Turning 40: Insights for Thriving in the Middle of Life

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Stepping into a new decade is a rich experience. It feels actually powerful and significant, like a new milestone on the journey of life has just been reached, and like a whole new decade of possibility has just opened up. I've always felt like entering a new decade is kind of magical. You only enter one every 10 years, and you only get another new decade birthday after another entire 10 years have been lived.

In my recent experience, it's exciting turning 40 and I'm happy to report from the other side that I do not feel old or awkward as I might have feared in my 20s. It's weird, but in some ways I feel younger and lighter than I did in my 20s and 30s. And part of that is because I've lived more, I've healed a lot and I've done so much inner work to evolve and be able to step more into alignment.

I've made mistakes and pivoted and rebuilt. I've overextended and course corrected and learned to let things go. I've faced myself and the painful patterns of my conditioning, which is a process that I don't think is ever really finished, but that gets easier as you go along. And I'm still here and still on the journey and still learning and growing, maybe in the best ways yet.

In this episode of Called to Bloom, and as a newly minted 40-year-old myself, I am sharing with you all my best insights, including realizations, mindset shifts, tips, practices, exercises, and guidance for how to thrive in the middle of life and beyond.

In This Episode, We Cover:

Embracing a New Decade — 00:00
The Truth About Aging — 04:14
Living Longer, Not Just Getting Older — 09:28
Discovering What Really Matters — 12:59
The Paradox of Aging and Growth — 17:44
The Power of Affirmations — 24:33
Living Without Regrets: A Call to Action — 27:25
The Importance of Following Your Passion — 31:42
Cultivating Your Superpower: The Hero Within — 33:17

Mentioned in This Episode:

Called to Bloom Podcast Episode 05: “The Holistic System That Reshaped My Life and Business”
Louise Hay’s Book: You Can Heal Your Life
Julia Cameron’s Book: The Artist’s Way
Tarot of Flowers — www.tarotofflowers.com
Michelle Obama’s Podcast Interview with Jane Fonda — "I'm Not Disappearing - A Candid Conversation About Aging"
The Crown Season 2, Episode 2 — “A Company of Men”

Resources:

Join the Poetry of Flowers — holistic floral artistry online courses to empower your creative practice from anywhere in the world
Explore Workshops & Mentorships — deepen your floral artistry practice in-person
Discover Tarot of Flowers — a gift of abundant floral wisdom for any flower-lover or seeker
Use code CALLEDTOBLOOM for 10% off your first Tarot of Flowers order
YEAR END SALE! Use code TIMETOBLOOM30 for 30% off any Poetry of Flowers course bundle or single-payment membership purchase for a limited time only

Details from Our Sponsors:

This episode of the Called to Bloom podcast is brought to you by the Tarot of Flowers — an original and fully illustrated tarot deck born from the deep wisdom of flowers, and perfect gift for a florist, flower-lover, gardener, or seeker you love.

Also don't miss out on our YEAR END SALE giving you 30% off all Poetry of Flowers online courses and the all-access membership for a very limited time. Use code TIMETOBLOOM30 for 30% off any Poetry of Flowers course bundle or single-payment membership purchase before this special opportunity closes for the year.

Keep in Touch:

Thank you so much for being here, and for being part of this radiant community as we step into these creative callings together. If you enjoyed this episode:

I would love to hear from you! Connect with me on Instagram: @nectar_and_bloom and @calledtobloompodcast
Please leave a review on Apple Podcasts or on Spotify. Your words help other creatives and seekers like you to find their way here, and they just mean the world to me.

Full Transcript:

Personally, it is my consciously chosen intention now to thrive, find success with more ease, and to deeply enjoy and be present with this time in my life.

As a person who spent a whole lot of my teen years and my twenties experiencing a life based on subconscious beliefs that if the work isn't miserable, it doesn't count, and that no matter how hard I work, it will never be enough, I am here to share some gifts and insights now that I have gained through long hard years of inner work in my thirties that have set me up now for a much freer, much more aligned chapter of life as I head into my forties.

And why am I sharing this with you? Because I know firsthand that as my heart was able to slowly open up with compassion and understanding from my own experience, that I am not alone. And you are not alone, and we are not alone in confronting the results of subconscious beliefs and patterns that shape our lives and everyday experiences.

