How to want more without feeling guilty for empty nesters: honest answers for Tuckahoe

A lot of people in Tuckahoe describe their life the same way: "fine." Good routines, nothing on fire. But ambition and gratitude can live in the same house — and that is the conversation nobody starts at dinner. Let's start it here.

And this is Tuckahoe: part of greater Richmond, full of people who built a good life on purpose and still feel the pull toward more. Which is exactly why this question lands differently here than anywhere else.

The giveaways of grateful-but-stuck

• You say 'I'm blessed' and 'I'm bored' in the same breath — and mean both.
• You've started romanticizing a version of yourself that used to want things.
• Your gratitude practice has quietly become a list of reasons not to change anything.

The Tuckahoe walk test

• Take a 20-minute walk through your neighborhood and narrate, out loud if you can, what you'd build or change if comfort wasn't in charge.
• Whatever you said first — that's your thread. Pull it gently for seven days.

The goal isn't to despise the life you have. It's to love it enough to keep growing inside it.

Ready to stop settling?

Get There Is a Fine Line Between Gratefulness and Complacency tonight for less than a dollar on Kindle, or grab the $14.99 paperback with Prime shipping — and join readers across South who are done coasting.

Kindle — $0.99 Paperback — $14.99

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Keep reading

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• How to want more without feeling guilty for empty nesters — a guide for Bon Air, VA readers