Reflections from Middle Age

Something strange has happened to me since I turned 50. I’m not sure whether it is the after effects of Covid, and the weird isolating change to normal programming that entailed, or trying to re-find my role and purpose, my fit, after several years of studying.  Maybe it is one of the side effects of being the other side of 50, with grown up children who come and go as they please, independent but leaving a trail of laundry in their wake  Maybe it’s just another thing to chalk up to the menopause.

The thing is I feel quite disconnected from my old self. That self I was in prior years and how that relates to who I am now. If my primary role is no longer mum, do any of the skills and approaches to life from prior to that stage apply? What can I rely on from my past to direct my future? That me seems out of date with the world I find myself in, 20 years later. It comes from a different time, a different place. Even a different culture.

The years of studying illuminated for me that the self is merely a construct of the brain, a perception much like colour, sound or taste.  A schema that has meaning of course, but not an enduring, unchanging soul consistent from birth to death (or beyond). Maybe it’s just knowing this reality that creates a cognitive dissonance.

Still, this phase of life is discombobulating. I’m finding myself breathless on occasion, struggling to work out who I am and what I’m good at. The transition to a new stage of life, with new rules and expectations, is probably never easy. I’m a little more externally validated – I like to know what’s going on so I can adapt and find my place, so that doesn’t help.

Age is also playing a role. The general aches and pains that come with a body and brain that has toiled for half a century means there is always something twinging. A niggling reminder that definitely wasn’t there in my 20s when I could drink until 4 in the morning and still turn up to work and put in a vaguely respectable performance. Granted, I’m fitter now than I’ve ever been. Maybe if I was running, cycling, swimming and hitting the weights as a youngster I’d also have been complaining about how my back or foot or neck aches.

There is something else though. I feel like I’ve emerged from parenthood, or Covid, or studying, or something into a world that seems out of touch with my own values and skills. I’m into truth, but we live in the world of fake. From faces full of chemicals to conspiracy theories and love affairs with authoritarians, authenticity, truth seeking, honesty seem a million miles away. I like connecting with people. Depth, understanding what is really going on under the hood. But the world seems much more interested in quick and dirty, making a speedy buck and moving on. Surface level interaction is good enough.

Is it?

It feels like the world is falling apart at the seams. Self-interest seems sky high. Goodness seems sparse. We’re bedazzled by influencers faking fame and fortune. MAFS, with their appalling entitled, status oriented, socially aggressive and self-obsessed characters is the highest rating show in Australia, and those values are spilling over into my neighbourhood. And travel influencers seem to have contributed to the ruination of every good place on earth. Bah humbug.

I say all this knowing our brains, our social media algorithms and the news itself heightens all that is negative in the world. Still, I’m struggling, at least on occasion, to navigate the turbulence of this post-modern world. This post-family, post-youth, post-mum world I find myself in.   

And yet, here we are, I remind myself through the act of this writing. This disgorgement of words onto paper. Or, more accurately, keystrokes onto screen. Healthier, fitter and wiser than my younger self. Alive and living life with determination – even if somewhat befuddled – which is more than can be said for lots of people. And lucky. Oh so lucky. Not bursting at the seams with money, but well off enough. Not at the top of some success ladder, but living a life I deliberately chose. A life of connection. Of family. Of the pursuit of curiosity.

Sometimes I wish I could go back to that younger version of me and say, wise up chicken. Life is short, stop worrying so much. But it’s older me that needs to hear that today.

“Wise up chicken. Stop striving so much. Look at what you have not what you don’t, look at who you are, not what you aren’t. Breath into joy, the wondrous joy that is the opportunity to be alive and live in a part of the world not marred by tribal violence, religious crazies, authoritarianism and war. Let joy fill your lungs with delight while the air is still breathable. For nothing is promised. But right now, you have freedom and opportunity. Enjoy it.“

Onwards