I recently read an article about American’s fleeing the country to escape the current political climate. They relocate to Europe only to discover their expectations don’t match their anticipated reality. They suffer from “the-grass-is-greener” syndrome, some persistent hallucination that, any place other than this place, will provide everything needed to be happier.

A big part of the American dream is the promise of totalizing happiness. And yet the United States ranks lower in the happiness scale every year. The country obsessed with happiness barely makes it in the top 40%.

This mindset follows us everywhere. Our culture of happiness has strict social rules. Expressing negative emotions is unacceptable – “good vibes only.” Yet we get extraordinarily uncomfortable with every mild inconvenience, making it impossible to live up to our own standards.

This endless search for happiness can even have us traveling to imaginary enchanted lands where life is depicted as sunny and cheerful, with the warmth of small towns and the acceptance of big cities.

But here’s the truth: Leaving just to escape rarely works.

When you leave to escape, you’re hoping your circumstances will change how you feel. When you leave to explore, you’re willing to let new circumstances change who you become.

We’ve confused convenience with quality of life

Amazon delivers AAA batteries to your doorstep tomorrow. McDonald’s French fries arrive without your having to put on shoes. Enormous refrigerators, clothes dryers, drive-through pharmacies, and customer service departments ready to resolve our problems almost instantly.

And God forbid something doesn’t work.

We become indignant.

Somewhere along the way, we decided the good life was an easy life. That progress meant eliminating inconvenience, outsourcing effort, and shrinking the time between wanting something and getting it.

And we’ve become remarkably good at it.

But in our perpetual pursuit of comfort, have we become less capable of being uncomfortable?

I’m not suggesting comfort is the enemy. But perhaps our dependence on it is.

We’ve made life extraordinarily convenient without necessarily making it more fulfilling.

And we’ve eliminated something else along the way: countless opportunities for human connection.

United States ranks among the loneliest countries globally. Particularly when compared to Western and Northern Europe, contributing to our rise in mental illness.

The disappearing art of everyday human interaction

A few mornings ago, I scribbled out my to-do list before heading out.

· Pick up bread from the famous bakery down the street (yes, I’ve reintroduced bread into my life) and say hello to Antonella.

· Stop by Luigi’s butcher shop for those amazing chicken breasts.

· Grab some apples from Daniela’s fruit market.

· Head to the medical clinic to refill my American hormone prescriptions.

Expecting an afternoon lost to Italian bureaucracy, I came prepared.

Novel. Snacks. iPad.

Except the entire visit was quicker than any urgent care experience I’ve had in New York.

My eighty-year-old doctor spoke barely a word of English and appeared less than thrilled to be there. Somehow, between my questionable professional Italian, dramatic hand gestures, and his limited patience, we managed to communicate. I even turned his sour mood into something playful.

I left congratulating myself for having plucked a few diamonds from that challenging conversation.

By the time I got home, I felt lighter than when I’d left.

None of those interactions was particularly meaningful on their own. But collectively, they created a sense of belonging.

And yes, it was inconvenient to schlep around Florence carrying bread, raw chicken, apples, and hormones.

The uncomfortable business of living

Italy is no utopia. It has maddening bureaucracy, economic problems, low salaries, and plenty of its own materialism.

That greener, perfect place?

It doesn’t exist.

And I certainly haven’t eliminated stress by moving here.

I have financial uncertainty. Language barriers. Moments of loneliness. Things take longer. Simple errands require more effort. I don’t always understand what’s being said to me, and sometimes I have absolutely no idea what I’m doing.

But without trying, I’ve become happier.

Not because life is easier, but because I’m more engaged in the ordinary business of living.

I walk more. Notice more. Speak to strangers. Get lost. Make mistakes. Figure things out. Discover places I never intended to find.

And somewhere in all that inconvenience, I’ve found something no amount of convenience could provide: a deeper sense of participation in my own life.

And that requires something unexpected: vulnerability.

You have to leave the house. Risk rejection. Make mistakes. Ask questions that make you feel foolish. You have to be willing to feel like a total dumbass sometimes.

