What Is A Mid Life Crisis?

1. We suddenly find ourselves taking stock of our life so far.
2. We start to evaluate who we are, and what we have achieved.
3. We start to seek out childhood friends to see what they have amounted to and compare.
4. We Begin to question our previous approach to life.
5. We begin to ask ourselves if we are worthy.
6. We begin to possibly feel negative about the results of life so far.
7. We may well begin to add up our financial worth so far
8. We may begin to question our beliefs, our approach to life and our whole ideology.
9. We start to realise we will one day expire, check out of planet earth and cease to be.
10. We may start to think about the legacy we will leave for our offspring and their offspring. Will they be proud of us?

These are only a few of the possible symptoms & signs of a mid life crisis.

Most people who begin to go through this do not even realise it is happening to them. It slowly emerges and creates confusion, loss of confidence and even depression. The telegraph published an interesting article about 40 signs of a mid life crisis Among those reasons are “Realising you will never pay off your mortgage“, “Wanting to buy an expensive bicycle“, “Not taking any pleasure in your friends successes” & “Wanting to quit work but know you’ll never be able to”

In my case I had to address the fact that my appearance is no longer youthful. This certainly affected me badly because the music business is a young person’s game largely.

Understanding how you came to this point

In my case illness has already played a big part in my life. My journey has been unusually challenging with near death experiences, morbid obesity, psychological trauma from childhood events & addiction. After losing half my body weight in my late 40s I found myself with a convenient mid life crisis! Re evaluating my situation had to be done anyway. Losing so much weight changes things a lot! New opportunity seemed available for me, a change in personal perception was inevitable. As a result I came to terms with the facts of my life but not without a lot of reflection. It is those reflections that give rise to a potential for depression, loss of confidence, inadequacy and a sense of failure. Your journey may well be more usual. The capitalist system we are forced into from birth sets out the path and we automatically fall into line.

We do all the things we are expected to do;

• Learn from an early age what money is
• Learn from parents that work is important later
• Become trained at getting up early every day and going to a place where our lives will be submitted and regulated.
• Understand there is a thing called rules and law. Fall into line.
• Leave education with respectable qualifications
• Get a job or start a business and commit the largest part of our freedom to work
• Get a partner
• Buy a house
• Have children
• Vote governments in and out
• Enjoy one or two holidays each year
• Donate our youthful energy to keeping the country strong by paying taxes.

As a result people end up fighting to stay healthy under the stress of it all .

Most people do all of the above on autopilot. People donate the first half of their lives to keeping the country strong financially. The system is set up to exploit our young energy and it does it rigorously. People slowly but surely start to lose that youthful energy and finally arrive at the realisation they have changed. And its not good. Often the outcome of life so far doesn’t match the rosy vision they imagined for themselves 25 yrs ago. so along comes the mid life crisis.

When the mid life crisis emerges it is almost like we begin to really think about our lives properly for the first time ever.

Re-evaluation

So we begin to slide into an emotional turmoil. It can happen slowly. The first sign may be the loss of energy. No biggie, so you carry on. But life gets more tiring as time goes by and the desire to slow down emerges. We start to notice how we look & how younger people look. We begin to realise that our way of thinking is in fact becoming the old way as new technologies emerge and younger people seem to be leaving us behind in that regard. We might begin noticing how well others of a similar age have done in life so far and start comparing that to ourselves. We might start to realise that others in our age group seem a bit more educated in matters of consciousness. Charity, benevolence, morality etc. This becomes something we realise we have never really thought about. We may suddenly find ourselves questioning our whole belief system. We might begin to finally realise that we have been largely moving through life blindfolded having been unfairly distracted by the expectations of the capitalist system. Finally we find ourselves confused and sad. We might start drinking more alcohol and a sense of giving up on life can creep in. We can very easily be left clueless of how to understand and deal with this. It truly does become a personal crisis. It can even seem like a complete nervous breakdown for some.

How to work your way out of the mid life crisis

People do emerge from this positively and very productively. It is just a phase we naturally go through. In order to navigate this part of life successfully and healthily we need to take a responsible approach. We need to go to a new level of our understanding of life, of the human nature and our part in that. I will now share my own observations of how to do this according to my experiences.

There are some hard facts that we absolutely must accept at this time of our lives.

1. We are older and will never be young again.
2. The second half of our lives has begun.
3. We are a completely different person intellectually compared to our younger version.
4. We must make sense of and accept fully, who we are now.
5. We must find a reason to go on, to maintain our health and be happy for the remainder of our lives.

In order to do all of the above easily we need a good reason right? Of course we do.

If we do not find a good reason to do so then we will remain depressed in our state of collapse. In order to find that reason we must take a new look at ourselves and decide what is really important.

The bigger picture

In my case I came to the realisation that I want my life to count for something. We are all a part of something far bigger than ourselves. We are a part of an evolving human race. Our children are the new version of us and their children will be a new improved version of them and so on. When your future great grandchildren look back at the family history what would you want them to think?