The best part, however, is that as we become more conscious and more aware of our conditioned thoughts and beliefs, we can also become more conscious about choosing and practicing new beliefs that help us to co-create a life in alignment. Our chosen beliefs and cultivated mindset help us to attract experiences that are in harmony with who we really are or who we are now as we heal and evolve through our art and our work.

Welcome to the Called to Bloom podcast. I'm Jen Cavender, founder of Nectar & Bloom and your host as we explore tools and holistic methods that empower you to craft an inspired career and a fulfilling creative life.

I am a floral artist and educator who left an academic career to build my dream floral design studio. Now I empower flower lovers, florists, and creative entrepreneurs like you to find your aligned path and to build your dream.

Together we go deep into topics covering creative entrepreneurship, health and wellbeing, sustainability, personal transformation, the art and business of working with flowers, and practices for manifesting a life you love.

If you are ready to feel inspired and empowered as you build your next Aligned Creative Chapter, you are in the right place. Now, let's bloom.

The Truth About A New Decade

Let's take a look at the truth about aging and growing up.

It goes without saying that our culture at large still shuns and fears aging. And there's a lot of understandable trepidation about getting older, especially for women, as we are often made to feel like our greatest value is our physical youth and beauty.

I however want to report from the other side as a brand new 40 year old that I actually feel really good. I feel powerful in a kind of aligned way in myself, in my body, in my work, and in all aspects of my life that I didn't know was possible before.

Ayurveda has had a lot to do with that. Learning about and practicing the gentle, harmonious, and accessible shifts that help to support my well-being for who I am, and where I am in life have brought so much goodness and improved health and vitality to me, not to mention happiness and alignment in my life.

Check out my episode on "The Holistic System That Reshaped My Life and Business" to learn all about it.

But back to aging. I have a theory that as you get to the top of a decade, so to speak, you start to feel older and older, but once you cross into the next decade, you're just a baby in that new decade again. I discovered this when I turned 30.

I remember being 29 and feeling like I was really getting up there in age. But the minute I turned 30, I realized, wow, I am so young. People are 39 and I'm only 30. After this experience, I kind of knew and felt great about turning 39 now, as I have stepped into the fourth decade. Again, I feel kind of freshly minted, brand new, a young and capable 40 year old with all of the gifts of my life thus far, plus all of my life still ahead of me. And I know once I turn 49, I've got the same changeover when I turn 50 coming

True, I look older. I have more smile lines and crinkles in my face. I am older. It's kind of liberating to step back and remember that it's much more empowering and enjoyable to just be the healthiest, happiest version of yourself at your current age. Be a vibrant and joyous 30-year-old, 40-year-old, 50, 60, 70, 80-year-old, rather than trying to look younger than you are, which is inherently uncomfortable and objectively a losing battle. Why are we battling anyway?

Aging is part of life and I love the new messaging I sometimes see now, again especially for women, that emphasizes how lucky we are to get to grow old. How lucky am I to be 40 years old and full of life and vitality, nourished by the memories and experiences and relationships of my life thus far,

and excited about all that is still to come. I have learned, although of course I don't always remember to practice it, that being here now, in the brilliant and fleeting beauty of this present moment, is the most fulfilling place to be. This precise moment will never again be, and as such it is beautiful and precious.

Whenever I invite myself to be present, I am thrilled by the experience.

Right now, I am sitting, breathing, listening to the evening bird song outside, and I'm thinking about you, where you might be right now when my words reach you, when you tune into this audio letter of hope and presence that I am writing to you now.

And I love how being present allows us to share something right now, here in this space together, having this conversation and feeling connected on the journey of life. That is such a gift.

Now, of course, with all of my acceptance and gratitude for my years, I am also definitely all about nurturing my youth. And that's okay too. I have beautiful face creams and oils to nourish my skin. I stay active with movement that makes me feel good and strong. And I eat well and I prioritize getting enough sleep. I work with healers to keep healing the inner wounds and traumas that I carry that contribute to old patterns, unhealthy habits and stress.

And no matter what, I am not perfect and I never will be. And accepting that again and again, no matter how hard parts of me try or wish to be whatever perfect is, that is liberating.

When we feel free, it is easier to feel relaxed. When we are relaxed, we are not tense. When we are not tense, we make healthier choices, feel more at ease, and are more present, open, joyous, and radiant. What is beauty in a person beyond that?

Carr and I often joke about a slogan we could put on a t-shirt and wear around whenever we get too focused on the changes in our looks and our lives as we age.