More often than not, actually.

We’ve become so consumed with removing the obstacles from our lives that we’ve forgotten what we might discover by stumbling over a few.

Perhaps happiness has been waiting all along, just beyond the comfort we’ve worked so hard to create, in the beautiful, messy, inconvenient business of being alive.

Once I battled through the fear, uncertainty and endless what the fuck am I doing? of it all, there was really only one thing standing between me and my future life of slow morning strolls and afternoon cannolis.

Money.

I aggressively saved. And when I thought I’d saved enough, I saved more. I worked more so I could save more, and that cycle continued for nearly two years.

Grinding.

Not exactly atypical for the average American.

The problem was, there was never an arrival. No number that made me exhale and think, Okay. That’s enough. I’m safe now.

And then something happened that I hadn’t anticipated.

I started making good money. More than I’d ever made before.

Suddenly, walking away from it felt almost impossible.

I had saved enough to live in Florence for at least a year, maybe longer if I nickeled and dimed my way through it. But now I had a brand-new fear:

Never seeing those bountiful high waters again.

Yikes.

The dollar signs were seductive. Keep going like this and I could finally be financially secure. No more scarcity mindset (ha!). A solid retirement. More savings. Less uncertainty.

So naturally, I started questioning the entire fucking plan.

Do I really blow up a completely okay life, where I’m comfortable enough and finally making decent money, for something foreign and unpredictable?

You’re an adult! This is completely irresponsible! Think about your future!

And so I did.

I thought about my future self looking back at me and asking: Why didn’t you go when you had the chance?

I split my universe in two, like one of those old Choose Your Own Adventure books.

The woman who stayed. And the one who left.

New York

Wake up early. Workout. Drive to my first client. Then another. And another. Protein shake while answering text messages between sessions. Drop off a return at UPS. Pick something up on the way home. Figure out dinner. Shower. Collapse on the couch.

Go to bed.

Wake up.

Do it again.

I could see myself at sixty, still training clients, teaching yoga, health coaching. Still filling my calendar and making good money. Meeting the same friends at the same restaurants, laughing at stories we’d probably been telling for twenty years.

My house would be nicer. Maybe I’d finally renovate the damn bathroom.

There’d be money in the bank. My investments would have grown. I’d own more things. I’d certainly have more certainty.

My girls would have their own lives by then. I’d see them when I could. Birthdays, holidays, visits squeezed between everyone’s schedules.

And I’d travel once a year. I’d probably come to Italy for a few weeks every summer. Then somewhere around day ten, I’d feel it. That familiar ache.

Soon I have to go back.

Back to the calendar and the clients. Back to traffic. Back to a life I’d become extraordinarily competent at living. It wasn’t a bad life. That’s what made this so fucking hard. I could have stayed there forever.

Same. Safe. Small.

Florence

I saw heroism in a woman who chose to stalk her dream at any cost.

In my imagination she was slightly ridiculous, of course. Wild hair. Leather jacket thrown over a flowy dress. Sassy boots. Sitting at a café with her laptop open and a cappuccino going cold because she’s too busy pounding away at the keyboard.

Apparently my subconscious had cast me in an Italian movie.

But underneath the fantasy, I could see something. She was rested.

Her life was less certain and she probably had less money. Her income fluctuated. She couldn’t tell you exactly where she’d be living in five years. Maybe not even two.

That scared the shit out of her sometimes.

But strangely, she didn’t need as much either.

Money still mattered. I’m not delusional. This woman had bills to pay and a future to fund. I wasn’t planning on funding my old age with cappuccinos and self-discovery.

It just wasn’t the center of everything anymore.

She had time to walk somewhere because she wondered what was around the corner. She could spend an afternoon writing without immediately wondering how to monetize it. She’d sit across from people whose lives looked nothing like hers and have long conversations in another language.

Her world was bigger.

New people. Different cultures. Places she’d never been. Ideas she hadn’t considered because she’d spent most of her adult life surrounded by the familiar.

I imagined her traveling, writing a book, or doing nothing of the sort. I pictured her stumbling upon some entirely new thing that fifty-year-old me couldn’t possibly imagine yet.

