Midlife Mastery Journal

The road ahead is always totally dependent on the free-will choices that two individuals are going to make. Yet, as we approach the end of the calendar year, I think it wouldn’t do any harm to offer some suggestions about what to do when a midlife crisis threatens to end a relationship.

I know that it seems counter-intuitive and unhelpful to be told that the best approach to your partner who’s showing signs of a midlife crisis is ‘hands-off,’ but it’s exactly true. Take for example the advice that’s given to people who are in a relationship with people in active addiction (not an unusual situation during a midlife crisis either, I dare say): detach with love.

For those who have gotten themselves enmeshed in the emotional morass of the midlife transition and remain unaware of the dynamics of this volatile period of life (both men and women), the prospects for their relationships, even after twenty or thirty years together, may seem hopeless.

There are no real tragedies in life (except, perhaps, a person who gives up on him- or herself along the way). There are only events or happenings. Each one is little more than an invitation to grow.

Once you’ve accepted the fact that you can define ‘adulthood’ as ‘childhood without the parental constraints,’ you begin to see the seeds of the problem right away: too many people go into marriages that are founded upon little more than hopes, feelings, and wishful thinking.