Navigating Midlife Transitions
A 6-week online course to navigate midlife’s most common transitions with confidence and a fresh perspective.
This course is right for you if…
You’ve recently experienced a "Massive Shift" in your life.
We’ll help give you tools to create structure, identify direction and make space for internal processing time.
You're ready to reframe the infamous “Midlife Crisis.”
Relationships, career, health, and purpose can all shift at once and be overwhelming. We transform a "crisis" into a “calling."
You're inspired to explore and maximize your “Next Chapter.”
We’ll help you to reflect on your lifetime of experience to cultivate and harvest the wisdom you can share.
A groundbreaking online retreat...
Expert Guidance
Led by the 3 MEA co-founders and MEA’s SVP Digital Kari Cardinale, learn from leading transition experts on aging, career, health, and relationships.
New Life Coordinates
Reexamine the first half of your life and set new coordinates with clarity and purpose to navigate the road ahead.
Digital Intimacy
We have mastered a model of community building, unique immersion, and authentic engagement without having to travel.
Transitional Intelligence
Using our proprietary 6P’s of Midlife Transitions, explore the Anatomy of Midlife Transitions and expand your “TQ.”
Lifetime Access
We believe in long-life learning and so will you after experiencing MEA Online. This course is yours. Forever.
Blended Learning
Live events, 1:1 conversations, and weekly learning on your own creates a balance of community learning and self-discovery.


"These courses have been life-changing for me. I know that they've come to me at the right time in my life, but I've also embraced them wholeheartedly and they have definitely changed me in a way that nothing else has before."




What our students say about the course
"I signed up in 15 minutes!"
This course helped me think about different ways to stimulate our thinking in transitions that we’re going through. My greatest appreciation was the beginning, the middle, and the end.
"An online course unlike any that I’ve seen before. Very engaging!"
With where I am in my life, I really needed this course. It was all about transitions. This course really helped me narrow my focus, and think about what are next steps…and I got them!
"This was a beautiful journey that has come to an end, unfortunately."
The program was spectacular. It really surpassed my expectations. I was really surprised about how the course was curated. There was such a warm intensity and personal touch to it.
"Highly recommended for anyone wanting to live a richer life as they age!"
This course gave me the tools and the comfort that I wasn’t alone, as well as a greater confidence that I could get through these feelings of being stuck. The program was fantastic!
Online course overview
Managing the transitions in life such as relationships, work, financial, and health can often be challenging. Did you know there are more transitions in midlife than any other? There are no schools or tools to manage them more effectively — until now. MEA will help you identify where you are in all of your transitions and guide you through them faster, with greater clarity and ease.
MEA Online offers experiential learning, growth, and connection with insightful tools to shift your mindset and create more resilience and adaptability. Our unique blend of high-energy live events, weekly videos, community conversations, and reflection tools feels like an immersion retreat grounded in a highly effective framework and experiences that will leave you feeling more peaceful, connected, optimistic, and inspired. Join our global community.
Personal Transitions
Explore your current personal transitions—relationships, empty nesting, moving, etc. Learn how key mindset management tools can help you reframe and grow.
• May 26, 4 p.m. PT / 7 p.m. ET
Physical Transitions
Understand how changes in our body can have a profound effect on our self-image and root out our “inner agesist” that holds us back.
Psychological Transitions
Are you feeling stuck or more resistant to change? Explore how our attitudes and approaches to transitions evolve as we age.
• June 9, 4 p.m. PT / 7 p.m. ET
Parting/Passing Transitions
Explore the impact of facing mortality, the loss of loved ones, and the stages of transition that occur when people come and go from our life.
Professional Transitions
Whether you are leaving a career or starting a new one, learn to reframe professional transitions with a growth mindset.
Purpose Transitions
Create an actionable roadmap for a renewed sense of purpose and legacy, creating a life filled with meaning and joy.
• June 30, 4 p.m. PT / 7 p.m. ET
Weekly “Community Cafe” Discussion Groups
Meet your core faculty
All-star guest faculty
Join a close-knit community of 3,000+
MEA Alumni





Let’s do this together.
Enroll today to reserve your spot for our next course, beginning May 26, 2023.
A Semester of MEA May 26 - Nov 10, 2023
Enjoy MEA online for a reduced price of 15% while spots last.
Enjoy MEA online for a reduced price of 15% while spots last.

