Midlife Mastery Journal

After the Fall: Recovering Your Initiative

What happens when you run headlong into one of life's 'ten terrible transitions'? You probably know what they are — I've written about them before: 1) Death of a loved one, 2) Making a life commitment, 3) Breaking a life commitment, 4) Changing careers, 5) Going into business, 6) Retirement, 7) Bankruptcy, 8) Serious illness or accident, 9) Spiritual awakening (including addiction recovery), and 10) Embracing sexual identity (as Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual or Transgendered). All of them (even the 'good' ones) have the same effect on your experience of day-to-day living: it stops! Everything comes to a screeching halt until the transition is completed. You've fallen. So, what happens then?

Everyone goes through the same four sets of experiences, according to his or her temperament and the nature of the transition. I call them "the four 'R's": realization, reaction, reflection and result. At each experience, you encounter a different set of emotions, all of which have to be dealt with before you can get on with the life you've chosen for yourself. Let's look at each one.

Living at Statistical Ground Zero

"Life," they say "begins at 40." In so many ways, 'they' got it right for a change! Regardless of how we might be feeling about it inside, by age 40, the world is ready to take us seriously. We have achieved a degree of success, and everyone around us is prepared to take us seriously. By 40, we're firmly ensconced in 'adulthood' and we've had at least some opportunity to wield a power and authority that we only dreamed of when we were adolescents. I have to say 'regardless of how we might feel' because secretly every adult retains some of that sense of the 'little child in the big world' and the 'terrified teen' inside an often very competent adult exterior. If you haven't figured it out by now, let me assure you that it takes a long time to 'finally, really, truly grow up.'

Whether or not you're ready for it, midlife also marks your shift from the sidelines to mid-field in the game of life. If you were very fortunate in your early years, you may have been spared from having to deal with what I'm choosing to call the "ten terrible transitions." Few people are given the burden of having to endure all ten; however, most people have to endure most of them, and, the longer you live, the higher the statistical probability that it's going to be your turn to face each them. Of the ten terrible transitions, nine of them generally happen at midlife. The longer you've been able to avoid having to endure them, the closer they're coming to you — at least the ones that you're destined to have to endure. Let's look at them.

Your Cultural Obstacle to Growing Up

So you think you're all grown up, do you? You might want to think again! If you haven't navigated your way successfully through the midlife transition to full (physical, mental, emotional and spiritual) maturity, then you're not 'all grown up' . . . yet. There's no shame in growing, mind you. As a matter of fact, that's what life is all about: becoming. The only time that someone can truthfully say that you've 'made it' is after you're dead. Then, there's no more becoming to be done. You'll be finished, in every sense of that term. If you're not 'all grown up' yet, don't fret. Wear it as a badge of honor that, as the saying goes, "God isn't finished with me yet."

Whether you're 15 or 50, you've got some growing to do. Yet most people who are reading these words are unaware that there exists a huge obstacle to your growth that you're just taking for granted. In fact, if you're like most people, you probably think that this major obstacle to growth belongs there: it seems like that's the way things are supposed to be. What could it be that's slowing or stopping your progress, and yet you just accept it as 'normal'? It's your culture. You can think of your culture as the lens through which you view yourself and the world. Or, as sociologist Geert Hofstede describes it, it's the mental 'operating system' that underlies the functioning of your reason and your judgment. Culture consists, in fact, of the unconscious assumptions that you make about how life in this world ought to function. The sad truth is that, for most people, culture stands in your way, however: so long as you don't confront your cultural assumptions, you're powerless to grow beyond them.

The Second Hallmark of Maturity

Have you completed the midlife transition from adulthood to maturity? It's really quite easy to judge: there are two major hallmarks or characteristics that set maturity apart from mere adulthood. We've already said quite a bit about he first hallmark, which involves replacing the 'borrowed' values, goals, aspirations, and expectations of adulthood (inherited from family, peers, teachers, religious and political leaders, the media and culture) with personally-significant core values that are generally independent from outside influences, opinions and judgments. Maturity replaces the phrase 'supposed to' with 'choose to.'

However, this is only the first hallmark of maturity. The second hallmark is almost a corollary of the first, although it doesn't always follow upon it. Once we make the decision to adopt a core value system that resonates with the person who we are (or discern that we are meant to be), we have the option to choose the goals toward which we are going to strive. The hallmark of a mature person who has successfully completed the midlife transition appears as a set of goals that are concerned more with giving back than getting. An adult is someone who has achieved a certain amount of independence and is pursuing goals that foster and promote that independence and personal well-being. The mature person is one whose energies are focused on forwarding the prosperity and well-being of his or her family, community, nation, culture, and humanity as a whole. Midlife transition moves a person from enlightened self-interest to making a lasting contribution to human progress. I don't think that we consider this seriously enough as a sign of the midlife transition.