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Midlife Crisis · Why We Do What We Do

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: You're listening to Why We Do what we Do. Welcome
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: to Why We Do what we Do Mini. I'm your host,
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: Abraham and that Mero Shane. We are a psychology podcast.
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  Speaker 1: a friend, joining us on Patreon. I'll talk more about
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: those discussions or those things at the end of this discussion.
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: Not those discussions, but those strategies. But I think that
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  Speaker 1: is we're jumping into this thing. Is there anything I
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  Speaker 1: missed or you'd like to add before we talk about
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  Speaker 1: our topic?
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  Speaker 2: Dujuur, No, let's talk about my life not just kidding.
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  Speaker 2: Le's talk yeah, let's talk about like, let's talk about this.
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  Speaker 3: I'm so excited.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, all right. If you didn't see the title, or
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  Speaker 1: even if you did, well, tease it a little bit.
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  Speaker 1: You might see people in their forties and fifties who
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  Speaker 1: are going through some things. They're getting divorced, they might
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  Speaker 1: be buying fancy cars, they might be quitting or starting
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  Speaker 1: new jobs, and you look at them and you think
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  Speaker 1: to yourself, they're going through a midlife crisis. Well, if
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  Speaker 1: you're in the United States, you might be thinking that
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  Speaker 1: at least spoiler.
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  Speaker 3: Spoiler, Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: So midlife crises are tumultuous times adults experience as they
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  Speaker 2: head into the middle of their lifetime, as the name suggests,
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  Speaker 2: often characterized by what appears to be impulsive, irresponsible, and desperate.
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  Speaker 2: These behaviors seem to indicate these poor adults are confronted
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  Speaker 2: by the fact that they are moving into the twilight
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  Speaker 2: years of their life, an attempt to recapture their youth
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  Speaker 2: by acting, I guess youthful. Yeah, I never bought a
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  Speaker 2: fancy car when I was youthful, but I guess I
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  Speaker 2: was impulsive.
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  Speaker 1: Sure, yeah, something like that. Maybe they like get a
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  Speaker 1: new partner who is significantly younger than them, all kinds
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  Speaker 1: of stuff. We're going to unpack what midlife crises are
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  Speaker 1: and what science has to say about this. So let's
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  Speaker 1: start with some basic descriptions, as we kind of already did. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: let's talk about midlife crises.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, so, the.
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  Speaker 2: Midlife age ranges from thirty to seventy, but more consistently
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  Speaker 2: as identified as forty to sixty, with thirty nine being
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  Speaker 2: a specific COSPA, which if some of the effects of
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  Speaker 2: a midlife crisis are going to happen, they'll likely happen here.
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  Speaker 2: So thankfully I'm on the other side of that.
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  Speaker 1: At least that's what they say.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: One source that we found listed some warning signs that
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  Speaker 1: someone might be experiencing a midlife crisis, that they're feeling
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  Speaker 1: trapped in the momentum of your life, obsessively comparing yourself
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  Speaker 1: to others, feeling trapped in a dull career, having nightmare
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  Speaker 1: as an anxiety, questioning life decisions, with drawing from friends
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  Speaker 1: and family, feeling a need to escape, and feeling like
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  Speaker 1: you have no one to talk to or to support
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  Speaker 1: you through any of those things. That's sort of the
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  Speaker 1: sort of emotional signals that they indicate you might be
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  Speaker 1: experiencing a midlife crisis.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, And as we mentioned, the stereotype cliche is buying
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  Speaker 2: expensive things such as fancy cars, or suddenly changing careers,
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  Speaker 2: or getting divorced or possibly starting a new relationship with
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  Speaker 2: the younger partner. Those tend to be kind of like
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  Speaker 2: the flagship the hallmarks of a real good midlife crisis.
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  Speaker 1: It's great, I'll think, yeah. And there are some studies
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  Speaker 1: that show that life satisfaction does tend to decrease over
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  Speaker 1: time with age, particularly as we're getting into this section
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  Speaker 1: of thirties and particularly the forties and whatnot, and it
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  Speaker 1: often kind of decreases from there onward. There are some
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  Speaker 1: data to suggest that once you sort of get out
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  Speaker 1: of that range that maybe goes back up, but mostly
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  Speaker 1: it sort of says as you're hitting this sort of
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  Speaker 1: mid point here, that life satisfaction decreases. Many psychologists have
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  Speaker 1: pointed out that there are a lot of stressors that
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  Speaker 1: can start emerging during this time as well. You've got
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  Speaker 1: children who are leaving the house, maybe even graduating college
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  Speaker 1: and going off to other places. There can be fights
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  Speaker 1: with the spouse that are going on work can have
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  Speaker 1: a lot of responsibilities and deadlines, and even could be
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  Speaker 1: at the point where people maybe are feeling a little
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  Speaker 1: pushed out because they've been in their career for a
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  Speaker 1: long time and have newer people coming in friends and family.
