Episode 70: [Wendy Alexander] Reclaiming Your Voice Through Menopause

On this week's episode, Elizabeth talks with Wendy Alexander about her writing journey through menopause and how she helps women find their authentic voices and career paths. 

Wendy's perspective is where you'll find inspiration, especially if you're in this phase of life, or you're curious about what's ahead. You'll hear about how menopause can be viewed as a transformative journey for women. 

During menopause, many women struggle with uncertainty and experience profound changes which can lead them to question their life choices, particularly with their careers. Wendy describes menopause as a "sacred time" when women demand to be heard and have less tolerance for things that don't feel fulfilling in their lives. 

This episode highlights how journaling serves as a powerful tool for processing difficult experiences. Wendy shares how including raw journal excerpts in her book added authenticity and depth that resonated with her readers.

Wendy and Elizabeth engage in an in-depth discussion about how women in midlife often realize they've been pursuing careers they thought they "should" do rather than what they truly want, and how menopause presents an opportunity to recognize and repackage their unique skills for meaningful career transitions.

Connect with Wendy online:

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Transcript

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Welcome to the Inspired Writer Collective podcast. We're your hosts, Elizabeth and Stephanie book coaches who help you finish your book. Tune in each week as we dig into the writing process, including reaching your goals and silencing your inner critic. You'll learn how to deepen your characters, hone your authentic storytelling style, and strengthen your writing muscles by exploring books in and out of your own genre. You'll also hear from published authors, industry experts, and marketing specialists who will give you tools to navigate this. Self-publishing landscape. We are here to provide the support and accountability you need throughout the marathon of writing so you stop running in place, editing the same chapter over and over, and find the confidence to move forward. Get your copy of a curated list of four essential craft books to assist your memoir writing or a character coffee chat for fiction writers through the links in the show notes, let's bring your book to life together. Welcome back to the Inspired Writer Collective podcast. I'm your host, Elizabeth, and today I am joined by Wendy Alexander. She is a career transition coach. She grew up in apartheid era South Africa, and now lives and works in Australia. So we're bringing you a global perspective today. She is the author of the book Internal Uprising, reclaiming Your Voice and Wisdom Through Midlife Menopause and Beyond. And she really focuses on working with people who are looking to transition that their career path later in life. So especially those menopausal women who have realized that they were doing the job they thought they should do and now wanna transition to the job they want to do. And I think there are a number of writers that actually fall into that category where people find writing later in life. Um, so I'm excited to explore that with you today and also talk about your own process of writing your books, sticking to the writing process through all the ups and downs, and your strong passion behind getting this message out. So welcome to the podcast, Wendy. Oh, thank you for having me. Hi everyone. Okay. So to get us kind of launched, what was it about the struggle of the midlife and menopause and career that really pushed you to not only write your book, but now essentially do this work that you're doing now? Um, so I've always been written since I was really young growing up in South Africa. That in itself was a challenging environment. Um, and I didn't obviously understand that whole apartheid and segregation as a young child, and so I would just write my way through things and I started to notice that that's how I was able to process anything that was challenging or difficult. I mean, I wrote about joyful things as well, but fundamentally my writing started as a means of processing whatever I didn't understand. So when I was younger, it was. Little short stories. Um, as I grew up as a teenager and really understood South Africa and what was going on there, there was a lot of dark poetry, so, mm-hmm. It's not poetry I showed to a lot of people'cause it was, it was angry poetry, you know, trying to make sense of the, the world I was living in. Um, so writing has been a companion for me, um, in the form of poetry. Little short stories. Journaling mostly, um, throughout my life. And then, uh, we migrated to Australia when I was about 20, going on 21. And I did a lot of writing then as well because that was all about trying to figure out this new country, you know, all the new found freedoms that I didn't have in South Africa. And people might think that that's, um. A joyous thing. And it was in many ways, but it was also very difficult because going through a world that is so completely new. Um, so that, there again, I wrote, uh, through that time and then I had, you know, loads of challenges along the way, like most people, and I've always written through them. Mm-hmm. And it was interesting when menopause came along and that phase of life, I forgot the one thing that I always do, so, which was I was going through this difficult. Physical and emotional and mental changes. And I wasn't writing. It was so interesting to me when I observed it later, I was struggling through that phase, but the one thing I wasn't doing was writing. Mm-hmm. Um, so