How to start over in life at 50. Real Practical Tips & Advice

The first thing we need to get out of the way is the question “Is 50 too old to start over?” which I have heard people ask. Well, my answer is OMG NO! You, lady are just entering the most exciting and dynamic phase of your life. You are NOT NOT and I repeat, NOT too old! You are going to be bada$$! Let’s get you back up and running.

Don’t know where to start? Lets look at your life

Now I’m guessing you have found this page because something major has happening in your life and you are feeling unsure of how to move forward. Maybe you feel a bit like a spinning compass, desperately whizzing round trying to find your true north.

It’s important to remember that you are never really starting over in life.

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By 50 you have a whole lifetime of skills and knowledge that will help you successfully rebuild in whatever area of your life has gone out of balance.

You can do this. You just need to focus on the areas that need a little help. 

I want to make this post about actual practical advice that will help you do just that.

The Wheel of life audit.

The diagram below is The Wheel Of Life. It’s a simple but powerful tool that helps you to visualise the present balance of your life. By filling out the diagram you can easily see which areas of your life need the most attention so that you can spend your energy wisely.

The sections in the wheel represent different areas of your life, with the centre of the wheel as 1 [least satisfied] and the outer edge as 10 [most satisfied]. 

What I want you to do is print out the wheel and then physically colour in the sections depending on how you feel about each area of your life.

• How do you rate these areas of your life on a scale of 1 to 10?
• For example, if you are happy in your relationship you would colour out to 10, but if money was an issue you maybe would colour just slightly out from the middle to 2.

This will give you a birds eye view of the areas of your life and where things may be out of balance.

Thankfully, there are some tried and trusted steps that you can look at to ground yourself and provide you with a path to move forward.

Use the following questions to help you determine how you would rate each life area on a scale of 1 to 10. 

Examine your life with these crucial questions

Fill in your Wheel of Life

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Work life

• Do I actually like my job?
• Can I see myself still enjoying it in 5 years?
• Does it give me the opportunities of what I want to achieve?
• What did I want to do as a kid?
• Would I still enjoy doing that job if I did into as an adult?

Health

• Do I feel well and healthy?
• Could I make improvements to what I eat or drink?
• Is there an exercise I enjoy or would like to try?

Friends & Family

• Are there friends I have drifted apart from that I miss?
• Do I have a close circle of friends? Do want one?
• How do I feel about family members? Do I want more closeness or less contact with them?
• Do I feel happy with my family relationships? Is there something I can do to improve them?

Fun and Recreation

• Do I have fun?
• Am I able to relax or do I find it difficult?
• Do I have hobbies that I enjoy?
• Are there hobbies I would like to learn and experience?

Money

• Do I earn enough to finance my lifestyle?
• Do I have a plan for financial freedom or retirement?
• Do I have a financial cushion to see me through hard times?
• Are there ways I could improve my financial situation?

Romance

• Do I have a good and nurturing relationship that allows me to be me?
• Do I want one? Or do I want to stand on my own with self confidence?
• If I have a relationship, am I nurturing it?

Personal Growth

• Am I moving forward in my life and improving and growing as a person?
• Do I feel stagnant and directionless?
• Are there opportunities that I could take to continue to grow.

Physical Environment

• Do I like where I live or would I prefer to live elsewhere?
• If so is there a way to make that move happen?
• Am I happy with my home or are there things I could do to improve it?

How to interpret Your Wheel of Life

Once you have completed your wheel you need to contemplate your results.

There may be areas which are very obviously in need of attention, which are skating very close to the centre of the wheel. These areas can be your main priority to make changes and get the ball rolling with some positive moves.

However, it’s important to remember that in life, everything is connected and certain areas may have an impact on other things too. For example, money has a big impact on many areas. 

If you don’t have enough money coming in this can stop you enjoying hobbies or living in the place that you would like. The stress of not having enough money can also impact on relationships and family. So in this case, money would be the life area to target first and improve. Then the other areas would be more likely to fall into place.

By using the wheel of life to audit yourself you can begin to find a sense of direction of the areas that you can expend your energy on to get the best results. In this way you can start to formulate a plan to help you in your mission to start over in life at 50.

How to start over in life at 50. The 5 crucial questions

With your Wheel of life results in mind its now time to ask yourself 5 crucial questions that will help you narrow down your plan.

Think of the area of your life that needs most attention. The one that you are going to tackle first.

Ask yourself

• The number 1 question. What is going to make me happy?
• What am I good at and enjoy?
• What am I passionate about?
• What will give me the freedom I need?
• What can I do that will serve others?

Write down your answers somewhere you can come back to them and review them from time to time. It’s maybe a good idea to start keeping a journal so you can plot your journey.

For journalling ideas and a free goal setting printable, check out this post – How to focus on yourself when the world demands too much every day

Creating your starting over at 50 life roadmap.

Is 50 too old to start over? Absolutely not!

Now comes the fun part. The part where you decide where you are heading. Where you plot your course.

I don’t know about you bit I find I feel a lot better when I have a plan. Im on a mission sister and nothing is going to get in my way. 

I’m sure it’s the same for you.

You should have an idea from the questions you just answered about the direction you can take. 

• Maybe you want to set up a side hustle based around your passion
• Maybe you want to get out and meet new friends
• Maybe you want to shift careers
• Maybe you want to add an extension to your house or move locations
• Maybe you want to improve your financial situation.
• Life Goals and timeframes

You know where you are going. But to achieve it you need to set yourself a time frame. By doing this you focus your mind to achieve what you need to do.

