'Midlife by Design, Not by Default' Month
It started with a sentence.
Earlier this year, for International Women’s Day, I asked women to finish this:
“This is Midlife by Design, not by default, because…”
Sixteen women responded. Different countries. Different stories. Different seasons of midlife. But underneath all of it, the same quiet knowing. That this chapter of life is asking something of us. And that most of us have been too busy, too tired, or too conditioned to answer it on our own terms.
I sat with those videos for a long time after.
And I realised that what those women had done, in ten seconds, in their own words, from their own lives, was name something that doesn’t get named enough.
The moment a woman stops defaulting and starts designing.
I’ve been building Midlife by Design for a year. Writing about it, coaching within it, podcasting from inside it. All of it is rooted in one belief:
Midlife is not something that happens to you. It is something you can choose, consciously, honestly, imperfectly, to design.
But a belief needs a home in the calendar to become a movement.
So I gave it one.
Midlife by Design, Not by Default Month is an annual observance, held every September.
September was chosen deliberately. It’s the start of autumn, the season most associated with shedding, with going inward, with letting go of what no longer fits so that something truer can take its place. The leaves don’t apologise for falling. They simply release what they’ve outgrown.
This month lives inside that rhythm.
What happens here every September
Five weeks. Five pillars of a consciously designed midlife. Each week, one expert conversation and one essay exploring a different area of the life you are building:
All essays from every September are archived here, a growing record of the conversation, year on year.
The campaign prompt
Every September, women everywhere are invited to share:
“I’m letting go of______. I’m building ______.”
In a video, a caption, or a note, however, feels right.
#MidlifeByDesignNotByDefault
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