Creating Midlife Calm: Coping Skills for Stress & Anxiety in Family, Work & Relationships Ep. 230 How Exercise Reduces Anxiety and Stress in Midlife—and the Mindset That Will Make Exercising Easier
Why does exercise start to feel harder, more exhausting, or more discouraging in midlife?
You’re not imagining it, and you’re not alone—your body and nervous system are responding to real changes.
In this episode, you’ll discover:
1. Why your exercise mindset can increase anxiety and make movement feel harder in midlife
2. How new science helps explain what’s changing in your body—and why intensity and pressure often backfire
3. How simple coping skills and an updated mindset can support your health while helping you feel calmer and more motivated
Take 11 minutes to understand your midlife body, reduce exercise-related anxiety, and learn a more supportive way to move—you’re worth it.
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About the Host:
MJ Murray Vachon LCSW is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with more than 48,000 hours of therapy sessions and 31 years of experience teaching her Mental Wellness curriculum, Inner Challenge. Four years ago she overcame her fear of technology to create a podcast that integrated her vast clinical experience and practical wisdom of cultivating mental wellness using the latest information from neuroscience. MJ was Social Worker of the Year in 2011 for Region 2/IN.
Creating Midlife Calm is a podcast designed to guide you through the challenges of midlife, tackling issues like anxiety, low self-esteem, feeling unworthy, procrastination, and isolation, while offering strategies for improving relationships, family support, emotional wellbeing, mental wellness, and parenting, with a focus on mindfulness, stress management, coping skills, and personal growth to stop rumination, overthinking, and increase confidence through self-care, emotional healing, and mental health support.