Decide on your final goal.

• How do you want your life to look in a year?
• How do you want things to be different?

Then divide your final end goal into smaller divisions.

• What can you achieve in a week towards your end goal?
• Where do you want to be in 6 months?

Chunking down your big goal into smaller bits like this makes it much more easy to deal with. It makes it much more likely that you will create meaningful change in your life.

You CAN build a life you love

Top 10 tips for building the new life you love at 50

I want this post to give you practical steps to take in order to successfully start over in life at 50. I hope the previous exercises have given you a good idea of your direction. 

However there are a few things that you can do to help you move positively towards your new life and keep your sanity whilst you are doing it.

1 – Don’t rely on alcohol

When you are facing a big life change, such as divorce, the empty nest or similar it is a little too easy to rely on the crutch of a glass of wine to see you though. Whilst it may seem like the answer in the short term, long term it will undermine your energy and motivation. 

Try to stick to guideline or keep wine to one night a week only or special occasions.

I wrote a post on how to cut down on alcohol which may help if you find you rely a little too much on wine. You can read it here

2 – Keep a journal

A journal is a brilliant way to get the thoughts out of your head and to keep track of your goals. You don’t have to make it into some kind of masterpiece. It’s for your eyes only. A journal allows you to process your thoughts in privacy.

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3 – Look after your body

When you hid midlife its definitely time to take stock of how you look after your body.

You won’t have the energy to do the things you need to do if your body is struggling to keep up. Now may be the time to start doing something that will help your fitness.

This doesn’t need to be spending hours in the gym. Walking is an extremely underrated form of exercise and helps your mental health too.

Getting out for a 30 minute walk every day does wonders.

I wrote a post about how walking can benefit your health and the best way to go about getting started. You can read it here.

4 – Get better quality sleep

Sleep is the great healer. I always feel that if you have slept well you can face anything. However, when you hit midlife and menopause, good sleep can go by the wayside for a myriad of reasons.

Hot flashes may keep you awake. Fluctuating hormones can wake you at 3am leaving you tossing and turning.

It’s frustrating but it’s crucial that you take steps to ensure you are getting enough sleep so you have the energy to create your new life.

However, there are things that you can do to help. I wrote a detailed post that gives you a whole bunch of ideas. Check it out here to see if there’s anything that can help you.

5 – Learn Meditation

Learning to Meditate is one of the most useful skills I have ever learned.

Not only did it help me overcome my chronic anxiety, it helped me stay grounded through the trauma of cancer treatment. Once you have the basic skill under your belt it will lead you into wonderful areas and allow you to remain calm as your new life unfolds. You can find beginner lessons locally or online.

VIEW ON AMAZON

If you have struggled with meditation before, try listening to Binaural beats recordings which help your brain enter  a meditative state easily. This recording, Deep Alpha by Steven Halpern is a good place to start. View this music on Amazon Here.  There are many different recordings in the same vein. Find one that works for you…

6 – Leave your comfort zone.

When you hit midlife its easy to stay doing the same things. Stay in the safe rut. But if you want to start over in life at 50 you need to make some big changes.

A good way to do this is to start doing some things you would normally never do. Totally break out of your comfort zone.

The size of this step is up to you depending on how large your current comfort zone is.

Smaller steps could include.

• Joining a brass band and learning an instrument
• Joining a choir and singing on stage
• Going on holiday alone for the first time
• Bigger steps could be
• Going sky diving
• Or even selling up everything and move city

Examine where your own comfort zone lies and take a step outside of it

7 – Don’t be scared of living alone

If you are starting over due to divorce or relationship breakdown, it can be hard to face living on your own. It can be all too easy to rush into another relationship for fear of being alone.

However, it is a really important thing to do to learn to enjoy your own company and space. To feel confident living on your own and under your own terms. Maybe you will decide do don’t need another relationship and that’s OK too.

An increasing amount of women are also choosing to be in a relationship but keep separate living spaces.

You are in charge of deciding how your new life looks and who you share it with.

8 – Examine your career

Mid-life is a great time to examine your career and decide what you want from it.

Often you may have been doing your job for a long while up to this point. You need to ask, do you want to carry on with it or would you like to try something else for the last part of your working life?

It may be a good time to set up your own business or go with an entrepreneurial idea that would work for you into retirement. Don’t be afraid to ring the changes.

9 – Overhaul your finances

Midlife upheaval can put a dent in your finances. It’s crucial to overhaul and improve them, especially if you are living on your own for the first time, maybe after divorce.

Take the time to look at your budget and then make a plan for financial independence.

This is the part of your life where you can really put a plan together to make sure that you can retire in the way that you want to. Start planing now if you haven’t already.

10 – Actively craft the life you want to live

I’ve saved the most important tip till last.

You are not a passive spectator in your life. It’s up to you to grab it by both hands and craft the life YOU WANT TO LIVE.

Maybe up till now you have been playing by others rules, being a wife or mother. Now is the time that you can take control and live the life YOU want.

The exercises you have done should have given you an idea of the direction you want to head in. Now grab it with both hands.

Your time for living life on your own terms is NOW

Starting over in life at 50. YOU CAN DO IT!

I hope this post has shown you that you can start over at midlife. You can live the life you want. It just takes a little work and energy to create.

It’s time to make the change. To break the mould of the life you had and to walk forward bravely into the future to grasp the life you want.

As with any metamorphosis, the process can be a little messy or difficult but keep the faith. Stay strong, keep aiming towards your goals and you will find your new life slowly emerging as a beautiful reality.

Love and Light