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  Speaker 1: You start will get to get you to the point
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  Speaker 1: where people are starting to pass away at a slightly
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  Speaker 1: higher rate, which can be very difficult and traumatic to
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  Speaker 1: deal with. And although midlife crises can technically happen to anyone,
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  Speaker 1: they do seem particularly stereotypically more likely to happen among men.
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  Speaker 1: And in that group of people, there is some who
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  Speaker 1: have claimed that there is silence suffering. They're not really
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  Speaker 1: talking about the fact that they're feeling these things, that
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  Speaker 1: they're going through these things, and so it sometimes all
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  Speaker 1: of the sudden, their behavior seems to kind of come
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  Speaker 1: out of nowhere when they are not sharing their thoughts
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  Speaker 1: and feelings about those sort of situations. So that's all
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  Speaker 1: kind of stuff that we do see that is more
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  Speaker 1: or less backed up by some amount of studies, research, science, observation,
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  Speaker 1: self report, et cetera.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, now there are some caveats on pack here. Let's
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  Speaker 2: start with the fact that that's her midlife crisis was
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  Speaker 2: coined by psychoanalyst Elliott Jacques, that is, a Freudian psychologist
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  Speaker 2: in nineteen sixty. So this is a recent phenomenon. This
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  Speaker 2: is not something that was happening to Victorian era powdered
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  Speaker 2: wig wearing nerds like this was happening. This is only
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  Speaker 2: a recent at least the name suggests this is a
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  Speaker 2: recent phenomenon.
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  Speaker 1: Right, yeah, only the last sixty some odd years. Like
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  Speaker 1: That's that was interesting to me to think that, like, wow,
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  Speaker 1: this is you would think that this is like an
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  Speaker 1: idea that had been around for quite a while. And
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  Speaker 1: although for younger people sixty some odd years probably sounds
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  Speaker 1: like a crazy amount of times. I mean, that's what
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  Speaker 1: the reason, like that was within the last century that
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  Speaker 1: this was coined initially.
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  Speaker 3: Not a long time for science.
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  Speaker 1: Not a long time for science. And then yeah, as
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  Speaker 1: we said, immediate red flag when a psychoanalyst claims anything
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  Speaker 1: about how behavior works, or when they introduce an ad.
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  Speaker 1: All right, we're back. We've been talking about the origins
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  Speaker 1: of this idea, or at least the term for a
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  Speaker 1: midlife crisis.
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  Speaker 3: Now.
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  Speaker 1: Ironically, Carl Jung, a contemporary of Freud who didn't really
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  Speaker 1: call himself a psychoanalyst, but for all intents and purposes,
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  Speaker 1: he was young saw midlife slightly differently, writing that quote,
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  Speaker 1: midlife was a time when previously suppressed aspects of the
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  Speaker 1: psyche might become integrated. Men could recover their unconscious feminine
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  Speaker 1: side or anima previous submerged during their youth, and women
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  Speaker 1: come alive to their hidden opposite or the animus. And
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  Speaker 1: I don't really know what he's trying to say there,
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  Speaker 1: but it seems like he's indicating that, like, we maybe
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  Speaker 1: go through some evolutionary psychologically evolutionary type steps, but that
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  Speaker 1: doesn't necessarily mean that they are counterproductive or harmful. Sure, yeah,
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  Speaker 1: that's my response.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's kind of like I'm just like all right, like.
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  Speaker 1: Those are things you said, Yeah, those are things.
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  Speaker 3: That you said.
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  Speaker 2: It sounds like one of those like influencers who's like
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  Speaker 2: a wellness influencer, just saying stuff and they're like sure,
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  Speaker 2: like that's this.
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  Speaker 3: You know.
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  Speaker 2: Anyway, there is a reason to be skeptical about theories
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  Speaker 2: that come with from psychoanalysts. And it's not just us
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  Speaker 2: going like, oh, well, psychoanalysis blah blah blah, Like there's
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  Speaker 2: a reason why. And to add to that that while
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  Speaker 2: some studies show decrease life satisfaction, the actual decrease was
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  Speaker 2: pretty minuscule and not very significant. So like our current
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  Speaker 2: body of literature suggests that life satisfaction is probably not
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  Speaker 2: as important or as much of a factor in this
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  Speaker 2: as like it could be made out to be, well, but.