That was kind of the point. She had room to find out.

And God, she wasn’t so fucking tired.

I’m not talking about the kind of tired that requires an early bedtime. I knew that tired well too.

This was the exhaustion of spending decades managing a life. Producing. Caregiving. Scheduling. Earning. Solving. Always anticipating what needed to happen next.

What happens when that lifts? That question fascinated me.

What might I actually have the energy for if most of it wasn’t spent simply keeping up?

Would I write more? Who would I meet? Where would I go? What parts of me had never gotten enough oxygen to develop?

I had absolutely no idea.

For once, that started to feel less like a problem.

The Florence woman might never earn what the New York woman earned. She might never have the same financial predictability. She might wake up at three in the morning occasionally wondering what the fuck she’d done.

Actually, I’m fairly certain she would.

But when I tried to imagine her at sixty, something about her felt more alive to me.

I couldn’t see the details. I didn’t know what her bank account looked like, where she lived, whether she’d stayed in Florence or wandered somewhere else entirely.

I couldn’t even tell you what she did for a living.

Ten years ago that would have terrified me.

Now it fascinates me.

Because the New York woman was easy to predict. I already knew her. I knew exactly how her life worked and who she would probably become if she kept living it.

But this other woman?

I wanted to meet her.

And maybe that was enough of a reason to go.

I love this life!

I have to be honest—I was never one to believe in fairy tales or happy endings. Life was something we endured. A constant struggle. A swim upstream.

At any given moment, we’re managing a loss, a marriage, a job, our children. We’re missing someone or needing to achieve something.

Don’t we always experience some kind of gap in our lives? Isn’t that just the way it is?

There are moments in between that bring relief. Fun outings with friends. Weekend trips with family. The nourishment of a warm bath or a hot cup of tea.

Those are the things that keep us trekking through.

But fulfillment was always fleeting. And there was always this discreet resignation within me that said:

I guess this is it.

Then there is this other part that absorbed the toxic positivity thrown in every direction. Social media proclaiming we have the power to turn ourselves into something sparkly and Yes! We can achieve all of our desires!

Just keep optimizing!

Somehow, hustle culture even found its way into wellness. Three-week courses designed to tap your way out of family trauma. Quantum-leap your way to bliss with breathwork. Manifest success with your thoughts!

And then we layer on the guilt of not doing enough.

Maybe if I breathe better? Sit in colder water? Sweat it out in a hotter sauna? Should I get the vagus nerve stimulator? A hyperbaric chamber? Maybe I just need more oxygen.

Or better thoughts.

Christ! Enough with the optimization!

The other day, I was sitting in a park when the sun broke through the trees and landed directly on me and the weathered bench. Like a connecting line between this world and the next. It spoke to me and said – it’s not as much about self-improvement as it is self- attunement.

There’s something to this trust thing people. It keeps revisiting me time and time again and I think I’m finally understanding it!

I listened to the pull that brought me here, and I’m feeling things I don’t remember ever feeling before.

Yes, I know. The adrenaline hasn’t worn off yet. New life hasn’t become regular life. Ask me again in February when it’s raining and I’m schlepping groceries up a Florentine hill.

But still.

Something feels different.

So let’s entertain an idea for a second.

What if there are places in the world that simply fit us better?

Not one predestined magical location with our name written on it (or maybe there is…because I’m beginning to wonder). But places where the pace, culture, beauty, climate, sensory environment and values interact with who we are in a way that makes living feel…..easier. Where coasting downstream is possible. A place where you naturally function at your best.

A place of belonging.

There’s actually some science behind this. Environmental psychology explores concepts like place identity and place attachment—the ways places become intertwined with our sense of self and the emotional bonds we form with them.

Which makes me wonder:

Can certain places permit different versions of ourselves to emerge?

Because when I climb the marble staircase to my Florence apartment, and step inside those ancient walls, I feel something…different.

Not the sparkly, optimized, I’ve finally figured out life! kind of happiness.

Like the old life of black and white has suddenly given way to a prism of color.

