Culture is forcing a midlife crisis for adults of all ages

I can’t stop thinking about something I witnessed last year. I was sitting in a hotel restaurant in Ann Arbor (I had just given a talk to the Ann Arbor District Library). I was already feeling out of place because someone on the sidewalk had just said “Where did you come from? You’re certainly not from around here!”. Well, this particular hotel restaurant was buzzing with BIG! BEEFY! BALD! BOYS! Most of them with giant callused hands wearing American flag t-shirts. It sent me into fight or flight mode (I am not very familiar with this demographic). I asked the host, “What’s with all these guys??” thinking it was some kind of bald meetup? The host chuckled and said, “Oh no, actually we’re hosting the United Association of Plumbers and Pipefitters right now.” So there I was wearing my silly colorful speaking outfit, tattoos and tooth gems on full display, in this hotel restaurant, surrounded by a comical amount of plumbers. Except! For a family that was sitting at the bar! Two adults with a child who was probably somewhere between 8 and 10. I took notice because A: they weren’t bald and B: there was a child sitting at a bar!? You can do that in Michigan??? The adults were clearly drunk and the child was boisterous and confident, as though this was a typical experience.

A thing you need to know about me is that if I could have any *selfish* wish granted, I would be invisible. (Obviously my real wish would be “world peace,” just like I’ve wished as I’ve blown out my birthday candles every year since I learned about the concept of war.) I don’t want to be invisible for anything nefarious. I just LOVE studying humans! I want to see their mannerisms and how they speak differently when in different spaces. I want to see how their performance of Human shifts depending on who they’re with. This is the same reason I hope ghosts are real. I can’t wait to float around and haunt YOU. All of this is to say that I am a PASSIONATE eavesdropper. People watching and eavesdropping are my favorite hobbies, especially when I see an unusual situation unfolding. I am LOLLYGAGGING.

Kid takes shots of coke at bar

So! Sat at this bar is a kid and two drunk adults and I am LISTENING. Observing! They’re laughing and hooing and hawing about past memories, and the kid is talking about how drunk they are and the last time this happened and how he had to get ready for bed by himself because they were passed out on the bed. It’s sad, but then I get a nugget of helpful slurred information: “Well, when your dad and I are together, it’s our special sibling time, so Hunter, we go all out!!!” Ahh okay, they’re siblings. And the child’s name is Hunter! “Another round!!” they scream to the bartender, who asks Hunter, “You want another shot of coke?” The bartender proceeds to pour three shots. Two shots of vodka and one shot of coke. The three cheersed and I watched the kid shoot back his shot of coke like this has happened at least five times already that night and countless times before.

Now (I cannot believe it’s taken me this long to get to the point of my story), Hunter’s dad says “Dad’s gotta go up to the room! Poopy time!” (he didn’t say exactly that but my memory has decided so). Hunter is left with his extremely drunk aunt. Drunk Aunt (D.A. from now on) says “Hunter, Iga’beserioswi’younow…wha’you wanna be when you grow up?” Hunter knows how to answer immediately because you know he’s been asked this since he was a toddler. He confidently shouts “A lawyer!” D.A. is quite shocked and clearly sobers-up for a second. “A lawyer!? Of course you would Hunter, you’re so smart! That’s a good career, you’ll make a lot of money.”

Then D.A. goes into a grandiose drunken monologue. Waving her finger in the air, she tells Hunter that he can’t just be a lawyer, he has to choose a specialty. “You have to pick a path!” She rattles off the types of law she can remember: criminal law, white collar crime, divorce attorneys, child custody, immigration. “Which one are you gonna be?” Hunter starts to look really worried because clearly he doesn’t know about any of those or what they mean. Panicked, he says “Can’t I just be a lawyer?” “NO!!!” shouts D.A. “Why?” Hunter asks. Obviously D.A. doesn’t know or really have the wherewithal to explain, so she says what I remember adults barking at me since I learned what the words meant: “That’s just how the world works!”

Adults love planning a kid’s career

You probably remember a smattering of adults asking you what you want to be when you grow up. It’s one of the first things we’re asked when we begin to show special interests of any kind! We answered with our limited knowledge of jobs, based on kid’s books, movies, who we interacted with, or the influence from our family. Some family members probably observed your interest in animals and shouted “You should be a veterinarian when you grow up!” or pressured you to follow along with the medical professionals in the family. It’s astonishing how quickly adults present the importance of a career to a child. And after that, it all happens so fast. In high school we’re asked to choose paths for education, tour colleges, and pick a major before we’re even 18. Most teens have already chosen before they can drive. But the problem is, we don’t have a fully formed frontal lobe or a sense of self yet. Our identities are only a combination of those around us and the examples we’ve had access to.

