EPISODE SUMMARY Retirement in the 21st century looks and feels different from how our parents experienced their retirement. It’s even going to be different from how we, once upon a time, might have imagined ourselves retiring. And while the loudest messages out there about retirement are all about financial security, investment strategies, and growing the nest egg, the truth is there’s more to consider than just dollars and cents. So the question is, what now? What is our new relationship with t...
Jul 06, 2023•17 min
EPISODE SUMMARY Are you concerned about your brain health and the risk of cognitive decline? Do you believe that memory loss is a natural part of aging? In this episode, I interview brain health professional Allison Liu, who shares practical steps to protect and improve our brain health. We discuss the importance of taking care of our brains, debunking the common belief that memory loss is inevitable as we get older. Allison expertly walks us through the 11 risk factors that affect brain health ...
Jun 22, 2023•41 min
EPISODE SUMMARY Do you believe that sex after menopause is always painful and that your sexual life will never be the same again? If so, you may be surprised to learn that these are just some of the common misconceptions surrounding sex after menopause. In this episode, Dr. Alyssa Dweck, MD, discusses these misconceptions and provides valuable insights into managing vaginal health during and after menopause. She explains the impact of decreased estrogen levels on vaginal health and the importanc...
Jun 15, 2023•43 min
EPISODE SUMMARY Stress is a common experience that affects our physical, mental, and emotional well-being, especially in midlife. But unfortunately, only a few have been taught to manage stress effectively. As a result, how to deal with stress is often one of those things we fumble our way around through life! In this episode, we're continuing our midlife health and well-being series, focusing on stress management. I'm joined by mindset and resilience consultant Shulamit Ber Levtov. She shares h...
Jun 08, 2023•43 min
EPISODE SUMMARY This is the first episode in a series on Midlife Health and Well-Being. I am joined by Laurie Lewis to discuss the benefits of intermittent fasting for midlifers and particularly for women going through menopause. As an expert on the topic, Laurie shares her personal experience with menopause and how intermittent fasting helped her. We also delve into the challenges of maintaining a healthy weight as we age, the impact of processed foods on our health, and the benefits of fasting...
May 25, 2023•55 min
EPISODE SUMMARY I think it’s safe to say we would rather be in a state of gratitude than not. It’s also safe to assume that we know — even if we may not be aware of the actual science behind it — that having a gratitude practice is beneficial to our well-being. However, I must confess that I struggle with maintaining a consistent gratitude practice. I find it challenging and often forced, which makes it difficult to stick with it. Moreover, there are times in life when feeling grateful seems imp...
May 11, 2023•44 min
EPISODE SUMMARY This is the official 200th episode of Second Breaks! I'm practically twisting myself around and patting myself on the back for reaching this milestone. But I don't want to just celebrate reaching a specific number. I want to mark the progress that I've made in life since I started this show. We all know change is the one thing that's constant in life, and in this episode, I want to reflect on that. Specifically, the change we go through intentionally or naturally over time. It's ...
Apr 27, 2023•40 min
EPISODE SUMMARY Well, folks, it’s hard to ignore the big news these days about ChatGPT and AI. Although we’ve been using AI for a while now, many of us have thought it was still a ways off from becoming truly disruptive. But now, with the launch of ChatGPT in November 2022 and GPT-4 in March 2023, we’ve entered a new phase of development where AI outputs are virtually indistinguishable from human outputs, and some are hailing, are even better than what humans can do. For those of us in the worki...
Apr 13, 2023•20 min
EPISODE SUMMARY: We don’t always recognize a curveball when we get hit by one. We don't see that we need to change and make some adjustments. Instead, we ignore it, deny it, or fight to keep things status quo. That is until it becomes glaringly obvious that some change is required. In this episode, I chat with Stephanie Dethlefs, whose curveball resulted in a change in her career and the identity that came along with doing that work. But these changes didn’t happen as soon as her curveball hit. ...
Mar 30, 2023•39 min
EPISODE SUMMARY: This is the second part of the conversation on why midlife is a call to action for change. If you haven't listened to Part 1 (Ep 195), I suggest you start there! In this episode, I tackle the subject of "unexpected change" or what I call curveballs — events that disrupt our lives, sometimes even reshaping and changing their trajectory. You can read the full text of this episode at http://secondbreaks.com FOOTNOTES: Life Is In The Transitions , by Bruce Feiler Ep 195: Midlife Is ...
