What if wanting things to feel beautiful isn’t frivolous at all?

This week on Love Monday, I’m talking about my compulsive need to rearrange the furniture, my very Libra relationship with beauty, and why the spaces we live and work in affect how we show up in them. Plus, a homecoming moment on the staircase reminded me that while there are times to rearrange what isn’t working, there are also times to stop moving everything around long enough to realize you’re already standing inside something beautiful.

Maybe you don’t need a whole new room.

Maybe you just need to notice how much you like this one.

One perfectly normal meeting with our financial advisor sent me into a full-blown career spiral involving UW Health, cosmetology school, power washing and, naturally, cow hoof trimming.

Then two friends reminded me of something I had apparently forgotten: I’ve spent the last 20 years inventing jobs for myself, convincing people they needed me, and figuring it out as I went.

This week’s Love Monday is about money panic, old neural pathways, the strange way we discount the things we’re naturally good at, and remembering that sometimes the answer isn’t becoming something new. It’s remembering what you already know how to do.

Also, I’m still not ruling out power washing. No one talks to you. It sounds delightful.

Nobody really sold me on midlife. There were plenty of warnings about what would change, slow down, sag, disappear or require a new serum. 😂

But nobody told me there might be an upgrade.

This week I’m talking about identity, ambition, getting older, and the possibility that the work of midlife isn’t becoming someone new at all. Maybe it’s refining. Keeping what fits, releasing what doesn’t, and using decades of evidence to build a life that feels increasingly like your own.

I’m also talking about the people we allow to influence our decisions, who belongs at the head table of our lives, and a question I can’t stop thinking about: What happens when we actually gather the right women around a table and give them enough time and safety to tell the truth?

Maybe the question isn’t Who should I become next?

Maybe it’s What feels more like me from here? ❤️

How do you know when something isn’t working? Or, maybe the real question: Have I tried hard enough?

A few weeks ago, we closed Creekside Scoop. I could have tried another idea, another pivot, another season. There is almost always something else we could try.

But at some point, I realized I didn’t want to anymore.

This week’s Love Monday is about the difference between quitting because something is hard and deciding you’ve given something enough of your time, energy, attention and money. And maybe the question isn’t whether you could keep trying.

Maybe it’s whether you still want to.

Wanting to is a good enough reason.

Love,

Katy ❤️

This week held a little bit of everything: coming home from Alaska, Dale’s birthday, my mom’s first heavenly birthday, the funeral of a friend, the beginning of another school year and Miles’s last first day of school.

Oh, and I celebrated five years alcohol-free.

Five years ago, I thought quitting drinking meant giving something up. I couldn’t have known how much of my life I was about to get back.

In this episode of Love Monday, I’m talking about beginnings and endings, grief and celebration, kids growing up, people we love leaving us, and what it means to actually be present for all of it.

Being alcohol-free didn’t make my life easier.

It made me available for it.

And after a week like this one, I’m more grateful for that than ever.

Welcome to Love Monday.

I’m Katy Ripp, a writer, entrepreneur, lifelong starter of things, and a woman figuring out midlife right alongside you.

Love Monday started as a Monday morning email and has grown into a place for stories about midlife, reinvention, creativity, work, family, alcohol-free life, becoming who we are, and figuring out what the hell we’re doing in real time.

Now, you can listen too.

New episodes every Monday. Sometimes I’ll read what I’ve written. Sometimes we’ll talk. Sometimes we’ll probably wander completely off course.

No perfect formulas. Just stories, ideas, and a little permission to build a life that actually feels good to live.

Welcome to Love Monday. I’m really glad you’re here.

Read more and subscribe to the Love Monday newsletter at katyripp.com/love-monday.