February 27, 2023 • 33 mins
As a midlifer, we often feel like we "should" have our shit together, but what if we don't? How do we get clear and honest with what's actually happening? In this episode, Syd Moreau, host of Forty AF, discusses why shoulding on ourselves allows us to stay disconnected from our lives and gives us an illusion of responsibility without having to take actual action.
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SPEAKER_00 (00:00):
Admittedly, I would go to the kitchen and I would
(00:02):
eat a few emotional supportcookies and maybe slice a few
pieces of cheese and pour a fewglasses of wine that evening,
and I would feel like absoluteshit about myself.
And that process, I did thatevery day.
I was giving a half-ass attemptto reach my goal, never really
being fully honest with what wasactually happening.
(00:24):
In my mind, I lived in theshoulds.
I had to change the cycle.
I had the desire, but the defeatwas in the should.
Should give us an illusion ofresponsibility without having to
take actual action towards adesire or a goal.
This is the 40 as fuck podcast,where we have worthwhile, real
(00:48):
as fuck conversations aboutmidlife.
What you're gonna hear on thispodcast is not the fluff you see
scrolling Instagram, it's themessy parts of midlife because
midlife feels a littledifferent.
I wouldn't say midlife isnecessarily a crisis, but it's
worth paying attention to.
(01:15):
So I have a confession for youguys.
Since 2007, when I first joinedFacebook, I was always hoping
with every seemingly perfectFacebook post or even later with
my Instagram post, I really didtry to convince you that I have
my shit all together.
Not only was I trying toconvince you, I was actually
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probably trying to convincemyself as well.
My mission with this podcast isto normalize not having our shit
together in our 40s.
And even if we feel like we haveit all together, I still want to
normalize this middle part ofour life as an exploration into
ourselves.
Using this time to redefine anddecide how we want to show up
(02:00):
and really thinking about who dowe want to show up to, I think
that that's really important.
It's not actually necessary thatyou have a crisis, but asking
yourself, does my present selfalign with my future self?
Fundamentally, that is what isat the core of this evaluation
period.
At this stage of our lives, weare really lucky because we have
(02:23):
this vast backlog ofexperiences.
And all of those experienceshave very unknowingly or
unconsciously formed thiscurrent version of ourselves.
And the current version ofourselves may or may not have it
all figured out yet.
And honestly, there's a prettygood chance that we will never
have it all figured out.
It is really hard, though, tolook at ourselves and
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acknowledge the areas of ourlives or even ourselves that
need some attention.
And it's even harder to admitout loud to other people who
care and love us that we'restruggling.
But announcing it to the socialworld and telling the world
about our flaws and ourweaknesses and areas that we
need growth in, or even wherewe're completely failing in our
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life, I don't think being fullytransparent or 100% authentic on
social media is actuallynecessary.
I really don't want myex-boyfriends or my grade school
nemesis knowing that I gained 20pounds over COVID.
No thanks.
I will use the perfect selfieangle to hide those 20 pounds.
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And yes, I did do that duringCOVID.
My point is that there should beno judgment in posting photos or
videos that portray ourselvesthe way we want to be seen
online.
We're human.
We're going to want to do that.
Like I said before, to gothrough this period a crisis is
not required.
But it does require a level ofauthenticity and transparency
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and really vulnerability withourselves.
But what you post on socialmedia really doesn't matter.
But how you look at yourself inthe mirror, I think that
matters.
And I mean that bothfiguratively and literally.
Most of us have these reallygreat intentions, even
motivations to make changes.
But when it comes down to it, welet ourselves down.
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We don't follow through and wekind of flake out on ourselves.
And we do this day after dayafter day, but we have this
desire for change.
We want something more ordifferent, and that's normal and
healthy.
It isn't selfish, and it alsodoesn't mean that your life is
crap either.
In labs, scientists haveactually found that without
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desire, our action stops.
Rats that were neurologicallydeprived of dopamine, and
dopamine is a neurotransmitterin the brain that is largely
responsible for movement,motivation, taking action in our
lives or going towards somethingpretty much describes desire.
The rats without the dopaminelost all of their will to live.
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Now, I'm not actually sayingthat you're going to die by not
having some version of a midlifecrisis, but what I am saying is
this work isn't selfish.
Improving who we are and wherewe want to go kind of seems like
it's life essential.
I think rethinking what thisperiod of time looks like for us
and not calling it a crisis ishelpful.
(05:21):
Hitting rock bottom or needingto implode our life or making
these huge sweeping changes, Idon't think that any of that is
necessary.
I think this evaluation shouldbe about defining what's
important in our lives.
And basically at the core of it,we're aligning the trajectory of
the next 40 years of our livesso that we end up where we want
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to be, hopefully, knowing thatwe lived out our lives
contentfully, with joy, andspending it with people in
places who love and support us.
In a landmark study by Harvard,and it's called the Harvard
Study of Adult Development, itwas conducted over 80 years.
And during this 80-year study,they followed over 700 men.
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And what they found by analyzingtons and tons of data on these
men is that good relationshipsare what keep us happier and
healthier, nothing else.
It came down to having goodrelationships in our life to
keep us happier and healthier.
This is in stark contradictionto surveys of millennials who
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80% say being rich is a lifegoal for happiness.
And 50% of millennials say beingfamous is also a major life goal
for happiness.
Think about that.
So I would say that hindsight ofthe 700 participants in the
Harvard study gives us a waybetter glimpse of how aging and
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experience alter and define whatis actually important in life.
And that's why I think that thismidlife marker that we're in is
so important.
But unfortunately, asking thesehard questions and doing this
work isn't necessarily lookedupon positively, not always by
our family or culture.
