4 Ways To Start Living Midlife With Purpose

Rebecca Perkins' article on living midlife with purpose makes the core point - it's an uphill battle if we start AFTER those precious years!

It got me thinking about my five years teaching.  After my 2nd year, it hit me that the time to circumvent the February blahs & blues was to head 'em off from the time we returned to school after Christmas break, when most students & teachers felt low energy-ish.  My 3rd, 4th & 5th years were hallmarked with HIGH energy projects introduced as soon as school resumed.  We were too engaged & bustling in February - including first discussions on Spring's carnival - to get bummed!

Think of midlife like early January - our great shot at setting up a pattern that will get us through the rougher spots ahead.  It didn't make February less grey, cold & dreary.  It gave ways to make something more important than the mid-winter wearies.

Love Rebecca's statement, "Midlife is the time to show up.  It's time to stop messing about.  It's time to honor ourselves & our abilities.  Life is too short."

That's how I felt with my students - the time I had with them was too short to not use every moment of it.  By early January, the class had its own identity.  They had made their assessments of me, I'd made mine of them; we were a swirl of individual & group energies & dynamics.  A lot like where we find ourselves, our families, our work circles & social groups. 

Early January & midlife are peak times for getting down to living at a conscious fullness.  Rebecca offers four key points for getting down to it:

• Have a "what if" mindset - what if it was possible, if I experienced myself in a different way, if I was prepared to do it EVEN if it flopped?

• Get curious - yes, yes & yes!  This is something that only just clicked with me in writing my crowdfund request.  Rather than ME THE EXPERT, it focuses on me the curious, the questioner, the seeker.  Instead of being MY way, what ways do others see, how do others approach aging, what's a possibility that would NEVER have occurred to me?  I grew up thinking that power was found in having the best answers.  At 64, have learned how messed up that was - the greatest power is found in posing questions.

• Imagine life without letting fear, procrastination, rationalizations take the lead.  Rebecca includes one of my favorite quotes from Elizabeth Gilberts' Big Magic:  “Fear: I recognize & respect that you are part of this family & so I will never exclude you from our activities, but still you suggestions will NEVER be followed. You’re allowed to have a seat and you’re allowed to have a voice but you are not allowed to have a VOTE. You’re not allowed to touch the road maps; you’re not allowed to suggest detours; you’re not allowed to fiddle with the temperature. Dude, you’re not even allowed to touch the radio. And, above all else, my dear and familiar friend, you are absolutely FORBIDDEN to drive.” A message I processed growing up was that we're meant to shun fear, get rid of it - a sure bet for actually handling fear the reins, because working against it only makes fear & all its traits grow stronger.  So recognize them as the gremlins they are, give them a tip of your hat  (they HATE a neutral HELLO!) & move past to better.

• Daydream about the future.  Take those daydreams seriously.  Give them definition & heft, clear-cut edges & a heart-felt, deep gut sense of reality.  EVERYTHING is possible in daydreams, there are no limitations, no boundaries.  Interesting reality - the same is true about life.  Daydream substantially enough & discover it's just the slightest shift from dream to reality.

Early January, midlife.  Time to consciously live with purpose, to start looking past the false premises about absolute certainty we somehow processed in those earlier years, messed up messages we got from who knows where but which we are finally - in our middle years - able to recognize as flat-out, full-bore foolishness.  

Midlife - time to take steps to live our own big magic, if we're not already; to wade in & relish the Auntie Mame portion of our great & glorious life, to let it take us to the edge & beyond!