You’re 40. Seven Things You Need To Do Before You Hit 50.

The next 10 years are life-defining.

Karen Nimmo
Published in
4 min readSep 2, 2024

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Image by pvproductions on Freepik

Feeling your age (just a bit)?

For some reason those big zero birthdays force a stock-take. Make us reflect on the choices we’ve made, the mistakes we’ve made, the regrets we’ve had to suck up and bank.

Life stock-takes are a good thing. It’s often one of the reasons people sign up for coaching or therapy. To assess where they’re at — and how to plot the next step forward.

Obviously, you can make changes at any age or stage of life. And often we don’t bust out of the safety zone until we’re really pushed — or we’re all out of choices.

But when you reach 50, you have laid down a half-century foundation for your life. It’s a little confronting. You can’t roll back the clock on your age — or many of the decisions you’ve made.

Many people struggle with that because they’re dissatisfied with where they have landed — their jobs, finances or relationships. And they feel too trapped to make change.

If that’s you, and you’d like to get down and dusty with where you’re at, here are seven things to think about before your next decade gets old.

“We need to regularly stop and take stock; to sit down…

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Karen Nimmo

Clinical psychologist, author of 4 books. Editor of On the Couch: Practical psychology for health and happiness. karen@onthecouch.co.nz