Change, Mid-40s rebellion and living without regret.

Hi friends!

I got my nose pierced again this week. Third time. That's not really what this week's pod is about, but stick with me.

I sat in a piercing studio that smelled like antiseptic and ink, and felt the exact same rush I felt as a teenager doing this. Nothing about it was practical. It didn't help my business, my parenting, or my bank account. I just wanted it - the same reckless way I wanted things at seventeen, before I learned to run every decision past an imagined committee of people who might judge me for it.

Turns out reconnecting with the piercings-and-rock-music version of myself was step one of a much bigger conversation I had with myself this week. Step two was way less fun: unpacking the fact that my forties have basically been one long game of “but wait, there's more f$ckery coming.”

New career at nearly 40. A separation. A few house moves. Major shoulder surgery. An economy that took out my second career right after I'd finally built it. I've started calling this decade the reinvention decade, because “chaos” felt a bit much for a newsletter subject line.

Here's the bit I actually want you to take from this week's episode: reinvention doesn't get easier just because you've done it before. Losing a job I'd had since I was 21 didn't prepare me for major surgery. Surgery didn't prepare me for co-parenting. Every single time, it was new terrain.

What experience does hand you, if you let it, is proof. Proof you're the kind of person who gets through things.

On the pod this week I talk how I break down change with my clients, so they start taking the kinds of risks they've been too scared to think about. I also get into the “rocking chair test,” the thing I use to make hard decisions when certainty isn't coming (spoiler: it's never coming). And I go back to being seven years old, when my parents split up, because that's honestly where a lot of my relationship with uncertainty started.

It's a big one this week. Go listen to episode 6 wherever you get your podcasts, and if you've got ten seconds spare, a review or a 5 star rating makes a big difference! (I'm still a baby in the big wide world of podcasting, and every little bit of support helps!)

Take care,

Rachael. xx