yourself. For example, try yoga and meditation to help lower your stress, improve your sleep and enjoy peaceful moments with your self.
• Find opportunities to learn how to make the best transition possible by reading, studying materials on changes and personal development. Be more prepared for the rest of your life by learning from the wisdom of others.
• Take control of your finances. If this has always eluded you or been your husband’s job, now is the time to harness your energy and learn a new competence. Start with books or classes as needed.
• Try a new hobby or class. This is the prime time to discover hidden talents and explore interests.
• Find meaningful work. Many empty nesters find this is the best time to start a brand new career.

Midlife is an exciting and pivotal stage in your life. Accept that you may have some raw or confused emotions and that this is normal. If you experience symptoms of depression and your sadness doesn’t go away you should consult a professional. Otherwise, recognize that your empty nest may be one of the greatest gifts your children can offer you.

By Anne Uemura, Ph.D., www.coach4womeninmidlife.com
Therapist-healer-life coach