How to Stop Fearing Ageing and Start Embracing Your Best Years Yet

26 Oct 2026 · 1 h 06 min · Episode 35

Episode How to Stop Fearing Ageing and Start Embracing Your Best Years Yet

0:00 1:05:55

Most of us were handed three stages of womanhood and then silence. There is a fourth one, and midlife sits right in the middle of it.

In this episode I sit down with Ali Knight to talk about the four stages of womanhood, and the one most of us have never been told about: Maga, the years between motherhood and elderhood. Ali explains why this stage can feel like losing yourself when it is actually a return to yourself, why midlife anger is valid rather than just hormonal, and why we are not a problem that needs fixing. This conversation changed how I feel about aging, and I think it will do the same for you.

Key Takeaways

-Anger in midlife is information, not a symptom to be managed. It usually points at injustice, and putting everything down to hormones lets everyone else off the hook.

-Two opposite things can be true at the same time. You can grieve a version of your life and feel excited about the next one without having to choose between them.

-Resentment is the signal that a boundary has been crossed, and usually crossed a long way back.

-Ali’s daily practice: ask what is happening in my head, what is happening in my heart, what is happening in my body. Three answers give you something to act on.

Timestamp:

The Four Stages Of Womanhood Explained (00:00)

Motherhood Burnout And Lost Boundaries (07:00)

What Is The Maga Phase (08:55)

When Alcohol Stops Working In Midlife (18:32)

Midlife Is Not A Decline (26:29)

Why Am I Angry In Midlife (39:20)

Perimenopause Is Not A Problem (53:38)

How To Navigate Midlife Change (58:11)

Struggling to know what to do when stress, boredom or big emotions hit?

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Ali Knight is a coach and facilitator who works with women through the natural phases of womanhood, drawing on the work of women like Jane Hardwick Collings and Hoppy Wimbush. Her focus is the Maga phase, the years between outward nurture and elderhood, which she frames as a time of sovereignty, truth telling and self permission rather than decline. At 50, having reached menopause herself and having stepped away from a marriage that no longer fit, she speaks about this stage from lived experience as well as practice. She has been a guest speaker inside my Rediscovering Me program and my membership, The Hub, and she writes on Instagram and a newly launched Substack.

Website: https://www.aliknightcoaching.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/aliknight_soulmedicine

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ali.knight.111/

-One to one soul coaching: https://www.aliknightcoaching.com/one-to-one-offerings

-Retreats, small group gatherings in beautiful places: https://www.aliknightcoaching.com/retreats

-Group spaces, programmes, immersions and ceremonies through the year: https://www.aliknightcoaching.com/groupspaces

-SoulKin Circle, her new group space, waitlist here: https://www.aliknightcoaching.com/soulkin-waitlist

-Soul Tools, her free and paid resources: https://www.aliknightcoaching.com/soul-tools

Sarah Rusbatch is an accredited Health and Wellbeing Coach and one of Australia’s leading experts on grey area drinking. Her podcast, Stronger, Bolder, Wiser, is the go-to space for women who are questioning their relationship with alcohol, navigating life alcohol-free, or simply curious about what life could look like on the other side of the bottle.

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