There are so many methods and procedures out there to try to slow or reverse the effects of aging. And we can all do or not do any of them that speak to us, that are safe, that bring us joy, in my humble opinion, no judgment whatsoever on cosmic surgery or otherwise. But also, ultimately, and here's where the humorous slogan comes in, we laugh and say to ourselves, just get old. The point is, don't fight it, just get old.

It's delightful to embrace this with a sense of humor and a big relieving dose of acceptance.

Let's just get old together and we can do that in a beautiful intentional way.

Not Getting Older but Living Longer

In my studies of Ayurveda, my teachers have shared with me that we do not need to think of aging as getting older, but instead as growing up.

What a sweet and subtle but impactful energetic shift that brings. Also, my teacher recently told me, "We are all getting older. Even a newborn baby born today is getting older." What I admire so much in Ayurveda on this topic is this holistic acceptance and embrace of the stages of life, of all stages of life, and the day-to-day process and beauty of living it.

I find language to be very powerful tool and the words we choose have a big effect on our energy and our experience,

which inspired me to shift from saying "getting older" to "living longer." Instead of as I get older, try out as I live longer. So this episode is not about getting older, but really about living longer and all of the best insights and guidance that I've come across for embracing and thriving into the middle of life and beyond. So let's dive in.

This episode of the Called to Bloom podcast was brought to you by the Tarot of Flowers. Two years into my wedding floral design work, I spent New Year's tucked away in a tiny Airbnb in Joshua Tree, journaling in a room full of smoky quartz as a desert hailstorm rolled through. I was soul-searching, wondering how to bring my passions together into a new type of offering that felt really exciting and aligned.

On that New Year's morning, I wrote in my journal, Create an Oracle Deck Based on the Wisdom of Flowers. I felt like I channeled this idea, and I was thrilled with how it felt like the perfect way to weave together my writing background, my love of healing modalities, and my years of designing with flowers.

I have always loved oracle decks, the way a simple card can become a mirror into your own soul, and it can bring a moment of powerful insights. And through color, scent, and gesture, flowers offer powerful metaphoric guidance in their own sensory language. Five years later, after late night drafting sessions, endless research, reading passages aloud to Carr, and partnering with my sister, to hand illustrate every bloom, that dream became something real.

Tarot of Flowers is an original 78 card tarot deck rooted in traditional archetypes and translated into the poetic language of flowers. Each illustration is created by stippling thousands of tiny dots, and the accompanying guidebook includes everything you need to know about tarot to draw cards and read from the flowers with confidence.

And everything is contained inside one beautiful hardcover box that feels like something you might like to leave out on your coffee table.

A tarot of flowers deck makes a meaningful and truly one of a kind gift for florists, flower lovers, nature lovers, gardeners, and seekers alike. It is available in my online shop at nectarandbloomfloral.com. And if you own a shop, it's also available for wholesale, so just reach out.

As a Called to Bloom listener, enjoy 10 % off your first tarot of flowers purchase using code CALLEDTOBLOOM at checkout. That's C-A-L-L-E-D-T-O-B-L-O-O-M, one word at checkout. And now back to our episode.

Discovering What Really Matters

So what really matters during a new season of life and how do we discover it?

As I turned 40 this year, I decided I wanted to celebrate by going on a special trip somewhere in the world where I've never been and somewhere I've wanted to go, but that maybe needs a special occasion to make the commitment and long travel to get there. I chose a beautiful little 10 million year old African Island off the coast of Madagascar in the South Indian Ocean.

The island is called Mauritius. During my semester abroad in France, way back in college, my host mother told me about the island. Île de Maurice, she called it, saying that it was her favorite place on earth. She gave me a five rupee coin from Mauritius embossed with twin palm trees from her

last visit there. I still have that coin. And after doing some research, I was certain that this peaceful, multicultural, Ayurvedically imbued and geologically gorgeous little Hindu island was definitely the place for a 40th birthday adventure retreat. I've always wanted a summer birthday too. And lucky me, November is heading into summer in the Southern hemisphere.

While I was there, I set my intention for the trip to just be open, to listen, and to receive the guidance I need for this new chapter of my life. I also invited myself to use quiet times going for jogs down the trails or the beaches or during my yoga practices to reflect on what it means to me to turn 40 and what's important to me now in my life and work as an artist, entrepreneur, and educator.

