Good advice, from a 36 year old middle aged man 3 years into a midlife crisis after a massive work-related burnout event.
A couple more pieces of advice from me:
* A midlife crisis has its own glacial pace. Be prepared to be upside down for a long time.
* Be prepared not to be the same person you were before. Be prepared to learn there is no turning back.
* If you're in a midlife crisis, your previous life was simply not good enough and reality has caught up to you. Go through the process, and you'll become a better person.
* Outsource your mental health during this phase to professionals. Not even your spouse might be able to accept what comes out of this reconfiguration of yours. You will probably need the help of someone that is not invested in your previous existence to hold you in this trying time.
--
3 years in, it's getting better, I miss part of my previous life, but I know who I am now, how I operate, and I won't compromise to fit someone else's mould anymore. In your childhood you had no say in how you were grown and pieced together. You had to carry whatever they had built for you until you broke down. Now is your chance to start over and do a better job at it.
Wow, 3 years, that's a long way. Congratz on making it this far and good luck on the road still ahead.
39yo here, just stopped shy of a full burn-out & after a month with a lot of confusion, crying and panic decided to hand in my notice. That helped a lot, but I'm not really well yet ~3 months in. Mainly sleep is an issue. My body seems to enjoy triggering tiny panic attacks when I'm falling asleep, which makes falling a sleep complicated >_<
I've been struggeling with sleep and anger issues for many years now, but it had come to a point where I did not want to accept being angry anymore. Anger turned into crying and despair, but that is frankly progress. I got some help, it was not great, but it helped me understand a lot about myself. In the end, this gave me the courage to quit and think about life in a different way.
Now I just have to figure out where to go from here. Stick with what I know and do it better or do something different entirely. Not a clue how to figure that one out yet.
Anyway, thank you for sharing. It's good hearing from other people that went through similar things.
My midlife crisis at 40 was more like a midlife epiphany. We moved from a perfectly good and totally beautiful city (Bath, UK) into the arse end of nowhere in Devon to live in a shack in the woods with no running water and to be near the sea.
We went with two small (8 and 5) kids (responding to those here saying it's not possible - it is!) and downsized from a busy city life to a quiet rural one.
Our intention was to stay a year. After two years we mentioned going back to the kids and they put their feet down - the most relaxed kids in the world decided they knew what was good for them: splashing about in rivers with sticks, fires on the beach, mud, a tiny school, more present parents, late nights lying on a hill looking at the stars. So we listened to them and stayed.
We're still in the country, by the sea, and our kids are now nearly grown up. We're having a blast. We're here for them. They're here for us. We'll never be rich but we're a great family unit.
If we hadn't had the guts to do a crazy thing (I give all credit to my wife for having the idea!) and decide pretty much off the cuff to follow our "crisis", we'd never have discovered our new life.
We've been very fortunate with our circumstances and I never forget that - but fundamental to all of this has been making the leap. Fear of the unknown can be countered by just doing it, knowing that crazy looking decisions can create amazing futures. Doing things is often better than curling up in fear and not doing them.
We just did the lightweight version of that, moved from a major city to the beach, but still in a beach town. It came about due to my wife’s midlife crisis induced by major (now solved) health problems. We’ve lived at the beach for three weeks and already it feels like our best decision in many years.
(We kept our old jobs and are working mostly remotely. The commute is two hours each direction by train, but doing that once a week is fine by me.)
- What about friends and family? Are you further from or closer to family? Did you have friends nearby? Did your kids? What is your familial and social circle now, compared with then?
- What about school?
Bath might be beautiful, but it's definitely not perfectly good!
It's at the same time too small to be interesting (you need to drive an hour to get to Bristol), but too big for having those advantages you mention for Nothing-by-the-Sea.
If you need another 'kid' (48m) in mid-life-burnout-crisis to join you - I'm your guy!
-
I have been going through MLC since the beginning of pandemic - and I am trying to figure out what to do as I dont ever want to go back to the type of tech work I was doing (SF currently has the largest commercial real estate vacancy in the country, and I dont see that getting better - and for a decade I built out the tech in many of the large office spaces in SF and for many hospitals...
I cant go back to that.
I want to do something analog/creative and non-tech related.
I grew up in the scenario you describe with your kid - growing up as a latch-key-kid in Lake Tahoe in the 80s was AMAZING - just leaving the front door and walking off into the wilderness and stomping through streams, building tee-pees out of shaking aspens that we would chop down. Build booby traps (terribly)...
