For the midlife women entrepreneurs asking, what if the question isn’t “What’s wrong with me?” but “Who can no longer carry this life?”
For 23 years, I worked as an ICU nurse.
And one thing never changed.
Patients would walk in (or be wheeled in) convinced they already knew their diagnosis.
Sometimes, they’d watched a television segment.
Sometimes, they’d read an article.
Sometimes, they’d spent an hour on the internet and arrived absolutely certain they had found the answer.
The doctors would sigh.
Sometimes roll their eyes.
Occasionally debate.
It was almost comical.
Because everyone was trying to explain a symptom before understanding the whole person.
I’ve been thinking about those moments a lot lately.
Because I think we’re doing something very similar with women in midlife.
Everyone Has a Diagnosis
Open social media. Listen to a podcast. Read the headlines.
Everyone has an explanation.
👉🏼 It’s hormones.
👉🏼 It’s perimenopause.
👉🏼 It’s burnout.
👉🏼 It’s your nervous system.
👉🏼 It’s mindset.
👉🏼 It’s trauma.
Now…
Before anyone misunderstands me…
Many of those things matter.
Hormones matter.
Trauma matters.
The nervous system matters.
Deeply.
But lately, I’ve noticed something.
Women will say:
“My labs look okay.”
“I’ve regulated my nervous system.”
“I’ve done the therapy.”
“I’ve read the books.”
“I’ve changed my habits.”
Then they whisper the sentence that tells me we’re talking about something deeper.
Much deeper.
“I just don’t recognize myself anymore.”
That isn’t a hormone.
That’s an identity.
Brené Brown Is Talking About Unlearning
And I love that.
Her newest work invites us to examine what we’ve learned about leadership, courage, accountability, and the discipline required to unlearn what no longer serves us.
I think she’s opening an important door.
But I keep finding myself wondering…
What happens when it isn’t just your leadership that needs to change?
What happens when the identity doing the leading has reached the end of its assignment?
Because you can learn new leadership skills.
New communication patterns.
New skills.
New habits.
But if you’re still trying to build from an identity that was created to survive…
Eventually you’ll find yourself asking:
“Why does all this work still feel so heavy?”
The Question Nobody Is Asking
We’re asking:
How do I regulate?
How do I optimize?
How do I perform better?
How do I become my future self?
I think there’s another question.
One that changes everything.
Who is trying to do all of this?
Because the business follows the identity.
The relationships follow the identity.
Leadership follows the identity.
Confidence follows the identity.
The nervous system protects the identity.
Everything organizes around the identity.
So perhaps the real work isn’t fixing the woman.
Perhaps it’s gently releasing the version of her that no longer fits.
The Fastest-Growing Entrepreneurs Aren’t Twenty-Somethings
One of the most fascinating shifts happening right now is that women over fifty are among the fastest-growing groups of entrepreneurs.
I don’t think that’s an accident.
I don’t think they’re simply starting businesses.
I think they’re reclaiming authorship.
Not because they suddenly became ambitious.
Because they finally became honest.
Honest about what they wanted.
Honest about what no longer fit.
Honest about the cost of continuing to perform identities they had already outgrown.
Honest about being done proving, perfecting, and pleasing.
The business isn’t the transformation.
The business is often the evidence that the transformation has already begun.
They’re Calling It the “Ugly 40s”
When I first read this, I nearly chuckled out loud.
And then, I felt something else.
Protective. (No, I was pissed.)
I understand what they’re trying to describe.
The messy middle.
The confusion.
The uncertainty.
The unraveling.
The season where confidence dips before identity reforms.
But I can’t call it ugly.
Because I’ve watched too many women walk through it.
I’ve watched women who believed they were falling apart discover they were finally coming home.
I’ve watched women release careers that looked successful but felt like prison walls.
I’ve watched women stop apologizing for wanting lives that fit.
I’ve watched women trust themselves for the first time in decades.
Ugly?
Nope.
Sacred.
Without question.
Always sacred.
You Can’t Think Your Way Out of a Chapter Your Body Is Still Living In
This is where I believe the conversation deepens.
Your body remembers identities your mind has already outgrown.
That’s why insight isn’t always enough.
That’s why reading another book isn’t always enough.
That’s why another mindset shift sometimes changes everything…
…for about three days.
Your body has practiced being the responsible one.
The achiever.
The caretaker.
The woman who earned love by being needed.
The woman who performed compliance to avoid being abandoned.
The woman who selflessly put everyone else’s needs before her own.
It doesn’t forsake those patterns because your mind decides it’s time.
It learns through lived experience.
Through safety.
Through repetition.
Through identity recalibration.
This isn’t about thinking differently.
It’s about alignment.
It’s about becoming congruent.
The Portal Exists for the Chapter Between the Chapters
This is why I created The Portal: Sacred Unraveling™.
Not for women who need more information.
There is no shortage of information.
The world has never offered more books…
More podcasts…
More summits…
More experts…
The missing piece isn’t information.
It’s integration.
It’s having someone walk beside you while the old identity loosens its grip and the truest version of you learns how to lead.
Not from performance.
But from presence.
Not from proving.
But from congruence.
Not from survival.
But from truth.
An Open Invitation
So if you’ve been asking yourself,
“What is wrong with me?”
Can I lovingly offer another possibility?
Nothing.
Perhaps your hormones are changing.
Perhaps your nervous system is asking for care.
Perhaps your body is asking to be heard.
And perhaps…
Something even deeper is happening.
Perhaps you’ve reached the place where the woman who got you here is gently whispering,
“I’ve carried this as far as I can.”
Not because she failed.
Because she finished.
She finished her job.
And maybe…
The woman who’s waiting beneath her has been ready all along.
If you’re standing in that sacred space between who you’ve been and who you’re becoming, I’d love to invite you into a Midlife Calling by Design™ Audit.
Not because you need another diagnosis.
But if you are in The Sacred Middle…
Sometimes the greatest gift isn’t finding another answer.
It’s finally asking the right question.
—
With truth, fire, and deep understanding,
Coach Shannon
Spiritual Business Alchemist & Midlife Identity Recalibration Strategist
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