Here’s what I think, because I thought a mid-life crisis was some saucy affair, booking a one way ticket to Europe or making an over night decision that changes everything.

But there was something about her words that felt like that stuck to me like glue, there was something about hearing the words that resonated and so I have sat deeply for the last 24 hours with the realization maybe a mid life crisis isn’t what you see in the movies and maybe, just maybe it is the brutal realization that while they world is moving around you you have become like a stranger to yourself.

Don’t get me wrong my life is beautiful, I have 3 incredible children, an amazing husband and I have built a beautiful business and brand. I live in New Zealand on a gorgeous lifestyle block and for the most part I should feel nothing but happiness.

Textbook life goals all ticked off.

Yet I seem to feel like a stranger to myself, like I have played all those roles that everyone needs me to be, like every day is mapped out in a Groundhog Day like energy and I truly can’t remember what the feeling is to be spontaneous, make decisions based on pure joy and to ask myself “what do I want”.

In the race to be the best mother, to bring in an income, to be a good friend, to tick of life goals I become numb to ever checking in with myself, to asking myself what I need and to putting myself first.

If mid life crisis’s can make you feel numb to the world and lost then maybe she is right, maybe that is what I am feeling.

But the beauty of the breakdown is always in the rebuild, maybe this crisis as it’s called is divinely timed because what is coming for me would have passed me by if I wasn’t having these realizations. Maybe I will say yes to the very think that will bring me back to myself and a new path will appear.

As I write this it’s 9.49am on a Saturday, by now I would have done the housework, went for an hour’s walk, be replying to work emails or at my children's sports but when I woke up today I decided I wanted to fill this whole day with choices that make me smile, that fill my cup or that bring my joy & happiness.

And weirdly in the dance between guilt of not feeling productive and freedom to feel I am truly connecting with my authentic self as I write I somewhat feel a little more alive, a little more reflective and for the first time in a long time asking myself what it is I want, in a world I so often feel forgotten or unimportant.

So if this is you, you aren’t having the affair or booking a one-way ticket and you are just feeling like this world is passing you by and you aren’t quite sure which train you should be on or if where you are is right where you are meant to be just know you are not alone.

Shifts aren’t meant to be comfortable, these feelings can make or break you if you chose to abandon them so please honor them. Stop being an actor in life and become the writer of your story.

You are not selfish for sitting with a mirror to your soul and being honest about what stares back at you.

Mid life is a privilege denied to many, we simply can not exist through all stages that got us here and not feel shifts, changes, evolution of who we were once where. To get this far we have hurt, been hurt, we have gained we have lost, we have won and we have lost and none of this will ever keep us the same as we once where.

It was no mistake my friend reached out, to share her wisdom & the have excitement in her voice when she told me I’m having a mid life crisis. She felt the excitement, the anticipation and the possibilities of what that can look like for me.

In her words, for the first time, in a long time I felt alive, I felt seen & in a world I stopped giving myself choices I realized I am a crossroads of being able to decide what is ahead and not move through the intersection blindly.

So here I am, the writer, not the actor and it feels the most free I have been in a very long time.

All my love

Over my lifetime I worked hard to mask feeling not good enough with achievements, with kindness (even to those who never deserved it), with being incredibly forgiving, with choosing compassion, with never being able to say no and for absorbing every hit of criticism to change or kill that side of myself.

At 40 I now look at myself like an almost stranger, I’ve realized the too much Paige was exceptional, she was kind, she was strong, she was wise, she was intuitive, she was empathic and saw life in colour, she was funny and larger than life, she felt deeply and responded emotionally.

But now she is a women on edge, who feels shame, who hides away, who cut down all the parts of herself she loved to fit in, who blames herself first in conflict and who allows her heart to get hurt and absorbs the hit to keep the peace.

She says “It’s ok”, when it really isn’t, she is compassionate to a fault and wants to make sure there is never a ripple in the water. She doesn’t know the difference between being chased by a bear in the woods alone and offending someone unintentionally. She questions every single day if she is the problem because no matter how many eggshells she walks on , no matter how much kindness she shows, no matter how quietly she lives her life she still feels like she is the center of problems & is unsure quite how she got there.

So now here I am, lost from the magic of me and realizing that everyone's peace is safe, but mine is anything but. My mind consists of daily ruminations of every scenario I have been wrong, everything I could have done to annoy anyone, anything I could have said that could have been misinterpreted. The sun falls on everyones days and mine has been spent in mental torture, wondering how I went from too much, to barely existing.

I didn’t intend on being this vulnerable in my first every post but fuck it, vulnerability is where the connections worth pursuing form for me and masks of “I'm good” seem to find me in the wrong circles.

I decided I need to understand why I am like this, is there a beautiful angle this can come from that makes me feel better about myself than how I currently feel.

I read a statement that slapped me in the face immediately. She would rather carry the weight herself than allow others to feel it.

This is me.

I would rather take the hit, than make a hit.

I researched the ways you would describe someone who keeps the peace at the expense of their own, and if a mirror had been held to my soul it would of given this exact reflection.

A peacekeeper

Self-sacrificing

Conflict-avoidant

Compassionate to a fault

Gentle-hearted

Long-suffering

Patient

The bigger person

Emotionally generous

Quietly resilient

As I look at that list I feel conflicted, is this person a push over? Is this person a soft soul for this world? Is this person more concerned with protecting their image than honoring themselves?

One thing I know for sure, whoever this person is on paper is Mother Theresa but deep down isn’t honoring something within her that makes her feel loved, valued and seen just as she is.

So how do I become “harder” without being colder?

How do I honor and give space for my feelings in rooms where I feel they don’t matter?

What does being comfortable with knowing in life I will dissapoint people and it doesn’t mean I am a bad person?

If you made it this far, just know if this is you I feel you, see you and hold the space for you to reflect and realize a lifetime of feeling like you are the problem has made you a stranger to yourself.

I am going to leave you with this for today.

Being a peaceful person doesn't mean becoming a silent person. It means learning to protect your own peace with the same care you've always given everyone else's.

love from me