I caught myself doing it again recently.
Sitting on my phone, scrolling through other people’s lives.
Someone was renovating her house. Someone else was getting in shape. Someone was traveling. Someone had discovered a new hobby, changed her style, started a business, organized her entire house, learned to garden, read twelve books that year, or somehow appeared to be living a much more interesting life than I was.
And there I was.
Watching.
For years, I had wanted to start a blog and build a business of my own. I had ideas, notes, plans and things I wanted to say. I kept telling myself I would get to it when I had more time.
But somehow, I always had time to scroll.
That realization was uncomfortable.
I wasn’t lacking ideas. I wasn’t necessarily lacking ability. I was giving away the small pieces of time I could have used to begin.
And when I finally decided to get off my phone and start chasing my own midlife dreams, I realized just how much I could accomplish.
Not all at once.
Not perfectly.
But consistently.
That was when I started building this blog and business.
How Much of Our Life Are We Giving to Our Phones?
I’m not anti-phone.
I use social media. I use Pinterest. I look things up, find ideas, save recipes, discover products and gather inspiration.
The problem isn’t having a phone.
The problem is when consuming other people’s lives starts replacing the work of creating our own.
It’s easy to pick up your phone because you have ten minutes to spare.
Then suddenly, you’ve been scrolling for 45 minutes.
Nothing terrible happened.
But nothing happened for you either.
You didn’t read the book beside you.
You didn’t take the walk.
You didn’t try the workout.
You didn’t clean out the closet.
You didn’t work on the idea you’ve been thinking about.
You didn’t write the first paragraph of the blog post.
You didn’t outline the business.
You didn’t create anything.
You just consumed.
Then you do it again tomorrow.
Ten minutes here. Twenty minutes there. An hour at night. Another half hour in the morning.
Those little pieces of time don’t feel important while we’re giving them away.
But they’re our life.
And sometimes, they’re the exact time we keep saying we don’t have.
I Kept Saying I Didn’t Have Time to Start
For the last few years, I had wanted to start a blog and business.
I wanted a place to share what I was learning, create helpful resources and build something that belonged to me.
But I kept putting it off.
I had responsibilities. Errands. Housework. Family needs. A long list of things that felt more urgent.
And, of course, I told myself I needed a bigger block of time to begin.
I thought I needed a perfect plan, a clear brand, a finished website, endless content ideas and enough uninterrupted hours to make real progress.
What I actually needed was to stop handing those hours to my phone.
Once I started paying attention to how often I was scrolling, I began reclaiming small pockets of time.
Twenty minutes to write.
Thirty minutes to plan.
An hour to learn something new.
A few minutes to organize an idea instead of consuming someone else’s.
Those small pockets added up.
I started writing posts, creating resources, learning how the business side worked and turning ideas into something real.
I didn’t suddenly have unlimited time.
I simply started using more of the time I already had.
We Don’t Have Unlimited Time
This hits differently in midlife.
When you’re younger, life can feel almost endless. There will always be another year to figure things out.
Midlife makes you more aware that time is moving.
I don’t mean that in a depressing way.
I mean it in a wake-up-and-use-it kind of way.
There is still so much life left to live.
There are books you haven’t read, places you haven’t visited, skills you haven’t learned and projects you haven’t started.
Maybe there’s a business idea you’ve been carrying around for years.
Maybe you’ve always wanted to write, create, teach, sell, design or build something of your own.
Maybe you keep waiting for the right time to begin.
But what if the right time isn’t a wide-open calendar?
What if it’s a small decision to stop scrolling and spend the next 20 minutes on something that matters to you?
What if we spent less time studying other people’s lives and started building our own again?
Find Out What You Want Now
One thing I’m realizing about midlife is that I don’t necessarily want all the same things I wanted ten or twenty years ago.
I’ve changed.
You probably have too.
So instead of automatically reaching for your phone whenever you have downtime, start experimenting with your actual life.
Try things.
Read a type of book you’ve never read before.
Try Pilates, lift weights, go hiking or take a dance class.
Learn to garden.
Paint something.
Change your bedroom.
Try a new hairstyle.
Cook food from a country you’ve never visited.
Take a class.
Start writing.
Volunteer.
Try pickleball.
Learn photography.
Start the blog you’ve been thinking about.
Research the business idea you’ve been carrying around.
Create one small offer, product or resource.
