Go against the grain!

When you arrive at 50, those around you will expect you to slow down and retire. They will ask what you are planning to do when you stop working. The marketing messages you see are pushing youth and beauty and the pursuit of material goods. You suddenly realize you don’t have an answer or a plan for what you will do. So instead you work harder, but it’s the same career you’ve been working in for many years—and you never really enjoyed it in the first place.

This is when you realize that you don’t have the energy or passion for THIS work any longer! What can you do?

This is the hard part. Your friends and family have come to expect nothing different from you. You have defined yourself by your work. This is the image you project to others. Your work has paid the bills over the years, provided for a few fun material goods, and your family never complained. But inside you, something—suddenly—is seriously wrong. You know and you feel it. I am going to die soon if I continue this work…

At least that’s how it feels. You feel trapped, bored, and worse—empty of purpose or passion. You read stories about—and admire—others at 50 who have given up their banking and teaching jobs to suddenly move to an outpost in South America, or open an orphanage in Africa. You wish you had the courage to follow your own passion, or at least figure out what it is. Crises all around you

You start to notice that people your age are dying around you. Your friend from college—the successful one—suddenly has a heart attack and dies, leaving his family behind. A person you work with is diagnosed with cancer. Your neighbor gets into a car accident and is unable to walk again. These things make you nervous. You feel lucky that you are healthy; no crises yet. Then your crisis hits…

…and it will. Perhaps one day you come home and your spouse of 20 years tells you he is not happy any more and wants out. Or you are laid off without notice or severance. Maybe you hurt your back, and now you can only work part-time.

Perhaps you crisis is a small one, but it feels just as large as those on this list. You are tired of your boss reminding you of your mistakes, and the silly dress-down days at work make you ill—you just can’t bear the news of another mandatory office birthday celebration. You feel trapped

You suddenly feel like you have died. What is left in life? Each day seems like the last, and you suddenly feel like you are not contributing to anything that seems important or worthwhile. At 50, life changes

In mid-life, and especially around 50, it is normal to start to feel a little hopeless about your life. While the messages around you suggest retirement, followed by death, you actually feel differently. Deep inside, you feel 25 again. You know you still have the energy for something more if only you could figure this out. You still feel attractive, and actually a little sexy, although you would hardly broadcast this to others. The problem is, of course, that there doesn’t seem—at 50—to be an outlet for all this youthful passion. All your friends are continuing their normal routines, and talking of retirement. You think to yourself, retirement? I haven’t even started to live yet. Make your crisis a crusade

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