I think it was about a year into the menopause journey. Um, I was talking to a naturopath I was working with, and then he was telling me about all. The women that were coming to him of a certain age and how they were struggling and he was trying to figure out what it was about, and I said, it's probably menopause. And he says, so we started talking about that and then he said, someone should write about this. And I was like, whoa. The, you know, the long bells, the red, whatever, it went off in the head and I thought, I, why am I not writing about this? And so I started to journal and it really was, um, recording all the emotions. That was going on, the confusion, the anxiety, all of the stuff I was experiencing, I started to record. Um, and then as time went by, I could see that I could actually, there was a message, a theme coming through about making changes, but I was also noticing that I was able to process it better because I was constantly using, you know, the written word and I was writing in a journal at the time. I. Um, yeah. And then, you know, talking again with the same naturopath, uh, he said to me, you should write about this because you went, whenever we spoke about it, he said, you're very articulate about it. You're very passionate about it. Mm-hmm. Um, and so fundamentally I ended up turning the journal into a, a book, but I did it reluctantly at first because I was, when I started to write the book, you know, I, I suppose you want to. You want to only share sort of the good side of it, that you came through it. Mm-hmm. But when I sent it off to an editor, she, she came back and she said, something's missing from this book. And I was like, Ooh, what's missing? Um, and then she said to me, how did you come through all of these different things that you're writing about? And I said, well, I journaled through it. And she said, I'll bet your journal looks very different to the book. And I said. Yeah, it does. And so she said, would you mind sending me some of your journal? She said, only what you're comfortable sharing. She said, because I know a journal can be a very personal thing. And so I sent a few extracts and she came back and she said, that's what's missing from the book. She says, there's a depth to the journaling and a depth to the honesty and the authenticity and the challenge. Mm-hmm. She said, look, it's up to you. But she said, I really believe you should put a couple of extracts from that journal into the book. And of course I wrestled with it, you know, because I mean, as writers, we want our work to be accepted. We also don't want to be judged, you know? And I was like, man, I sound like a crazy person in this. So. Yeah, I was really challenged with deciding on that, and I sat with it for a bit. Mm-hmm. But then I realized, because I'd also, at that stage, I'd done quite a lot of research on that whole menopausal journey. And I'd also started to talk to other women. And I did realize that if I, if I had a message and I wanted to be authentic, then I had to be willing to open up. To actually let inside those other, those darker parts, you know that because other women were going through it too. It wasn't just me. Um, so in the end, yes, I have included extracts almost in every chapter there's extracts from my journal of my state of mind or of me trying to process what I was going through. And the book is the better for it. I know that, you know. Um, and, and I sent it all back to her and she's, and she was. She said to me, this is, this is what you should have been writing from the start. And weaving that whole journal through the whole story and all the messages in each chapter. So it's there and um, it took me a while to actually decide to publish it. Um, but I have, you know, because all I had to go through the, the journey of being ready. Mm-hmm. I love that and I feel, feel like that's well received. So validating. Yeah. I love that. You know, I've struggled with that same thing in writing my memoir, and I only more recently, probably, Hmm. Just a month or two ago, decided that I actually wanted to use. Actual excerpts from my journal. And then previously I had just been, you know, referring to it for memory recall purposes and, and whatnot. But then I realized there was some beauty in the, like, messy struggle of me trying to sort through my feelings in that present moment. Like I had done such a great job of capturing where I was and to try and translate that adequately in prose and narrative was just like not coming across as strongly. And even though I still value, like having that narrative framework so someone outside of me can understand what my journal even means, uh, I just felt there was a greater depth and vulnerability and authenticity when I included little excerpts of those moments from my journal. And I, I think there's some, it adds some like validity even to like the message that you're trying to, you know, share with other people and the path that you're trying to guide others on to. To be that relatable in that it's not all about just the end goal. It's not all about the what, the end result. Like, there's so much that happens in the process in that messy middle, in the like developing as you essentially go through another form of puberty, right? Like we have like multiple times in our lives as women where we, our hormones totally shift our bodies. You know, we, we hit, you know, purity and adolescence. Women go through a lot of changes when they have children and then menopause comes, and I think that's a wise of your editor and also b, brave of you to be willing to put those really raw emotions from your journal into your book. Yeah, well look, I've, it's certainly, it's been well received so far. Um, the