FLIPSIDE OF MIDLIFE®: Fail Forward

What if failure is exactly what you need in midlife and beyond? 

In this episode, I make a case for purposeful failure — and why the women who stretch, reach, and fall flat are the ones who grow the most in this season.

Failure carries information, builds resilience, and helps you move forward. This one might just change how you feel about your mistakes, my friend.

🔗 Explore ELEVATE at flipsideofmidlife.com/elevate-membership

📩 I'd love to know what you fail at this week! Reach out at karli@flipsideofmidlife.com

xo Karli

P.S. While you’re at it, join myFLIPSIDE OF MIDLIFE® email community!

Visit my new website focused on my private one-to-one services. I’d love to guide you as you honor where you are and explore what’s next!

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Transcript

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It's rare to hear someone profess a love of failing. But what if a hotbed of failure is exactly what you and I need in midlife and beyond? Keep listening, my friend. This episode may change how you view your mistakes and failures. Hey there, my friend. I'm Karli Newman, your favorite Gen X dealer of positive vibes, Life and Wellness Coach, and Founder of FLIPSIDE OF MIDLIFE®, a community for women in midlife and beyond. Thanks for being here with me. Answer me honestly, my friend. How do you feel about failure? Viscerally, in your body, what sensations come up for you when you think about failing? When something doesn't go the way you planned, or you try something and it falls flat, or you put yourself out there and you flop. What comes up for me? Embarrassment, guilt, disappointment, sometimes exhaustion. Any of this sound familiar to you? Somewhere along the way, we started to believe that failing was to be avoided, not something to celebrate. Whether it's perfectionism, fear of risk, or a desire to stay in a comfort zone, midlife and beyond is a season to break through those limiting beliefs. Today, I make a case for purposeful failure. For trying things knowing they probably won't work. For being the woman who stretches, reaches, and falls fabulously flat on purpose because that's where the good stuff lives. Here's what I mean. Failure only happens when you try. Now, that sounds pretty obvious, but just stick with me for a moment. The women who never fail are the women who never stretch. They never reach beyond what's already comfortable and known. And in midlife and beyond, playing small is actually a big risk because small keeps you exactly where you are, and where you are right now is not where you're meant to stay. Trying new things, even badly, keeps your mind sharp. It keeps your spirit curious. It keeps your life expanding and moving forward. Failure isn't a sign that you're falling behind. It's a sign that you're still playing the game, my friend. Now let's talk about what failure actually tells you. Every failure carries information, and that could be about what doesn't fit, what needs to be adjusted, what you're truly made of, how resilient you are. The problem comes in when we're so busy feeling bad about failing that we never stop to notice the lessons. When you can stop and ask,"What is this trying to show me?" Oh, that can change everything, my friend. Because the answer is rarely what you might expect. Sometimes a failure shows you that you don't really want what you thought you wanted. Sometimes it illustrates a skill that you can learn. Sometimes it shows you that you're braver than you thought you were. Get curious about your failures, my friend. They hold so many lessons and answers, things you can be grateful for, things that help you move forward, things that expand your life. I want to be sure you leave this episode today knowing that failure is proof of a woman in motion. The next version of you, the one who moves differently, shows up differently, lives more fully on her own terms. She doesn't just magically appear, my friend. She emerges through attempts, through curiosity, through adjustments, through failure. The things that didn't work, the lessons she gleans from them, the next steps that she takes because of her mistakes and failures. Every stumble is evidence of growth. And it's growth in progress. Every failure is actually a step forward to the woman that you are evolving into here in midlife and beyond. My challenge to you this week is to try something you're not sure you can do. Something that has a real chance of not working out for you. Let yourself be a beginner. Let yourself be imperfect, and allow yourself to fail fabulously. And then get curious about what you're learning as you do. This season of life is too rich and too full of possibility to feel any other way about failure than positively. If taking more chances alongside women who genuinely support one another sounds like your kind of community, something you might crave, come check out ELEVATE. It's my monthly membership for women in midlife and beyond. It's a private space far away from social media where we talk about a theme or a topic every month. We learn about it, we dig deep within ourselves, and we share with one another. Find out if it's right for you at flipsideofmidlife.com/elevate-membership. I'll have that link for you in the show notes. I'd love to know what you fail at this week. Reach out and tell me at karli@flipsideofmidlife.com. I read every message, and I love hearing from you. Join me here on Wednesdays for more bite-sized episodes you can apply to your midlife and beyond, and every other Sunday for guided meditations and visualizations. I look forward to meeting you here for all of it. Take care and be well, my friend.