Kids need to grow up in the woods - not in the cities.
Midlife crisis needs to be split into the "responsible for kids" and "not" categories. The "not" people can do wilder/riskier things, although I suspect on average they don't since fear of things massively outweighs "can you actually do it" factors. Probably the paper boxes we build are smaller than the metal ones outside of them.
Normalize transition in your kids lives'. It will serve them so much better in the long run.
I had my own dramatic "mid-life crisis" a few years ago in my early 40's and have two teenage kids (pre-teen at the time).
We didn't hide anything from them, including the overall shape of the career issues, relationship issues, hopes and dreams, how we were handling regrets and commitments, and so on.
Of course we didn't involve them in all the nitty gritty (and what we shared, we do so with respect to their relative ages and levels of experience), but the idea that hiding what it means to be a complete, imperfect and yet aspirationally evolving human being from your kids is a major opportunity lost.
Now my kids know that just being successful doesn't mean you're happy, that everyone goes through changes of heart, that our goals and dreams evolve, and that this is a natural part of life.
I'm a huge fan of parental role modelling through action and reflective practice. Showing them how you go through your own life transitions helps them tremendously in theirs.
Thank you. I turned 40 this weekend, and have spent the last few months if not years wondering who the hell I am, and thinking about all the cool projects, startups, languages and learnings I'd love to explore.
However, I also have a 3-year old I'm taking care of who drains me of all my excess time and energy. I can't do any of this stuff. I'm exhausted at the end of the day, and with my 1-2 hours at the end of night after my kid goes to bed, I'm certainly not writing the Great American Novel.
Maybe when he's older I'll have time for a midlife crisis.
I struggle with this—if you have kids, sometimes staying the course feels like the "responsible" thing to do. But plenty of people get laid off out of the blue, and plenty of people pursue their dream and have a thriving second career.
There is probably no right answer, but I guess the question is: "what decision can you live with?"
not going to help anyway. midlife crisis and other related mental problems can never be resolved by outward solutions. you can distract yourself for a while with exciting new hobbies (like getting a motorbike) but it will come back and even harder at that because then you will feel like it's even more hopeless as even this exciting change didn't really solve the underlying issue. but some people also just get used to being unhappy and that's about it for them.
Nice metaphor. I like the paper = financial, social constraint and metal as "down to the metal" physical limitations. Kinda clunky though, needs a few rounds of workshopping!
My wife and I at (46 and 48) went all out 2 years after our younger son graduated and two years after Covid.
TLDR; we downsized from an our house in the burbs and our cars bought a vacation home/investment property in a resort in Florida where we live half the year and we nomad the other half flying across the US.
I turned 40 last year, shortly after “making it” to my career goal: CTO of a hyper-growth start-up.
Shortly after my birthday, my daughter, who had just started middle school, was hospitalized because she was suicidal.
What I believe has been a midlife crisis exploded with such tremendous force, I thought I was losing my mind. Thank goodness for good therapy, which I immediately sought.
This is the most profound reconfiguration I’ve ever experienced.
I’m excited for the person I’ll be at the other end of this, and how my life will feel, but I’ve learned there is no planning for any of this. There is no white-knuckling any of this.
I’m relearning how to connect to myself and how to shape a life around that connection.
It’s not easy. It’s not close to done. It’s exciting. Terrifying.
To the author’s point: I’m not wasting this opportunity. That doesn’t mean I’m writing books or or doing things to keep busy. For me, wasting this opportunity would be ignoring the incredible self-reflection, forgoing the reconnection with self, and powering through the burnout and discomfort to keep on with plans I laid for reasons I’m not sure I fully understand anymore.
There is a peace I’m sensing, and I can’t wait until I’m fully aligned with it.
For those of you experiencing similar, I wish you the best. I think our best years are ahead of us.
If you don't mind sharing, where did you find a therapist, and what is their background? It seems like there is such a wide range of options, and I'm a bit hesitant about the online platforms.
Sorry to hear about you and your daughter, and I hope you're both doing better. Was she a heavy social media/cell phone user? It's been shown to cause mental issues in teens, especially girls.
