Can I pick your brain?

For my next book on midlife sensuality, sex and relationships?

I’m writing my next book, for women, about women, and I’d love to get your thoughts on issues you face and areas of learning you’d like on certain areas.

I’ve stared at many blank pages in my time. As a writer, it’s an occupational hazard.

But the blank page I’m staring at now doesn’t feel fraught with emptiness, but bursting with potential. I’m really excited about the words that will emerge, not just because it’ll be a book someday, but because I always write my own way of living through my writing. I process my thoughts about my own life while I process thoughts about the issues on a page as a coach, a journalist and an author. 

But I need your help. Not with the words… (although a few choice sentences are always welcome). But to help me mould it. Like my last book Midlife, redefined: Better, Bolder, Brighter, this new book will be formed from my own experiences exploring these topics, and from the related issues facing the wonderful clients I work with as The Midlife Coach. And they are subjects that affect all women - sensuality, sex and relationships.

So I’d love to pick your brain, if I may?

Just to set the scene, my last book, Midlife, redefined: Better, Bolder, Brighter came about from my own exploration of how to age powerfully in an age of anti-ageing propaganda, research on this unique age for women, as well as my coaching tools and guidance for women to navigate the messy middle of life (now a many-decades long stage from our 30’s to our 60’s). There was also a little bit of swearing. Not a lot. But just when I needed to really fucking emphasise a point for women to matter more in their own midlife.

 Everyone has a messy middle. Yes, everyone. Some of us are just better at hiding the mess than others. But messy middles are there because life isn’t perfect, no matter how many Charlotte Tilsbury Flawless Filters you try.  Stuff happens you didn’t plan or want. Stuff happens you did plan and want but they turned out not to be as iron-free as you hoped. You grow and cry and meet challenges and achieve amazing amounts, you evolve and learn and lie down on the floor to recover, and get up and keep going. And that’s just on a Monday. The amount of impossible women make possible every single day is incredible.

We are in a game changing time of life, and that means we get to redefine many of the ways in which we work, love, relate, eat, exercise, play, evolve, explore, recover, rebuild, create, and live our lives. 

So Midlife, redefined is about exploring that messy middle of life and making it about you. Of dealing with the good and bad mess in a way that empowers and supports you, while deciding what messy path lies ahead. 

The response was amazing and I feel so grateful every day just how much I’ve been able to bring the issues that affect women at midlife to a public forum (and no, it is not a book about menopause, although there is a chapter on it), but relationships, health, purpose, passions, body image and confidence, ageing, careers, and fun. Yes, fun. Very important to put the FUN into the fundamentals of life. Yet it’s often bottom of the To-Do List for busy women. 

And so my next epic writing adventure and venture begins. And I’d love your help!

It’s going to be called (for now) Midlife, redefined: Sensuality, Sex and Relationships.

You know, small topics. 

It’s taking a sliver of the previous book and making it a full sized cake, dealing with areas that can really affect women throughout the varying ages and stages of life. 

Why these three topics?

Because they are so important for women today to define, redefine and approach with intention. And because there is a lot to redefine. There is a lot of confusion, bullshit conditioning and as I explore in my previous book about all aspects of our lives, sometimes we need to go back and check in with who and how we are now at this age and stage of life (whatever that is). What worked before might not be what you need or want now. You have laughed, and loved, and lost and learned and so you have experience and you know differently. Or maybe it’s just that you need to refresh where you are.  

So here’s what the new book will explore:

Sensuality

Sensuality in the sense of connecting to your body and connecting to the senses around you. Yes, this means moving out of the full-time bed-sit in your brain where many of us reside because that’s were those To-Do Lists live. I’ll be exploring bodily and sensory pleasure, which is not necessarily sexual. For a woman, this sense of self can often disconnect. We can literally lose a sense of ourselves, lose touch with ourselves. So I’ll be exploring what connecting to your body means, being aware of, and taking intentional pleasure in the impact of sounds (including music, laughter, the sea rippling on a shore), touch (including acts like yoga, breathing, swimming, caressing, sex), smell (your skin, nature, food), taste (foods, ideas, nutrition, taste in creativity and love), and sights (are you feeling seen? What inspires you?).  How do women - in the mayhem of midlife which can include pregnancies, miscarriage, sexual partners, exhaustion and overwhelm, loss, menopause to name but a few - stay connected to their body and their sense of self?

Sex

I’ll be exploring the three C’s of sex. And before you think of something else that might be, I mean connection, communication and continual intention (although it might include the C things you were thinking of too).  I’ll be looking at sex as we evolve and grow from the sniggering teenager into vibrant (or not) sexual women, the myths, the magic and the small print. How can we redefine sex to be more than just an act of penetration but a whole approach to connection and pleasure.

Relationships 

How to redefine your relationships in midlife, be that marriage or post-marriage relationships.  What is your definition of success for your relationship NOW, at this age and stage of it and your life, how to work within a relationship so both people can thrive, or how to recover from a long relationship and move forward with as little baggage as possible. Lots of juicy stuff in there to help women navigate keeping the ‘me’ in the ‘we.’

So, here is what I’d love to know, if you feel willing and able. I’m throwing in some polls below as well as some questions and if you would like to ask me anything you’d love to learn about, or tell me your thoughts on any of these you can reply to me here, or also DM me on IG @Midlifecoach or email me directly at alana@alanakirk.com. There’s a gift for you too!

If you are not a subscriber it will ask you to subscribe (it’s part of the settings I can’t change as they need an email to prove it’s not one person making lots of votes.) but under no circumstances do I expect ayone to pay for a subscription just to vote! I’m afraid it’s not very clear so here is a button to subscribe for free and you can unsubscribe immediately after voting if you choose.

Other things I’d love to know:

What activity most connects you to your body?

What frightens you most about these topics?

Has your interest in sex changed over the years?  If so, why and how?

How often do you and your partner review your relationship? Would you even know how?

I would love it if you could share this post too, to anyone who might be interested. As a thank you for your comments, thoughts, emails or messages I’ll send you a copy of my My Midlife Journal prompt template which I often share with clients to help them take a beat at the beginning and end of each day to connect to themselves and get what they want from the day. The questions are geared to make you more driven by your internal needs rather than just react to the external demands. It’s been a gamechanger for me and many of my clients.

As always I’d love your comments and shares. Now, back to that bursting blank page!