How many Mondays do you think you have left?

I turned forty this year, and for the first time, the future felt shorter than the past.
It didn’t scare me; it woke me up.
It made me curious: if I keep living exactly as I am, who will I become?

So I tried something. I wrote two letters from my eighty-year-old self:
one from the version who kept waiting for the right moment,
and one from the version who finally stopped waiting and lived.

Same woman. Same life. Different endings.

It was uncomfortable, but it made everything real, the habits, the excuses, the systems I’m building now.
It showed me what stays if I don’t change, and what’s possible if I do.

Maybe try it yourself. Write two letters, one if you wait, one if you choose.
See which one feels closer. That answer will tell you everything.

I kept telling myself I was getting ready.

Another Monday. Another new start. Another list that looked like progress.

I collected advice like trophies, podcasts, screenshots, saved posts, and a museum of blueprints for a life I never built.

I thought becoming prepared meant becoming powerful.
But all I became was busy.

My days were full. My soul was short-staffed.

I kept saying after this project,
after this phase,
after the kids are older.

There was always a later version of me waiting to start.

I called it patience.
It was the fear of wearing nice clothes.

I built systems to keep myself safe, not awake.
I mastered consistency, but forgot curiosity.

Some nights, I’d lie in bed replaying my day, all boxes ticked, yet something humming under my ribs like a small trapped animal.
That’s how you know it’s not peace. It’s containment.

The mirror stopped reflecting me back.
It just showed progress.

The body changed. The numbers improved.
I had proof I was winning, but no idea what game I was playing.

I wish I’d let people see me before I was ready.
I wish I’d stopped waiting for confidence and walked out shaking.
I wish I’d risked being misunderstood sooner.

I kept perfecting plans for a life that would have loved me messy.

Time never shouted. It just slipped its shoes off and left quietly.

That’s how regret arrives, not loud, not cruel, just patient.

Holding all the years you meant to live.

I didn’t wake up fearless.
I just stopped mistaking fear for a stop sign.

The day it changed, nothing dramatic happened.
I simply got tired of hearing my own excuses echo louder than my potential.

I moved, quietly, clumsily, without applause.
The momentum built itself.

I stopped collecting plans and started collecting proof.
Every time I did what scared me, the fear got smaller. I didn’t.

The systems stayed, but they stopped feeling like surveillance.
They became structure, the kind that supports, not suffocates.

I stopped trying to be consistent and started trying to be congruent.

I built a body that could carry my ambition.
A mind that could rest in silence.
A life that matched the pace of my truth.

I became impossible to guilt, because I started telling the truth sooner.

The mirror still changes. The eyes don’t.
There’s peace in that kind of recognition.

I stopped chasing balance. I built capacity.

Some mornings, I still think about the version of me that waited.
I thank her for holding the line long enough for me to arrive.

But I don’t visit her often.
There’s too much living left to do.

None of us knows how many Mondays we have left, only that they keep disappearing faster than we expect.
Writing these letters reminded me that change doesn’t happen in grand moments. It happens in the small, unglamorous choices that eventually build a different life.
If you do write your own two letters, keep them somewhere close. They’ll remind you that your future is still negotiable, but not forever.

I’ve been writing these pieces in the quiet, between school runs, work, and late-night thinking, but I’ve started sharing more of the journey in real time too.
The reflections, the systems, the messier parts of reinvention that never make it into the newsletter.

If you want to follow along, you’ll find me here:
LinkedIn
Instagram
Website: orgesameli.com

Come say hi. It’s less about followers, more about finding the others who are doing the invisible work too.

If something in this email made you pause, think, or feel seen, send it to a friend who’s been quietly trying to make a change, too.
You never know what might land at the right moment. Link here.

And if you’d like early access to the eBook I’m writing, the real systems, mindset shifts, and habits that helped me lose 50kg and rebuild my health, you can join the waiting list here. “You’re not behind. You’re building, and that takes time.”