This is hustle porn. All of Kleon's books are hustle porn. A lot of, "you just gotta, like, do, man." Not a lot of whatever the hell that means for the millions of folks who exist in the long tail of every creative market, struggling day in and day out to try to escape the doldrums of their day jobs, but never making it. Year after year. YouTube video after YouTube video. New social media site after new social media site. Kleon's (and others like him, one of which I would consider Paul Graham) success is in no small part due to selling you a story that success is attainable.
But it's probably not. Hustle porn makes its bank on you thinking you're going to be the one to beat the odds. You're probably not. You buy the books and t-shirts and the prints and the seminars and you fill the coffers of someone else's success.
You probably don't even really want success. If you play the "and then what?" game on "what would you do if you had what you want?", you'll eventually realize all you want is happiness. Success isn't happiness. There are lots of successful, deeply unhappy people.
Focus on the happiness. You can make a thing. And you can absolutely not sell it. You can make a thing and not even tell anyone about it. If making a thing makes you happy, focus on that. The rest is a distraction, someone else telling you that making the thing isn't enough, that it has to be "successful" before it's "real".
Yes, happiness is easier when you're financially stable. That's not the same thing as the "success" that hustle porn tries to sell. Hustle porn needs you to remain dissatisfied so you keep buying the hustle porn. Do what it takes to be financially stable. It's good if you can make that be your source of happiness, too, but get ready to accept that you probably can't.
Just choose to be happy. How? You just do. You just decide, "I'm going to be happy." And then it happens. It's really fuggin' weird, but it works.
On a similar note, I find the "don't waste it on a car, use your imagination" dichotomy quite shallow. Do whatever that makes you happy. You can buy that car if you want, and do great things at the same time too if that's your thing. Or, maybe you're happy with your car, and your work too. You don't owe anyone to be that designated person. You may need to own that car in order to truly process whether you need it in your life or not, or to feel having control over one part of your life, and transfer that perspective to the other parts. Human psychology is quite complicated, and usually you're the most informed person about yourself.
I don't know anything about this author until now, but by reading the one article and thinking a little critically and reading here, what he said was deceptive. A lot of advice is actually just toxic, because in it's generality, people always give assurances behind it. It might be fine for trivial things, but for shaping major themes in one's life, one really can't have a feeling of FOMO because they don't act on this generic advice.
I say this because I have spending years shaking this off. This is my mid-life crisis (that I decided had to start when I turned 40 :P ) What you say about success and happiness is relevant - even if "success" is an implicit measurement in places where hustle is a religion, it's best to ignore that stuff and do your thing ... or not. :)
Austin Kleon's books are not hustle porn to me. In fact, it comes across as the opposite. It feels like tips for being creative. Some of the advice is for unplugging, pursuing side projects, practicing procrastination -- things that do not sound like your typical "top 100 tips to succeed" tripe. The third book -- Show Your Work -- could be taken as hustle porn. But if you read it in context with the others, it doesn't seem that way. Just a way to get your work out there without being spammy. If it seems hustle porn, you might be missing the point.
Midlife crisis is about recognizing your mortality and limited time left, and looking at what you have done and finding it comes up short to what you hoped for your life.
The reality of how little time you have left is a key component, that death is stalking every decision and will likely curtail some plans.
This mentality is why I'm nomadding despite the constant threats of Return to Office. (I'm at Google.)
I spent a dozen years in San Francisco. I know what serves me there and what doesn't. I know that I find day-to-day life there low-key depressing. I know my friends there have largely moved away and/or moved on to the next chapters of their lives. I know it's way too hard to find a suitable romantic partner there.
Kowtowing to the RTO whims would be relegating myself to another year that's probably a lot like the other ones, with the hard parts getting harder with every year lost.
I don't know where my forever home is, but I owe it to myself to figure it out.
>> Higgs was saying that the artists he admires are people like David Lynch. People who you wouldn’t think there’s an obvious place for them in the world, but they just do their stuff regardless, and a place sort of builds around them.”
As someone who’s definitely nearing or within a MLC, I’m so fed up with this narrative. It’s pure and simple survival bias. Most of the people doing exactly this end up frustrated, poor, forgotten, incapable of recognizing their own narcissistic personality, and surrounded by scattered/broken/dysfunctional relationship.
A very tiny minority, despite all that, gets successful, and yet we build entire narrative universes around these few outliers and their survival bias.
I wonder if the mid life crisis is a completely modern and secular malady.