Frequently Asked Questions
What is MEA and how did it begin?
The Modern Elder Academy (MEA) is the world’s first midlife wisdom school with online programs and campuses in Baja California Sur, Mexico and Santa Fe, New Mexico. The inspiration came to founder Chip Conley while writing his book, Wisdom@Work: The Making of a Modern Elder. Based on his own career and life experiences, this powerful idea — becoming a “modern elder” — launched our campuses, and MEA Online.
Is this truly an academic course or another self-help workshop? OR What are the academic aspects of this course?
MEA Online is a rigorous educational program that features sophisticated insights into exploring a more purposeful path to your career, vocation or calling with our core faculty and includes leading educators, scientists, researchers, speakers, authors, athletes, and activists. The Emergence of Long Life Learning is the peer-reviewed white paper by MEA founder Chip Conley and design psychologist, Ingo Rauth, P.h.D., that illustrates the theory affirmed by 1000+ MEA’s program graduates.
How do I know if this course is for me?
Is something shifting in your life? Do you want it to? Are you struggling to figure out “what’s next” in your career, vocation or calling? Do new tools, resources, structure and accountability call to you as well as inspiration and connection within a supportive community? Then MEA Online is for you. MEA Online attracts an intergenerational and multicultural student body, which makes for a rich exchange of life experience. Most of our students are between ages 40 and 65 but we've had students as young as 30 and as old as 88. There is no age requirement or professional experience required to take this course.
How will this course really help me manage what’s next?
MEA Online offers a unique immersion experience with expert leadership and guidance on creating a more purposeful “What’s Next.” You will explore 8 themes to better understand yourself, your history and your future. You will develop new language and tools to understand where you are in your journey, and set micro-commitments to make small changes over time that lead to big changes in positive directions.
I’ve taken online courses before but wasn’t satisfied. How is MEA Online different?
We understand that there is a lot to choose from online. But MEA Online is not a “one-and-done” course where you’re left to flounder on your own. We’ve developed tools and practices that translate beautifully online using our proprietary “digital intimacy” principles. Our matrix learning style consists of: individual weekly learning on your own time, (4) facilitated high-energy LIVE experiences, and weekly optional live discussion groups. Our community is our strength and your connection will continue as an official MEA alumnus with a variety of alumni programs available to you.
Will I have access to the teachers?
You will meet and engage with our core faculty in our live events And, if you want more connection, we offer regular office hours with our MEA Online facilitators.
I’m not sure if I will have time to complete the course in the 6 weeks
We’ve organized the modules to help you easily set aside a block of time that works for you each week. Many reframe their weekends and find it resets their mood for the entire week. And, you’ll have lifetime access to return to any sessions you might not be able to do if something comes up. This also includes a recording of our LIVE events. So, if your schedule is interrupted, you won’t miss out on a thing. You can revisit the course anytime, at your convenience.
I’m on the fence. What if I’m not satisfied with the course?
We’re so confident MEA Online will transform your ability to design a purposeful path, that we offer a no questions asked money-back guarantee AND Lifetime Access to the course.
Can I hear about other students’ experience with the course?
“One of the best things to come out of 2020.” “The human connection you were able to build in an online program was amazing.” “Exceeded my expectations... “It just works!” 95% of surveyed graduates say that they are better equipped to navigate midlife transitions after taking this course.
What are the technical requirements to successfully take this course?
You can access MEA Online using a desktop or laptop computer or tablet as well as the ability to join video conference calls. We offer tech support via email.

Reframing Transitions
Gain immediate and practical tools to manage transitions.
- The MEA Team