In June I closed my coaching practice — a practice I had been building for two years. It was the kind of coaching I needed when I graduated college and started adulting, and again seven years later when I left my corporate job to focus on motherhood, and again in my mid-forties when I launched my LLC, and again when my firstborn and second-born started college. And at every other significant transition in adulthood.
I didn’t have a good reason for closing the practice other than a strong sense that I had given and received everything I was meant to as a coach. And ignoring that sense would be a disservice to me and the women I worked with. Still, I questioned whether it was too soon to walk away from something that was still taking shape. Was I repeating a pattern of leaving just when things are starting to get real?
Despite my doubts, I chose to let go of coaching and trust myself. I had some ideas about a creative project I wanted to pursue next, but first I wanted to take time off and just be. After the closure I spent two weeks in Italy with my family, where I felt completely at peace with my decision. That trip also made me realize that I needed more time before beginning anything new.
Once we landed back home, everything in me was asking for a break. But I didn’t want to admit that I wasn’t ready for my next project. I tried to ignore it, bypass it, justify it. But my body pushed back. I got sick, overwhelmed, anxious. A little voice inside kept saying, “This isn’t working.”
“I’m having a midlife meltdown,” I thought. And maybe I am.
The truth is I’ve been through a lot of change in the last few years, and my body feels a little stuck in the past. Old memories are resurfacing, and something is asking to shift. For the first time, I don’t have a clear plan for what’s next. I’m simply writing, mothering, existing, living one day at a time.
It feels unfamiliar to be in the world this way. I’m used to having answers and carefully organized goals with timelines. I’m used to being the stable person people turn to for support. But the tides have turned. I’m learning to show up in uncertainty, to lean into my relationships to be supported and cared for, to ask for help when I need it, to admit when I’m struggling or scared, to breathe and be with the full experience of change.
With love,
Jessica
