Freedom Looks Like This – solo travel for women over 40 ready to choose themselves

Damianne President – solo travel for women over 40
  • 5.0 (3)
  • Self-Improvement

Freedom Looks Like This is a solo travel podcast for women over 40 who feel restless, disconnected, or tired of waiting for the "right time" to start living differently. Hosted by Damianne President, the show explores intentional solo travel as a way to rebuild self-trust, stop waiting for permission, and create a life that actually feels like yours again.  Solo travel is just where the story starts. What this show really explores is what happens when women stop waiting, take themselves seriously, and begin making decisions for themselves, without over-explaining or asking for approval.  Episodes dive into topics like:  solo travel for women over 40fear, self-doubt, and the hesitation to go alonelearning to trust yourself againidentity shifts in midlifechoosing what you want and acting on itWhether you’re planning your first solo trip or simply craving more freedom in your everyday life, Freedom Looks Like This offers real conversations and relateable reframes to help you move forward, whether at home or on the road.

  1. Your Adult Gap Year Doesn't Have to be a Year

    4d ago

    Your Adult Gap Year Doesn't Have to be a Year

    We keep telling ourselves we'll take the trip we actually want once we've finally figured everything out. What if you have that backwards? You will not think your way to your next chapter from inside the old one, and the clarity you keep waiting for tends to arrive out in the doing, on the trip itself. This is the adult gap year, reimagined, and it does not have to be a year, or a leap, or anything as big as you are picturing. After all, this is not Eat, Pray, Love. In this episode: The season you didn't chooseThe trap of thinking harderThe habit discontinuity effectA quiet month in FlorenceInterrupting one autopilotThis episode is for you if: you're in a season that ended before you were ready, a role, a relationship, the shape of your household, and you keep waiting for clarity before you do anything about ityou've wanted a solo trip but told yourself you can't take the time, the job needs you, or you have to figure your whole life out firstyou've been calling this stretch a transition, or limbo, and some part of you is ready to do something with it instead of waiting it outyou're a woman over 40 in a midlife transition who wants to feel like yourself again, not just keep showing up for everyone elseyou already travel solo, or you want to, and you're ready for the how, and you've heard enough of the why About Freedom Looks Like This: Freedom Looks Like This is a podcast for women over 40 who want to travel solo, or who already do, and want to go deeper. Host Damianne President explores self-trust, decision-making, and what it actually takes to stop waiting and start moving. New episodes every Tuesday. For solo female travelers, midlife women, and anyone who suspects that the real barrier isn't logistics. Support the show Join the next Solo Trip Decision Workshop live on June 20. It's for women who've decided they want to take a solo trip and want help deciding the trip they actually want: https://freedomlookslikethis.com/training Email: contact@freedomlookslikethis.com Join Skool: https://freedomlookslikethis.com/community

    21 min
  2. This is the 40+ Solo Travel Advantage

    May 27

    This is the 40+ Solo Travel Advantage

    Solo travel as a 40-year-old looks different from solo travel at 25 in ways that have very little to do with the budget or the boutique hotel. By 40 you already know what you want clearly enough to design a trip around it, and the work at this stage is to stop overriding yourself when something cheaper or more convenient shows up. This week Damianne tells the story of walking out of a Sapa travel agency with the wrong tour booked until she caught herself hours later. The 40+ solo travel advantage is clarity, and the work is to stop negotiating against yourself when you book. In this episode: [00:00] The 40+ solo travel question[07:03] Booking and unbooking the wrong tour[14:21] What a private tour really gives[17:28] The question that changed[23:56] This week's invitation This episode is for you if: you've talked yourself into the cheaper trip and then realised hours later it wasn't the one you wantedyou're a woman over 40 who knows what you want but keeps overriding it for someone else's idea of a good dealyou travel solo or want to, and you're still using rules you set at 25 about money, group tours, or eating on the goyou keep optimising your solo trips for cost or group availability when what you actually want is fitAbout Freedom Looks Like This: Freedom Looks Like This is a podcast for women over 40 who want to travel solo, or who already do, and want to go deeper. Host Damianne President explores self-trust, decision-making, and what it actually takes to stop waiting and start moving. New episodes every Tuesday. For solo female travelers, midlife women, and anyone who suspects that the real barrier isn't logistics. Support the show Join the next Solo Trip Decision Workshop live on June 20. It's for women who've decided they want to take a solo trip and want help deciding the trip they actually want: https://freedomlookslikethis.com/training Email: contact@freedomlookslikethis.com Join Skool: https://freedomlookslikethis.com/community

