I was mountain biking in Red Rock Canyon last weekend, watching a pair of women ahead of me on the trail. One of them was clearly struggling — short of breath, second-guessing herself, slowing down every few steps to look back. The other one was steady, eyes on a small tree in the distance.

When the trail forked, the first woman froze. "Which way?" she asked. The second one didn't answer right away. She just pointed to the next marker — barely visible, near a tree maybe forty feet ahead — and said, "That way. We're still on the path."

I kept riding, but the moment stayed with me.

Because that's what trail markers do. They don't tell you where you're going. They don't tell you how far you have to walk. They don't tell you what's around the bend. They just confirm — quietly, repeatedly — that you're still on the path. That someone walked here before you and tended to the way. That you can trust where your feet are.

This month, we're walking together with a question I think every woman in midlife eventually has to answer:

What guides me when the landscape shifts?

Colorado has had a strange, fast spring. We barely had snow this winter. The creeks are running thin. The lilacs in my neighborhood are already in full bloom or past their peak, and the scrub oak has fully leafed out where it should still be tender. Hummingbirds are at the feeder weeks ahead of schedule.

The land is showing us a season that doesn't match the calendar.

And I think that's a fitting backdrop for the work this month. Because so many of the women I sit with — in coaching, in bodywork, in our circle — are walking through their own version of a landscape that's shifted faster than expected. Career changes. Empty nests. Aging parents. Bodies that don't behave the way they used to. Marriages that need updating. Identities that no longer fit.

When the conditions of your life are different from what you expected, what guides you?

The answer, almost always, is your values.

Values are not morals. Values are not principles. Values are not rules.

Values are the qualities of a life lived from the inside out — the felt sense of what makes a moment, a choice, or a season feel right. They're what you want to live by, and live for.

Imagine each value you hold has its own tone, like a note on an instrument. When you're living in alignment with your values, the notes form a harmony — your life sounds like itself. When you're not, the notes clash. There's dissonance. Sometimes a low hum of unease. Sometimes a full-body protest.

Either way, the body keeps score.

In 20+ years of bodywork, I've felt this under my hands. Women carry the cost of misalignment in their shoulders, their jaws, their hips, their breath. The body keeps record of every place we've said yes when we meant no, every value we've abandoned to keep the peace, every truth we've swallowed because it was inconvenient.

And the body, when we listen, will also tell us where the alignment lives. There's a softness, a settledness, a kind of hum, when a woman is living what she truly values. You can feel it.

So this work isn't just intellectual. It's somatic. It's a body practice as much as it is a head practice.

Here's where it gets clarifying:

There are two kinds of values most of us are walking around with — and learning the difference is one of the most powerful acts of midlife.

True values feel right in your body. When you imagine living them fully, something opens. You feel drawn toward them. They energize you, even when they ask something hard of you.

Should values are the ones we've absorbed from outside ourselves — from parents, partners, teachers, religion, culture, social media. They often come wrapped in love and good intentions. They look respectable. They sound impressive. But when we try to live them, the body protests. We feel tired. Resistant. Off.

A few examples:

• I should value financial wealth — when what you actually value is enoughness.
• I should value being a good mother — when what you actually value is being honest about your limits.
• I should value productivity — when what you actually value is rest.
• I should value selflessness — when what you actually value is sovereignty.

There's no shame in noticing should values. They served someone, somewhere — even if that someone wasn't you. Your mother may have needed productivity to survive raising four kids on her own. Your grandmother may have needed selflessness to make it through a marriage that asked too much of her.

What kept them alive may not be what your life is asking of you now.

The work isn't to judge them. It's to recognize them, thank them, and gently set them down so you can pick up what's actually yours.

Your values are your trail markers. Not because they tell you exactly where to go — life is too varied and your path too particular for that. But because they remind you, again and again, that you're on a path. That the path is yours. And that the body knows.

This week, I'd invite you to listen.

Pay attention to what energizes you and what depletes you. To what makes you lean in and what makes you turn away. Notice when your shoulders soften and when they tighten. Notice the moments when you feel the hum of yes and the moments when you feel the contraction of no — but I'd never say so out loud.

Those signals are information. Your body is pointing to the markers.

Trust them.

🌿 Want to take this work into your body, on the trail, with other women?

On Saturday, May 16, I'm leading a Trail Magic Hike at Stratton Open Space focused on this very work — Values as Your Trail Markers. It's a chance to walk with the question of what guides you, in the company of women doing the same. The trail is a beautiful teacher when it comes to values, and the body, in motion, in nature, has a way of revealing what's true.

Reserve your spot for the May 16 hike here

If a hike isn't your thing but something in this is calling to you, I'd love to walk with you in another way:

🌱 Laser Coaching — 30 minutes to ground yourself and find your next step. Book a session

🌳 Six-month coaching partnership — A deep, sustained journey back to your own truth, your own body, your own values. Learn more

💛   Angelique

Breakthrough BodyMind | www.breakthroughbodymind.com