We’re pressured to have our entire lives planned before we know who we actually are. In the back of our minds we imagine our lives as the profession we chose, doing that for 50? years and then someday retiring (ha!). We just have to work hard, put our heads down, “RISE AND GRIND!”, and stay productive. Work sucks! It’s going to suck! Because it’s work! But sometimes you’ll get vacations and they’ll make you feel better so that you can get back to work! And then eventually you’ll retire and finally feel relief. And that’s just how the world works.

“Normal” gets it wrong again

Society conditions us for this from the moment we’re born, in such a way that it all just feels “normal”. Pretty much everyone picks a path early in their life, plans their future with that in mind, has a vision of how things ares supposed to go, and banks on everything going according to plan. But hmm…weirdly…it almost never goes according to plan does it? Layoffs happen beyond our control, the economy gets unexpectedly weird, or maybe a pandemic swoops in out of nowhere.

What I’ve noticed from observing and working with many “normal” adults is that they have a lot of visions for what they expect their life to be and it’s all based on what they’ve seen before (yawn). So when reality doesn’t align with that vision, doesn’t feel as good as they’d imagine, or something out of their control prevents them from having it, they completely malfunction because the vision had become confused for their identity.

They start having big questions about “Who even am I if I’m not this vision?” “What do I want if it’s not this?”. And if you don’t know what you want to do with your career for even a second? You’re lazy! And directionless! And lost! A real failure in life! And even more!! At a certain point in our 30s, 40s, 50s, we develop a real sense of self. We begin to truly know who we are and find confidence in our values, interests, passions, what we want, and what we deserve. And often it’s…not what we chose when we were 17?!! WHAT?!! So we invented a term for this (one that’s certainly not about society’s shortcomings, but a personal failure made to be laughed at): a midlife crisis!

Midlife crisis actually good?!!

“Normal” adults absolutely hate having uncomfortable feelings. For generations they’ve gone to great lengths to create cults, religions, and trillions of tons of waste just to avoid having to think about something a little scary. And boy do I love a midlife crisis because it’s usually caused by a catalyst (sad) that makes them confront the difficult truths (good). Finally!

Whether it’s a breakup, an unexpected layoff, the weird economy, an unexpected pandemic, an industry that no longer feels aligned with our values, a job that doesn’t feel right anymore, or maybe looking up and realizing they’ve been on autopilot so long their real life looks nothing like they want—these things make them snap out of the trance of boring normalcy and say “Waitaminute!”.

And most “normal” adults seems to have a period in life where they realize the plan they made before their brain had formed may not align with who they actually are. And they (finally!!!) start to ask the uncomfortable, scary questions about who they actually are vs. who they’ve been told they “should” be, and what they actually want vs. what they think they “should” want.

But! our society handles it all wrong (shocker!!). It goes out of its way to convince them that their big questions are weird and wrong and this is a YOU problem. Look around, everyone else is doing fine and being “normal”. What’s wrong with YOU?! So they quietly suffer, maybe get nipple piercings, grow a soul patch, or make a large frivolous purchase to try and feel better. (Because we’re so consumer-focused as a society surely the only way to fix our problems is by buying!!!)

Society teaches us that we can’t veer off a plan or else we’ve failed. We can’t even acknowledge that we’ve changed our mind or “You’re a quitter!!!!”

Look under your seats! A crisis for everyone!

Now here’s the interesting part that I’m actually really excited about (even though it sounds kinda scary): people are having midlife crises earlier than ever. It’s hitting us NOW, regardless of age.

In the last 2 years, a dramatic shift has happened. Culturally, right now, en masse, a huge portion of the population is realizing that the plan they were forced into as kids isn’t working. That their vision for their future was built on lies?!!! And actually this autopilot they’ve been on, it feels bad! This isn’t what they deserve! And, actually, they have no idea what they want to be when they grow up even though they are a grown up!

People are getting more comfortable with the traditionally uncomfortable truths about the world. And they’re getting more comfortable with asking the scary questions. They’re realizing that just choosing a “reliable career path” isn’t enough because nothing feels reliable anymore. They can’t trust what they had been taught previously (because the system that taught them doesn’t even care about them). And they’re beginning to question the traditional rules of being a “normal” adult because that’s what got us into this mess in the first place!

They have more access to knowledge and more tools than ever. But most excitingly, they are asking the important questions that people are usually too afraid to ask: who am I vs. who I’ve been told I “should” be, and what do I want vs. what I’ve been told I “should” want.

Me, the eternal optimist, has a plan

I’m so proud of the people who are brave enough to confront this head-on, because most adults go their entire lives trying to avoid such uncomfortable questions. And if you’re asking these questions too, just know that you haven’t failed. Society failed you. And this isn’t just how the world has to work!

But in order to truly answer “What do I want to be when I grow up?” we have to know our real, unmasked selves first. The answer doesn’t lie in societal norms, expectations from family, or what’s currently trending. The answer can only be found through deep, internal work and intentional strategy. And I think we’re ready to do it NOW. As scary as it sounds, this is the moment I’ve been waiting for. Because this is exactly what I can help with.