No explanation needed. Just a feeling. A reveling in a natural instinct that this is where I’m supposed to be……

Maybe it is…..or maybe time will help me discover something different….stay tuned…..

….till next time friends.

*Curious to know if any of this resonates with you. Do you think there is a place where your best self is freer to emerge?

I’m relishing the contrast between my former life and this budding new one, but transitions have a way of making us fumble through the unfamiliar. We need time to learn the notes before we can sing.

And right now, I’m delighting in the wondrous discoveries—the stumbles, the awkwardness, the minor bruises that come with finding my way through.

That morning, I put on my white flowered sundress and twirled in the mirror with ridiculous confidence. Silver hoops. Hair free of ties. Flip-flops. Leather bag.

Ready.

I took one more look around before heading out.

My apartment.

I love every tiny inch of it. The ancient walls too thick for cell service. The exposed wooden beams. The old window panels. The terrace covered in lush greenery.

And the church bells.

Oh, those church bells.

I seriously love those bells. Something about them soothes and comforts better than any warm cup of tea.

Another unexpected luxury of living alone: when you leave, you know exactly what you’re coming home to.

The same untouched space.

No surprises. No unexpected messes to clean.

And the leftovers are still waiting in the fridge.

I swaggered and sashayed anonymously through the streets of my new city, across the Arno, past the Duomo, the Uffizi, Santa Croce, and finally to my destination:

Italian class.

Today begins routine. Structure. And new people!

Something that has always lit me up is meeting people from different backgrounds and cultures. When I visit somewhere new, it’s never only about the scenery. It’s the people. Their customs, rituals, beliefs, traditions. The way they move through their days.

And apparently, people from all over the world want to learn how to speak Italian.

I was placed in an intermediate class because my conversational Italian is strong—although my grammar leaves a lot to be desired—which meant my new friends and I could actually have full conversations together.

In Italian.

And what a collection of humans they were.

Betany from Finland told us about her adventures as a professional opera singer. Jose from Venezuela is taking a sabbatical from practicing law to travel through Italy and study Italian. Twenty-something Julia from Colorado is blissfully in love with an Italian man and determined to become even more fluent than she already is.

Walter from the Netherlands left his job in tax law to travel and learn even more languages than he already knows. Alta, from the Dominican Republic, is a self-made, successful Manhattan attorney working remotely for two months so she can become fluent in yet another language.

Why?

Just because.

There were others from Germany, Austria, Brazil, England, Australia…

Each carrying a story.

Each arriving with pieces of wherever they’d come from.

Each, for reasons entirely their own, choosing to be here.

After class, I wandered aimlessly.

Just because I could.

I let myself get lost in the jaw-dropping, man-made beauty of Renaissance Florence. At one point, I stood beneath a vast painted dome and tilted my head toward the heavens—figures and colors swirling upward, layer upon layer, until they seemed to disappear into the light.

I thought:

This is what reaching toward the heavens must feel like.

Every once in a while, life gives us one of those rare moments when time slows to a halt.

For a few seconds, there is nowhere else to be. Nothing else to become.

Your soul is free to wander the enchanted garden that is your birthright.

I stood staring for what felt like hours, almost afraid to move because moving might break the spell.

And then I realized I was doing that thing we do.

Trying to hold on to a moment while I was still inside it.

So I loosened my grip.

And somewhere in that stillness I heard my brother’s voice.

Go and play, Val.

Set yourself free.

Become a character in your own story.

Let new identities roar from rooftops.

Step into the life you dared to live.

And with that, I turned around and thought:

YES!

Five minutes after making my grand entrance into my bold new life, my mind revved in eager anticipation to do…something.

Once the mania of getting my (perfectly adorable) apartment unpacked and organized in every possible cozy way, I settled into a strange calm of a woman in motion. The volume of that deafening need to produce and do, slackened just enough for me to notice the ache that lies underneath. The one that struggles with slowing the fuck down.

All the boxes were checked.

Cozy apartment—check.
Neighborhood scouting—check.
Gym membership—check.
Italian school registration—check.
Modified client schedule—check.

