How Hoda Kotb made “Right on Time” her personal mantra (exclusive)

For Hoda Kotb, her 60th birthday comes “at exactly the right time”.

The Today The show’s co-host marked her milestone birthday on Monday, August 12, with a celebration on the NBC morning show. But among the many surprises that came her way – including appearances on Little Big Town and Sugarland, as well as a birthday greeting from Leo Sandra Bullock, also 60 – it was a mural hung outside the Plaza that perhaps meant the most to her.

Illustrated by the Thrive Collection, a New York City nonprofit that connects artists with public school students, the image shows Kotb’s hand held by two young hands, each wearing bracelets with the names of their two daughters, Haley and Hope.

Next to it is the phrase “Right on Time,” which Kotb has made his personal mantra over the years.

She tells PEOPLE that she first heard the words when she called her friend Robin Roberts in 2017 to tell her she had adopted Haley. “I said to Robin, ‘Can you believe I’m going to be a mom at 50?’ And she told me, ‘The baby is coming at just the right time.'”

Since then, Kotb has been drawn to this phrase in every aspect of her life. Her second daughter, adopted in 2019, was born on time. Career success, from presenting Today with Hoda and Jenna her Today The co-hosting gig alongside Savannah Guthrie came at just the right time. And love will one day come at just the right time, too.

“Some people say, ‘Oh, everyone around me is married and I’m single, why didn’t that happen for me?’ Or, ‘Why don’t I have this job?’ But you can’t live on other people’s schedule, you have to make your own way,” Kotb says. “In many ways, my life started in my 50s. Bevy Smith always says, ‘It gets better later’ – that’s what happened for me. And when it happened, I was ready for it.”

“It’s about trusting that life will give you what you want when the time is right,” she continues. “You have to have faith. These blessings will come your way, you just have to believe that you deserve them.”

Kotb didn’t understand that at first.

As she admitted in the episode of her podcast on Monday, August 12, Make spaceFor years she struggled with feelings of worthlessness, which she could only overcome by working on her self-esteem.

“If you had told me in my 40s that this would be how I would live when I was 60, I wouldn’t have believed it,” she tells PEOPLE. “I was grateful for what I had, don’t get me wrong, but I felt like that was all I had; that what I had in life was good enough and I didn’t deserve anything better. And it wasn’t until I was in my early 50s that I started to change that.”

Bringing it to life proved to be a helpful tool for Kotb.

“Sometimes just looking in the mirror and saying the words ‘I do’ can open up a whole new world of doors,” Kotb says. “I remember doing that before I had my girls; I literally looked in the mirror and said, ‘I want to be a mom.’ And if I hadn’t had the courage to do that – to visualize it, to manifest it, and to say it out loud – I don’t think I would have opened myself up to it, allowed that love, and truly come to believe that I was worthy.”

Kotb pauses for a moment and reflects on herself. “You know, I felt like I wasn’t worthy at first,” she admits. “When I adopted Haley, I held her and said to myself, ‘I don’t know if I deserve to have this beautiful child in my life.’ But saying that out loud is full of doubt and fear; that’s not going to help you. So I really reflected on myself and said to myself, ‘You are worthy; you deserve to be her mother, and she deserves to have you as her mother.'”

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This self-esteem has helped Kotb through all obstacles since then and has given her the confidence to believe that everything is part of the universe’s grand plan.

“We only have one life,” Kotb adds. “We’re only going to be here once. Why should we settle for ‘just enough’? Do you really want to waste your life not achieving what you want? You have to work for it and you have to remember that it will come to you… at just the right time.”