Welcome To Midlife: The Search For Meaning In The Middle

Lisa Steadman

Nobody hands you a roadmap for midlife. One minute you’re following society’s script… and the next you’re standing there like, “Um, hello? Plot twist?” This is the chapter of creaky knees, reader glasses, zero f***s, and crystal-clear clarity. The season where wisdom hits harder, priorities sharpen fast, and you finally start choosing yourself—boldly, honestly, joyfully. Welcome to the conversations that make midlife feel real, hilarious, brave, and deeply human. Together, let’s turn this whole messy, magic adventure into the chapter you didn’t see coming—in the absolute best way.

  1. Sep 30

    S2 E24: Becoming A Midlife Broad With Erin Keating

    What if the best thing you could become in midlife… is a BROAD? Not invisible. Not past your prime. Not quietly fading into the background while everyone under 35 gets called 'emerging.' A full-fledged, knows-who-she-is, owns-her-wins, takes-up-space MID-LIFE BROAD. In this episode of Welcome To Midlife: The Search For Meaning In The Middle, host Lisa Steadman talks with Erin Keating — Emmy-winning former TV executive, host of Hotter Than Ever, and founder of The Broad Collective — about what happens when the career you spent decades building stops fitting and you have to figure out who the hell you are next. Spoiler: It might be the beginning of something way better. We get into: ✨ Why women need to stop downplaying their accomplishments 🏆 The weird discomfort we have around actually celebrating our wins 🔥 Reinventing yourself after a successful first (or second or third) act 💼 Why women wait until they’re 100% qualified while men just go for it 🎙️ Finding and USING your voice in midlife 👯‍♀️ Why building something new can feel lonely AF 💥 What it means to officially embrace your inner BROAD Erin also shares how walking away from her longtime career in television eventually led her to create The Broad Collective, a community for midlife women building businesses, changing careers, launching ideas, and generally refusing to disappear quietly. Because maybe midlife isn’t about becoming a new you. It’s about finally becoming the version of you who gives fewer f*cks about what everyone else thinks. Welcome to midlife, Broads. We’re just getting started. 🎧 ABOUT WELCOME TO MIDLIFE Welcome To Midlife: The Search For Meaning In The Middle is about the messy, funny, occasionally WTF years when the life you built meets the woman you’re becoming. We talk reinvention, relationships, careers, hormones, grief, ambition, identity, and what happens when you realize the middle might actually be the most interesting part. 👉 Subscribe for more conversations about navigating and owning your next act. #WelcomeToMidlife #MidlifeWomen #MidlifeReinvention #WomenOver40 #WomenOver50 #CareerReinvention #SecondAct #FemaleEntrepreneurs #TheBroadCollective #HotterThanEver

  2. Sep 7

    S2 E23: The AI Studio System With Qiushi Zhang

    What if the biggest disruption in Hollywood could also become one of the biggest opportunities for creators? In this episode of Welcome to Midlife, host Lisa Steadman sits down with writer-turned-tech founder Qiushi, creator of Leyline, an AI-powered studio system designed to help independent creators take an idea from concept to finished, distributable content, without waiting for someone else to greenlight them. After years of watching promising projects stall inside the traditional entertainment system, Q decided to build the platform she wished had existed for her, a way for creators to develop scripts, create cinematic AI-powered vertical series, build proof of concepts, explore distribution, and ultimately become their own mini studios. Lisa and Q get candid about what AI disruption really means for writers, filmmakers and anyone navigating a mid-career reinvention, including the very real fear, uncertainty and ethical concerns surrounding this rapidly evolving technology. They also explore a more empowering question: What becomes possible when the tools to create are finally in our own hands? 🎬 Learn more about Leyline: LeylinePro.ai 🎧 Subscribe to Welcome to Midlife for conversations about career reinvention, relationships, creativity, aging, ambition and becoming who you’re meant to be in your next chapter. 💬 Tell us in the comments: Does AI make you feel more excited, nervous — or a little of both? #WelcomeToMidlife #AI #ArtificialIntelligence #AIForCreators #Filmmaking #Screenwriting #ContentCreators #Hollywood #CareerReinvention #MidlifeReinvention #WomenInFilm #IndependentFilm #VerticalDrama #FutureOfHollywood #CreatorEconomy #Leyline

