My Version of a Midlife Crisis

I just needed to stop

If I had to define the last decade of my life using only one word, it’d be searching.

What exactly was I searching for?

So many things. Anything, really. But mostly I was searching for a clue or sign to point me in the right direction.

I was truly lost.

It all started after the birth of my first child.

Becoming a parent rocked my world and as much as I love motherhood and thrive in this role, parenthood left me wanting more.

When I made the decision to shelf my career and stay home to raise my kids, I also chose to do away with a major part of my identity.

I was always a career person.

I wasn’t the woman who knew what she wanted in her person life- I never hoped for children or marriage or a long-term partner. I figured I’d be content owning a dog, a condo and living like SJP in Sex in the City- a single, independent, successful serial-dating woman about town.

I enjoyed meeting new people and answering questions about what I did for a living and I was proud of the career I had spent almost a decade building.

By the time I’d become a parent and the rise of Momfluencer culture took the world by storm, my attention became singularly-focused on achieving the level of productivity and success the typical Momfluencer had become known for.

As with everything else social media-related, I knew that what I was viewing wasn’t the whole truth. I knew these moms weren’t as put together and as organized as what they were portraying to the public.

But I didn’t care.

A fire had become ignited and I was determined to have what they had- I became uber-motivated to find a side hustle and a way to make money from home while still maintaining primary caretaker status.

As much as I tried to embrace the feminine by setting aside personal goals and ambitions to focus all of my efforts on my children, I simply didn’t have it in me. The desire for more- for an entrepreneurial endeavor and a certain level of success within in my career- was always there, looming beneath the surface.

If only I could figure out a way to be both at once- the nurturing, attentive mom and the go-getter business savvy woman.

But I struggled to make this type of lifestyle happen for me in an authentic way. As any working mom understands, I felt pulled in two very different directions and guilt was an ever-present companion regardless of which choice I considered making.

Eventually, determination turned into something negative and I began placing far too much pressure on myself, becoming overly focused on time frames and deadlines.

This was my version of a mid-life crisis.

Becoming a parent opens your eyes to how little time we actually have on this planet. Time becomes precious in a way I could never have imagined. Which is why I believe I went through a mid-life crisis-earlier than what’s considered typical- in my thirties.

But hindsight’s twenty/twenty and if I had known then what I know now, I would have stopped searching completely- I would have let go and relaxed.

Once I did, the answers became clear and the information I craved began flowing freely in my direction.

As my fortieth birthday approached and the pressure mounted, I couldn’t fathom entering a new decade without first having the specifics of my life ironed out.

Exhaustion was the catalyst that eventually helped me realize I had been going about things all wrong.

Stopping what I was doing became fulfilling in and of itself. For the first time in a long time-perhaps for the first time ever-I did absolutely nothing.

I simply existed.

Stop leaving and you will arrive. Stop searching and you will see. Stop running away and you will be found.

-Lao Tzu

My whole life I’d been leaving, packing, moving, running and then repeating the process again and again. Maybe I was restless or maybe avoidant- both were probably true.

It’s possible I was running from something. Maybe from failed relationships and alcohol abuse. Maybe I was running from my past and the many times I failed to live up to my potential.

Searching for meaning in the wrong place is akin to beating your head against a wall and expecting a brilliant idea to manifest from the beatings.

Every resource I attempted to extract meaning from led to nowhere.

But once I stopped what I was doing I found what I was looking for.

Things became clear and I experienced a major paradigm shift. I was no longer seeking. Instead, I simply chose joy.

I chose to engage in activities and with people that brought me joy.

I chose to let go of preconceived notions about where I “should be” at a certain stage of my life. I chose happiness, fulfillment and let the rest fall to the wayside.

By focusing on gratitude and simply being present in the moment, I became more content than I ever have been.

It was around this time I came up with the idea of career journaling.

By committing to this one daily act, I shifted my mindset from seeking to simply observing, feeling and being.

There were many things I did wrong in the decade leading up to my fortieth birthday. One mistake I made was assuming I had zero passion.

I possessed a long held, erroneous belief that if I didn’t have specific hobbies or interests I was passionate about, it meant I was a boring person.

I was probably comparing myself to my husband who’s always had a variety of hobbies and interests that bring him joy and fulfillment and I wanted that for myself.

I just needed to find my thing and all would be right in the world.

I tried new activities but none of them gave me that magical all-encompassing feeling I was looking for- none of them sparked a sense of passion within me.

I began reminiscing about activities that brought me joy when I was younger and it was only once I began writing that I was able to connect the dots and notice patterns.

You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards

-Steve Jobs

While trying to niche and hone in on specific passions, I forgot to zoom out. I forgot to view the forrest through the trees. What I really needed was to find common themes and realize that passion already existed within me. If only I had noticed the patterns sooner.

I wrongly assumed that passion was something that needed to be found- a thing to be discovered through relentless searching. But that’s simply not the case. Passion is something built and developed over time through focus and commitment.

Muddy water is best cleared by leaving it alone

-Alan Watts

What I was trying to achieve was akin to building a house without first laying foundation.

I needed meditation in order to still my mind.

I needed a still mind before I could recognize the many benefits of writing.

I needed writing in order to understand my emotions.

I needed to understand my emotions before I could let go of unhelpful feelings and fixed ideas that no longer served me.

I needed to let go in order to embrace new ideas and new energy and I needed to stop and be present in order to see things clearly.

Only then was I able to appreciate what I had instead of focusing on what I wanted.

It turns out, I was exactly where I needed to be and what I was searching for- what I needed- was in front of me all along.