“Oh that was great grandfather John, He worked as an android of capitalism until his late 40s then became an alcoholic and finally died?”

Or…..

“Oh that was great grandfather John, he worked the first half of his life as an android for capitalism before waking up intellectually and going on to help people in a really meaningful way?”

We are talking about our legacy.

The way we are remembered by our future generations for having contributed in some way. The truth is that this realisation of the bigger picture can set us free. It can enable us to fight depression of the mid life crisis. It can allow us to redefine ourselves in a truly exciting way. It can put a new fire in our belly and really empower us to become newly inspired to live. It will give us the secret of how to achieve happiness. We are now talking about the “why”

The “Why”

In asking ourselves “what do I think is truly important in life?” In doing this we will be challenged in several ways. Whatever we decide is the big “why”, we need to find that thing that can easily compliment the way we already think to an extent. If we attempt to shift into being someone we just are not then we are setting ourselves up for a fall. We will return to depression when we finally fail at our whimsical and unrealistic attempt to morph into a superhuman! We may need to ask ourselves how we can be more conscious?

 

Challenges will be things like;

• A lifetime of learned behaviours
• Selfishness
• Financial position
• Unavoidable commitments in life
• Ability to learn
• Ability to shift from negative thinking to positive thinking processes

For instance, if a man spends the first half of his life making as much money as he possibly can and self service has always been his way then selfishness may be a challenge.

He may find it difficult to shift toward a life of charitable activity completely forsaking the idea of profiteering. His psychological makeup simply wouldn’t allow him to be comfortable in doing that. But he may well have an epiphany that selfish hoarding of money by selling cars that pollute the planet is irresponsible and unhelpful to the human race.

He may realise he needs to do something new. Something more responsible.

In this case it would make good sense for this man to maybe make the decision that he wants to begin distributing a new product that is completely in line with positive human evolution. He might shift from selling cars that pollute the atmosphere to environmentally friendly solar energy panels. In doing this he could easily justify a responsible new approach in life that now makes him a part of the solution. He can feel worthy as a contributor to positive human development. In this case a man could suddenly feel he has new direction, new reasons to go on. He can now justifiably feel he is more a part of something bigger than himself. This could become his “why”

Another person may arrive at the conclusion that they have an opportunity to help others through some type of charitable activity.

Maybe they still have to work but decide to give up their evenings and weekends to help out at the local drop in center for the homeless, or maybe help raise money for a cause. Maybe this type of person will suddenly realise that campaigning for animal rights is important and starts to use social media to highlight an issue. Whatever it is we choose to do needs to be positive, helpful and good. Good is really all that matters in this life. The human race is suffering in many ways and the easing of that suffering can only ever be a worthy thing to try and achieve.

In order to find your “why” You need to take a fresh look at the world.

Understand the human process. See the political structure of the country, identify injustices, irresponsible practices, realise the rights and wrongs of the way our populations conduct themselves. It should also include an analysis of our own practices, our own attitudes. It may include a realisation that we have not been actually treating people well. We may realise that our attitude has been questionable and some things have to change. In doing this we will hopefully arrive to a point of better understanding of who we are and our place in this world on a higher intellectual level. We need to make new sense of our world and everything in it. Once you clearly see what is right and what is wrong this will naturally lead you to what it is you believe is important. You can then decide what you will do and “why” with the remainder of your life. You can find that amazing way to make your life count for something more than it does now. You are the wisest you have ever been in your life. You have experience a younger person doesn’t have. You can absolutely make that count. View your life so far positively and just look at this next stage as optimisation. Keep the good things and flush out the things that bother you. Also… the past has gone. Dont do regrets, regrets don’t help, they only eat away at you. Only do solutions. Accept the things you cannot change and know the things you can. Find your worthy “why” and go forward with renewed energy and excitement for who you will become.

Finding your “why” may include possibilities such as;

• Improving education – taking a degree in order to become better equipped to help in some way.
• Creating or inventing something
• Campaigning for a worthy cause
• Improving our attitude and learning to be a much better family member
• Travelling
• Helping others in need
• Taking our business to a new level
• Changing jobs to one that will make us happier and feeling we are involved in something more useful to the world
• Going into teaching a worthwhile subject

In my case I became a musical life coach.

I realised I had a real desire to share my best knowledge to the world and also write conscious songs about that knowledge. I decided to commit the rest of my life to attempting to guide troubled people using my writing and through my music. My why is to “share the good”

Whatever it is… You must find your “”why”

This will be your new meaning for life.

 

If you need to talk to someone regarding your mid life crisis or even to discover if you are in fact going through one then please feel free to shoot me a message

If you find you are struggling to understand what is actually good and what is bad

it may well help you to read my article; Say one sentence to lead an extraordinary life This article contains a reliable definition of good v bad.

Good luck.

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