Okay. Now what?

My keep-going, never-stopping self couldn’t help but squirm, half expecting the productivity police to knock down my door and catch me mid-exhale.

Am I always going to feel like I’m supposed to be doing something?

Some task. Some list. Some job. Some relationship. Some problem to solve. Something that hands me back my sense of completeness and says:

Okay. Now you’ve earned the right to take up space.

Oof.

Because this time-out-of-ordinary-time wasn’t supposed to be about skipping the soul-searching and jumping straight into job-searching.

This is where my real work begins.

The undoing is what requires every ounce of strength and persistence. Doing comes naturally. Give me a goal, a problem, a deadline, a person who needs something—I’m your girl.

Doing is the water I’ve been swimming in. Insisting that actions and production further us toward some sort of promise land is part of our distorted delusion - and it’s part of what kept me stuck in the muck.

More, more, more.

Do more. Have more. Produce more.

If only I had more time, more money, more success, more connection…then…

Then what?

This perpetual yearning is partly human. I get it. We are species born with a soft ache that keeps us longing. We’re in search of a spiritual home and no amount of yoga, manifesting, self-medicating, money—or apparently move to Italy— will ever cure us.

But combine that natural ache with a culture constantly telling us that progress is mandatory, that we should always be optimizing, achieving, becoming something more?

It’s pretty easy to spend an entire life swirling around in the land of never enough and what’s next?

Does that mean I throw my hands up? Abandon ambition? Of course not.

I don’t want to stop doing. I couldn’t even if I tried.

I want to stop needing to do in order to feel worthy.

So, I’ve decided to give myself an assignment.

Because, let’s be real, I’m not going to undo decades of programming in a few uninterrupted mornings on a Florentine terrace.

My assignment is to use this space, this container, this move, to become more intimate with the ache.

Is it the natural longing—or is it something else? Am I reaching for a task because I genuinely want to, or because stillness makes me uncomfortable?

When does ambition feel expansive—and when does it become proof of worth?

Notice the urge to immediately fill an empty afternoon. Solve the next problem. Build the next thing.

And then, every once in a while…

don’t.

And see what happens.

And yes, I fully appreciate the irony that I’ve just created a productivity plan for becoming less emmeshed with productivity.

Baby steps, people.

Even my undoing needs a checklist.

*There’s more to come—the adapting to Florentine life, the sensory overload of sights, smells, and sounds, the finding of routines, schedules, and even a social life.

Stay tuned…

And if anything I’ve written resonates, feel free to share, like, or comment.

Not that I’ll be using engagement as some kind of productivity test or anything…👀

I’m not going to lie or sugarcoat things. That’s not what I do here. I’ve committed myself to full transparency. You’re getting the unedited version.

Because life is unedited.

There is no manuscript. No neatly laid-out plan or guidebook. It’s an unscripted, chaotic tundra that can feel lawless and barren one minute—and like a scene from Mary Poppins the next.

August 7th — Sicily.

This year was different.

That familiar ache was gone. The one that usually hovered above me like a dark cloud, reminding me that soon this fairy-tale utopia of sun-drenched beach days and all-you-can-eat gelato would be over. Somewhere in the distance, there was always a plane approaching, ready to carry me back to the grind.

Except, no.

Not this time.

There was no plane coming to take me back.

Time slowed like one of those melting Dalí clocks.

I took space. Took stock. Looked out to where the sea meets the horizon and thought:

Holy shit.

This is happening.

I rode that wave for a day or two. The one that feels almost divine. Like an infant whose only job is to be completely absorbed in whatever is right in front of her. I surrendered to it. Let myself stop anticipating what came next. Gave myself permission to frolic and play.

It didn’t last long.

Soon, the bliss came crashing down—and everything came tumbling with it.

This is the part I’m ashamed to tell you.

Because, dear reader, I will have you know that this lovely, mindful yoga teacher…

can rage.

When my nervous system sounds the fire alarm, something in me can flip. Rational thought leaves the building, my body takes over, and some red-eyed demonic version of myself grabs the wheel.