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  Speaker 1: It actually doesn't go down that much. They're like, they
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  Speaker 1: do see a decrease, but it was like, right, from
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  Speaker 1: a five point zero to a four point nine, And
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  Speaker 1: I'm like, right, that is a decrease, but is it
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  Speaker 1: an important decrease?
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  Speaker 3: You know? Right?
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  Speaker 1: And furthermore, a longitudinal study at least one show that
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  Speaker 1: adults forty one to fifty became less neurotic and self conscious,
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  Speaker 1: so they're like just more secure and who they were.
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  Speaker 1: Another one showed that women from forty three to fifty
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  Speaker 1: two became less dependent and self critical and they became
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  Speaker 1: more confident, responsible, and decisive, so again sort of more
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  Speaker 1: assured and more comfortable with who they were and everything.
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  Speaker 1: So that does to me raise the inquiry of, like,
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  Speaker 1: how were those questionnaires set up in phrase that you
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  Speaker 1: would get these very different sort of reports, Because that's
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  Speaker 1: a really relevant consideration is like, did you tee them
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  Speaker 1: up to answer in the way that you thought that
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  Speaker 1: you wanted them to answer, even if that wasn't necessarily
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  Speaker 1: the intent. That does happen. Sometimes we're not necessarily considering
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  Speaker 1: our bias when designing these questionnaires that may or may
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  Speaker 1: not be a very accurate representation of how we think
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  Speaker 1: and feel. They are not.
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  Speaker 2: Right now, only about ten to twenty percent of adult
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  Speaker 2: experience anything even remotely resembling a crisis, which rarely or
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  Speaker 2: never reaches a full blown crisis.
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  Speaker 3: That's a fairly rare phenomenon.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, so it's like, this isn't an inevitable part of
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  Speaker 1: adulthood either. It's like, should anybody experience anything like this,
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  Speaker 1: It's a relatively small amount and it never actually like
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  Speaker 1: becomes a crisis, or almost never. In the extent to
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  Speaker 1: which people experience some sort of midlife crisis or midlife distress,
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  Speaker 1: it's usually better explained by things like life circumstances, some
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  Speaker 1: amount of culture, the context that's relevant for that person,
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  Speaker 1: and not really explained by just the age. Like that
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  Speaker 1: seems to be the implication of the idea of the
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  Speaker 1: midlife crisis is it's because you've entered midlife and that's
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  Speaker 1: the reason that these things are happening. And it's actually like, no,
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  Speaker 1: there's things are happening around you that happen to happen
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  Speaker 1: during midlife. That tends to be somewhat distressing for some people.
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  Speaker 1: Parents whose children are growd when in college might suddenly
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  Speaker 1: find themselves with a bunch more income that they weren't
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  Speaker 1: spending when they had kids, a bunch more time that
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  Speaker 1: they weren't spending when they had kids. And they also
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  Speaker 1: might be senior enough in their position at work that
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  Speaker 1: their work has become more flexible. So all of a sudden,
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  Speaker 1: they got disposable income and time on their hands, and
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  Speaker 1: they're like having fun with it. It's not a crisis.
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  Speaker 1: They're just like, hey, cool, I got some stuff I
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  Speaker 1: can do now.
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  Speaker 2: Right exactly, it's free time, baby. They start spending more
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  Speaker 2: freely because they can. Sometimes they realize that their relationship
• 10:27
  Speaker 2: was only being held together by their kids, and with
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: them out of the equation, they discovered they don't want
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: to stay in their relationships. I mean, parenting is really complex,
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: and when you don't have time to talk to another
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: person and there are no children involved, and then you go, oh,
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  Speaker 2: you're a different person than when we first met, Like
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  Speaker 2: that can be really complicated to navigate, exactly.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, And that just relationships change. People grow and change,
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  Speaker 1: and sometimes they don't evolve together, they evolve apart. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: And that can happen sometimes, and like when there's not
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  Speaker 1: really a reason for them to suffer each other any longer,
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  Speaker 1: they sort of feel like, well, I think we did
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  Speaker 1: the thing. Let's go our separate ways now, you know.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly.
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  Speaker 1: And now that that happens, that often either, Like it's
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  Speaker 1: like a lot of people also stick through and they
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  Speaker 1: do just fine. It's just it could happen. There's this
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  Speaker 1: sort of relative swath of people for whom that will
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  Speaker 1: be true. Now, there might be some people who do
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  Speaker 1: find themselves confronted by their most mortality, possibly because they
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  Speaker 1: live in a culture that emphasizes the importance of youth.
