Midlife Mastery Journal

Who Am I?

As I've often written, midlife has little or nothing to do with age. It happens when it happens. It's a psycho-spiritual event, a transformation from adult to maturity, from self-confidence to serenity. The demarcation area (midlife) can be identified by one overwhelming feeling: fear. Even more specifically, it's a fear of 'losing it' (whatever 'it' may be). You don't even have to be able to identify what 'it' is: all you need to recognize the midlife transition is to experience the fear of losing it. Dealing effectively with that fear takes you to maturity; failing to address it leads you to midlife crisis. So, how can you deal effectively with what is very often a nameless fear? All you need to acquire (and, incidentally, this constitutes the essence of the spiritual transition) is a deeper self-knowledge. You don't really 'need' anything . . . you have everything you require.

Want some help? Here's a little exercise that I've put together for you to help you to work through this transition. The instructions are simple: a) Write down your answers; b) Do not read beyond this paragraph until you're finished with the exercise;. c) Work through each of the three phases of the exercise in order. That's it! It should take you approximately a half-hour to complete the exercise. Ready to begin?

1. Complete this sentence "I am a _____________" as many times as you can, each time filling in the blank with a different word or phrase (a minimum of 20 times).
2. For each of the statements you wrote down in phase 1, re-write each statement with at least 5 different descriptors (for example: "I am a married [descriptor] man [word or phrase from phase 1]."
3. For each descriptor-word (or phrase) set, circle the ones that are virtually impossible to change (for example: your height, your IQ, your sexual identity). Make sure that you only circle the impossible characteristics, not the merely difficult.

When you've completed your list and circled the appropriate characteristics, only then read on.

Your Own Personal Stile

No, it's not a misspelling (and yes, I do make frequent use of my spell-checker). As our agrarian past fades from our collective memory, so will the images of pastoral scenes, farm implements, and, yes, even stiles. I even had some trouble finding a decent photo of one (and this one's from England, where the rural life still survives). What made me think of a 'stile' (a ladder providing access over a fence or wall) today was an interview I had last night with Rabbi Ed Weinsberg. Ed faced and overcame the challenges of prostate cancer just a very few years ago, and he's written a book that documents his story (and others) for the benefit of the 1/6 of all men who'll be facing that disease. For Ed, the experience catapulted him to a higher appreciation of faith, love, and even sex.

It's a fact of the human condition: transitions never come easily. They always appear as an interruption in the kind of life we desire and even plan for: a life of security, tranquility, ease, and peace. Yet, as I've written fairly often, the so-called 'interruption' is the reality, the sense of security is the illusion. Our 'common sense' lies to us, and tries to convince us that these disruptive events that come hurtling like projectiles into our lives are obstacles to our happiness and progress. Obstacles? Or, are they, in fact, the steps that take us up and over the obstacles? I submit to you that, just perhaps, these disruptions — even the big and painful ones — are what stimulate change and growth and that, without them, we'd face stagnation and decay. "No pain, no gain" is true particularly because every change involves a painful separation from our status quo.

What You Want vs. What You Need

Recently, from a business, personal, and spiritual perspective, I've been doing a lot of meditating on [apparent] failure. Right now, I can't think of a more apropos topic for people facing and experiencing the midlife transition. For one thing, your successes don't precipitate a midlife crisis. In fact, an uninterrupted string of successes can actually insulate you from undergoing the midlife transition, leaving you for longer than expected — and longer than necessary — state of im-maturity. When you're 'blessed' with success, you may be getting what you want, but to your own detriment: not getting what you really need.

I ardently agree with Friedrich Nietzsche that "What does not kill me, makes me stronger." The contrary, may very well also be true: What pampers me, makes me weaker. Getting your own way may, for a time, seem like a triumph; but, is it really? Does it actually move you forward, or does it, more often than not, lead you further into imminent trouble? Do negative consequences hold you back in fact, or are they, rather, 'medicinal blessings'?

Life Is Coming At You - Are You Ready?

Our local Giant supermarket has introduced hand scanners so that you can just walk up and down the aisles, collecting your groceries, while scanning them and bagging them right in your cart. Checkout involves downloading the inventory from the hand scanner into a self-serve checkout station. It's pretty cool. For produce, you pick out your fruits and vegetables, take them to a weigh station, enter the item code and it prints out a scanable label.

Here in Rehoboth, it's spring. Even though we're facing a (weekday) move to Washington DC in just about a month, Craig wanted to put in his annual garden. Since I'm no longer working 24/7 on my coaching business, I've been available to help shop at Lowe's and lug bags of soil and mulch around (which is about the extent of my gardening expertise). Last week, we came home with a Jeep-load of plants of several varieties.

What does our mutual shopping experiences have to do with midlife? Hold on . . . I'm getting there.