I wish I could tell you I’m exaggerating for effect.

I’m not.

It takes a lot to get me there. It doesn’t happen often. But when it does, I can become reactive, loud, and very unlike the person I work so hard to be.

And yet—that person is me, too.

That may be the most uncomfortable part of this story.

The flawed parts of me somehow made it in the suitcase too.

Because reinvention doesn’t mean becoming someone new. I didn’t get to leave the inconvenient parts of myself at JFK. As Jon Kabat-Zinn reminds us, wherever we go, there we are.

So what happened? What pushed me far enough to lose it?

That part doesn’t really matter. And more importantly, it isn’t entirely my story to tell.

What is mine to tell is this:

I thought I had failed as a mother.

For the remainder of my time in Sicily, I wrestled with the possibility that I had somehow recreated the very relationship I’d spent my adult life trying not to recreate—the one I had with my own mother.

The thought made me sick with fear.

But eventually, something else occurred to me.

Perhaps I wasn’t losing my daughter.

Perhaps I was being asked to let go of the version of her that belonged to me.

Maybe entering this season of freedom requires something I hadn’t anticipated: releasing some of the identities I’ve spent decades holding onto.

And that includes who I am as a mother.

What I’m learning is that as our children grow into adults, our relationship with them grow-up, too. Sometimes that transition is graceful. Sometimes it creates a rupture that feels irreparable.

Those can be the most transformative of all.

So, folks, apparently this is what happens when you dismantle your old life: you quickly get hit with the hard truth that freedom, grief, motherhood, identity, old patterns, and all your unresolved shit come along for the ride.

The difference is, this time I’ve deliberately created space for it.

Stay tuned for the raw, the real, and occasionally, the ugly.

Because this part of the adventure was only the beginning.

Next stop: Florence.

Where dream meets reality.

I'm staring at that tire swing with an ache deep in my chest.

The same yard. The same tire swing.

The same view I've looked out on for nearly twenty years.

And yet today, nothing feels the same.

There is no end to the reminders of what I'm leaving behind.

The weeks leading up to this day have been emotionally chaotic. There were moments I felt trapped in my own cobwebs of anxiety—those What the hell am I doing? moments that had me arguing with myself.

Forget the whole thing.

Just stay, dammit.

This is harder than I imagined.

Goodbyes have a way of sneaking up on you.

I've been saying them secretly for weeks.

The familiar grocery clerk: This may be the last time I see you...and possibly the last jar of crunchy American peanut butter I'll buy for a while.

The geese at our neighborhood pond—the little family I've watched since the goslings first hatched. Now they're nearly grown.

Good luck, adolescent geese.

You've got this.

And then there were the heart-wrenching goodbyes.

The ones you pray aren't really goodbye.

Just...

Arrivederci.

Until we meet again.

My clients.

There's a special kind of intimacy that develops when you walk into someone's home week after week, year after year. You step into their lives, and whether you intend to or not, they slowly become part of yours.

I'm not just leaving a job.

I'm leaving a life.

Ironically, the sameness that had once felt like a dull shade of gray suddenly burst into color.

Everything I had longed to leave became almost impossible to let go.

Time stood still during that final hour before the Uber arrived.

I sat motionless, staring at the four walls that had witnessed so much of my life. The air felt thick. Heavy.

This. Is. It.

There is no turning back now.

Everything is packed.

Everything is ready.

There is nothing left to do...

...but go.

#midlife #FlorenceItaly #emptynest #wings #NewBeginnings #MidlifeTransformation #reinvention #lifeabroad #newadventures

How does someone pack the last essentials of a familiar life and ship them off toward uncertainty?

It didn’t happen overnight.

When the days and weeks and months began blurring into one long beige car ride to nowhere—despite the perfectly programmed GPS—one question kept playing on repeat:

Is this it?

Julia was living her life independently, barely needing me as she navigated her final years of high school. Ava had taken root in New York City, thriving and building a life of her own.

And me?

I was somewhere between crisis and growth. Between who I had been and who I was becoming.