    26 min
  3. The Decisions That Build a Solo Traveler Aren't the Big Ones

    May 20

    The Decisions That Build a Solo Traveler Aren't the Big Ones

    The small decision on a Sunday morning, the park or the cafe or the hotel room, is building something that will help you for your solo trip. I took myself on an overnight trip to Olomouc in the Czech Republic, a city about three hours from Prague, because I was tired and I knew from experience that if I stayed home with a free weekend I would work. What the trip made visible was this: between where you are now and the solo trip you haven't booked yet, there are lots of small decisions that have been waiting for you to make them. I made a small decision to I leave the Museum of Modern Art in Olomouc after thirty minutes because I was done. There was judgment in that, the kind that asks whether you're cultured enough to stay longer. I noticed it, and I left anyway.. Psychologists call the relevant skill interoception: the ability to sense your own internal signals before you've reasoned your way to an answer. It's a skill, not a fixed trait, and it gets stronger the more you use it in low-stakes situations. Those situations, ordinary and small, are what build a solo traveler. That's the practice. Not the trip. In this episode: - Olomouc in late spring - Thirty minutes in the museum - Holy Trinity Column, covered - Park, cafe, or hotel room - Cognitive distance and the solo outing - The evidence account This episode is for you if: ou've named the trip, know roughly where and when, but you still haven't booked anythingyou're a woman over 40 who finds herself defaulting to the logical choice, and then wondering afterward why it didn't feel rightyou've felt the slight pull toward something and then reasoned your way out of it before you had a chance to follow throughyou're a solo female traveler who wants to understand what's actually building your capacity for bigger decisions, not just your ability to plan a tripResources mentioned: Go Alone guide: My free guide to taking yourself out alone, designed for step one of the process she describes in this episode. It walks you through how to design your solo outing, what to notice, and how to follow what surfaces. Free at freedomlookslikethis.com/goaloneFree workshop, May 30th: a live online session with Damianne for women ready to take the next step toward solo travel. Details at freedomlookslikethis.com/trainingAbout Freedom Looks Like This: Freedom Looks Like This is a podcast for women over 40 who want to travel solo, or who already do, and want to go deeper. Host Damianne President explores self-trust, decision-making, and what it actually takes to stop waiting and start moving. New episodes every Wednesday. Support the show Join the next Solo Trip Decision Workshop live on June 20. It's for women who've decided they want to take a solo trip and want help deciding the trip they actually want: https://freedomlookslikethis.com/training Email: contact@freedomlookslikethis.com Join Skool: https://freedomlookslikethis.com/community

    23 min
  4. Searching vs. Meeting Yourself as a Solo Traveler

    May 13

    Searching vs. Meeting Yourself as a Solo Traveler

    I'm sharing a conversation from Kellie Stirling's podcast Talkin About Midlife where I'm visiting as a guest rather than a solo host or interviewer. We started from the very beginning: Saint Lucia at birth, Canada at 12, then India for my first teaching job, then Sudan, Japan, and finally Prague, where I've been for thirteen years.  Somewhere in all of that, a Sufi teacher in India said something to me in my mid-twenties that's still relevant to me and an important reminder more than twenty years later. It directly connects to one of my key ideas these days: there is a real difference between searching for yourself and meeting yourself. In this episode: Saint Lucia to PragueThe Sufi teacher's readingTraining the nervous system abroadSearching vs. meeting yourselfMidlife, identity, and new roles20% more enjoyment This episode is for you if: You've been traveling for years and still feel like you're looking for something, and you're not sure whether you're going toward it or away from itYou're a woman over 40 who wants to hear the full long version of how someone became a solo traveler, not the edited highlight version where it all clicked one afternoonYou want to understand what actually separates intentional solo travel from just going somewhere alone, because you've been wondering if you're doing it rightYou've heard of the RAIN meditation but never heard someone describe using it while buried in fermented rice sand in Japan, with cotton balls in their earsFree Resources: Damianne's free guide to start solo travelDecide Your Trip workshop to figure out your first or next solo tripMeet Kellie Stirling: Kellie is the host of Talkin About Midlife, a podcast about life, health, love, relationships, the inner world, aging, and what it means to be human in a female body at this time in life. Kellie is also a somatic experiencing practitioner. Find her show wherever you listen to podcasts. Learn more about her podcast and follow at https://www.kelliestirling.com/podcasts About Freedom Looks Like This: Freedom Looks Like This is a podcast for women over 40 who want to travel solo, or who already do, and want to go deeper. Host Damianne President explores self-trust, decision-making, and what it actually takes to stop waiting and start moving. New episodes every Tuesday. For solo female travelers, midlife women, and anyone who suspects that the real barrier isn't logistics. Email: contact@changesbigandsmall.com Support the show Join the next Solo Trip Decision Workshop live on June 20. It's for women who've decided they want to take a solo trip and want help deciding the trip they actually want: https://freedomlookslikethis.com/training Email: contact@freedomlookslikethis.com Join Skool: https://freedomlookslikethis.com/community