Thinking to my religious friends who have 5+ kids, a rich spiritual life and deep engagement with community, it's very hard to imagine them going through one.
Because they are too busy, but mainly because their life is oriented from the get-go around what is very meaningful to them
The stereotypical concept of the big singular midlife crisis has been debunked. Crises occur in every age span, and they are highly individual. I agree though that a crisis should never be wasted.
I turn 39 in a week, and I might be hitting something like a mid-life crisis. Though I'm successful by many metrics, there's so much I wanted to do by this point in my life that I've been feeling like a failure. For instance, there's been this side project that I first got the idea for in 2014 and have been actively working on since 2017, and I still haven't released it yet because I keep going back to the drawing board and overthinking everything. I'm terrified that my body is slowing down and I won't have the energy to see it through.
I’m 47 and I’m not sure if I’ve had a midlife crisis, which probably means I have not. My adult kids, however, joke that I’ve had one a year for as long as they’ve been alive. I’m what the late Barbara Sher called a Scanner. I keep a Scanners Daybook and lots of other notebooks and I’m always working on a new project or hobby. When someone asks about my hobbies I often say that I’m a serial hobbyist.
I am not quite old enough for a midlife crisis, but suffered a period of extreme burn out which was followed by some kind of crisis/breakdown and I am actively in the process of destroying my life and everything good I worked for.
I at this point both hope that I'm still here to experience a "midlife" crisis and that it isn't even half as bad as this has been.
as a a peasant who has grown from being very poor in a third world country and currently living in a first world country with acceptable lifestyle, this is poor idea to myself because mid life crisis is only for people who are rich, the poor are too busy trying to live rather than changing it.
This is an interesting read, because I turned 40 this year and I have been struggling, I didn't expect to feel this way, but I also never really understand or registered the magnitude of turning 40 was, I never really processed that I had somehow grown old and I was still just drifting through life, living like I was 20.
What is the process for not wasting such Crisis though? I feel part of the reason why I am in this position in the first place, is I never am able to make sense of any of such times, I just struggle through it and eventually it goes away a little bit. Every time I try to figure anything out, I get stuck in overthinking and I don't really know what options are available to me anyway.
I recall my parents both independently confiding to me that the other was going through a midlife crisis and I think what they were actually doing was just trying to define the others behavior as the cause for their own unhappiness. And specifically push me into believing one or the other was the one behaving oddly.
If you’re experiencing a midlife crisis, please be honest and straightforward with your partner, and the other people in your life. You’re feeling the loss of opportunity and possibility, but that doesn’t mean everything about your life is wrong. Your partner may be able to help.
I’ve always thought midlife crisis was a weird thing. Nobody knows when they’ll die. Maybe you die in an avalanche at 24. At which point you probably should have reassessed your life and assumptions at 12. Or maybe you die in a car accident at 18. Or a house fire at 32. Maybe you’re gunned down by the husband of the lady you’re sleeping with at 74.
If there’s any benefit from a midlife crisis you should probably get on it today. Nobody knows the hour and manner of his end. You might have missed your midlife already!
I am 37(male) going though one and its certainly has its up and downs. Maybe a few here can let me know what field I should break into.
I am Sr developer in the industry for a decade. Regular dev shop and manage 3-4 direct reports and play the senior tech role for a couple of projects at any given time. I enjoy working with code but much less so then years ago.
I have a LOT of personality (meeting new people, selling myself, etc.) that I sadly don't get to us at all in my current position. I went to a work conference in DC back in February and talked to strangers non-stop for three days. I loved every minute of it. I am getting bored being at a desk all day and would rather use my personality in my work. I have my past in the technical and want to use my personality to make money now. I know there has to be a place where that's an advantageous combo. I am not afraid to take a pay-cut in transition. My company will hopefully be acquired soon so I should be able to do some hunting.
Any advice on what I should pursue? Welcome to suggestions and any private message etc with suggestions. Thanks!
[+] [-] sph|2 years ago|reply
A couple more pieces of advice from me:
* A midlife crisis has its own glacial pace. Be prepared to be upside down for a long time.
* Be prepared not to be the same person you were before. Be prepared to learn there is no turning back.
* If you're in a midlife crisis, your previous life was simply not good enough and reality has caught up to you. Go through the process, and you'll become a better person.
