Episode 2, Midlife Crisis

This weeks topic is different to what I planned. I was doing some online research to find the most interesting and severe midlife topics worthwile writing about. I wanted to build a chronological order and start with the one that has the highest value for all of us. So far so good. But the only thing that popped up after typing „midlife“ was „crisis“! I had no intention to push things into this direction but it seems that everything related to our prime years unavoidably ends in desaster.

But why is this the case? Everyone knows that two things drive sales figures i.e., sex and drama. Since sex probably isn‘t your biggest concern when you are in your 30’s to 40’s- is the midlife crisis an unproven exaggeration? Let’s dig into this and see what people mean when they are talking about midlife crisis. The holy grail of every profound research is of course wikipedia. It states the following: „The concept of midlife crisis is based on the assumption that most people base their existence on life goals. Despite all individual differences, the chances of achieving one's own life goals in midlife are often reflected on, which can lead to upsets and insecurities with regard to one's own identity (role in family, job, social life, etc.) in the sense of the term.“

(https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midlife-Crisis (Abre numa nova janela))

It basically says that we set goals (which every „good“ motivational video encourages you to do), but we miss them and this causes a crisis. What is the solution to this dilemma? Setting no goals at all? Or lowering the bar so you can easily jump over it even after your first lumbago? 

I can personally say that I need goals in my life. Otherwise I would float around aimlessly. My expectations and hence my goals for my midlife are staying as healthy as possible, starting a family, enhancing my career, sticking to the few good friends I have and finally growing a respectable beard. Is that too much? Ok, the beard-thing most likely. But I think that starting a family and becoming better at what we do already is not even a goal. For me it simply feels like a natural tendency in our society. And I think that you will agree with me on that. So let’s stop worrying too much if we potentially end in a crisis. Let’s start doing things instead- whatever your goals are!

Visit Midlife Man (Abre numa nova janela) to read all previously published episodes.

Please feel free to share and subsribe to my newsletter. Thank you for your support and becoming part of our community!