Trailblazers’ Stories: not-your-average Blog
Here you’ll find more than 450 full-lenght articles, most 4000 words+, about subjects that would interest people who are navigating huge life changes, challenges and crises and are starting the next chapters in their lives. Most articles feature the story of someone who had to cope with a life-altering crisis. Maybe you’ll find the story of someone who survived the exact same crisis as you are facing? You can use the search function below to find inspiring stories:
Here are the main themes:
1. Retreats – Stress Dissolvers & Direction Finders – The transformative power of retreat experiences for people navigating major life transitions, career pivots, and personal crossroads. Explore how stepping away creates space for clarity, renewal, and intentional next chapters.
2. Horses – Partners in Transformation – How equine-assisted learning can accelerate emotional healing, build self-awareness, and guide stressed professionals toward their next chapter with wisdom that only horses can provide.
3. Navigating Life Changes, Challenges & Crises – Practical strategies and emotional support for weathering life’s storms—from unexpected upheavals to planned transitions. Learn to navigate uncertainty with resilience and emotional adaptability during pivotal life moments.
4. Burnout & Stress Management in Transition – Understanding why life transitions amplify stress and burnout risk. Science-backed approaches to managing acute and chronic stress when you’re already navigating significant personal or professional change.
5. Life Purpose – The Foundation of New Beginnings – Discovering and reconnecting with your deeper purpose during times of change. Explore why clarity of purpose is essential when reinventing your life, career, or identity.
6. Emotional Intelligence, Empathy, Self-Awareness & Mindfulness – Developing the inner resources that make transitions smoother. Cultivate emotional maturity, self-compassion, and mindful practices that support you through life’s most challenging passages.
7. Reinvention and Reconstruction after a Major Life Change – Navigate relationship shifts, empty nests, health scares, career pivots, redundancies, retirement, relocation, professional success without fulfillment, and find clarity for your next chapter.
8. Grief, Loss & Legacy – Honouring what’s been lost while creating meaningful legacy. Process grief from death, relationship endings, or life chapter closures, and discover how loss can transform into purposeful living.
9. Nature, Sustainability & Slow and Solo Travel – Reconnecting with natural rhythms as an antidote to modern overwhelm. Embrace sustainable, intentional living that supports well-being during life transitions and beyond.
10. Writing, Reading & Storytelling – How words heal and transform during major life changes. Explore writing your story, reading for solace and inspiration, book reviews, and storytelling circles as powerful tools for processing transition.
Margaretha Montagu
How self-hypnosis can help you reset your emotional state and empower you to thrive through life’s transitions. Feeling exhausted, overwhelmed, and disconnected from the world around you? In a world that glorifies busyness, burnout has become a steadily spreading epidemic...
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Margaretha Montagu
Are you going through the motions at work, feeling like something is missing—despite the promotions, paychecks, and accolades? Imagine waking up every day with a deep sense of purpose, knowing that the work you do isn't just paying the bills...
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Margaretha Montagu
While researching my article about being paralysed by an identity crisis during major life changes, I came across this compelling quote, “The outer conditions of a person’s life will always be found to be harmoniously related to his inner state…Men...
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Margaretha Montagu
Imagine waking up one day and realising the person staring back at you in the mirror looks like a complete stranger. Not because of an impromptu hairstyle change or the appearance of a few extra grey hairs, but because life...
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Margaretha Montagu
If you try to Navigate Life without Your Inner Compass during a Major Life Change, You are going to get Lost Meet Your Inner Compass Your "inner compass" refers to your internal guide or sense of direction, shaped by your...
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Margaretha Montagu
The Life Quake Series: How Sophie Managed to Survive her dreadful Divorce, one of her Toughest Life Challenges Sophie stood at the edge of the forest, the cool morning air kissing her tear-stained cheeks. She hesitated. The trail ahead was...
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Margaretha Montagu
Until my early fifties, I never particularly noticed trees. I was aware of them, more or less, in a taking-them-for-granted sort of way. I thought people who hug trees and people who go forest bathing were a bit weird. Until...
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Margaretha Montagu
Defeating Self-Doubt One Perfect Sentence at a Time The best way to describe the start of my writing career would be that I fell into it by accident. I wrote my first book, Self-Confidence Made Simple - French Women Share...
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Margaretha Montagu
The Perils and Pitfalls of Penning Your First Masterpiece (and Why It’s Totally Worth It) So, you’ve decided to write a book. Congratulations and welcome to the writing community! You’ve chosen a path that combines the soul-crushing despair of self-doubt...
