Phases Of Life
June 16, 2020
A lot of youngsters who engage with me for coaching and mentoring conversations are all in their thirties. They have a lot of questions about what is happening in their life and what they should be doing to get ahead.
This is for them.
Our childhood, teenage years, early adulthood leading into our first jobs are perhaps the most exciting phase of our life. Being immersed in academic and extracurricular pursuits, egoless bonding with friends, sexual exploration, seeing the world beyond immediate home, and the first paycheck with no responsibilities, a lot of great stuff happens in this phase of our lives. We are reasonably fearless(even those who are fearful are least fearful in this phase), and we believe we can achieve anything we want.
Enter the phase of the early ’30s, and you start coming face to face with some realities of life. Career and work get demanding. You realize that it’s not good enough to be in a job. You have to grow, you have to compete, and you must prove that you are capable, to the people around you. Family, kids, and responsibilities kick in. Elders around you who you took for granted start experiencing sickness. Some lose family members. The Stress of life and living unto expectations you have set for yourself and others have set for you start to take a toll. You begin experiencing some disappointments and failures. And with those, you start building unconscious fears, anxieties.
The stress peaks, culminating in the mid-life crisis in the late thirties and early forties.
Then something wonderful starts happening. You start taking stock of our life. You begin to see that you have achieved and experienced most of what you dreamt of when you were young. Your bank balance is higher. You realize that you have grown and evolved as an individual. The blessings of children, family, and friends hit home. You begin acknowledging that your time on this earth is finite, and you start appreciating your day to day existence naturally. You begin experiencing more happiness and contentment naturally.
Moreover, Kids grow up and become independent. The burden of responsibilities lightens substantially. You enter the second half of your life feeling good.
If you are in your thirties and are feeling a little stressed or anxious or unhappy, don’t worry, there is nothing wrong. It is just a natural process of your evolution in a phase where a lot is happening in your life.
Chill up and enjoy the ride. There is more happiness around the corner, waiting for you !!!