Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
Who here has had a mid-life crisis or knows someone who has? Where your anxiety about aging, your boredom with your job, and your sense of the monotony of life drives you to have an affair, buy a motorcycle, and hit the gym?
According to the experts, this is just the stuff of Hollywood films and Oval Office shenanigans--not real life. "Crises" aren't triggered by age, but by some disturbance in your life, like a personal illness, a grave loss, or a career setback.
Those things aside, by the time you've reached mid-life, you're actually less susceptible to crises than you might be at any other point in your life, which makes sense: by mid-life your personality has matured, you have a stable job, a loving family, a house. In other words, you've achieved many of the markers of happiness and success. When Alexandra Freund, an expert on these matters, asked her research subjects what age they'd most like to be, most said they'd like to be in their 40s. Life, like wine, gets better with age.
So the idea of a "mid-life crisis" seems to be a myth:
In the process of figuring themselves out, young people will wrestle with establishing personal goals and values. After young adulthood, however,personality remains relatively stable for the rest of one's life, researchers have found...
Midlife without the crisis
In middle age, people tend to focus on making positive contributions to society through the interactions of people of significantly different ages. Such interactions include formal and informal mentee/mentor relationships, stratified workplace relations and cross-generation family dynamics.
Middle-age adults are "no longer driven, but now the drivers," say researchers Bernice Neugarten and Nancy Datan in their paper "The Middle Years" ("The Foundations of Psychiatry," Basic Books, 1974).
Critically, middle adulthood comes with a greater sense of control then other life periods. Young adulthood, by contrast, is usually a time of striving, and late adulthood is typically a time of loss, including of one's job, health and friends.
The most common complaint in midlife is not boredom, as many young people fear, nor a feeling of crisis. "People are experts of themselves at this age," Freund said. "They know what is good for them and what isn't."
Rather, researchers conducting large surveys have found that the main problem for middle-age people is feeling unable to get everything done.
"In middle adulthood, you are living at your fullest. You've achieved a lot in your job, the kids are growing up, you are healthy and have more resources than when you were a student. There is not much mortality in your social circle. … You know where you are going and don't question yourself all the time anymore," Freund said.
Not that midlife is void of critical changes: Menopause, andropause (male menopause), the emptying of the nest, and the death of a parent all often happen during middle adulthood. But not everyone sees these changes as negative. Menopause and an empty nest, for example, can result in a newly flourishing sex life.
For an alternative theory, see Frank Turner's angsty--but great--song Photosynthesis:
Lyrics can be found here:
Well I guess I should confess that I am starting to get old
All the latest music fads all passed me by and left me cold
All the kids are talking slang I won't pretend to understand
All my friends are getting married, mortagages and pension plans
And it's obvious my angry adolescent days are done
And I'm happy and I'm settled in the person I've become
But that doesn't mean I'm settled up and sitting out the game
Time may change a lot but some things may stay the same
….
Oh maturity's a wrapped up package deal so it seems
And ditching teenage fantasy means ditching all your dreams
All your friends and peers and family solemnly tell you you will
Have to grow up be an adult yeah be bored and unfulfilled
Oh when no ones yet explained to me exactly what's so great
About slaving 50 years away on something that you hate
Look I'm meekly shuffling down the path of mediocrity
Well if that's your road then take it but it's not the road for me
Perhaps Turner is the exception that proves the rule. Let us hope so, at least.
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Comments:
Jan '11
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
Now what am I going to blame all my problems on?
Jun '10
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
I never bought in to the midlife crisis idea. Thanks for the video----I like Frank Turner & they were the world's cutest little kids. Now off to shovel....
Sep '10
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
If correcting past mistakes and having the courage to do so is a crisis, I've had mine.
May '10
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
It has? I do?
Dec '10
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
Ah, then how to explain the number of marriages that I've seen break up over the past 5 years or so? I'm 51, my oldest (son) graduated from HS in 08. Just looking at his group of friends, we've seen 6 sets of parents get a divorce in that time frame.
I won't say that I totally buy into the concept of a "mid-life crisis", but there does seem to be a restlessness, a dissatisfaction in many as they reach that point in life.
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
Similarly, I've never bought in to the "identity crisis" idea. The whole concept of it strikes me as bizarre!
Jul '10
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
Kennedy Smith
It has? I do? · Feb 21 at 7:44am
You know, like Charlie Sheen.
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
The Great Adventure!: Ah, then how to explain the number of marriages that I've seen break up over the past 5 years or so? I'm 51, my oldest (son) graduated from HS in 08. Just looking at his group of friends, we've seen 6 sets of parents get a divorce in that time frame.