I kept waiting for a hand to reach down from the sky and hand me an instruction manual. I’d imagine standing in my kitchen on an ordinary Tuesday morning, making an espresso, when suddenly—boom!—the answer would appear. Instantly, on that completely unremarkable day, with too much to do, I’d know exactly what came next.

That day never came. (Damn.)

So I did the next obvious thing.

I reread the self-help books lining my shelves. I practiced visualization and loving-kindness. I meditated again, hoping to quiet the temper tantrum of unsolicited thoughts. I hugged my inner child. I revisited old wounds and old journals. I went on retreats and walked sacred paths that I was certain would lead me to freedom.

What all of it ultimately taught me was something much simpler: Trust.

Trust my instincts more than my conditioning. Trust my capabilities. Trust the unseen parts of life that don't always make sense.

Trust has never come naturally to me. We have history.

Learning to connect with that deeper self—the steady part that doesn't doubt or waver, the part that seems to have a direct line to something far greater than me—has taken years. And honestly, I'm still getting to know her.

The fear of uncertainty hasn't disappeared. It's just not as loud anymore.

What has grown louder is the quiet nudge I've spent years pushing aside. Looking back, I realize the answer wasn't something I needed to find. It was something I needed to trust. For someone who has spent a lifetime searching for certainty before taking the leap, that's no small thing.

Maybe this move to Florence, at fifty years old, isn't just about moving to another country. Maybe it's the greatest act of trust I've ever asked of myself.

It's not an escape. It's an act of honoring a longing that has been patiently waiting for me, despite every hesitation.

Can I explain it rationally? Not completely.

It would be like asking a painter why she paints or a singer why he sings. Some things aren’t meant to be justified. They’re meant to be lived.

Maybe my rational mind would tell you I’m an explorer. Someone who needs to leave familiar ground every so often—not to run away from life, but to grow more deeply into it.

Maybe it would tell you that even though this feels financially risky, sometimes we need an intermission from our carefully constructed lives to make room for possibility. The kind of possibility that routine—and an overworked, exhausted, neglected version of ourselves—can never reveal.

Maybe it would tell you this is an investment in my future. A deliberate decision to step outside my comfort zone and discover parts of myself that never had enough room to emerge.

But more than anything, it reminds me of this: Stop postponing your life for someday.

Our somedays are no longer infinite. Now is the time to build the second half. So I’m finally choosing to trust the quiet nudge that first whispered to me years ago.

The one that, little by little, has finally become louder than my fear.

What's your nudge? The one you've been pushing aside for "someday?"

#midlife #MidlifeTransformation #emptynest #NewBeginnings #separation #FlorenceItaly #reinvention #lifeabroad #wings

A bold, daring, slightly terrifying thing that once felt far too impossible even to think out loud.



For years, I kept this dream tucked away in a quiet corner of my heart, visiting it only in secret moments when no one was looking.

I told myself it was ridiculous. Too complicated. Irresponsible.

What about the mortgage? The college tuition? The career that took years to build?

Where is the sanity in chasing butterflies when reality is pressing down on my shoulders?

"Be responsible. Be dependable. Be realistic."

That disciplinary voice, filled with fear and authority, kept the longing quiet enough to keep me in the grind. After all, who was I to leave the "real world" in pursuit of some romantic, fairy-tale?

Saying NO to the wild love within us keeps us trapped in a dim world of self-negotiation. Something in us aches for the impossible because deep down we know it actually is possible. It's simply waiting for our permission.

When we restrain ourselves, we only see a restrained world.

Here I am—a separated, empty nester in midlife. If not now…when? This season isn't asking me to hold on tighter. It's encouraging me to let go.

To reinvent. It’s a time ripe for change.

A final calling to step into the mystery of intuition. To honor this ever-present nagging instinct and finally say YES.

I first seriously considered moving abroad - specifically Italy - after my brother’s passing. His loss nudged the idea out from hiding. When I promised him I would live for the both of us now, I felt him whisper back:

Then do the thing.

That was before Ava decided to spend her graduate year in Europe, and Julia was fully committed to the University of Amsterdam.

