Wednesday, December 17, 2008

Mid Life Crisis

As all the knowledge goes, in these days since the dawn of the Internet, almost everything term that you google will come up with a wikipedia entry. The first line in the wikipedia entry reads: Midlife crisis is a term used in Western societies to describe a period of dramatic self-doubt that is felt by some individuals in the "middle years" of life, as a result of sensing the passing of youth and the imminence of old age. If you continue to read on the entry, they will offer some factors that lead to mid-life crisis, followed by some of the characteristics.

Individuals experiencing a mid-life crisis have some of these feelings:
  • search of an undefined dream or goal
  • a deep sense of remorse for goals not accomplished
  • desire to achieve a feeling of youthfulness
  • need to spend more time alone or with certain peers

They exhibit some of these behaviors:

  • abuse of alcohol
  • conspicuous consumption—acquisition of unusual or expensive items such as clothing, sports cars, jewelry, gadgets, tattoos, piercings, motorbikes, etc.
  • depression
  • paying special attention to physical appearance
  • trying to attach themself to a youth
I wonder how many people who are not in the middle years of their life but yet experience these kind of feelings. All these feelings are rather common i believe, although not so much of the behaviors. I do feel these ways every now and then, but i guess it is more of a "feels like i have wasted the past ___ years of my life doing nothing productive, and achieve nothing that actually enhances my current situation". This occurs especially more so when certain things that you have been doing for a long time and you suddenly just decided to stop it, without having anything else that interests you to do in the meantime. For me, currently my study life is ending soon, but i realize that i do not have any goals for my future. While not knowing what jobs you want is quite common, but due to the high inertia in my system, i prefer not to probe into the region of future uncertainity. There are so many things i actually want to do, probably learning some musical instruments, more languages, photography and even dancing, but sad to say somehow i am a person that refuse and unwilling to do things alone. I guess most things in my life happens either because i was forced to or someone actually asked me to go alone. I learnt Japanese because 2 of my friends wanted to learn, and we only studied for 3 mths. I learnt guitar because a friend decided to learn, and i stop when my A' levels came. I went for diving because an army mate is going and asked if i want to go along. I learnt driving just because i was kind of forced to go, or rather told to go and i really hated driving manual car in the beginning, and even now i don't really like to drive because of the heavy traffics.

While certainly i am not in the middle age of my life (at least i hope not else i probably will be gone by 50 or something), i am certainly lost at the crossroad between the transition from studying to working. So many people has told me that working suck and life will be so tired and boring after that. But hopefully from all these negativity, working will give me the finanical power to move out of my parents' house and maybe rent a place somewhere with a few good friends, and actually might have a chance to have a more interesting life, and might be the start of my real life in society.

1 comment:

Eric Tan said...

Characteristics of Quarter Life Crisis may include:

# feeling "not good enough" because one can't find a job that is at one's academic/intellectual level

# frustration with relationships, the working world, and finding a suitable job or career

# insecurity regarding the near future

# insecurity concerning long-term plans, life goals

# insecurity regarding present accomplishments

# financially-rooted stress

# nostalgia for university, college, high school or elementary school life

# tendency to hold stronger opinions

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quarter-life_crisis