Age of Mastery

It’s kind of interesting, being in mid-life. Some mornings, we feel the brunt of aging when merely getting out of bed causes multiple grunts and groans—and we wonder, who made that terrible sound? Was that me? We carefully make sure that anything we might need during the day does not require us to bend over to retrieve it. We can’t figure out how merely brushing our teeth caused our back to go out. Our sleep patterns change and we find we that “sleeping in” has become sleeping in until 7 am, but only after waking up several times in the night. In contrast, this is also an age when our minds are at their best. We can synthesize information on a much deeper level. We’ve developed some wisdom and compassion as we can imagine ourselves walking in someone else’s shoes. We’ve accomplished many things, possibly raised our children, and stand, one day, questioning what it’s all about? Where do I fit in?

 

I remember my great grandmother and I having one of our coffee and cigarette sessions when I was about 17. We were sitting at her dining room table, puffing away and chugging back massive quantities of caffeine, as she regaled me with bawdy jokes. She was slipping into the early stages of Alzheimer’s at the time. She suddenly stopped mid-joke and looked at her hand, which she thrust in front of me. Her arm was wrinkled and the skin almost transparent. She said, “I look at these hands and I can’t believe they are mine. I still feel 18.” I had no idea what she was talking about; I wish she was still here so I could tell her I get it now. I’m sure she thought that “youth was wasted on the young.”

 

Gail Sheehy in her book, New Passages, calls mid-life the "second adulthood." For our age group, she calls this the “Age of Mastery.” For some, mid-life becomes a crisis and for others, it becomes a time to spread our wings and explore the greater opportunities to find ourselves outside of the realm of societal construct, beyond being a spouse or a parent.

 

I was speaking with a friend who is going through a classic mid-life situation. It appears, from the outside, looking in, to be near crisis for him. He’s contemplating making major changes because suddenly he feels stagnate, undervalued, and that he has spent his whole life being the strong man—taking care of hearth and home. All the imperfections in his relationships have become gargantuan in proportion because he is now aware of him. His understanding of his emotions is somewhat new to him and he’s still working on being able to articulate his needs to those around him. And, they, I would suspect, are confused by his newfound awareness of self. He is at a crossroads between opportunity and danger. The turn he makes at this crossroads will have life-long implications. I’m proud of him for seeking professional counsel to help him try to piece together his wildly ricocheting thoughts and feelings so he stop feeling like he’s falling off a cliff. Men experience the “Age of Mastery” in a completely different way than women, so I may not always understand his angst, but I have a mountain of empathy for him.

 

Aging means a lot of things—our bodies start to fail us due to genetics and life choices and our minds cry out for a greater understanding of self and the world around us. Our experiences, as we pass through the various stages of life, share some commonality, but are also singular, and define who we are and what we will make of them. I looked at my hand today; it doesn’t look 18, but it’s a long way from 80 and I’ve still got a lot of living to do.

If you haven't the strength to impose your own terms upon life, you must accept the terms it offers you.
~ TS Eliot

 Originally published: Feb 28, 2006