* Outsource your mental health during this phase to professionals. Not even your spouse might be able to accept what comes out of this reconfiguration of yours. You will probably need the help of someone that is not invested in your previous existence to hold you in this trying time.
--
3 years in, it's getting better, I miss part of my previous life, but I know who I am now, how I operate, and I won't compromise to fit someone else's mould anymore. In your childhood you had no say in how you were grown and pieced together. You had to carry whatever they had built for you until you broke down. Now is your chance to start over and do a better job at it.
Good luck!
[+] [-] rootusrootus|2 years ago|reply
You're not quite middle aged yet :). And 33 is way too early for a midlife crisis, surely? Maybe it's just garden variety burnout and/or depression?
[+] [-] boesboes|2 years ago|reply
39yo here, just stopped shy of a full burn-out & after a month with a lot of confusion, crying and panic decided to hand in my notice. That helped a lot, but I'm not really well yet ~3 months in. Mainly sleep is an issue. My body seems to enjoy triggering tiny panic attacks when I'm falling asleep, which makes falling a sleep complicated >_<
I've been struggeling with sleep and anger issues for many years now, but it had come to a point where I did not want to accept being angry anymore. Anger turned into crying and despair, but that is frankly progress. I got some help, it was not great, but it helped me understand a lot about myself. In the end, this gave me the courage to quit and think about life in a different way.
Now I just have to figure out where to go from here. Stick with what I know and do it better or do something different entirely. Not a clue how to figure that one out yet.
Anyway, thank you for sharing. It's good hearing from other people that went through similar things.
[+] [-] dmje|2 years ago|reply
We went with two small (8 and 5) kids (responding to those here saying it's not possible - it is!) and downsized from a busy city life to a quiet rural one.
Our intention was to stay a year. After two years we mentioned going back to the kids and they put their feet down - the most relaxed kids in the world decided they knew what was good for them: splashing about in rivers with sticks, fires on the beach, mud, a tiny school, more present parents, late nights lying on a hill looking at the stars. So we listened to them and stayed.
We're still in the country, by the sea, and our kids are now nearly grown up. We're having a blast. We're here for them. They're here for us. We'll never be rich but we're a great family unit.
If we hadn't had the guts to do a crazy thing (I give all credit to my wife for having the idea!) and decide pretty much off the cuff to follow our "crisis", we'd never have discovered our new life.
We've been very fortunate with our circumstances and I never forget that - but fundamental to all of this has been making the leap. Fear of the unknown can be countered by just doing it, knowing that crazy looking decisions can create amazing futures. Doing things is often better than curling up in fear and not doing them.
Right. I'm off for a surf :-)
[+] [-] Joeri|2 years ago|reply
(We kept our old jobs and are working mostly remotely. The commute is two hours each direction by train, but doing that once a week is fine by me.)
[+] [-] htamas|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ant6n|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sanderjd|2 years ago|reply
- What about friends and family? Are you further from or closer to family? Did you have friends nearby? Did your kids? What is your familial and social circle now, compared with then? - What about school?
[+] [-] pas|2 years ago|reply
It's at the same time too small to be interesting (you need to drive an hour to get to Bristol), but too big for having those advantages you mention for Nothing-by-the-Sea.
[+] [-] samstave|2 years ago|reply
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I have been going through MLC since the beginning of pandemic - and I am trying to figure out what to do as I dont ever want to go back to the type of tech work I was doing (SF currently has the largest commercial real estate vacancy in the country, and I dont see that getting better - and for a decade I built out the tech in many of the large office spaces in SF and for many hospitals...
I cant go back to that.
I want to do something analog/creative and non-tech related.
I grew up in the scenario you describe with your kid - growing up as a latch-key-kid in Lake Tahoe in the 80s was AMAZING - just leaving the front door and walking off into the wilderness and stomping through streams, building tee-pees out of shaking aspens that we would chop down. Build booby traps (terribly)...
Kids need to grow up in the woods - not in the cities.
[+] [-] darkclouds|2 years ago|reply
What beach, you must be on a foamie considering todays conditions?
[+] [-] tux2bsd|2 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] quickthrower2|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nraford|2 years ago|reply
I had my own dramatic "mid-life crisis" a few years ago in my early 40's and have two teenage kids (pre-teen at the time).
We didn't hide anything from them, including the overall shape of the career issues, relationship issues, hopes and dreams, how we were handling regrets and commitments, and so on.
