Most of us don’t intentionally design our lifestyle—we just fall into patterns. Our calendars fill up, commitments stack up, and before long we’re busy but not always aligned with where we truly want to be. Goals end up being put off, sometimes for another year because of misalignment. Designing your lifestyle with intention requires a deliberate pause to assess where you are, what truly matters in this season, and what no longer fits.
At mid-career or halftime of life, this isn’t about starting over—it’s about making thoughtful adjustments and decisions. By regularly evaluating the road ahead, you can simplify, prioritize, and move forward with clarity instead of feeling overwhelmed. In this show and article, we’ll walk through several foundational principles to help you do exactly that, starting with our core values.
The Foundation of Intentional Living: Strong Core Values
Maximizing Skills You've Already Earned
Affirming Experience Instead of Starting Over
Experience is not baggage—it’s leverage. Every success, misstep, and lesson has refined your discernment. At this stage of life, experience allows you to recognize patterns quickly, avoid unnecessary detours, and choose alignment over approval. Most startups that eventually find huge success have faced huge failures. Here are some examples: Rejected by investors and nearly broke, the founders of Airbnb famously sold cereal boxes to survive before refining their model and building a global hospitality brand. Sara Blakely of Spanx faced years of rejection from manufacturers and retailers before her bootstrapped idea became a category-defining company. James Dyson created over 5,000 failed prototypes and was turned down by major companies before successfully launching his own Dyson vacuum brand. You can find many of these stories on the podcast How I Built This with Guy Raz.
Intentional lifestyle design affirms your story rather than dismissing it. The question shifts from “What do I need to become?” to “How do I best use who I already am?” This perspective replaces pressure with confidence and opens space for purposeful growth rather than frantic reinvention. It’s also a lesson in perseverance and tenacity. Don’t give up too soon.
Pursuing Relationships that Support Your Dreams
Relationships shape lifestyle more than most people realize. The people you spend time with influence your mindset, energy, and expectations. Designing your lifestyle with intention requires honest evaluation of relationships. Which ones encourage growth? Which provide accountability and perspective? Which drain energy or keep you anchored to outdated versions of yourself?
This doesn’t require abandoning people—it requires prioritizing proximity wisely. A small circle of supportive relationships often does more for fulfillment than a large network of shallow connections. In my book Women at Halftime, I introduce relationship circles as a way to be intentional about who we allow closest to us in this season of life. Not every relationship belongs in our inner circle—and that’s both healthy and necessary. Our closest circle includes those who know us deeply and support us consistently, while outer circles hold meaningful but more seasonal or limited connections. As life shifts at halftime, these circles naturally change, and becoming intentional about them helps protect our energy, set healthy boundaries, and nurture relationships that support who we are becoming next.
Inserting Time with Family--on Purpose
Family time rarely happens by accident. At mid-career, family dynamics often shift as children grow more independent while parents need increased care—placing many of us in the sandwich generation. This season brings competing emotional, time, and financial demands that can quietly pull us in multiple directions. Intentional living means deciding how present you want to be—not just how available—and making family-centered choices before exhaustion makes them for you.
Designing family rhythms—shared meals, travel, traditions, or regular check-ins—creates connection and memories that endure. Presence, not perfection, defines meaningful family time. The time we took to spend with our parents before losing them is some of the most precious memories we currently keep in our hearts. For about five years, instead of physical gifts, we intentionally gave gifts to spend time together, which ultimately was a gift to us as we remembered those special times.
Turning Intention into Action with Clear Priorities
Intentional lifestyles require clear priorities. Not everything can carry equal weight. Without prioritization, even good opportunities become burdens. It is so easy to let the urgent take over the necessary. I guarantee this happens to most of us. In fact, it’s why I keep my 10-minute timer in my office for certain projects. It’s old-fashioned, but it works, especially for creatives like myself.
Clear priorities help translate values into daily decisions. They reduce overwhelm, protect energy, and restore margins of time. Saying no becomes easier when priorities are visible and honored. And this is why reviewing quarterly goals both personally and professionally is so helpful. Design happens when priorities show up on the calendar—not just on a list.
Application: Living Aligned, Not Rushed
Sometimes I hesitate to take the time for a bath—but every time I do, I’m reminded how necessary it is. It gives me space to relax, read, and reset my thinking. Not everyone has a bathtub, of course, but we all need something that helps us pause and refocus. Designing your lifestyle with intention doesn’t remove challenges or the need to step away—it simply reduces regret. When values guide decisions, skills are used well, experience is honored, relationships are chosen wisely, family time is protected, and priorities are clear. Thus, life feels aligned instead of rushed.
This is the heart of intentional living: choosing alignment over autopilot and purpose over pressure. You are not starting over—you are intentionally moving forward.
Here are three steps you can apply right now:
- Write down your top three core values for this season of your life.
- Identify one skill, along with experience, you want to use more intentionally.
- Make one calendar change that reflects your priorities.
Additional Resources
Goal Setting Worksheets-free download!
Hero Mountain Summit- a 5-month "Power of After" journey to help you answer "What's Next?" with your desired lifestyle & maximized skills and experience.
Power of After: What’s Next Can Be Your Most Purposeful Chapter by Deborah Johnson
Stop Circling: Steps to Escape Endless Roundabouts by Deborah Johnson
By regularly evaluating the road ahead, you can simplify, prioritize, and move forward with clarity instead of feeling overwhelmed.
deborah johnson
Thought Leader, Keynote Speaker, Author
If you are interested in growing and learning, check out our online courses here: Online Learning
1,341 words
