Well, how did I get here?
Often in middle or later life it can occur to people that they have not really made their own choices, and that somewhere along the line they have lost their way. They have followed ideas about ideas about what it was they were suppose to be doing, but then realise that they were someone else’s ideas. Something starts to feel wrong, but they cannot put their finger on what; after all, they have done everything that has been asked of them. They have ‘delivered’, and some are very high achievers and some even have high achieving hobbies, because of course, the hobbies also have to deliver. But… but… one day, some wake up wondering if this is all there is, and there may be a sense of emptiness, and even depression.
Carl Jung talked about a second life at what we would call middle age, where we realise that we perhaps want a different life to the first half. Some people call this a mid-life crisis. I call it a readjustment of priorities in response to the (perhaps unconscious) realisation that the clock is ticking. Jung was clear that these changes were meant to happen - you were meant to slip into a different kind of mindset in mid-life as part of the individuation process. We can just call it growing up, if you like. We readjust what is important to us and we make some changes accordingly, maybe letting go of some things and bringing in new things.
You might realise that the life you have been living is no longer the one you want, or your values are no longer your values. Perhaps you see life differently, or you’ve had a life changing experience. Perhaps you look around you and see a world on fire, or the inequalities are too much, or that we are disconnected from the world around us, or maybe all of these things, or, you might look around you and see a life full of possibility and wonders, and an amazement of how things on this planet work. It might be any or all of these things. You might wonder what you will leave behind. This might all be too much to read on a day when you just wanted to look at a nice picture.
There are many different events that can precipitate this change, or nothing at all; sometimes it can simply be a growing feeling of life lacking lustre, of there being nothing else, of constantly being on an increasingly pointless hamster wheel, or that more something life affirming needs more attention. The answer is not more, better, best, but what else might there be? What other possibilities? What could be new?
The answer is not out there, it is not moving to a different country or swapping something for a new version or model. It is in you somewhere; somewhere that may have been shut off and put away in a box, and you can’t see it yet but the knocking is getting louder. It is not always easy to listen to, and it might scare the horses if you do make any sudden movements. But as the old saying goes, if not now, when? Are you going to listen?
I really feel like you're talking to me here Wendy 🤔
Yes! I can so relate. In fact, I wrote about this very thing here: https://graciewilde.substack.com/p/changing-the-rules
Thank you for sharing your ideas.