I won't say that I totally buy into the concept of a "mid-life crisis", but there does seem to be a restlessness, a dissatisfaction in many as they reach that point in life. · Feb 21 at 7:45am
Yes, I can see that. What explains the restlessness? A yearning for youth? A sense that life is slipping away? I know one person, same age range as you, who after a long and loving marriage, decided he wanted to leave the marriage--kids are grown and out of the house--to pursue his "dreams." He ultimately decided to not leave his family. But it was a close call. No event spurred this "crisis" that he had--just a sense that after years of devoting himself to his family, he now wanted to devote his time to doing his own thing.
Jul '10
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
I always thought "mid-life crisis" was TV movie comb-over speak for narcissistic blow hard life-style. A Hollywood excuses Hollywood by syndromizing selfishness extravaganza.
May '10
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
Emily Esfahani Smith, Ed.
Yes, I can see that. What explains the restlessness? A yearning for youth? A sense that life is slipping away? · Feb 21 at 7:57am
I blame Bucket Lists. As Harley Quinn might say, that old clock's a tickin, and there's so many things you planned to do.
Sep '10
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
Jul '10
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
Barrack Obama's mid-life crisis is turning out to be ours.
Nov '10
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
Hmmm. I think both the “identity crisis” and the “mid-life crisis” are real phenomena although neither is necessarily a crisis. At some point in growing up you have to decide whether you are your parents or if you’re going to be somebody different. Most choose something different. At some point a couple of decades later you reevaluate the choices you’ve made. Many find they are not as different from their parents as they thought they would be. That’s cause for some reflection.
To say these things are not caused by age but by some disturbance in your life says nothing. Everyone has disturbances in their life and age is just the result of enough time going by for those disturbances to accumulate.
Of course, some people are able to deny themselves the experience of a mid-life reflection on their past choices. But that might lead to a worse problem later. The only way out is through.
Jun '10
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
"Everyone has disturbances in their life and age is just the result of enough time going by for those disturbances to accumulate."
I agree with that. But as we age and build up more of those disturbances, most of us learn to cope better, too. That's why the mid life crisis doesn't ring true for me & never did. If we all said the Serenity Prayer every morning we'd be better able to use our wisdom to fend off those feelings of regret and turn them into moments of reflection that will improve our lives going forward.
Sep '10
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
Regarding Jacques, his undergirding theory was quite interesting. He put his finger on something that affected individuals as well as organizations: a changing perception of time horizons. In organizations, he found many people should be promoted higher than their bosses because they could think much longer term and imaginatively than could their bosses. This flew in the face of modern "team based kumbaya" management theory and much of his work was banned in certain management schools.I think its an interesting line of thought, though -- as is usually the case -- it is no holy grail.
I do think that its possible to read too much into it -- I think most cognitive scientists would grant that in males especially the age of 35 is roughly when testosterone levels start to drop in sedentary males and all types of falls in key neurotransmitters can begin to precipitate a "crisis".
Dec '10
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
Emily Esfahani Smith, Ed.
Yes, I can see that. What explains the restlessness? A yearning for youth? A sense that life is slipping away? I know one person, same age range as you, who after a long and loving marriage, decided he wanted to leave the marriage--kids are grown and out of the house--to pursue his "dreams." He ultimately decided to not leave his family. But it was a close call. No event spurred this "crisis" that he had--just a sense that after years of devoting himself to his family, he now wanted to devote his time to doing his own thing. · Feb 21 at 7:57am
I think part of it can be attributed to what I call "taking inventory". Similar to what Teejaw mentioned, a reevaluation. Have I accomplished the things I thought I would? Am I "successful"? Am I loved? Fortunately, I married an incredible woman (how THAT happened still baffles me) who still loves me, so on that front things are good. I did conduct an inventory in 2009, however, which resulted in some internal turmoil. Fortunately it didn't have lasting effects.
Nov '10
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
It isn’t that you won’t have disturbances and even crises. It’s how you deal with them. How you get through them.
I’ve watching the PBS Masterpiece “Any Human Heart.” The title comes from a quote by William James, "Never say you know the last word about any human heart.”
To anyone who is also following it, do you think Logan Mountstuart had a mid-life crisis? The better question would be, “How many did he have?” A yet better question is, “Did he deal with his crises effectively?"
The ultimate question might be, “How does this guy continue to walk and talk and breath at all?"
Edited on February 21, 2011 at 6:11pmJan '11
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
I had a mid-life crisis just before I turned 50. But instead of getting a mistress, I got a Masters degree. Much cheaper. I heartily recommend the path I took.
May '10
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
Pseudodionysius
Edited on Feb 21 at 08:23 am
Feb 21 at 8:20am
Kant wrote something very similar, though he put the date closer to 40 than 35. Mine came at 39.
Dec '10
Re: Are Mid-Life Crises a Myth?
I'm 53, so it's time. But I just can't get my wife to agree that I need a corvette.