Mar 16, 2023•23 min
EPISODE SUMMARY: This week's guest is Bernie Borges, Producer and Host of the Midlife Fulfilled podcast. Bernie shares his perspective on what (and when!) midlife is — which is quite non-traditional, bordering on controversial! I expect it will generate some reactions, no doubt. I’m also sharing my own thoughts and definition of midlife. Although not dissimilar from Bernie’s, it has minor differences. It’s important that we adopt a broader definition of midlife because how we view midlife has si...
Mar 02, 2023•24 min
In the season opener, Lou Blaser makes the case that midlife is a call to action for change. This is a two-parter conversation, and in this episode, Lou talks about why midlife change is necessary and inevitable and why this change is certainly not a crisis. You can read the full text of this episode here. Connect with Lou Blaser on LinkedIn . Subscribe to Midlife Cues , a weekly newsletter about intentional living in midlife. Get full access to We're All Getting Older at loublaser.substack.com/...
Feb 16, 2023•15 min
In this bonus episode, I share my plans and goals for the podcast for the year. FOOTNOTES : Connect with Lou Blaser on LinkedIn . Subscribe to Midlife Cues , a weekly newsletter about intentional living in midlife. Get full access to We're All Getting Older at loublaser.substack.com/subscribe...
Jan 26, 2023•7 min
Contrary to popular opinion, wisdom does not come with age. It is the act of sitting down and reflecting on our own experiences that creates wisdom. And one powerful exercise we can do to capture that wisdom is to reflect on the lessons we're taking away from our experiences in the past year. Before you get too busy with your 2023 goals and plans, take a pause to consider the lessons you learned from last year. A slight variation to this is to ask what you learned ABOUT yourself last year. In th...
Jan 05, 2023•18 min
Have you ever looked back and considered how different you are today from the 20-year-old version of yourself? This is a question that I ask all my guests on the podcast. And I’m always blown away by the thoughtfulness of their answers. In this short bonus episode, I’ve compiled the responses of my guests this year so you can listen to all of their thoughts back to back. I’ve found myself in their words. I’ve found so much strength and inspiration as well. And I think you’ll feel the same way. O...
Dec 22, 2022•12 min
Many of us conduct some kind of a year-end review process sometime in December. My process has evolved a lot over the years, but I’ve been sitting down to do an annual review religiously since my corporate years. I’m always looking for ways to keep my process relevant to wherever I am in life. I also work to spice it up so things don’t get boring and I can look forward to the exercise toward the end of December. During the last few years, I’ve picked up a handful of new questions that aren’t the...
Dec 08, 2022•22 min
A singular event rarely transforms a person. True transformation occurs over time and usually, after a series of events that shakes one's world view. ABOUT MY GUEST: Vivek Chakrabortty is the CEO and Founder of The Kavi Group, a crisis management and business continuity consulting firm that supports some of the largest firms in the world today. He is a husband and a father to 3 young adults. You’ll hear him say later that home is wherever his family is, so let me just say, today, he and his fami...
Nov 24, 2022•57 min
I’ve come to regard midlife as a kind of fresh start or rather, we can choose to approach it as a fresh start. This is a time in our lives when we can pause and really review where we are and think about how we want the second half of our lives to work out, and then really refocus our energy toward that. For many of us, that means choosing to change areas of our life. Sadly, as much as the vision of our future can be exciting, many of us would rather look away from that vision because we’re not ...
Nov 10, 2022•41 min
We've all avoided having an important conversation because of fear. Often, we do so because we don’t have the tools — we don’t know where and how to begin. We don’t have the words or the vocabulary to discuss an important topic. Sometimes, it’s because we’ve been burned in the past when a difficult conversation went awry. I also feel like the older I get, the need to have these difficult or sensitive conversations aren’t decreasing. They feel like they’re multiplying! And just because we’re olde...
Oct 27, 2022•39 min
While I have pursued many “big” projects and taken on risks head-on, there are still many things that I hold myself back from because of fear. Sometimes, it’s because I don’t feel ready. The worst is when I hesitate because “who do I think I am that I could pull this thing off?” Recently, a good friend did one of these challenging public-facing projects. I had front-row seats and witnessed her move from idea to full execution and was so impressed that I asked her to chat about it when it was ove...