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Margaretha Montagu
It can make all the difference if you know if your boss is an introvert. If you suspect that you are heading straight for a burnout, because you can't figure out your boss, it may be because your boss is...
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Margaretha Montagu
Has Affirmations Gone Out Of Fashion? No, affirmations have not gone out of fashion—but they have had a significant makeover, they have evolved to meet our needs more effectively and to fit better into our busy lives. With the growing...
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Margaretha Montagu
"Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.” Melody Beattie I have been keeping a gratitude journal for at least 4 years now. I started small: 5 bullet points every morning and...
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Margaretha Montagu
How Self-Compassion Can Help You Build Your Business and Your Career As introverted professionals, we can greatly benefit from being kinder to ourselves, especially during life changes, challenges and transitions. I had this idea that being an introvert was a...
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Margaretha Montagu
“Compassion for others begins with kindness to ourselves.”-Pema Chodron What is Self-Compassion? In short, self-compassion is about getting to know and accept yourself, forgiving yourself, loving yourself, helping yourself overcome insecurities, respecting yourself and protecting yourself. You'll find more detailed...
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Margaretha Montagu
....and how Kindness can help You make and keep Friends The idea when I started writing this post was to simply make a list of what I think are the 10 most meaningful kindness quotes. I quickly discovered that limiting...
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Margaretha Montagu
It's as much about the Journey, as it is about the Destination Early one Saturday morning, I was sipping a small noisette (double espresso with milk) at the Café de Commerce, watching the world go by on the way to...
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Margaretha Montagu
I have always been a quote collector. I used to store my collection on a USB stick (luckily, these sticks managed to store more and more data, as my collection dramatically increased, over the years.) I often use quotes in...
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Margaretha Montagu
Understanding the Unique Challenges Recently, I read that "starting a business is a daunting task for anyone, but for introverts who are also empaths, it can feel impossible. The unique combination of introvert and empath in one mind, presents a...
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Margaretha Montagu
Mastering the Art of Hosting Transformational Retreats: Combining Personal Insight, Professional Skills, and Practical Abilities Sometimes, as retreat hosts and leaders, we often get lost in the details of everything we want to share with our guests. We know we...
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Margaretha Montagu
“The great and glorious masterpiece of man is to live with purpose.” - Michel de Montaigne Make Finding Your Life Purpose a Priority Knowing my purpose in life, during the various stages of my career, and especially during major career changes...
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Margaretha Montagu
How to Stay Strong When You Lose a Loved One My mission is to help people through life challenges and transitions, like divorces, empty nests, voluntary and involuntary career changes, redundancies, losing loved ones etc. My beautiful Barzoi, Arcady Nikolai,...
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Margaretha Montagu
What can I, as a guest do to ensure that my retreat is transformational - before, during and after my retreat? You have finally decided that if you don't take a break now, you will end up so burnt out...
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Margaretha Montagu
Take a Deep Breath. Pick Yourself Up, Dust Yourself Off and Start Again. Life has a way of throwing curveballs that can knock us off course, whether it's a career setback, a relationship ending, or a personal loss. In those...
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Margaretha Montagu
Hesitating at the Crossroads: A New Beginning Picture this: You're standing at the edge of a dense forest, the path behind you swallowed by mist, and the road ahead twisting into who-knows-where. Life can feel like that sometimes—especially when you're...
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Margaretha Montagu
Mother Hunger: Walking the Camino de Santiago de Compostela can provide Answers to your Questions A couple of my retreat guests this year, who came to my little farm here in the southwest of France, primarily to walk the Camino...
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Margaretha Montagu
I have always been a morning person, so I was not too seriously inconvenienced, in my fifties, when I had to start over and create the mother-of-all morning routine to help me manifest the life I wanted to live, from...
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Margaretha Montagu
Harness Your Unique Strengths to Build a Thriving Business In a world that often glorifies the extroverted hustle, it’s easy for introverts to feel overshadowed. Networking events, public speaking, and constant social interactions can seem like insurmountable hurdles. However, being...
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Margaretha Montagu
How Cupcakes and a Houseplant (called Fred) Helped One Woman Conquer Imposter Syndrome Life's most profound lessons often come at inconvenient times and from unexpected sources. As we work our way through crises, challenges and changes, we encounter experiences that...
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Margaretha Montagu
Or As Neither of the above? As a business owner, it can be useful to know if you are an extrovert or an introvert, as each category has its own strengths and weaknesses. Extroverts and introverts approach the starting and...
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Margaretha Montagu
Discover How Nature Can Save Your Sanity (and Your Startup) "Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under trees on a summer’s day, listening to the murmur of the water, or watching the clouds float across...
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