people, some of the people that know me personally, were. Probably a little bit shocked about, about the struggle because they know that they sort of look at me and they, they see a strong woman. And I've said to them, you know, but sometimes the strength, I realize that the strength was about the whole journey. Not just, not just sharing, um, you know, that I came through it and that I was at the, the tail end of it, and that I then transformed my life and went and found the career that I really wanted to do. Mm-hmm. Um. Because the thing is, with, with that journey, it is, it is still, it can still be a struggle. Like I'm through the worst of it. So I'm, I've, I'm what you would call postmenopausal and have been that for five, six years. Mm-hmm. Um, so I'm through the worst of it. But there are moments when you still get the odd hot flash. You, you still have. Insomnia from time to time. And, and insomnia is the worst for most of us. We all know, even as a, a new mom, you know, that if you don't sleep well enough, you know, for a period of time, it really starts to affect other areas of your life. Um, mm-hmm. So I think the message that I wanted to share with other women is that once you know what it is and you've processed it, and you've come through the worst of it. Understand that it's still an ongoing journey, but at least now you've got some tools. Like I have tools and I know exactly what to do and thankfully, you know, all my symptoms have mostly died down. They happen once or twice a year, and I can live with that. So, yeah, it, it struck me when we talked before, um, you shared a statistic with me about women in menopause and mental health. I wonder if you would go into that a little bit here. Well, um, I. My research showed me that, um, there was a lot of women who, because they don't talk about it, the isolation can become so overwhelming. And one of the things, the alarming thing I discovered was that it's a time when a lot of women commit suicide, right? Mm-hmm. Um, and I dug into some of that research, even some, some, some celebrities here in Australia. Um. When I looked at the time that they went through some of that and there was a couple of suicides, very much one after the other year in Australia. And I looked at that, I was like, they were all hitting that phase. Mm-hmm. And, and that's probably the most profound message. And one of the reasons in the end that I suppose I decided that I did need to share the whole journey. Because I myself struggled with a little bit of that, you know? Mm-hmm. Like just feeling so dark and feeling so challenged. And more importantly, because especially if you looked at in the world as a strong woman, or well put together woman when this comes along and you don't know what's happening to you.'cause mine came early in my head. That was supposed to happen in my fifties. It came at age 45. So I was very unprepared for it. Right. Um, right. And I think because I was so unprepared and I didn't know what was going, and it took a while to figure out what was going on, and the darkness was descending in thoughts and in, you know, the body changing so rapidly and all of that. Um, yeah, I, I absolutely struggled. Um, and then when I started to do research, I was like, wow, I'm not the only one. And look at. The thing we are ignoring, sometimes we're ignoring it to the detriment of ourselves and to women then feeling so overwhelmed that they can't cope anymore. You know? So that was, that was a scary stack to find out. Mm-hmm. Um, but it forwarded the journey and it, and, and then when I spoke, I can't remember if I shared this with you when we spoke previously, but, but I was talking to a ma, a ma, a male colleague at work one day, and. Mm-hmm. He came for a report that he wanted my approval on. It was, uh, someone that reported to me and I was going through a hot flash at the time or something, and I just blurted out in the office like, I hate this menopause stuff, whatever it was, you know, I think I even used the word shit or something. I said, I hate this. And then I was like, oh my God, this is a younger male colleague. Mm-hmm. I can't believe I just said that. So here's the other thing. We women start to get embarrassed about even speaking about it because it wasn't spoken about. There's a lot more conversation having happening around it now, but back then it wasn't. And then he just looked at me and, and he just, he closed my office door. And I thought, oh, oops. You know, I was like, what is this all about? Then he, he shared how his best friend's mother had committed suicide a few months earlier. Mm. And he said when they found her journal, they discovered. What she was going through around menopause. Oh. And he was devastated. And I was just shocked. He was shocked. We were both shocked, staring at each other, not knowing what else to say about that. But that was in fact one of the catalysts that made me write the book.'cause I was like, mm-hmm. Oh no, this is, this is a little heating a little bit too close to home. Because I knew what I was struggling with and the thoughts I was having in my own head. And then he's sharing the story. And at that stage, I'd read a lot of this other research that I was doing and I was like, I suppose that's where the bravery came to actually write it. It was one of the catalysts, apart from the editor telling me that there was something missing. It was one of the catalysts, like, I need to write about this, this, this is something that's important. And yes, it's scary. I was scared to write about it. But it felt important enough to me to do something about it, to at least put a message down so that maybe the women coming up behind me, if they ever felt similar to that, they, and they read