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  Speaker 1: They it might be a culture that emphasizes the lack
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  Speaker 1: of utility of elderly people, and that could potentially make
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  Speaker 1: some people start to question their self worth as they're
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  Speaker 1: heading into that segment of the age range. So if
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  Speaker 1: the culture supports it and it emphasizes it, and it's
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  Speaker 1: in the zeitgeist, the awareness of people probably more likely
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  Speaker 1: to happen as well.
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  Speaker 2: Right Relatedly, it seems to be a Western English speaking,
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  Speaker 2: possibly largely American phenomenon. Many other cultures don't even have
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  Speaker 2: the idea of a midlife crisis or even a midlife
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  Speaker 2: age range. So this is uniquely it feels like at
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  Speaker 2: least a uniquely American thing.
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  Speaker 1: Yes, at least sort of Western English speaking type thing.
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  Speaker 1: But it does seem largely like it is a United
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  Speaker 1: States potential United States problem. Yeah, like other people that like,
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: what is midlife? What does that mean? They don't have
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  Speaker 1: language for that because they've never considered that that was
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  Speaker 1: a thing that needed to be delineated as a part
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  Speaker 1: of your developmental trajectory. Sure, So all this leaves us
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  Speaker 1: with is is there even such a thing as a
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: midlife crisis? Uh? Kind of maybe for some people, but
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  Speaker 1: mostly because as we head into that part of our
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: lives in which we're experiencing a lot of circumstantial changes
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  Speaker 1: that can come with different ways of responding to those changes.
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  Speaker 1: Some of those are very helpful and positive, some of
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  Speaker 1: them are distressing and difficult. Sure, and that just means that,
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  Speaker 1: like when we become faced with these major life changes,
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: our priorities can change. Sometimes what seemed like it was
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: really important, maybe it doesn't seem so important anymore. Something
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: that didn't use to seem so important suddenly starts to
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: feel kind of important. That just happens when we go
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  Speaker 1: through big, like major changes, like all of a sudden,
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: our kids are completely gone, all of a sudden, Like
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  Speaker 1: I'm realizing I don't really like this person I've been
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  Speaker 1: with this whole time, you know whatever, all of a sudden,
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: like I'm realizing that, Like I don't have a lot
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  Speaker 1: of potential for advancment in my career. Maybe I look
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: elsewhere and see what else I can potentially do that
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: would bring me more joy. And sometimes none of those
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: things happen. Most of the time, none of those things happen.
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  Speaker 1: So it's like, right, there doesn't seem to be the crisis,
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  Speaker 1: and it doesn't seem to happen that often if it
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: does happen at all, right, exactly, And of course, what
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: we was gonna leave with, Like there are some people
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: who expressed in some of the resources that I found,
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: at least a lot there are people who expressed a
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: lot of concern over the rates of suicide that can
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: happen among this group. We are at a time right
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: now in our country where it seems like deaths that
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: are related to despair and suicide are very high at
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: the moment. This tends to happen in conservative administrations. The
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: data are there, just look it up. We have a
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: particularly aggressively dangerous one right now, and that does seem
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: to be correlated with those insan and that could be
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: really tough for people to deal with. And that is
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: a thing that we're more likely to face the longer
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  Speaker 1: that we stay alive. And so that is something that's
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: related to the midlife experience. If you or someone you
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: know is experiencing thoughts of self harm or distress that
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: may result in self harm or harmed others, please call
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: nine to eight eight. That is the national hotline. You
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: can reach and talk to somebody who can help work
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: you through those work with you through those issues for sure.
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: All right, I think that's what we have to say
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: about midlife crises. They may or may not be a thing.
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: Is there anything you would like to add that I
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: forgot before we wrap this up?
• 14:28
  Speaker 3: No, I think that covers all of it perfect Well.
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: We're right about fifteen minutes, so I'll try and do
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: this quick. If you'd like to support us, you can
• 14:33
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• 14:39
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• 14:41
  Speaker 1: of our full length discussions. If you like to leave
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: us your thoughts about midlife crises, please email us. You
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: can contact us directly at info at wwdwwdpodcast dot com,
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: and we do look forward to hearing from you. But
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: this is way you have to say about this, and
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: we're at our time for a mini so let's go
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: ahead and close it out here. This is Abraham, mister Shane,
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: Why We Do what We Do? Any is out.
• 15:00
  Speaker 3: Bye.
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: You've been listening to Why We Do What We Do.
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  Speaker 2: going to WWD WWD.
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  Speaker 2: Thanks for listening, and we hope you have an awesome day.