Why Am I Here? Finding Your Purpose in Midlife
"For many, midlife becomes a period of deeper self-discovery and the courage to prioritize the self in ways they haven't before."
I think about that line a lot in my work with women. Not because midlife is the only time this question shows up, but because it's one of the loudest times it shows up.
You've probably felt some version of this before. Starting university and wondering who you're supposed to become. Deciding whether or not to start a family, and what your life is for if you don't. Every major threshold in life tends to come with the same quiet, uncomfortable question underneath it: why am I here, and what am I going to fill my time and energy with, spend my money on? Midlife, generally understood as the years between 40 and 65, is just the latest and often the loudest version of that question. The kids need less of you. The career has either plateaued or become familiar in a way that no longer stretches you. The next few decades are wide open, and instead of that feeling exciting, it can also feel disorienting.
Here's what I notice with a lot of the women I work with: most of us go through life without ever actually identifying our purpose. We build careers, raise families, keep households running, and somewhere in the middle of all that doing, we never stop to ask what any of it is actually in service of. WHY are we doing it? WHERE is it leading us?
Purpose can sound like a lofty word, the kind of thing you'd find on a vision board, and when your days already feel a little empty, the idea of identifying your purpose can feel entirely out of reach. Where do you even start when you're not sure there's anything underneath the question at all?
Why Purpose Matters
The discomfort you're feeling has a name, even if it doesn't always get named. Boredom. The sense that you're wasting time. A quiet, persistent wondering about why you're here at all. These are existential questions, and they're worth taking seriously at any stage of life, but especially now, as you figure out who you are and how you want to live the second half of it.
I've written before about the particular loneliness that shows up in midlife, the kind that comes from a full life on paper that still feels quietly empty, and about the identity questions that surface when the roles that used to define you start to shift. Purpose is closely tied to both of those. When you don't have a clear sense of what you're building toward, connection gets harder to find because you're not sure what you're looking for in the first place, and identity gets shakier because you're defining yourself by what you do for other people rather than by what actually matters to you.
What an Empty Calendar Actually Costs You
If your days stretch out before you in a way that feels more unsettling than freeing, purpose is part of what's missing. It's not just about having something to do. It's about having something that helps you choose what you fill your time with, rather than defaulting to whatever fills the space, whether that's scrolling, overcommitting, or busying yourself with things that don't actually mean anything to you.
There's a real parallel here to healthy boundaries. Purpose, like a good boundary, helps you be fully in or fully out of the things you choose. When you know what you're actually here for, you can say yes to the people and activities that align with that and mean it, without the resentment that builds when you're just filling time. And you can say no to the rest without guilt, because you're not measuring your worth by how much you're doing.
Giving to others and receiving from them is usually at the centre of what provides that sense of purpose, and it's not incidental that this also happens to be good for the people around you. A woman who knows what she's here for tends to show up more fully, and that ripples out. It contributes to healthier families, healthier friendships, and a healthier community, not because she's trying to be a good example, but because she's no longer operating from an empty tank.
What Purpose Can Look Like
There's real research behind this, not just intuition. A Stanford study led by psychologist Anne Colby followed close to 1,200 adults in midlife and found that people whose goals extended beyond themselves, things like improving the lives of others or building something for their community, reported significantly higher well-being than those pursuing purely self-focused goals. In her words, those who were purposeful beyond the self said their lives were filled with joy and happiness. Separate research out of Harvard's School of Public Health found that adults with a stronger sense of purpose showed measurably better physical outcomes years later, including a 13 to 14 percent lower likelihood of decline in grip strength and walking speed for every increase in purpose scores. Purpose isn't just a nice idea. It has a physical signature.
So what does it actually tend to look like in practice? Most people find it through some combination of the following:
Giving time to others, whether that's driving cancer patients to appointments, caring for animals at a rescue centre, volunteering with a local Boys & Girls Club, or something as simple and consistent as babysitting for a neighbour or your own grandchildren.
Connecting with spirituality, whether through a church, mosque, or other faith community, or through smaller, quieter forms of that, like leading a small group or helping out with childcare on Sundays.
Helping others learn and grow, through mentoring, teaching, or guiding younger colleagues or young adults through decisions you've already made.
Giving financially to causes you believe in, whether that's a mission organization, a cancer charity, or a local program that matters to you.
Creative expression, whether that's writing, painting, or making music, tends to be an underrated source of purpose, especially for women who put creative pursuits aside for decades while they built a career or raised a family.
Mentoring within your professional field, not as a formal program but as the kind of relationship where you're actively helping someone earlier in their career navigate what you've already figured out.
Civic or community involvement, sitting on a local board, advocating for something you care about, or simply becoming the kind of engaged neighbour who shows up.
Where to Start
Before you try to answer the big question of what your purpose is, it helps to start smaller. What sparked a moment of real joy for you recently, even something small? What skill do you have that's connected to that joy? And is there a need in the world, in your community, in your family, that skill could actually fill?
From there, you can widen the lens. What brings you joy, broadly, not just today but as a pattern across your life? What unique challenges have you faced, and what did they teach you that someone else might need to hear? What actually matters most to you, not what you've been told should matter? What are your genuine strengths, and how could those strengths help someone else?
These aren't meant to be answered in one sitting. They're meant to be sat with, revisited, and adjusted as you learn more about yourself in this season. The goal isn't to land on one perfect, permanent purpose. It's to get specific enough that you can start making different choices about how you spend your time, your energy, and your money, choices that actually feel like yours.
If you're in the middle of asking these questions and finding it hard to answer them alone, that's exactly the kind of work I do with women in Surrey, White Rock, Langley, and online throughout BC. You can book a free consultation to see if I'm a good fit for you.
Sources
Suttie, J. (2018, March 8). How to Find Your Purpose in Midlife. Greater Good Magazine, UC Berkeley. https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/how_to_find_your_purpose_in_midlife
Dick, B. (2025, September 11). Rediscovering Your 'Why': Finding Purpose & Passion in Your 40s. Bonafide. https://hellobonafide.com/blogs/news/finding-purpose-menopause
Valente, S. (2024, November 21). Here's How I'm Unleashing Power and Purpose At Age 40. The Good Trade. https://www.thegoodtrade.com/features/how-to-turn-forty/
