I had a great 51st birthday at the end of October, and I really appreciated all the thoughtful messages and greetings from my readers. Many of you shared your stories, and it’s so empowering to hear from so many women well into their 50s and 60s who are very happy with their age.

Really it comes down to how you’re living your life and whether you’re happy with how you’re spending your time. I know I wouldn’t go back to my youth, even if it would erase the lines and reverse the “gravitational pull,” as I’ve decided to call it. I’m much happier with where I am right now because I get satisfaction from my work and it allows me time to devote to parenting.

I vividly remember my 40th birthday. I was alone in a new city with a 4- year-old and no immediate way to make a living. I was scared, but I knew I had to be creative and find a way to make it work. It was quite a journey of reinvention, but I came out the other side and there is NO WAY I could have imagined what my life would look like now.

I didn’t have a clear picture of where I was going back then (I hadn’t even heard of staging at that point), but I knew I was moving towards a more fulfilling life, one step at a time.

None of us has a crystal ball that will answer all the “what if” questions and fears that can haunt us daily if we let them. All we really have is our talent, our ambition and our belief that we are the drivers of our own lives.

If we step into the power of that, anything is possible!

My color recommendations were recently featured in a national magazine, and amazingly, one of the readers actually looked me up to let me know that she had used one of my suggestions. She wrote, “Two painters transformed my front door and (single) garage door with low-luster Caliente, a beautiful red from Benjamin Moore that you suggested in the October issue of Style at Home. It looks fabulous. Many thanks.”

This is a great example of how we often don’t know the impact of what we’re doing. We can spend all kinds of time marketing and think that no one is listening, and then “out of the blue” the phone rings or we get an email from a potential client. Look for more posts this month that relate to this idea.

I hope you enjoy this month’s posts.

By the way, did you get a birthday present from me on YOUR special day? Don’t forget to join my birthday list here for free so I can send you a gift on YOUR birthday!