Of course we didn't involve them in all the nitty gritty (and what we shared, we do so with respect to their relative ages and levels of experience), but the idea that hiding what it means to be a complete, imperfect and yet aspirationally evolving human being from your kids is a major opportunity lost.
Now my kids know that just being successful doesn't mean you're happy, that everyone goes through changes of heart, that our goals and dreams evolve, and that this is a natural part of life.
I'm a huge fan of parental role modelling through action and reflective practice. Showing them how you go through your own life transitions helps them tremendously in theirs.
[+] [-] codq|2 years ago|reply
However, I also have a 3-year old I'm taking care of who drains me of all my excess time and energy. I can't do any of this stuff. I'm exhausted at the end of the day, and with my 1-2 hours at the end of night after my kid goes to bed, I'm certainly not writing the Great American Novel.
Maybe when he's older I'll have time for a midlife crisis.
[+] [-] turnsout|2 years ago|reply
There is probably no right answer, but I guess the question is: "what decision can you live with?"
[+] [-] 2-718-281-828|2 years ago|reply
not going to help anyway. midlife crisis and other related mental problems can never be resolved by outward solutions. you can distract yourself for a while with exciting new hobbies (like getting a motorbike) but it will come back and even harder at that because then you will feel like it's even more hopeless as even this exciting change didn't really solve the underlying issue. but some people also just get used to being unhappy and that's about it for them.
[+] [-] cranium|2 years ago|reply
And compared to divorce, a midlife crisis has a lot more upsides.
[+] [-] yieldcrv|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] detestablelife|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sdwr|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] melenaboija|2 years ago|reply
And sometimes the ones from “not” get there without ever knowing what _needing to work_ means.
[+] [-] scarface_74|2 years ago|reply
TLDR; we downsized from an our house in the burbs and our cars bought a vacation home/investment property in a resort in Florida where we live half the year and we nomad the other half flying across the US.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36306966
[+] [-] jodacola|2 years ago|reply
Shortly after my birthday, my daughter, who had just started middle school, was hospitalized because she was suicidal.
What I believe has been a midlife crisis exploded with such tremendous force, I thought I was losing my mind. Thank goodness for good therapy, which I immediately sought.
This is the most profound reconfiguration I’ve ever experienced.
I’m excited for the person I’ll be at the other end of this, and how my life will feel, but I’ve learned there is no planning for any of this. There is no white-knuckling any of this.
I’m relearning how to connect to myself and how to shape a life around that connection.
It’s not easy. It’s not close to done. It’s exciting. Terrifying.
To the author’s point: I’m not wasting this opportunity. That doesn’t mean I’m writing books or or doing things to keep busy. For me, wasting this opportunity would be ignoring the incredible self-reflection, forgoing the reconnection with self, and powering through the burnout and discomfort to keep on with plans I laid for reasons I’m not sure I fully understand anymore.
There is a peace I’m sensing, and I can’t wait until I’m fully aligned with it.
For those of you experiencing similar, I wish you the best. I think our best years are ahead of us.
[+] [-] austinl|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] za3faran|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] moneywoes|2 years ago|reply
As someone looking to replicate your success, I'd love to know some of your learnings
[+] [-] wintermutestwin|2 years ago|reply
With your newfound awareness, they almost certainly are.
Signed as one who is about 15 years down the path you have realized...
[+] [-] selestify|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] feedyourhead|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] moron4hire|2 years ago|reply
But it's probably not. Hustle porn makes its bank on you thinking you're going to be the one to beat the odds. You're probably not. You buy the books and t-shirts and the prints and the seminars and you fill the coffers of someone else's success.
You probably don't even really want success. If you play the "and then what?" game on "what would you do if you had what you want?", you'll eventually realize all you want is happiness. Success isn't happiness. There are lots of successful, deeply unhappy people.
Focus on the happiness. You can make a thing. And you can absolutely not sell it. You can make a thing and not even tell anyone about it. If making a thing makes you happy, focus on that. The rest is a distraction, someone else telling you that making the thing isn't enough, that it has to be "successful" before it's "real".
Yes, happiness is easier when you're financially stable. That's not the same thing as the "success" that hustle porn tries to sell. Hustle porn needs you to remain dissatisfied so you keep buying the hustle porn. Do what it takes to be financially stable. It's good if you can make that be your source of happiness, too, but get ready to accept that you probably can't.