So if you are entering a new decade or facing a big birthday or just feeling like you are at a significant moment in your progression along the journey of life, ask yourself this: what does this year or this new decade mean to me? Use it as a chance to check in and refine your heading.

What do you want this time in your life to be about? What feels good, exciting, meaningful, nourishing, important, or expansive for you?

You know I love a good journaling prompt. So try that out and let me know what you discover.

As for me, I asked myself, what is this new decade about for me? I went for a run so I could just sit with, or rather jog lightly with, this question. This is a helpful way for someone like me to kind of meditate in motion. As I listened inwardly for answers to what this new decade is about for me, here's what I heard:

I want this decade to be about health and vitality, about healing and wholeness, connection and community, creativity, and about knowing and pursuing what really matters to me.

As I continued to listen, I also felt other pieces of guidance and insights from my life start to arise, which I'm going to share with you now in this episode.

No matter where you are in life, whether you are much younger or much older or right about the same age as me, we are all in moments of transformation and growth, moments of self-discovery and what I think of as self-recovery, recovering parts of ourselves that we banished or pushed away or forgot about while we were trying to be what we thought the world wanted us to be.

And because of that, I want to invite you to ask yourself too, what is this decade, this next birthday, this coming new year, or this next chapter of my life really about? What is my intention as I proceed? Again, you might want to pull out your journal and use these questions as journaling prompts. I truly find journaling to be one of the best ways to get my brain to slow down, to listen, and to process with clarity. So try it out.

Then as you're contemplating or journaling, ask yourself either inwardly or on the page the following questions:

1. What does health and vitality mean and look like for me now?

2. What does healing and wholeness mean and look like for me now?

3. What does connection and community mean and look like for me now?

4. What does creativity or creative expression mean or look like for me now? And

5. What really matters to me now? What are my values in this season of my life?

That last one about what really matters to you and what are your values is a deep one. Take your time. This is a great end of year inventory prompt to answer as you review where you've been, where you are and where you want to go. It's not about, what others are seeking or what it seems like you should be pursuing or doing. It's truly and only about what matters to you.

Is that giving yourself a chance to try something you really want to experience?

Is that building or inviting in more meaningful relationships? Is that making a career pivot? Is it building a more creative life where you can express and share what you know in your bones you are here to create?

Here are a few more insights and tips I have for you as I reflected on what it means to me to turn 40 and what tools I have and have to share about how to thrive as we enter the middle of life.

The Paradox of Aging and Growth

Let's talk about the beautiful paradox. I have found that as you live more life, you come to a beautiful paradox. A paradox is two opposite things that can be true at the same time. In this paradox of what happens as you live longer, on the one hand, you become more established, wiser, and you know who you are and more about how the world works. This gives you stability and confidence and steadiness.

On the other hand, you will find yourself feeling more present, happier, and even younger throughout your life if you also choose to embrace in every stage of life that you are still just a beginner, that you are still learning, and that the best is still yet to come.

I like to remind myself even now at 40, and even when I picture my white-haired, vibrant self in my 70s or 80s, that I am only just beginning. This means staying open to discovering your next calling or passion or creative assignment. Staying curious both about how the world works and who you are as you continue to unfold and discover yourself and this life.

What I'm suggesting here is that we endeavor to hold two seemingly opposite things at once, knowing that both are equally true. First, that you are wise and established, and also that you are still brand new and have your whole life ahead of you. When we can stand on the foundations we have been building, we feel more confident and steady. We are more capable and motivated because we have hope and belief in ourselves based in real experience and that thing called sweat equity.

When we can also say at any age, I'm only just beginning, I still have my whole life ahead of me, whether we have decades or only a few years left, that belief supports real joy and an open and excited energy that feels youthful and capable and confident too.

Ever since I created the Tarot of Flowers deck, I often think of archetypal moments like this in the soul's journey through life in terms of tarot.

In this case, the paradox could be embodied by saying that we are trying to hold both the Fool and the World cards at once.

The World card, which is the stately, impactful, and ancient-feeling King Protea flower in the Tarot of Flowers deck, is the final card of the Major Arcana, and it represents the powerful return home from a long quest, When we bring with us the gifts from our travails and journeying back into our life and to our community.

It's a time of wisdom and celebration, the experience of being wiser and more capable now with all that we have experienced and all that we have learned.