    48 min
  5. From Giggling Through Cairo to Leading 30+ Solo Travel Retreats

    May 6

    From Giggling Through Cairo to Leading 30+ Solo Travel Retreats

    Most women have a definition of solo travel in their head, and it's usually the thing keeping them from taking the trip they dream of. If solo means handling every unknown by yourself with no one to call on, of course you're not booking the trip.  Gina Cambridge built her business as a travel coach on the gap between that definition and what solo travel can actually look like. In this episode of Freedom Looks Like this, we talk about solo travel retreats within a group tour and how that still counts. Gina has led over 30 retreats and tours across destinations like New Zealand, Bali, and Cuba. We also get into safety abroad and the difference between what the news tells you about a place and what living there actually feels like. In this episode: Group tours that still count as soloSnoring, single rooms, and matchmakingThe bunk bed that led to BaliLunch with the phone put awayCairo, giggling, and going aloneThe family beach day and permission This episode is for you if: you are curious about taking a group tripyou've considered a group tour but worried about choosing the right oneyou're an introvert who wonders how anyone is supposed to make friends on the road, especially with everyone glued to their phonesyou've taken solo trips before and want to try different approaches Resources mentioned: Gina Cambridge's free guide to Fearless Solo TravelWanderlust Solo Women ToursGina's podcast Wanderlust Solo Women Travel "Unscripted" on YouTubeGina on Instagram: @wanderlust_momentum and @wanderlust_travel_coachGina on LinkedInGina on FacebookAbout Freedom Looks Like This: Freedom Looks Like This is a podcast for women over 40 who want to travel solo, or who already do, and want to go deeper. Host Damianne President explores self-trust, decision-making, and what it actually takes to stop waiting and start moving. New episodes every Wednesday. For solo female travelers, midlife women, and anyone who suspects that the real barrier isn't logistics. Support the show Join the next Solo Trip Decision Workshop live on June 20. It's for women who've decided they want to take a solo trip and want help deciding the trip they actually want: https://freedomlookslikethis.com/training Email: contact@freedomlookslikethis.com Join Skool: https://freedomlookslikethis.com/community

    36 min
  6. Why Not? Stop Overthinking Solo Travel

    Apr 29

    Why Not? Stop Overthinking Solo Travel

    Maybe you've been thinking about a trip for months, looking at flights, reading about the destination, knowing roughly what's there. And still not booking. Or you've already been on the trip and running a calculation the whole time: how do I make this count? Was this worth it? Both versions have the same problem. The question you're asking doesn't close. It just generates more conditions. In this episode, Damianne introduces the two-word question she's used for years, one that doesn't require a perfect reason to go, just the absence of a real blocker. With three stories from three very different decisions, she traces how the same question opened doors she couldn't have planned for, including thirteen years in a city she'd never seen before she arrived. The "why should I go" question has a problem: it's designed for explanation, for optimization. It needs a good reason, and so it's easy to delay. Instead, you generate concerns. Address one, and another appears. The timing isn't right. The savings aren't there. Something at work needs you.  Solo travel for women over 40 isn't really a logistics problem. It's a question. So we need to ask better questions. In this episode: The cherry blossom calculationThe question that keeps generating conditionsTwo words and how they workOff the main path in SapaA pyramid in TiranaThirteen years lateThis episode is for you if: you've been looking at flights for a trip you haven't booked, and you're genuinely not sure what you're waiting foryou travel solo and find yourself measuring the experience instead of just being in ityou're a woman over 40 who wants to stop generating conditions and start decidingyou've answered one concern about a trip only to find another one waiting in its placeResources mentioned:  Free workshop — freedomlookslikethis.com/training  Make the trip decision in a small group with Damianne. Next session: June 6. Support the show Join the next Solo Trip Decision Workshop live on June 20. It's for women who've decided they want to take a solo trip and want help deciding the trip they actually want: https://freedomlookslikethis.com/training Email: contact@freedomlookslikethis.com Join Skool: https://freedomlookslikethis.com/community

    29 min
  7. You Never Feel Ready to Travel Alone Before You Take The Trip (and that's alright)

    Apr 22

    You Never Feel Ready to Travel Alone Before You Take The Trip (and that's alright)

