28 Dec The Lazy Way To An Awesome Life: 4 Secrets Backed By Research
Living a great life need not be that hard.
I’m not saying it’s always easy; but we can make things easier!
Using research based strategies we can massively increase our chances of doing what works and so thus, enjoying the benefits.
And Eric Barker sums up 4 of these powerful strategies in this great article …
You can reach a point in life where you think, “I am never going to achieve what I thought I would.”
Yeah, dark, but far from uncommon.
You’re not where you expected to be. There’s a sense of needing to make up for lost time — but it seems there’s less time than ever. Life has gone from feeling like an epic unfurling adventure to a sterile bureaucratic treadmill. Endless deadening responsibilities, but there’s no longer a narrative guiding it all toward victory and fulfillment. The numbing predictability gives birth to a corrosive sense of boredom.
You want to send it back to the kitchen: Please tell the chef this is not the life I ordered.
Or maybe you did get what you wanted – but it’s just not all you thought it would be. And so you ask yourself the question:
“Is this all there is?”
(For the record, I don’t recommend putting that phrase on an inspirational fridge magnet.)
Are these feelings a midlife crisis? Well, when you feel the need to ask that question, it kinda answers itself. It’s like a spiritual awakening — but in reverse.
Maybe you’re not even in midlife. Doesn’t matter. The feelings are the same. It seems like it’s too late to turn the ship around. The accumulated decisions and compromises have locked you in. Your life seems like something that happened to you. “How did I get here?” You feel trapped.
YEEEEEEEESH, that’s depressing.
Okay, some of you may be thinking: “Eric, are you feeling okay? Good God, I’m not having a crisis but your description might give me one.”
Sorry for the “Scared Straight” presentation. (And I’m doing just fine, thanks.) But we have an issue here that everybody knows about but nobody gives you an answer to. Plenty of discussion about youth. Many references to the “Golden Years.” But then there’s that BIG area in the middle where many of us are. Not much guidance. Figure it out. Best of luck.
Adulting is hard. We all get tired and start to question life. We all wonder if we’re really doing it right. And if we’re not careful, it can reach crisis proportions where you find yourself motorcycle shopping. Maybe you’re in the midst of it, maybe you’re on your way out of it, or maybe you can see it on the horizon, but we could all use help doing some existential troubleshooting in the muddy middle of life.
Yeah, time to roll up our sleeves. We’re gonna get some solid insight from a few books on the subject: Middle Age, Life Reimagined, and Midlife.
Okay, adults. Time to start adulting. Let’s get to it…
The Truth About The “Midlife Crisis”
The midlife crisis has been around forever, right? Wrong. The concept originated in a 1965 paper by Elliott Jaques titled, “Death and the Mid-Life Crisis.” But clearly a lot of people related to it because by 1980 the idea had really caught on. (Heck, somebody even created a board game about it.)
But here’s where things get weird. By the year 2000, when the concept of the midlife crisis turned 35, well, it was having a midlife crisis of its own. Researchers took a hard look at the data and couldn’t find it. It seemed like a myth or at least something that wasn’t very common.
That’s a relief. Just because you turn 35 or 40 or 50 doesn’t mean your life is totally going to fall apart. Whew. But here’s where I am called upon to use one of the most foreboding words in the dictionary:
However…
The data does show the middle is the low point for happiness in life. Control for whatever you want, torture the data however you like, the results are the same. Happiness has a “U-shaped curve” across the lifespan. It peaks around 20, plummets in the 40’s, and you see a happiness peak again at around 70.
From Midlife:
Adjusting for income, marital status, and employment, Blanchflower and Oswald found that the level of reported happiness by age had the shape of a gently curving U, starting high in young adulthood and ending higher in old age, with an average nadir at forty-six. The pattern showed up in seventy-two countries around the world. It was similar in men and women and regression analysis ruled out an explanation in terms of the stress of parenthood.
What did they attribute the happiness drop to? The scary stuff I mentioned at the beginning of the post. Unrealized goals. Questioning your choices. Life changing but your identity not keeping up.
So few people experience a true “crisis” — but the struggle for happiness in midlife is real. And it’s not just common; it’s nearly ubiquitous. Ugh.
(To learn more about how you can lead a successful life, check out my bestselling book here.)
Fear not. There are ways we can make the U-shaped curve a little less curvy. First, we’ll look at achieving happiness. A recommendation from the science? Stop trying.
I’m kidding. Well, kind of…
… keep reading the full & original article HERE