The Fool card, which is the bold and playful Gerbera Daisy in the Tarot of Flowers, is the first card of the Major Arcana, and it embodies that foolish, naive, yet brave first step into the unknown of a new journey, When we are a beginner again, when our courage and foolishness empower us into the next adventure.

So think of this time in life as holding both of these cards, both of these flowers together in that beautiful paradox. In truth, the world card also signals the coming of the next adventure, when we begin again as the fool. So they are very much connected in that way as well. When we begin, we are seeking mastery. When we achieve mastery, we soon desire to begin again anew.

This opportunity to embrace the paradox that as we live longer, we are more established and also still only just beginning reminds me of something that Carr said to me when we were falling in love that really floored me at the time and something that became an immediate cornerstone of our relationship.

Early on in our dating, we were hanging out in the grass on campus at USD between classes and he looked at me and he said, I want to always be getting to know you. Man, that guy.

I believe this is both a transformational and foundationally nourishing value for a loving long-term relationship and also equally a transformational value for our relationship with ourselves. It is so romantic to know that someone who loves you wants to always be getting to know you and to always be getting to know the person you love. And what a kind and loving gift to give yourself.

Take a moment, put a hand on your heart and say to yourself, I want to always be getting to know you. How does that feel? Do you sense the encouragement to keep growing and becoming who you are meant to be? Do you sense the acknowledgement of your infinite potential?

So as I kept tuning into myself to see what kind of advice or guidance or insights I had when I asked myself what is important to me in this new decade of my life, I also realized

that my mind was full chosen beliefs that had really started to change by cultivating a new mindset. What did I worry about in my twenties and early thirties? It's hard to remember because once you move through something, you often forget about it completely. Can you think of something at some point in your past that used to worry you all the time, that you realize now that you never think about anymore?

I think of things that seem so silly to me now, like crappy breakups and boys who were never going to be lastingly the right person for me. I used to think and worry about running 80 miles a month. I think I thought subconsciously that if I kept up my workouts to the level I did them in college, that that would somehow prevent me from getting older. It doesn't. And as it turns out, running 80 miles a month is not really good for you, especially as you live longer.

I used to also worry about making more money, which is very undefined. That's what's problematic about that. I used to worry about making more bookings. Same problem, very undefined. What is more? I used to worry about looking older. It's not possible to not look older. And I used to worry about whether or not I was good enough at anything I did and whether or not I was enough, or too much, et cetera.

So many worries and pains of the mind. And it doesn't mean that they're gone, but it does mean that over time, and through inner work and mindset shifts, things change.

Here's what I choose to think, to cultivate and to celebrate now:

I choose to cultivate thoughts about how I get to discover what feels good and healthy for my body now in this stage of life. I get to care for and listen to my body in all seasons.

I cultivate the thought that the more I know myself, the easier it is to take care of myself. And the more I take care of myself, the better I feel. The better I feel, the more clear I am about my values and what matters most to me.

And from there, the more I live my values, the more aligned and fulfilling my life and work are. Now, of course, we can't control everything. There are aspects of life that are just not in our control and we need to learn to navigate them. We need to find support, guidance for that. But I'm talking about the things that we can shift, the things that we can easily reach.

And often those are mindset shifts and choices to cultivate different beliefs and thoughts, which is very much accessible to us and hugely transformational.

The Power of Affirmations

I also write out affirmations for myself. My mom was always reading cool books on healing and wellbeing when I was growing up. And another one of those that I could never forget was Louise Hayes' book, You Can Heal Your Life. I have since read and reread this book and I still find it revolutionary.

Louise mentions, among so many mindset shifts and holistic, empowering concepts, to write out and listen to your affirmations.

Julia Cameron mentions this practice too in her book The Artist's Way, which, I seem to mention in almost every episode of Called to Bloom. I like to keep an ongoing list of affirmations in a note on my phone, and I update them every few months or so, as affirmations can shift depending on what new beliefs I'm working on or want to reinforce in my consciousness.

I also finally actually recorded them too in a voice note. I thought this would be so weird and cringy, but actually it's really powerful to be able to listen to your own voice saying affirmations about you and your life. Try it, there's nothing to lose. Here's a quick process for how to create your own affirmations list:

1. Write down any positive beliefs or affirmations you already have in mind and love. Think of short, easy-to-remember statements that put what you want in the affirmative.