it, they could understand that they weren't crazy. Mm-hmm. And that those thoughts and those challenges and that mental anxiety and all of that that comes with it is something that you can get through. But it's really important to acknowledge that you're going through it and find people that you can talk to or read a book or read about it and understand you're not nuts. Mm-hmm. You know, this is part of a woman's journey. This is a fluctuation of hormones raging through the body, and it has strange effects for some people. Mm-hmm. You know, sometimes difficult, very difficult effects. Well, and it's interesting too, the time in your life when it hits in relation to like most people's career paths, right? Yes. You know, by the time you're like 45, 50, 55, you know, you're probably at the top levels of management. You've got security in your job. You might feel like you have a handle on your life, and then all of a sudden your internal world suddenly starts going through this massive shift where I imagine that contrast between like. How you're presenting your life, but what you're actually feeling isn't just such disparity that it can be really confusing and really unsettling of, well, I thought I had made it. I thought I had done the thing. I'm supposed to be thriving. The kids are grown and you know, off the college or out of the house now, and this is supposed to be my era, you know, and here I go through this thing where all of a sudden I'm depressed, I'm, you know, feeling all these things. I have all these physical things that feel like. Or shutting down the lethargy, the insomnia, all those different, um, basically side effects of, and aspects of going through menopause that people don't always like recognize in the moment as being collectively menopause or perimenopause symptoms. But they can be seen, at least from the people I know who are in those phases, like really. Um, confusing and unsettling, and a lot of people just feel like they're, they're failing in life without having any sort of framework to understand that this is happening On a biological level, this is not a failure of character. This is not, you know, an environmental thing. It's not that you just need a new exercise routine or something like that, like it's, it's just a much bigger process and. And a bit unavoidable. Sure. Like you said, you provide tools and you've learned ways to navigate that. And I would love for you to speak a little bit about some of those tools you mentioned in the book. Um, but yeah, I mean essentially it's a process you have to go through. There's no like avoiding that. No, there's no avoiding. And also I. Over a period of time as I was writing through, through that journey, I started to realize that it was actually quite a sacred time for women because a lot of the time we are living life according to societal expectations. But what I noticed was, and this is from my own experience, but also the women I spoke to when I was writing the book, um, our tolerance. For all the things that we've put up with or the societal norms that's expected of us, becomes very challenged at that time. Um, and that's certainly what I noticed. I was like, you know, I'm writing this book, but I'm also working in corporate in a very high powered, high paying job. And I'm like, I hate this. You know, this is coming up a lot. I'm like, this is meaningless. This work doesn't matter to me anymore. The only thing that I really still loved about my job was working with people. So I was already, um, before I took the, my business and, and stepped into my career, 2.0 as I call it, I was already helping some of my younger colleagues with the direction in their career because I had. Created a very successful career for myself doing certain things that were different to what other people were doing. And so when people were watching me, they would say, how did you land that really great role? You know, and how did you interview and all of this.'cause I would often change and, and navigate, um, and take and challenge myself. And I end up getting what I went after. So people would ask me, you know, how did you do that? So I was already helping colleagues, you know, just helping navigate, teaching them how to interview strongly, all of those things. Um, and I realized that was making me happy. I really loved doing that. And as I said, writing was is, it's in my DNA, you know. And so I started to help people write their resumes, write their LinkedIn profiles, all of these things. Um, but I realized too that I was really, I think the, the BS tolerated just drops during that stage of life. Mm-hmm. You know, you just, you recognize that there's certain things that you just don't want to do anymore. You don't want to put up with it anymore. And I think that's a very sacred time for a woman because a lot of the time, and certainly with me as I'm younger and going through life. There's certain things I don't like or there's certain things I'm not enjoying anymore. But someone, if it's not my own voice sometimes and imposter syndrome and all those things, telling me someone else's voice is always trying to make me be sensible. You know, you've got a great job, you're earning great money. Be sensible. Don't think about changing careers now. Why don't you know, people tell you all these things? Um. But as I started going through the period writing, I realized, no, actually this is a sacred time. This is when a woman's voice will not let her suppress it anymore. Mm-hmm. Because that's what was happening for me. I was like, this voice was just, there was so many different things happening in the body, but also within my mind, in my head, the voice just wouldn't be still anymore. It was like, no. You are not doing your purposeful