Once I finally said yes to this sacred invitation, life began moving in ways I never could have orchestrated myself. Doors opened. Obstacles softened. The impossible slowly became possible.

And with every careful step, my faith grew stronger.

So...

On August 6th, I'll board a one-way flight out of New York.

I'm moving to Florence.

There is so much more to this story, and I can't wait to share it with you.

Why Italy? Why Florence before Sicily? What first sparked this dream? What fears almost kept me from going? How did I finally decide to leap?

This isn't just a move.

It feels like something bigger.

And I'd love for you to come along for the journey.

Stay tuned…..

#midlife #NewBeginnings #reinvention #midlifejourney #EmptyNest #seperation #florenceitaly #lifeabroad

Graduation. College Drop-off. Empty Nest.

My youngest reached her rite of passage—her Independence Day. A declaration of sovereignty. The end of one era, the beginning of another.

I knew this day was coming. I’ve been feeling it in fits and starts throughout her entire senior year: the college applications, the prom-date hysteria, the graduation parties, the senior trips. Still, here we are sitting with free-floating grief while navigating the space between two life stages.

Our children aren’t the only ones venturing into new territory when they leave. As they spread their wings, we’re called to reimagine home, relationships, interests, and ultimately, our own identity.

Motherhood was my salvation. It forced me to fully show up and invest in living. I did it for their sake and saved myself in the process. That’s the irony. I didn’t lose myself in motherhood—I discovered myself through it.

All the pursuits and life plans I spent years chasing lost their urgency the moment I first looked into my daughter’s eyes. There, in my arms, was my greatest purpose.

When I watched her walk across that graduation stage, something shifted. It felt like an adjustment from a cosmic chiropractor, slipping everything into place. From the bedtime snuggles and kissed boo-boos to the heartbreaks and boyfriend drama—we have arrived.

This is what we prepared her for. Independence Day. And damn, we did a good job.

She is ready.

There is nothing empty about today. On the contrary, it’s soul-full— “for this I came”.

Life moving forward will be different, but rich with possibility. It aligns beautifully with the midlife reset. The re-nesting. The opportunity to evolve into something new or rediscover parts of us that may have been waiting patiently in the wings—now seen through fresh eyes, greater wisdom, and deeper appreciation.

Here’s to new adventures. For us all……

When the kids leave and the house falls quiet, I will admit, the silence can be deafening. And if you’re in the throes of hormonal perimenopausal madness, beware of full-blown hysteria.

But here’s the truth: Midlife is a reset button. Without even asking for it, life grabs us by the shoulders, sometimes with a whisper sometimes with a shake, and reminds us that time is growing short. We’re no longer looking at an endless road ahead. We’ve checked the boxes: the degree, the spouse, the kids, the house. The next destination isn’t as clearly defined.

And here is where we encounter the crossroad – crisis or growth (or for many of us, it’s both).

The questions begin to surface. What do I really want? What’s next? What truly makes me feel satisfied? Fulfilled? And those childhood wounds we’ve tucked away while chasing life’s to-dos - they haven’t vanished. They’ve been lurking behind every heartbreak and battled storm, shaping our choices and our decisions. Either we keep wandering through the same dark alleys, or we finally stitch ourselves whole again.

And here’s the thing: living all these years has taught us a few valuable lessons. We’ve learned that we don’t need to conform or play by anyone else’s rules. With greater confidence, we carve our own path—shedding expectations and choosing the direction that feels true. We’ve grown more attuned to the rhythms of our heart and the wisdom of our spirit, and we’ve learned to listen with trust.

This stage isn’t an end, it’s a beginning. It’s when we plant the flagpole and unapologetically claim ourselves. We have spent years trekking through the wild woods and digging ourselves out of trenches; now it’s time to build sanctuaries within and become fluent in the language of our own needs. We’ve earned this; now it’s time to own it.

And then ignite the spark. Be bold. Live out loud. Take the adventure, launch the venture, learn to paint, sing, pick up that long-forgotten hobby, go on that date, write that book, audition for the play.

Because midlife isn’t where the story fades. It’s where it finally gets interesting.

Valerie