You want to make it brief and easy to say and also easy to remember because you are helping to program your subconscious with new beliefs. Here are a few examples. I love my life. Money comes to me with ease and abundance. My life is balanced and joyous. My work supports me and brings me joy and things like that.

2. Write down any negative beliefs or statements that protective or worried parts of you say in your head throughout the day. Collect these separately and then sit down and translate them into an affirmative opposite. An example could be you hear in your head things like, "I'm not good enough." And you could translate that to: I am proud of my work. Or, I love my creative process. Or, my work is beautiful and brings me joy and purpose. Things like that.

Make sure that they feel right when you say them, even if you feel like they're not technically true yet. Beliefs are not time bound. So you are just affirming the belief that this reality that you desire is available and on its way to you already.

3. Once you have your list with as many or as few affirmations as feels right to you, then open a voice note and record them. Let this be simple. It doesn't have to be perfect. Just hit record and read your list. Listen to your affirmations in your own voice while you do chores, process stems, clean your studio, brush your teeth, or tend to the garden. Notice how you feel as you listen to them. And check in in a few months or even a few years later — things will shift.

Living Without Regrets: A Call to Action

Also, as I live longer into my life, I realize that there are seasons for things. Things that mattered so much at one point that just don't matter at all to me anymore. Things that I wanted that are not what I want now. Things that might have been good for me or worked well for me at one time that are not good for me or don't work for me now. Even ideas about my career, things I wanted to create that aren't aligned anymore.

This is the classic experience of gaining perspective and the lesson within it is to listen and to heed the callings and inspiration you feel when you feel them. Of course have discernment, some ideas are not meant to be, but also...

Take action. Step into what's calling you so that you don't have to live with any regrets.

I recently saw a clip from Michelle Obama's podcast interviewing Jane Fonda and talking about aging. In it, Jane shares how she is not afraid of aging and she's not afraid of dying either. But when she turned 60, she said that she was aware that she was entering her third and final act, as she put it. From this perspective, you have your birth to 30, first act, your 30 to 60, second act, and then 60 to 90 is pretty much the last hurrah.

She mentions that in entering this third act, she wants to live out the rest of her life free of regrets. That's really important to her and I totally agree with that.

I love this in fact because it makes us ask ourselves, how do we live life without regrets? If you ask me, my answer would be that you don't suppress, you don't hold back. You say what you need to say, you forgive what you need to forgive, and you give yourself the chance to do what is calling to you.

Don't make excuses or keep putting it off until one day when you finally quote unquote deserve it.

You deserve the opportunity to live in alignment and to have the experiences in your ability to have right now, just as you are.

So my advice? Do the thing that calls to you. Try it, give yourself a chance. Give yourself the opportunity you've always wanted to be given. If you really want to live a life that is free of regrets, don't hold back. Have courage. Do what you know in your heart is calling to you. And give yourself that chance to do the thing, to let yourself explore have an experience.

This is a huge reason why I started offering one-on-one mentorships in floral artistry. As a person who made a huge career pivot into an artistic field that brought me close to nature and allowed me to shape a business of my own that is aligned with who I am and what I have to give and

I felt deeply called, and I still very much do, to support others on their own journey into alignment, into creative expansion, into creative entrepreneurship, into flowers, and into a meaningful career.

Over the years, this offering has evolved from a half-day private class in my studio to the current Studio Immersion where you join me in the studio for two or three days of immersive and personally tailored experiences in floral design, in small business, and in how to holistically step into your authentic alignment, gifts, and success.

I have had brand new beginners making a complete career pivot into floristry, as well as established floral designers who are ready to expand and up-level, come to the studio for these multi-day immersive mentorships, and they are one of the most special and transformative, not to mention meaningful experiences that I get to share with you here in the studio.

If you've been longing to dive in or grow into the next level but feeling unstuck or unsure or simply in need of support and guidance for the road ahead, as we all are in the crossroads of our next growth into alignment, just reach out. I'm here. This is one of the things that I love to do more than anything else.

And I have taught floral design to people in their 20s, their 30s, their 40s, their 50s, and their 60s. I even have an online student who is in her 70s. I welcome all, and I am increasingly aware that while flowers may call to us in any season of life, there is definitely a specific season of life in which you are fully able to jump into this field of art as a career to give yourself a chance to be a working floral artist while you are able and while you desire to do that.

The Importance of Following Your Passion

The beautiful thing is you can always arrange flowers and enjoy creating with blooms virtually at any age. But starting or growing a floristry business, creating floral designs for weddings and events, or building large scale floral installations, being all in and building a career in a creative field you love, that is for a certain season of life.