  3. Jul 10

    S2 E20: Debunking Midlife Body & Beauty With Cheryl Girard

    What does it look like to stop fighting your body and start honoring the life it has carried you through? In this powerful episode of Welcome to Midlife, host Lisa Steadman sits down with artist, speaker, and body-acceptance advocate Cheryl Girard to explore beauty, aging, eating disorders, healing, and the freedom that comes from owning our bodies as Gen X women. Cheryl shares the deeply personal journey behind Flesh and Soul, her striking body of work created to challenge cultural beauty standards and invite women into a more honest, compassionate relationship with themselves. She opens up about binge eating disorder, what she has learned through her own healing, and the response from women who have seen themselves reflected in her art and message. Together, Lisa and Cheryl discuss: ✨ Body positivity, body neutrality, and self-acceptance ✨ Binge eating disorder and healing our relationship with food ✨ GLP-1 medications and the pressure to be thin ✨ Aging, beauty standards, and owning our age as Gen Xers ✨ How to support teenage girls struggling with body image ✨ The greatest joys and challenges of midlife ✨ Cheryl’s growing national speaking movement Subscribe to Welcome to Midlife: The Search for Meaning in the Middle for a new Season 2 episode every week. #WelcomeToMidlife #BodyPositivity #BodyImage #GenXWomen #MidlifeWomen #BingeEatingDisorder #EatingDisorderRecovery #GLP1 #AuthenticAging #WomenOver50

  4. Jun 22

    S2 E18: Hormone Intelligent Leadership With Mariah Prince-Allen

    Midlife women are often told they’re burned out, stressed, or just tired. But what if the real issue is hormonal? In this episode of Welcome to Midlife, Lisa Steadman talks with women’s health expert Mariah Prince-Allen about Hormone Intelligent Leadership, a powerful new framework for understanding how perimenopause, menopause, and midlife hormonal shifts impact women at work, at home, and in their sense of self. Mariah breaks down why so many high-achieving women suddenly experience brain fog, fatigue, sleep disruption, mood changes, and a loss of confidence in midlife — and why traditional burnout advice doesn’t always help. She also introduces the idea of hormonal bankruptcy, what it means for women who are carrying careers, caregiving, relationships, and identity shifts all at once, and how workplaces can better support women through this chapter instead of losing brilliant talent. If you’ve ever wondered whether you’re burned out, hormonally depleted, or simply in a season where your body is asking for a different kind of leadership, this conversation is for you. In this episode, we talk about: • What Hormone Intelligent Leadership means • Why midlife symptoms are often misdiagnosed as burnout • The workplace impact of brain fog, fatigue, sleep issues, and mood changes • What hormonal bankruptcy is and why it matters • How leaders and organizations can better support women in perimenopause and menopause • Why midlife women need more support, not more shame Subscribe for more honest conversations about midlife, reinvention, purpose, relationships, health, and what it means to become more fully yourself in the middle. #MidlifeWomen #Perimenopause #Menopause #WomenInLeadership #HormoneHealth #Burnout #WelcomeToMidlife #WomenAtWork #MidlifeReinvention #GenXWomen #Podcast

About

Nobody hands you a roadmap for midlife. One minute you’re following society’s script… and the next you’re standing there like, “Um, hello? Plot twist?” This is the chapter of creaky knees, reader glasses, zero f***s, and crystal-clear clarity. The season where wisdom hits harder, priorities sharpen fast, and you finally start choosing yourself—boldly, honestly, joyfully. Welcome to the conversations that make midlife feel real, hilarious, brave, and deeply human. Together, let’s turn this whole messy, magic adventure into the chapter you didn’t see coming—in the absolute best way.