Just choose to be happy. How? You just do. You just decide, "I'm going to be happy." And then it happens. It's really fuggin' weird, but it works.
[+] [-] sedatk|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bigpeopleareold|2 years ago|reply
I say this because I have spending years shaking this off. This is my mid-life crisis (that I decided had to start when I turned 40 :P ) What you say about success and happiness is relevant - even if "success" is an implicit measurement in places where hustle is a religion, it's best to ignore that stuff and do your thing ... or not. :)
[+] [-] randito|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] camillomiller|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nytesky|2 years ago|reply
The reality of how little time you have left is a key component, that death is stalking every decision and will likely curtail some plans.
[+] [-] bsimpson|2 years ago|reply
I spent a dozen years in San Francisco. I know what serves me there and what doesn't. I know that I find day-to-day life there low-key depressing. I know my friends there have largely moved away and/or moved on to the next chapters of their lives. I know it's way too hard to find a suitable romantic partner there.
Kowtowing to the RTO whims would be relegating myself to another year that's probably a lot like the other ones, with the hard parts getting harder with every year lost.
I don't know where my forever home is, but I owe it to myself to figure it out.
[+] [-] camillomiller|2 years ago|reply
As someone who’s definitely nearing or within a MLC, I’m so fed up with this narrative. It’s pure and simple survival bias. Most of the people doing exactly this end up frustrated, poor, forgotten, incapable of recognizing their own narcissistic personality, and surrounded by scattered/broken/dysfunctional relationship. A very tiny minority, despite all that, gets successful, and yet we build entire narrative universes around these few outliers and their survival bias.
[+] [-] xyzelement|2 years ago|reply
Thinking to my religious friends who have 5+ kids, a rich spiritual life and deep engagement with community, it's very hard to imagine them going through one.
Because they are too busy, but mainly because their life is oriented from the get-go around what is very meaningful to them
[+] [-] manmal|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] danielvaughn|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] codazoda|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] johndhi|2 years ago|reply
My mind is sick of hearing the things I should do. I know I should be better and fitter and less wasteful but... I'm tired.
[+] [-] ThrowAway1922A|2 years ago|reply
I at this point both hope that I'm still here to experience a "midlife" crisis and that it isn't even half as bad as this has been.
[+] [-] sharas-|2 years ago|reply
- Carl Jung
WTF are you talking about? "crisis", it's such western cliche. You actually start living after 40.
[+] [-] detestablelife|2 years ago|reply
as a a peasant who has grown from being very poor in a third world country and currently living in a first world country with acceptable lifestyle, this is poor idea to myself because mid life crisis is only for people who are rich, the poor are too busy trying to live rather than changing it.
[+] [-] ChildOfChaos|2 years ago|reply
What is the process for not wasting such Crisis though? I feel part of the reason why I am in this position in the first place, is I never am able to make sense of any of such times, I just struggle through it and eventually it goes away a little bit. Every time I try to figure anything out, I get stuck in overthinking and I don't really know what options are available to me anyway.
[+] [-] sircastor|2 years ago|reply
If you’re experiencing a midlife crisis, please be honest and straightforward with your partner, and the other people in your life. You’re feeling the loss of opportunity and possibility, but that doesn’t mean everything about your life is wrong. Your partner may be able to help.
[+] [-] more_corn|2 years ago|reply
If there’s any benefit from a midlife crisis you should probably get on it today. Nobody knows the hour and manner of his end. You might have missed your midlife already!
[+] [-] fxbe12|2 years ago|reply
I am 37(male) going though one and its certainly has its up and downs. Maybe a few here can let me know what field I should break into.
I am Sr developer in the industry for a decade. Regular dev shop and manage 3-4 direct reports and play the senior tech role for a couple of projects at any given time. I enjoy working with code but much less so then years ago.
I have a LOT of personality (meeting new people, selling myself, etc.) that I sadly don't get to us at all in my current position. I went to a work conference in DC back in February and talked to strangers non-stop for three days. I loved every minute of it. I am getting bored being at a desk all day and would rather use my personality in my work. I have my past in the technical and want to use my personality to make money now. I know there has to be a place where that's an advantageous combo. I am not afraid to take a pay-cut in transition. My company will hopefully be acquired soon so I should be able to do some hunting.
Any advice on what I should pursue? Welcome to suggestions and any private message etc with suggestions. Thanks!