And it's a window of time that isn't forever. So don't live your life looking back wishing you had given yourself the chance. There are so many ways to test it out, to step in, to see if this is for you. There are so many ways to learn about it, to start to become a floral artist or to up level your floral artistry practice. So if this calls to you, I just want you to give yourself that opportunity, that chance to do what's calling to you and what you love while you want to do it.

There could come a year of your life when you think, I don't have the energy for that anymore. I don't want to do that anymore. I wish I had, and that's what I want you to not have to experience.

Of course, if that happens, then just process it. You'll learn, you'll find something else. It's okay. But when you think about living your life free of regret, think about what burns inside you, what experience or opportunity is calling, and give yourself a chance, even just to step into it and experiment, so that you can look back on a life that has been fulfilling in which you did what was aligned for you in the seasons when they felt aligned.

I want you to give that opportunity to yourself.

Closing Thoughts — Cultivating Your Superpower: The Hero Within

As I mentioned earlier in this episode, is my intention, consciously chosen, to thrive, find success, and enjoy this time in my life. And it's also my intention to do so in a way that is a good investment for my future. On top of that, it is my intention to share with you any tools and approaches and perspectives that help make that possible so that you can also thrive and find success and enjoy this time of your life throughout your life.

I can say I've lived long enough now to have perspective on how what we do and cultivate now can pay dividends not just now, but down the road as well. What do you want for future you? How about feeling strong and healthy, feeling relaxed and confident, engaged and successful, creative and free, loved and connected? How about feeling like you are doing so well, which takes both action and mindset and learning how to be accepting and supportive of yourself and knowing what is enough in your terms.

Stay tuned for an upcoming episode, by the way, about knowing enough and how that can help you step into a life of abundance.

How about feeling like you are only just beginning? There is a very sweet episode in the show, The Crown, which I know has been out forever, but I always watch shows way later. That's just how I roll. But in this episode of The Crown, Prince Philip in his late 60s or 70s gets into carriage racing, because he finds it fun and fascinating. It gives him a new rush of purpose and engagement late in life, and it connects him with meaningful community.

I love this example because it shows someone late in life having a completely unexpected discovery of a passion that wasn't part of their life before. And that's possible for all of us in all stages of life.

That kind of spirit of staying curious and pursuing our passions and callings in all seasons of life, giving ourselves the opportunity, never feeling like we missed our chance or didn't go for it, or we've already done all the best of things we're going to do, none of that. Instead, allowing our interests and a sense of purpose to adjust and evolve as we do throughout life. That to me is a kind of fountain of youth, and a source of energy-giving joy that is worth pursuing.

And as one final parting thought before we close today, I want to encourage you to consider a superpower you have. You have the ability to choose and to be what you hope is possible for someone to be at your age now. You have the ability to be the hero that you want to believe in, the best and healthiest and happiest version of you now in this moment in your life.

Ask yourself, who is the best possible version of me at this age? How do they feel? What did they like? What did they do? And what did they not do? You get to be that person, to cultivate and discover that person. Think of a younger you looking up to and admiring an older you who inspires them, who gives them the hero to believe in, the hero that's possible at any age of life.

That is a real superpower and one very much in your hands.

One of my favorite affirmations I've added to my list lately is, "I am proud of the woman I have become." It feels wonderful to say that to yourself, and it affirms and reinforces an aligned way of being.

It doesn't mean all my fears and doubts and low moments and insecurities are banished or gone forever, far from it.

But it does mean that I have a guiding light, a heading to aim for, and a new belief that I am nurturing for this moment and for the path ahead.

Beautifully done. You just completed another episode of called to bloom another step forward on your creative journey and that deserves a little celebration. I think finishing any resource that nourishes your being and makes you feel more connected is one of the most empowering things you can do for your business and your creative calling Now to expand your experience hit follow so you never miss an episode and also head over to calledtobloompodcast.com

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and help other creatives like you to discover this podcast resource too. If you're ready to deepen your practice with classes and immersive experiences head over to nectarandbloomfloral.com and explore my workshops, one-on-one mentorships, poetry of flowers holistic online courses, wellbeing experiences, and my original Tarot of Flowers deck.

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For now, keep blooming. The world needs what you are here to create.

Cover image by Irida Mete