Episode #434 – Don’t Miss the Life You’re Actually Living

This is episode 434 of the Brilliant Balance podcast. Don’t miss the life you’re actually living.

I want to start today with a moment where I really recognized this in myself. It wasn’t a dramatic one. It wasn’t a day of crisis. It was just a quiet realization I had recently.

I was sitting at my kitchen counter with a cup of coffee early on a weekend morning. The house was really quiet. I had a journal out, and I was getting ready to leave for a Pilates class that wasn’t starting for a little while. I remember thinking, This is good. This is a good moment.

And that lasted about three seconds.

Then I thought, I should empty the dishwasher. I should put a load of laundry in. Did I remember to send that email? Did anyone bring in the Amazon packages? This whole flood of thoughts started coming into my mind.

It was like I was present for the moment—sort of—but also hovering a few inches above it, evaluating it and mentally preparing for the next thing. I was managing the moment instead of inhabiting it, skipping through something that was actually pretty darn good.

I couldn’t stay there. I had to catch myself as I was ready to skip right out of the moment.

And I hear versions of this from women in our coaching community all the time.

I work with a lot of women who have really good lives. They’ve built meaningful careers. They have great families. They’ve made thoughtful choices to create these lives. They didn’t just wander into them.

But there’s this clear restlessness—this sense of always looking for the next thing. They know it. And at the same time, they’re aware that they don’t want to miss this. They want to be more deeply present.

Recently, someone brought this exact issue to a Spotlight session in our BOLD Circle. Spotlight sessions are where we do peer coaching—getting eyes on a core issue someone is facing and drawing from the lived experience of the group.

What she said was, “I really want to build practices so that I can stay present in my life.”

It stuck with me because it resonated so deeply. I think a lot of us miss important moments in our lives. We’re technically there, but we’re not fully inhabiting them.

So today I want to talk about how that happens—not in a dramatic, life-is-ending way, but through subtle patterns you might recognize in yourself. I see capable women fall into these all the time. I certainly do.

And once you can see them clearly, you can start dancing with them a little—figuring out how to step back into your life without changing everything, just by noticing.

The first pattern is treating the season you’re in as a placeholder.

This is when we act like the current moment doesn’t really count. Once things calm down. Once the kids are older. Once work settles down. This is just something to get through.

On the surface, that sounds reasonable. You’re not denying reality—you’re acknowledging that you’re steering toward something.

But when we live like the future destination is the one that counts and this is just the bridge, we miss what’s actually here.

It reminds me of taking my family on vacation. For years, it felt like the trip didn’t count—the packing, the drive to the airport, the flight, the return home. Only the destination mattered.

Eventually I reframed it: It all counts. The packing counts. The airport counts. The flight counts. It’s all part of the experience.

When we treat this chapter as just a placeholder, we tell ourselves we don’t have to be present yet. We’re in the waiting room before real life begins.

But that’s dangerous—because at some point, the on-ramp is the journey.

Preparation and milestones are useful, but if everything is about arrival, you can become detached from your actual life.

So I want you to sit with this: Are you treating this chapter as transitional?

If you are, don’t put your life on hold until it passes. Even on a messy day or a messy month, is there one thing you can fully show up for?

The second pattern is living in the future.

This is different from placeholders. This is living one step ahead of yourself—using your attention to smooth what’s coming next.

You’re at dinner, but you’re planning bedtime. You’re in a good moment, but thinking about what follows it.

I remember watching my kids take surf lessons in California. It was one of those perfect moments—they were excited, trying something new, doing great.

And all I could think about was the sand. The wetsuits. The rental car. How we were going to get everyone changed and back across the highway.

That wasn’t congruent with enjoying the moment.

This shows up everywhere. The kids are playing outside, and we’re thinking about dinner.

It’s not anxiety—it’s competence without an off switch. You’re so good at anticipating and planning that every moment becomes a bridge to the next one. Nothing ever feels complete.

If we stop treating every moment as a means to an end—How does this advance the story?—we can return to presence.

We can inhabit the moment instead of managing around it.

Many of us are living slightly ahead of ourselves. We’re not where our feet are—we’re where our head is, three steps ahead.

The third pattern is not letting the good land.

We often feel subtly uncomfortable when things are good—not because we don’t appreciate them, but because enjoyment can feel fragile, indulgent, or vulnerable.

So we deflect. It’s not good enough yet. Let’s not get too excited.

We deny ourselves pleasure, success, and joy. Our enjoyment is highly regulated.

But being present requires fully experiencing the good—the joy, delight, awe, connection, and pleasure.

If you never practice letting it land—dropping into the moment and asking, How does this feel?—your life can look beautiful from the outside but feel unsettled on the inside.

Ease, at least the way we talk about it at Brilliant Balance, isn’t about things being easy. It’s about allowing yourself to be in the flow of what’s already here.

These three patterns reinforce each other. Treating chapters as placeholders, living ahead of yourself, and denying enjoyment braid together.

The result is a life that looks full—but isn’t fully lived.

You don’t miss your life all at once. You miss it in inches. Moment by moment. In the goodness you minimize. In the days you tell yourself don’t count.

And when you live that way, you don’t make memories. You’re not dropped in enough.

Every day holds something that can become a memory. One of the most powerful practices is noticing—anchoring into the moment and soaking it in, like taking a mental photograph you can carry with you.

This doesn’t take effort. It takes arrival.

You don’t need a different life to be present. You just need a deeper relationship with the life you already have.

That is enough to begin.

Thanks for listening today. This riff was inspired by that Spotlight session, and it got me thinking about how often we miss the life we’re actually living.

If you know someone who might benefit, please share this episode. And if you haven’t followed the show yet, now’s a great time to do that. Ratings and reviews truly help this work reach more people.

That’s all for today, my friends. Till next time—let’s be brilliant. ✨