work. You're not doing what you really wanna do and why? You know? Is it because you're seduced by the money that you are earning corporate? I mean, I was starting to ask these very deep questions and this was coming up as I was writing the journal as I was writing the book. Mm-hmm. Um, and as I was speaking to other women, and I'm like, we all actually know, deep down we know, but we spend, I believe we spend. Probably the first half of our life suppressing a lot of what we intuitively know about ourselves. Mm-hmm. Um, for various reasons. Sometimes it's practicality, you know, we have kids we have to feed, we've got a mortgage, we need to pay all of this type of thing. Um, but. When you get through, through that stage, when that voice starts to rise, it's almost like, that's why I called it an internal uprising. It's why I named the book that that voice starts to come and it speaks louder and it speaks louder and it doesn't still until you pay attention to it. Mm-hmm. Because it certainly didn't for me. Um, and so that was a time of a lot of change for me. You know, once I started to see there's this pattern, there's the same theme coming through my writing. Of dissatisfaction, of wanting to do something different, of a voice that felt like it needed to be heard, that I knew I was trying to suppress with practicality and responsibility. All of those things. And I wouldn't say to other women or anyone else I'm working with, just go out there and and quit your job. That's not practical either, because you don't wanna put yourself under financial pressure. But I do help people make that train that change gradually. Starting to look at the strengths for you. We are getting into some of the, the tactics when I work with women. Um, because one of the things I notice, women, we do suffer from imposter syndrome. We don't always recognize the gifts that we have, the talents that we have. There are many things that we do automatically in life. We are very good at multitasking, the best at multitasking, right? Um, and we don't often see some of our gifts as talents that can be packaged up for other people that we can serve other people with. And so that's one of the things I do do with people is that I delve into the patterns of their life with them, delve into the successes. The achievements both personally and professionally, because it's not only your professional success that matters. You know, you could be a woman who runs a woman's group as a side thing. You know, you might run a meditation group, you might write a write, run, a writing group. There's a level of structure, there's a level of organization that goes into that. Those are all skills that can be packaged up, but a lot of. People don't recognize that, um, things that they do automatically, things that they're naturally talented at, they don't see that as something that can be framed up in a way that can be a saleable commodity to somebody else. And that's fundamentally where I work. That's, those are the spaces I work, especially with women, because I will say, guys, identify quickly. They, they, they're quite comfortable blowing their own horns and, and going, these are my skills and I can use it. And, and they might get someone to help them frame it up like a writer or something. But I find women really are challenged with that, especially when they get to this midlife stage and they already going through anxiety and doubt, and now they're experiencing dissatisfaction in their career. They really struggle with pulling out. What's unique, special, and talented about themselves that they can then take to someone else. Mm-hmm. But within every person, if you've overcome any challenge, if you've succeeded in any way, whether it's in your personal life or in your professional life, if you've helped other people in any way, within just those three areas, there's a whole bunch of skills that you can frame up. Absolutely. I feel like that's sort of the process that I went through and we talked about this when we met before recording that now I'm no lo nowhere close to like menopause stage, but going through my divorce was a very like, and the loss of my career was a very like earth shattering. Midlife sort of thing, where all of a sudden I found and noticed all these things around me that I no longer wanted, and then was really kind of lost in who I was underneath all of those roles or all of those things as, as they were stripped away, it became, well, who am I? What do I even like, what's, what's really me underneath all of this? Um. And slowly kind of tapping into those various things, it's like, well, I like this. You know, like I love journaling and. I've been through some stuff and I have some stories I'm passionate about, and I, I felt really alone in a lot of this process. So maybe I could share some of these stories with other people and then it became, oh, well, I like talking to people. So podcasting may be something that like, yeah, we could incorporate. And I love interviewing guests. I love just getting to insight into other people's experiences. And more recently I've recognized. As a skill, the fact that I am a huge supporter of people, you know, I, I think it's something that we as women really discard as like, oh, that's just women. That's just a trait that women have. But like, it's a superpower the way that I am able to support my family members to, you know, provide that sort of backbone of structure and home life, and. Meals and consistency and love, and you go get it. You can do this kind of pep talks. Like that's something that comes very naturally to me, very easily to me, and it's something that I've realized I've already sort of done within a a business career realm. In putting together my