I’m approaching midlife. Many people have midlife crises as the life they are living turns out to be different from the life they want. And unlike their younger self, their options become more limited.
As Kieran Setiya put it nicely in his book: “I look back with envy at my younger self, options open, choices not yet made. He could be anything. But I am condemned: course set, path fixed, doors closed…Aging is a corporeal symbol of the progressive diminution of prospects”
While we can’t turn back the clock, Setiya provides some advice: care about something other than yourself and focus on atelic activities (things we do for their own sake and not as a means to achieve a particular end).
How about losses and regrets? Setiya believes they are essential parts of life: “To wish for a life without loss is to wish for a profound impoverishment in the world or in your capacity to engage with it, a drastic limiting of horizons…There is consolation in the fact that missing out is an inexorable side effect of the richness of human life…”
As we get older, we might have a different problem. According to Schopenhauer:
Disillusion is the chief characteristic of old age; for by that time the fictions are gone which gave life its charm and spurred on the mind to activity; the splendors of the world have been proved null and vain; its pomp, grandeur and magnificence are faded. A man has then found out that behind most of the things he wants, and most of the pleasures he longs for, there is very little after all; and so he comes by degrees to see that our existence is all empty and void.
In midlife we want a different life that couldn’t be, while in old age we discover that everything is meaningless.
But we are not doomed. Research suggests older people tend to be happier and more content with their life.
I think if we keep the end in mind and focus on what’s important, we can be content with life at any age. Perhaps because I already had a quarter life crisis, midlife hasn’t been a game changer for me. I’m grateful that there are still things to forward to, people I care about, and things I enjoy doing for their own sake.
An old friend reminds me that it doesn’t take a lot to make another person’s life more meaningful: a bit of humor, thoughtfulness, and kindness are all it takes.
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