    You probably have a condition before you'll book the trip, something that needs to be true first. But if you look back, a version of that condition has likely already been true. You met it, and then something else came up. The timing wasn't right, and then it was, and something else came up. There was always something. This is what practising deferral looks like. Every time you defer, you're getting better at putting yourself last. And after a while, that feels natural. It looks responsible, from the inside and the outside. But the woman you're becoming while you practise it is the one who doesn't quite trust herself to choose. That accumulates. And it compounds. The clarity and confidence you're waiting for don't come before the decision. They come after you've moved. In this episode: - Conditions that keep moving to stay out of reach - Building evidence, for or against yourself - The school bus in September - Nine months without a plan, but moving - Writing the trip as a decision This episode is for you if: you've been wanting to take a solo trip and keep finding reasons to waityou're a woman over 40 who makes thoughtful, reliable decisions for other people all day and can't quite remember the last time you made one that was purely for yourselfyou're a solo female traveler or seriously thinking about becoming oneyou've been telling yourself you're being responsible by waiting, and some part of you suspects that framing is doing double duty as a reason to stay put. Resources mentioned:The Science of Well-Being: a free online course on happiness, with Laurie SantosLearning How to Learn: an online course on approaching new skills and subjects, with Barbara Oakley About Freedom Looks Like This: Freedom Looks Like This is a podcast for women over 40 who want to travel solo — or who already do, and want to go deeper. Host Damianne President explores self-trust, decision-making, and what it actually takes to stop waiting and start moving. New episodes every Wednesday. For solo female travelers, midlife women, and anyone who suspects that the real barrier isn't logistics.Support the show Join the next Solo Trip Decision Workshop live on June 20. It's for women who've decided they want to take a solo trip and want help deciding the trip they actually want: https://freedomlookslikethis.com/training Email: contact@freedomlookslikethis.com Join Skool: https://freedomlookslikethis.com/community

    25 min
  8. How Solo Travel Changes You

    Apr 15

    How Solo Travel Changes You

    Each of us has a default response to unexpected moments, often without noticing it. I watched mine during a recent trip in Japan, paying attention to where I used to smile and keep moving versus where I'm now stopping, staying in the conversation, and letting things land. A place moves forward without you while you're away, and so do you. You don't just come home with experiences. You come home as someone who made a series of decisions, and that's what persists. This episode is set in Japan, a country Damianne lived in for four years starting in 2009. and it keeps returning to a comparison between who she was then and who she is now. The places have changed. The person is different. And both of these change the experience, not just because of the big moments, but through the accumulation of small ones: booking something despite not being sure it's worth it, making an appointment in a language you don't speak, sitting still on a balcony long enough to notice the light, letting someone's kindness actually land. In this episode:  Crossing water to NaganoshimaThe yukata that finally fitWhen the chef paid attentionSakura, rain, and the highlight reelThe coffee shop pauseThis episode is for you if: you've been somewhere beautiful and caught yourself calculating what would make it better, such as measuring your actual experience against some optimal version that doesn't quite exist, and then having to remind yourself to appreciate what's in front of youyou travel solo or are thinking about it and you want to understand what it actually changes in you, beyond just the places you see and the meals you eatyou're a woman over 40 who has a long list of things she's already decided she doesn't like, won't try, or isn't worth it,  and you're starting to notice that some of those decisions were made before you had all the informationyou've had that split second where something unexpected happened and you could engage or exit, and you defaulted to exit before you could think, and weren't quite sure afterward whyAbout Freedom Looks Like This: Freedom Looks Like This is a podcast for women over 40 who want to travel solo (or who already do) and want to go deeper. Host Damianne President explores self-trust, decision-making, and what it actually takes to stop waiting and start moving. New episodes every Wednesday. Support the show Join the next Solo Trip Decision Workshop live on June 20. It's for women who've decided they want to take a solo trip and want help deciding the trip they actually want: https://freedomlookslikethis.com/training Email: contact@freedomlookslikethis.com Join Skool: https://freedomlookslikethis.com/community

    30 min
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Freedom Looks Like This is a solo travel podcast for women over 40 who feel restless, disconnected, or tired of waiting for the "right time" to start living differently. Hosted by Damianne President, the show explores intentional solo travel as a way to rebuild self-trust, stop waiting for permission, and create a life that actually feels like yours again.  Solo travel is just where the story starts. What this show really explores is what happens when women stop waiting, take themselves seriously, and begin making decisions for themselves, without over-explaining or asking for approval.  Episodes dive into topics like:  solo travel for women over 40fear, self-doubt, and the hesitation to go alonelearning to trust yourself againidentity shifts in midlifechoosing what you want and acting on itWhether you’re planning your first solo trip or simply craving more freedom in your everyday life, Freedom Looks Like This offers real conversations and relateable reframes to help you move forward, whether at home or on the road.

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