memoir program to do that same thing, be that cheerleader for those who are interested in writing memoir who may not know how to structure their plot and story, or might not have a good handle on like. Creating a plan of an outline, but I am there to offer that support, to provide that structure, that backbone, so that then there's room for that creativity of that person to shine or, or for that, you know, that nagging message, that strong desire to share a personal story, to be able to like, give that, you know, some, some structure, some bones to put that meat on. Yeah. Well you, it's interesting, you've just, in that sharing, you've just listed a lot of what I would do with someone when I'm working with them is pull out some of those talents that like, okay, what, what is it that you do naturally? How do you do it? What have you overcome in your case, a divorce, you know, in my case, a broken relationship when I was pregnant and, and so on. So you go back, you dig. A lot of people don't see, they don't realize that there's so much value in the story already. And, and here's the other thing that, that I want to encourage people to remember is that, um, in the career space, people relate to story better. So make your resume, make your LinkedIn about the story because people don't realize it's an, I mean, I've, I've done copywriting for years as well for small businesses, and. Copywriting. There's an old saying in copywriting, facts tell, but stories sell. So most resumes that I used to see when I was hiring in corporate, and even now on LinkedIn, they are so bland. They are so fact telling. So they don't draw people in. And one of the ways I try and work with people is to teach them to write really powerful stories about. Their career success. Um, and I tell you, it makes a difference because I've, I've seen people be very resistant to that. Mm-hmm. But then they'll come back a few months later and they'll go, you know what? I actually did what you encouraged me to do, and I shaped up all my achievements and my successes, like a little story in my resume. And I did my LinkedIn, you know, following your tips and things. And suddenly I was getting people reaching out to me. And then when they interview, I also say, when you answer questions, do it in a story framework. Describe the situation, describe the actions you took, describe the outcome. Frame it up like a story because that is so, so much more engaging for the listener and for the reader. Human beings are wired, we are hardwired for story. Mm-hmm. It's, that's how you know when they didn't have scribes who were recording history. How was the information passed down through story? Right. Right. So we are hardwired for it. And so there's even a method to story, to memoir, to sharing within the career structure as well. I love that. Um, and so when I'm working with people, I don't do what everyone else has done because why? Because I saw for me that what everyone else was doing didn't work. When I did things a different way, that was when I had the success and I. And I had the job office and I got these great roles throughout my career, and this is kind of how I wanna try and work with people. So when I work with women too, I'm like, your story matters. Yes. Let's frame it up so that you can show someone just what you've been through and what you have to offer just through your own personal or professional story, or both. I always use extracts from both because there's more to us than. And just our professional careers. And I've had, uh, hiring people say to me, I don't like hiring people who appear as professional robots. Mm-hmm. I want a human being behind that. I want to know what makes them tick. Those are the people that usually get the, the good jobs. The juicy jobs are it, you know, the ones that pay well, the ones that bring quite a lot of satisfaction because there's a willingness to. Share the story or share the successes in the framework of a story. It really does matter in so many areas of life. Mm-hmm. It's relatable when you share story and, and so I think that what you're doing with helping people structure and support and encouraging them to do the memoir to identify a story that they're passionate about, there's real, real value in that. Thank you. And human beings are drawn to that. Mm-hmm. We are drawn to it. Absolutely. Um, I was wondering if, as we close out our conversation today, if you would share a little bit about how you tapped into your source of inspiration in order to keep writing, even when you were, you know, in the throes of writing as life was continuing to happen, as you were continuing to navigate. Going through that transition of menopause, how did you either stay focused or allow yourself to come back to it if you had stepped away at different points in the writing process, what's sort of your experience or advice around that? So, um, it's interesting. It's, it's rare that it comes from just inspiration. I think I read, um, Stephen King's book. I, I think it's called on writing. Yeah. And one of the first things he talks about is that discipline is going to get the job done. Mm-hmm. Because if you wait for inspiration or energy, it doesn't always come. Right. And so I develop the discipline of writing. So I would set aside a time, um, and I would go, okay, first thing in the morning, and I'd get up, you know, that extra half an hour. And I would just do it. And sometimes I, the just doing meant staring at the computer for like five minutes'cause nothing was going. Sure. Nothing, nothing was coming. And I was like, oh God. He was right. You know, it, it wasn't, it was very rarely about inspiration. There would be moments of inspiration and when they came, the writing was great. It just flowed, you know, when the inspiration comes through and the idea comes through for that particular chapter, or, you know, I've outlined the chapters, but chapter number three is just not moving. Um, mm-hmm. I just found going to the actual keyboard or some if I was writing in my journal.'cause sometimes I actually write better, you know, long hand. Yes. Um, I just sit there and do it. And if the page is blinking at me and nothing's happening, I, I don't move. I'm like, I told myself I was gonna do this 30 minutes. So we are sitting here until something comes out. So if it's only one sentence. Or two sentences or 200 words, then so be it. But what I found that I think it's like everything in life where, you know, when I was, when I first learned meditation as well, I couldn't do it. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. But I didn't not do it. I would go there and sit there and I'd be like, uh, you know, the mind chat is going, nothing's happening, right? Am I doing this right? Am I doing this right? Um, showing up is actually the key. Because eventually the brain switches in because you, you start to wire new neural pathways, I think. Mm-hmm. And the brain, eventually my brain realized that we were sitting here until it did something. And so in the end, after many, I would say many weeks even. Mm-hmm. Eventually when I sat down, it was like the brain knew this is the writing time and it needs to switch on for it. And that doesn't mean I wrote great things. Sometimes what I wrote was absolute crap, right? Mm-hmm. But I still wrote sure, and I could always go back and edit it later or,'cause I'm, I'm a firm believer in just getting, doing the brain dump. So I would just let the ideas come out. They would probably not make sense. The sentence structure would be. Atrocious. But I was like, you doing it? You're just letting the ideas come out and flow, because editing is a wonderful thing. You can go back, you can have 20 versions of mm-hmm. A book, you know, you can rewrite it, you can, but I think it's important to just show up for your work. Whatever it is you are wanting to do, any goal that you have in life. Mm-hmm. Show up for it. Eventually, you will train the mind, body, and spirit to align with you and that goal I. Mm-hmm. It's not even, it's not an easy process. I think people think it's easy. It isn't, writing is not easy. Wonderful. Or they, they think if it's not easy, then they're not meant to write. Right. That's, they think that other people have come to it easily, and if it doesn't come easily for them, then that's not their calling and that's not the case. I hear over and over again from guests like you, that it's, it's really about having that consistency and that discipline and having that action come. First and hoping then that the creativity or inspiration, you know, follows. But a lot of times it is just that practice of sitting down and creating the space and starting the process. That's right. And it's like any skill, isn't it? Any skill that we, you know, when we, when, when I first, when I was first introduced to computers in my work and things like, I was like, what is this thing I hated? It doesn't work. And if it went. Funny and it didn't work. I would ring up the IT support guys and go make it work. Make it work. You know? It was like I was almost afraid of the thing. Mm. Now, of course it's one of my greatest tools, but it took showing up and using the computer every day for me to then develop the skill in using it. And so it's writing is the same, you know, inspiration. If you are waiting for inspiration, you're gonna be waiting a long time. And when you get it. Be grateful for it because then it flows and it flows beautifully, but it's not something that comes every day. But the discipline is something that you can control. Showing up for your work, showing up for your writing time, if it's, you know, five o'clock in the morning or if it's later. So for some people, it's in the evening, they write better in the evening, once the day is done. I'm a morning person, so I do any writing early in the morning before I start my day. Beautiful. Um, yes, to show up. Well, Wendy, thank you for being here with us. Thank you for being willing to share your story and to. Put your journals into your work to put that personal touch and that experience into your work. Um, we'll have all of your social media links in our show notes so that hopefully people can connect with you if they are going through a career transition or finding themselves in that place where they look around and realize, oh, I'm just doing what everyone told me I should do, and it doesn't resonate anymore and it doesn't feel right anymore. So. Thank you for being such a great resource for women in particular, who are going through that period of life and providing a guiding light that there is a, a, maybe not an end, but a another side to it that you will eventually reach. Um, and, and giving women those resources so that they can navigate that transition. Absolutely. It's an absolute pleasure to be here. And yeah, I'm happy to converse with anyone who's wanting to know more or feel like they just need some insights. And then I'm on LinkedIn and that's where I do all of my free tips and tricks, especially in the career space, but a lot of it too, around that midlife journey for women. All right. Well, thank you so much, Wendy and listeners, thank you for being here for this discussion. Please reach out to Wendy if you feel like you could benefit from some of her resources free or otherwise, and happy writing. Yeah, happy writing. Thank you so much for tuning in to this episode of the Inspired Writer Collective podcast. 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