Oct 13, 2022•45 min
If I were ever granted a do-over, one thing I would do differently is to take my well-being seriously. Sadly, my well-being did not show up on my list of priorities when I was in my 20s, 30s, or even early 40s. In fact, I had previously confessed that the stupidest thing I ever said was, “I’ll sleep when I’m dead. Thankfully, some level of wisdom prevailed and I no longer think that way. Somewhere along the way, I learned the importance of self-care and about putting my well-being on my list of ...
Sep 29, 2022•49 min
In "Life is in the Transitions," Bruce Feiler writes about life quakes — those times in our lives when we have a massive burst of change that lead to a period of upheaval, transition, and renewal. Following the extensive research he conducted, Feiler concluded that, on average, we go through three to five of these events in our lives. And the average length of a life quake is 5 years. What happened to Karen Randall is one of those life quakes that Feiler was talking about. A huge change event ma...
Sep 15, 2022•38 min
As we get older, there's a tendency to recognize fewer and fewer personal milestones. As my guest, Dara Goldberg, pointed out, "It's as though once we hit midlife, all growth has stopped." But by not marking and celebrating milestones, we are, in effect, supporting the prevailing narrative out there that we disappear as we age, that it’s all downhill from here, and that everything good is in our past — all these narratives that, of course, we are rebelling against. We are inadvertently helping k...
Sep 01, 2022•33 min
We’ve all heard about stories. Storytelling is having its heyday. Everyone is invoking the word so much so that it’s beginning to lose its meaning which is what happens when everyone and their uncles use it in every conceivable way. But the way Ronna Detrick talks about our stories — those stories that have shaped our lives — is in a different category altogether. Ronna is a coach, writer, and speaker who focuses on the stories that have shaped women’s lives. She helps women reimagine our storie...
Aug 11, 2022•42 min
Most of the time, we try to plan for change rationally and meticulously. We think about what we want to do, where we want to go or end up, and how we want to go there. But there’s something to be said about serendipity. For opening ourselves to discovering a path we didn’t even know was a possibility. For holding plans loosely and setting a different intention than simply to arrive at our original destination. My guest, Diane Diaz, did a version of this when she was laid off from her job in 2008...
Jul 28, 2022•35 min
Those of us who are parents will be familiar with the mélange of emotions that comes when it’s time for the kids to leave the nest — whether that’s to college or to begin their adult life away from us. In this episode, I talk with transitions life coach Karen Herbert to explore how parents can best manage themselves during some of the most challenging feelings of empty nesters, and most importantly, how to focus on the most important thing — the relationship they have with their young adult kids...
Jul 14, 2022•47 min
The idea of seeking and getting help has become more acceptable in society, in general. More people today are open to talking about their experiences. And the stigma for getting professional help has greatly been diminished, if not entirely eliminated. There has been an explosion in the field of coaching over the last few years. And the result of all these newly-minted coaches is that getting coached, in all aspects of life is now relatively accessible for more people. So, the upshot is professi...
Jun 30, 2022•52 min
Change, as we all know, is the one thing that’s constant in our lives. Fellow midlifers will likely agree with me that change doesn’t stop when we reach midlife. If anything, it feels as if we’re dealing with change all the time. Some of these changes we deliberately introduce into our lives, such as when we intentionally change our lifestyle or eating habits, for example. Many of the changes are externally driven. But often, we know about these ahead of time such that we can plan and ease into ...
Jun 16, 2022•26 min
We are at the tail end of this series of episodes where we’ve been looking into the topic of Un-retirement. And to close the series, I invited my friend Mary Beth Simon, whose post-retirement plans you heard about in a previous episode. I sat down with Mary Beth to chat and compare notes about life post-retirement. Since both of us did end up starting small businesses of our own, we talked a little bit about the experience of launching our businesses. But most of the time, we were talking about ...
Jun 02, 2022•40 min
Many midlifers plan on starting a business post-retirement. Starting a business of any kind is always going to be a climb. There’s usually a significant learning curve involved. And when you’ve been an employee most of your life (and don’t have any business experience) this learning curve can be even steeper. I say this not to discourage anyone but to highlight the importance of doing our homework and walking into this new adventure with eyes wide open — even if the thing we want to do are the s...
May 26, 2022•38 min
