What Got You Here Won't Get You There
The perils and confusion of a life crisis.
We tend to make fun of the guy in his late-forties who buys a red Ferrari, dons a leather jacket, and starts having an affair with a much younger woman. He’s the recognised avatar of a mid-life crisis. We judge it as a desperate attempt to hang onto youth as it slips away. But existential reckoning is an inevitable part of the human experience …and it invites us all to dance at some stage, whether in mid, late, or even quarter-life.
We might lazily bracket ages as if entire decades of experience are a standard for ‘normal’ - our rebellious teens, reckless twenties, slightly-more-responsible thirties, sports-car-breakdown forties, etc. But in fact, life stages are uniquely individual and respective to our experience, responsibilities and mental awareness.
It’s not the progression of age but the shift between two different phases that can feel like a life crisis, and the fear of loss that comes with it. Nor are these growing pains a one-time rite of passage. We can be affronted by a sense of crises any time we face significant change.
This isn’t necessarily because we don’t want to move on. Change naturally stirs something in our primal bellies whether we ride the excitement or get ridden by anxiety. Either way, when life puts its hand on our lower back and guides us towards a new phase of life, we’re moving into new territory. Passing through the mildly unfamiliar to the great unknown. Who will we be in this new unchartered land? What are the rules? And what social currency will we have?
The scary part of any life transition, whether it’s a new job, a new environment, relationship or changing body, is that it likely threatens an identity we’ve been attached to. In fear, we might desperately try to resist or negate the change in the hope that a fast car, radical diet or plastic surgery will arrest the passage of time or compensate for the loss of control. These taxing and stressful measures give us the illusion that we can hold onto something that no longer works for us - like a toupée in the wind.
It’s the attachment that causes the distress. The refusal to fully let go of the old to welcome in the new. Trying to force what once felt easy.
It is in this resistance that we miss all the positives. The energy of fighting this change filling our head with negatives. We focus on the potential loss rather than the abundant gains. (Yes, abundant.)
Remember, change is uncomfortable because we are primally programmed to prioritise safety. In primal terms:
Change = potential threat. And threat = (probably) death.
…So the first step is to run an internal system upgrade for the year 2025!
What are the real threats and insecurities related to this change?
And what might we lose, miss, ruin if we don’t change?
We’re not just talking about big monumental life shifts here. This might be a change in our emotional defences and responses.
For example… A person raised in difficult circumstances might have been in survival mode growing up. As a result they learn to become cautious, guarded, independent and emotionally detached. Although these were valuable qualities to help navigate a time when they had limited autonomy, in later life these same qualities might prevent them from connecting in meaningful friendships and relationships. What used to be a positive, much needed response matrix at one time, is now a barrier and a hindrance to living a full and happy life.
This can be highly confusing. We like rules, formulas, internal listicles of what’s good and bad for us. So if something has worked for a number of years, how could we possibly believe it may no longer be a positive thing in our lives?
Tearing up the rulebook!
The thrilling part of any life transition is that it invites us to tear up the previous rule book and detach from whatever ‘identity’ no longer serves us.
Identity is only a construct we build around ourselves. Some scaffolding comes from us, some gets inherited, and some gets ‘kindly’ donated by society so we can match their social structures. It’s all irrelevant once we see it for what it is. Build it, change it, knock it down and start again, who cares?
Who wants a life of monotony?
Sure, change might be scary, but it sure as hell ain’t boring! Life is short when we consider the time many of us waste on the things that don’t matter. But life is also long if we’re lucky - so do we really want to stick to one lane? Limit ourselves only to what we know? Never change?
Going all in!
When we are drawn towards a change we should embrace it to maximise the experience and minimise the torture. The fearful voice in our mind will always whisper sweet nothings - romanticising past versions of ourselves in the hope that the familiar will keep us safe. We must think of this bothersome anxiety as an inevitable pain that is merely temporary - the discomfort of shedding a skin in order to grow.
Seasons change, leaves fall, new shoots grow. Life changes around us constantly. It’s our ego attachments that try to control what wishes to naturally evolve within us.
Rather than fight the tide and be consumed by it, we need to let ourselves move with what feels right for the time. Whatever needs to come in, and whatever needs to go out.
It’s only when we let go of where we were, that life can take us where we need to be next.
You captured the fact of life and what we should be. I love to hear the facts as it is, away from ostrich’s head hidden underneath.