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Midlife coaching clients are the most fun
With so much life experience behind us, we have stories, wisdom, and lessons to mine. That’s important and helpful because new questions are surfacing. We can make connections and see patterns that are easier to access with the benefit of hindsight and accumulated years.
There is a very specific sensibility that comes from being raised on Sesame Street and The Muppets and then painfully refined by living through the era of huge hair, pastels, and baby blue eyeshadow. It simply wasn’t possible to come through that time without a very healthy sense of humour and a huge dose of humility. Guess what the whole second half of life seems to require in very large doses…humour and humility.
Midlifers are transcending the isms of the (in retrospect incredibly messed up) 80s pop culture that most of us grew up thinking was normal and are embracing a new way of being. We keep trying to evolve and grow even when we don't always get it right, and as parents, mentors, teachers, and community members, we're raising a generation of fierce truth-tellers. I love that about us. That open-mindedness and willingness to evolve is also a key ingredient of a powerful second half.
Nobody is really paying attention to us but I see a huge upside in that. Consider it a cloak of invisibility that gives cover so we can be who we want to be and do all kinds of fun, subversive, exciting, impactful, fulfilling stuff. And if we want to be seen? Believe me we will be.
Midlifers have powerful questions about what makes life meaningful, what we can contribute, and what relationships and endeavors fill us up. We care about the planet, creating things, and expressing ourselves. This curiosity is essential and to me absolutely magnetic.
Putting on the mask of "good" isn't usually a conscious choice (but rather a *fun* coping mechanism and a product of being conditioned as a woman in our society). Taking the mask off is a choice; midlife is when that choice seems to be happening for a lot of us because wearing masks for decades gets exhausting. We want to be whole and known and not have to live up to some unattainable expectation of goodness. We may want to be a little bit *bad* sometimes. I'm so here for that.
Here’s a poem I wish I wrote but didn’t:
Sara styling hard on the cusp of 13 in 1984.
Unmasked
by Sarah Russell
I shivered when I took them off,
those masks of forty years —
goodgirlgooddaughtergoodstudentgoodwifegoodmother
goodgoodgood.
I stood naked in a new day.
Who was left?
Could I find her?
Would I love her?
Would anyone?
I set out to build a woman
without masks.
It took a while.
I lost people
and found others —
fewer than before.
They knew me when we met.
I knew them.
None of us wore masks.
All of us were naked.
But the sun was warm on our skin.
First published by Silver Birch Press.
(republished with author’s kind permission)
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What people say about working with Sara
Pam H.
“After spending many, many years in the large corporate realm I was completely hollowed-out when my job was eliminated. Sara listens with empathy, care, and wisdom. She helped me rediscover what has real meaning and value — and how far I had strayed from my true self. The notion of “what’s next?” is still very much out there for me but I now embrace it with a sense of optimistic possibility; clarity of my personal values and truths; and the confidence that everything really is going to work out just fine…”
– Pam H.
Johanna Reynolds
“Sara Smeaton is masterful with her coaching. After ten sessions, I feel stronger from a very deep place. For me, it’s been about building emotional resilience. This has felt like a missing piece for years now — and Sara’s line of questioning combined with her gentle guiding has allowed me to find my way to filling in this gap. I’m so grateful to have had this time with her.”
Photo by Marina Dempster
– Johanna Reynolds
Alan Dilworth
“Sara is an extraordinary listener and thinker, and is deeply insightful. Her coaching is both big picture and practical. It is always applicable. Sara was an indispensable coach for me in one the most challenging periods of rapid growth in my journey as an artistic and institutional leader, as I was called on to step in and successfully lead a large arts institution through a major unprecedented crisis. She was a true partner in this challenging but defining time. My work with Sara continues to be highly relevant in my latest artistic leadership adventures with Necessary Angel.”
Photo by Dahlia Katz
– Alan Dilworth Artistic Director, Necessary Angel Theatre Company