Are you on your priority list?

Weeks 13 & 14, Midlife Journal Guide

I wonder when I mention priorities do you look quickly to your To-Do list to see which items need moved up to NOW!!!!!! and URGENT!!!!!!! mode, or perhaps you are wilting at the realisation that there are too many exclamation mark items for the hours left in the day?

Priorities (plural) is a recent phenomena. The word priority actually means THE most important singular thing. But of course, in our mile-a-minute culture, one priority wasn’t enough and now we have them in plural, reflecting a scattered sense of modern life where EVERYTHING is urgent, and EVERYONE’s happiness is somehow on your shoulders. Which sort of defeats the purpose. The thing about focusing on a priority, (ok, you can have a couple, as long as you know which is THE priority among priorities), is that we can carry out-dated priorities into new stages and phases of life, and without checking in to update what’s really important to you now, you can be spending much scarce energy in the wrong direction (and hint, given that my mission as the midlife coach is to support women not lose themselves in the mayhem of midlife, dare I suggest spending that much scarce energy in every direction but you.)

Cast your mind back. Remember the checklist you made as you graduated from childhood into young adulthood? The checklist from which you would judge the success of your life at some future point that maybe felt a world way and reeeeeaaallly old. Maybe 35. The energy that created that early life checklist was likely to take the shape of chasing.

At midlife..… yes from 35 onwards…. that energy, hopefully, changes from chasing to choosing. Our priorities shift from being driven by that chasing energy to choosing how we want our life to feel, over how it looks.

As part of my year long Midlife, redefined Daily Journal Guide, I give you 14 daily prompts every two weeks to help you journal each day (or as many as you can muster) to get, and stay, connected to yourself. The prompts below for the next two weeks are about exploring your priorities and how they might have shifted. The diamond amidst the dirt is the recognition of the real priorities versus the ‘should’ priorities. Once you jump ship from conditioning criteria to intrinsic you ideals, your midlife shifts from you feeling you’re drowning in a tsunami to being captain of your own ship. Redefined midlife on your terms ahoy!

For those of you newly following me on Your Midlife Matters (thank you for being here!) I’ve already explained how this year-long adventure with yourself will work in Power is in Your Hand. You can start this journalling guide at any time of the year because it’s not date related: The daily prompts from Weeks 1 to 12 are here.

In this year long adventure with yourself, this opportunity to spend a few minutes every day (or as many days a week as you can) thinking about yourself will transform your relationship with yourself and to matter more in your own midlife and to build self-knowledge and empower yourself to live life for you.

A quick reminder we are now starting the second section - Passion, Purpose & Priorities for the next 8 weeks The first 8 weeks was Self-Discovery and the third part is Action and Living with Intention. Then we repeat these directions (with new prompts) for the second 6 months.

We started with self-discovery because you can make all the plans and checklists in the world, but if you aren’t coming from a place of current self-knowledge - who, how and where you are at this age and stage of life - you could be making the wrong plans, or signing up to someone else’s (culture, society, Instagram, the school gates, the patriarchy, your partner, your parent)’s version of success. 

So this section is all about reconnecting to, and retrieving, all the parts of you that still are there that may not have had much attention. Or just needs to get a bit of a shine.  Or you have lived and loved and laughed and learned and have developed new areas of interest and discovered new talents 

For ALL my lovely subscribers there is my free Midlife Daily Journal Template in my previous post here which you can use as a guide each day - and what I use every day.

For just €5 per month, this Midlife Daily Journal Guide (and lots of other content and discounts on coaching) is for my paid subscribers.

So let’s get into the prompts for Week 13 and 14 of your journaling journey.