And give yourself permission to decide:
I like this.
Or:
Nope. This isn’t for me.
That’s part of creating your next chapter too.
You don’t have to know exactly what you want your life or business to look like before you begin.
You can discover it by doing.
Turn Your Phone Back Into a Tool
Our phones can help us create a more interesting life.
The difference is how we use them.
Instead of scrolling through someone’s workout transformation for 30 minutes, find a workout and do it.
Instead of watching someone organize her kitchen, put the phone down and organize one cabinet.
Instead of watching someone talk about the books that changed her life, choose one and start reading it.
Instead of saving 47 ideas for hobbies you might someday try, pick one.
Instead of watching someone else build a business, spend 20 minutes researching how to begin yours.
Use the internet to learn.
Use it to find inspiration.
Use it to connect.
Then leave it and make something.
That’s the part I think we’re missing.
We collect endless inspiration without ever getting to the creating part.
Create More Than You Consume
Maybe this is a simple rule we can start using:
Create more of your life than you consume of other people’s.
If you spend 30 minutes looking at fitness content, spend 30 minutes moving your own body.
If Pinterest gives you an idea for your house, go try it.
If someone recommends a book, close the app and read it.
If you see a woman doing something and think, I wish I did things like that, pay attention.
Maybe that’s not jealousy.
Maybe it’s information.
Maybe there’s something about her life showing you what you want more of in yours.
Don’t just keep watching her do it.
Go find your version of it.
For me, that meant asking what I kept saying I wanted to do.
The answer was clear: I wanted to write, create, help women in midlife and build a business around those ideas.
Once I stopped spending so much time watching other people create, I had more energy and attention for creating my own work.
Your Next Chapter Doesn’t Need to Be Dramatic
Creating a new chapter doesn’t mean you need to quit your job, move across the country or completely reinvent yourself.
It can start small.
One new book.
One new walking route.
One drawer cleaned out.
One class.
One recipe.
One afternoon without your phone.
One page written.
One business idea researched.
One blog post outlined.
One product created.
One thing you’ve been putting off.
One decision you’ve finally made.
That’s how you start finding yourself again.
Not by sitting down and magically knowing exactly who you want to become.
By doing things.
By making small promises to yourself and keeping them.
By giving your attention to the life you’re trying to build instead of constantly observing someone else’s.
Stop Waiting to Feel Inspired
This is one of the reasons I created my Midlife Renewal Action Series.
Sometimes we don’t need another hour of motivational content telling us to change our lives.
We need something to do.
The Action Series gives you simple actions in different areas of your life so you can stop thinking about change and start moving.
You don’t have to overhaul everything.
Pick an area.
Take an action.
Then take another one.
Action has a funny way of creating motivation that scrolling never does.
And if you’re not sure what you want this next chapter to look like yet, that’s exactly why I created my free Vision Workbook.
Use it to step away from the noise and think about your own life.
What do you want more of?
What do you want less of?
What sounds interesting now?
What have you outgrown?
What would you like to experience?
What dreams keep coming back?
How do you want to feel?
What would you create if you stopped waiting for the perfect time?
Who are you becoming?
Those questions are much more useful than wondering what a stranger on Instagram had for lunch.
Put the Phone Down and Start Building
I don’t want to look back at this chapter of my life and realize I spent an enormous portion of it staring at a little screen.
I don’t want to know everything about everyone else’s life while barely exploring my own.
I want hobbies.
Experiences.
Books I’ve read.
Places I’ve gone.
Things I’ve learned.
A stronger body.
A home I enjoy.
Projects I’ve finished.
Ideas I’ve tried.
A business I’ve built.
Work that feels meaningful.
Memories that actually belong to me.
And I don’t think we have to wait until we have a giant plan for our next chapter.
Maybe the first step is much simpler.
Put the phone down.
Look around at your actual life.
Think about the idea you’ve been postponing.
Then ask yourself:
What could I create with the time I usually spend watching someone else live?
That question changed things for me.
It helped me start the blog and business I had been talking about for years. It showed me that I could make progress in small pockets of time. And it reminded me that I didn’t need to wait for a completely different life before I began building one.
Your next chapter isn’t happening on your phone.
It’s happening when you put it down and start creating it.
If you would like to explore some of my other products for your own Midlife Renewal Project, you can check them out here!
Midlife Renewal Project Products
