The Next 100 Days: Becoming the Author of Your Life

Happy Fall in the Northern Hemisphere!

Today I attended a seminar on 100 Days of Writing workshop with the London Writer’s Salon. As I listened, I found myself thinking about my own writing journey. I began actively writing my book, Coming Home to Yourself: An Embodied Meditation Practice for Those Who Have Tried Everything Else, last November. For months now, I have been showing up to the page—sometimes inspired, sometimes tired, sometimes knowing exactly where I am going and sometimes discovering it only as I write. Writing a book is a real self-awareness project! 

And today, as we enter the autumn equinox, I began thinking about something larger than writing: What do we want to do with these final 100 days of the year?

Autumn naturally invites us into a different rhythm. There is something about this season that asks us to slow down, even slightly. To notice what has ripened. To gather what we have been tending. To harvest what we have been sowing—not only this year, but perhaps for many years before.

So I find myself wondering: What are you harvesting at this time in your life? Not simply this season, but at this developmental stage of your life. What wisdom have you earned? What have you learned about love, work, relationships, your body, your spirituality, your boundaries, your purpose—and yourself?

And alongside all that you are gathering, what are you still carrying that no longer belongs in the life you are becoming?

What Are You Still Carrying?

Sometimes we know exactly what we are carrying: an old relationship, a role we have outgrown, a responsibility that was once ours but perhaps no longer needs to be, or an expectation about who we were supposed to become.

And sometimes what we carry is much less obvious. Our bodies can hold experiences long after our conscious minds believe we have moved beyond them. We may tighten without realizing it, hold our breath, clench our jaw, brace our shoulders, or feel that familiar knot in the stomach or constriction in the chest.

Perhaps you notice yourself hesitating just when you are about to take a step toward something you deeply desire. Sometimes what holds us back is not a lack of ability, discipline, or desire. Sometimes some part of us learned long ago that staying small, staying quiet, staying agreeable, staying busy—or staying protected—was the safest thing to do.

And perhaps it was.

The deeper question becomes: Does that protection still fit the life you are living now?

When Is It Your Time?

There is a question I want to invite you to sit with: When is it your time to become the author of your own life? Could it be now?

When will you allow yourself to remove some of the old coats of armor that once protected you but have become too heavy to continue wearing? What might you let go of—even symbolically—that would free some of the energy you have been using simply to hold yourself together?

Maybe it is the tightness in your jaw, the tension across your shoulders, the need to explain yourself, the habit of saying yes when your whole body is saying no, the belief that everyone else's needs need to come before your own, or the idea that it is somehow too late to begin again.

What might become possible if some of that energy became available to you again? What might you create? Where might you go? Who might you become?

Or perhaps the better question is: Who might you finally allow yourself to be?

Saying Yes to Yourself

There comes a point in our lives when saying yes to ourselves may require saying no somewhere else. No to another obligation. No to another project. No to being endlessly available. No to relationships or patterns that ask us to abandon ourselves in order to belong.

Boundaries are not simply about keeping something out. Sometimes a boundary creates the space in which something new can finally come alive—your writing, your creativity, your health, your relationships, your spiritual life, your inner work, your rest, your joy, or your deeper calling.

So when is it your turn? When is it your time to listen more closely to yourself? When is it your time to dive more deeply into the inner work that has been asking for your attention?

And what might happen if, at this stage of your life, you began saying a fuller yes to yourself?

Your Next 100 Days

I want to offer you a very simple reflection for these final 100 days of the year. First, imagine yourself 100 days from now. You do not need to create an enormous plan or reinvent your entire life.

Simply ask yourself:

How would I like to feel?

How would I like to be living?

What would I like to have nurtured, released, begun, or completed?

Now choose three words or short phrases that describe the future self you would like to meet at the end of these 100 days. Write them down and put them somewhere you will see them—perhaps beside your computer, on your bathroom mirror, in your journal, or near the place where you meditate.

Then ask yourself one more question: What is one thing I could do consistently for the next 100 days that would bring me closer to that person?

One thing. Not twelve. Not an entirely new life-management system. Just one intentional practice.

Maybe you write for twenty minutes, take a daily walk, meditate for five minutes, practice saying no without overexplaining, reach out to someone you love, create something, rest when your body asks you to rest, or ask yourself each morning, What do I need today?

Small actions, repeated with intention, can begin to change the direction of a life.

The Harvest Is Also You

Autumn reminds us that harvest is not only about what we have accomplished. Sometimes we are the harvest.

The wisdom we have gained. The compassion we have developed. The ways we have learned to listen. The boundaries we finally know we need. The deeper relationship we are building with ourselves.

This season may not be asking you to become someone entirely new. Perhaps it is inviting you to come home to the person who has been there all along.

And perhaps these next 100 days can become an experiment in listening: listening to your body, listening to your wisdom, listening to the quieter voice beneath all the expectations and old conditioning, and listening for the life that wants to be lived through you now.

A Place to Begin

If you would like some support with this process, I have created the Coming Home Reflection Guide: Returning to Your Inner Wisdom, Soul, and Presence, a workbook designed to help you begin working compassionately with your inner critic, deepen your relationship with your Higher Self, and explore the inner wisdom—and even the mystery—that lives within you.

And if you feel ready for a deeper conversation about where you are now and where you are being called next, you are also welcome to schedule a conversation with me. We can explore whether working together would be a good fit.

For now, though, begin here: What are your three words? And what is the one thing you are willing to practice for the next 100 days?

Perhaps your next chapter doesn't begin someday.

Let it begins now!

 About the Author: Dr. Veronika Tracy-Smith is a psychologist, author, conscious leadership and spiritual well-being coach with 40 years of experience. She integrates psychology, trauma healing, spiritual intelligence and embodied practice through her SPIRIT Framework™ and Coming Home to Your Soul Self™ program, helping women in the second half of life live and lead with greater wisdom and inner trust.