And I think most importantly,it's not always looked upon
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positively by ourselves.
I think that we've beenconditioned to feel that by
evaluating where we are, bystanding in some pretty
uncomfortable truths and somecourageous vulnerability, and
maybe admitting that we aren'tsatisfied and that we do
actually need to make changes,somehow that conveys weakness
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about ourselves or the choicesthat we've made over the years.
And I think when we operate fromthis place of deficiency and
inadequacy, shame, guilt,anxiety about ourselves, when we
do that, what we're actuallydoing is we're we're kind of
rejecting parts of ourselves.
And the parts of us that we shyaway from are the parts that we
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unconsciously formed during thedemands and the experiences and
the choices that we've made fromthe first 40 years of our life.
Our current version of ourselveshas quite honestly and with the
best of intentions formed allthe unhealthy habits that we
have.
It's been the reason that we'vetaken lackluster jobs and stayed
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in it.
We've stayed in unfulfillingrelationships, we've, you know,
maybe acquired some financialissues, and we have notebooks
and notebooks of unreachedgoals.
This is not to be ashamed of, orit's not something that we
should hide.
It's really how we got to thispoint.
It has served us well.
But because it is so hard tostand in those areas that need
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attention, we rationalize ourdiscomfort about them.
And we tell ourselves that we'rejust not being grateful enough,
or that we should be satisfiedwith how it is, or that it
really is good enough.
And don't get me wrong, Ibelieve gratitude and blessings
are at the heart of humanity.
But my own evaluative state inthe last couple of years that
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I've been going through, it'sshown me how I have bypassed my
own experiences and grief andthen chose to wear a mask for
the sake of looking like I havemy shit together.
And I did this veryunconsciously.
And I did it until I didn'trecognize myself anymore.
Rationalizing and disguising ourdiscomfort removes us from being
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present in our lives and itcreates this dissonance.
And when we do that, I think theworst thing that comes of that,
that comes of it, is that ourconfidence begins to wane in
ourselves because we don'tactually honor the parts of
ourselves that we know needattention.
It could be that you would gothrough this whole midlife
evaluation period and decidethat everything is good for you.
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But it takes an awareness todefine what is good enough for
you.
And that comes throughself-realization and paying
attention and staying present inyour life and to the emotions
that you're feeling.
You can't be rationalizing andnumbing out to avoid the
discomfort of the truth todecide that you are good enough.
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Back in 2020, I purchased aPeloton.
When I bought it, it was becauseit was going to be the answer to
losing those 20 pounds that Icouldn't seem to get rid of that
I gained from having my thirdkid at the advanced maternal age
of 39 and a half.
So that peloton came and I lovedit.
I rode that sucker everyfreaking day.
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But something wasn't happening.
I was not losing the weight.
In fact, I was actually gainingweight despite riding that bike
with like serious determination.
If I had to describe myself, andactually I used to make fun of
myself when I would ride thatbike, but I was kind of like the
wicked witch of the West in TheWizard of Oz.
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You know that scene when she'sriding her bike into the
tornado?
She's like, dun dun, dun dundun, dun, dun dun, dun, like
that was me.
I was so determined to lose thatweight on the bike.
I just pedal, pedal, pedal,pedal, pedal.
But I felt so defeated.
I felt like there was somethingwrong with my body.
Like, why was I not losing thisweight?
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After all, I'm riding this bikeevery day.
And I would beat myself up.
I would tell myself, you shouldbe skinnier.
What's wrong with you?
And I would look in the mirrorand not seeing results, I would
hate myself.
And if I'm honest, admittedly, Iwould go to the kitchen and I
would eat a few emotionalsupport cookies and maybe slice
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a few pieces of cheese and poura few glasses of wine that
evening.
And I would feel like absoluteshit about myself as I looked at
my Instagram scroll and seeingall the skinny girls.
And that process, I did thatevery day, over and over and
over again.
I had all this determination,then I wasn't seeing the
results.
So I had all of this self-hateand then shame and then guilt.
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And I think that we could allagree that buying my Peloton was
definitely a step in the rightdirection.
I did have the desire forchange.
I recognized I was uncomfortablewith my weight and I did want to
make a change.
I did what I was supposed to doon the Peloton.
I rode like a crazy lady.
But I wasn't honest.
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I was giving a half-ass attemptto reach my goal.
And then I was feeling like shitabout it the next day.
But I was never really beingfully honest with what was
actually happening.
In my mind, I lived in theshoulds.
Riding that bike should bepaying off.
Should allowed me to blame mybody for not performing like I
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wanted it to.
Should kept me feeling bad andhating myself.
And I wasn't even aware at thetime of how I was using should
to sabotage my weight lossjourney.
Should was just keeping mestuck.
Should allowed me to feel badabout my results.
And then I used it as an excuseto numb out.
Like those were my supportcookies.
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But then I had this realizationthat if I was going to achieve
my goals, which I thought aboutlosing weight day in, day out,
obsessively, because I wanted tobe back to my pre-pregnancy
weight so bad.
I had to change the cycle.
I had the desire, but the defeatwas in the should.
Should was keeping me fromresponsibility.
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And I think should is where alot of us get stuck.
A lot of us think we should notstruggle.
It should be easy.
We should be happy.
We should be grateful.
We should be healthy.
Should keeps us in inaction.
In many ways, it keeps us awayfrom our desires because should
is a passive statement.
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We repeat the patterns, we allowthe maladaptive behaviors over
and over again in our life.
We stay in unhealthyenvironments or relationships
because we should.
Should give us an illusion ofresponsibility without having to
take actual action towards adesire or a goal.
When we do little to change thescaffolding or the architecture
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that we operate from, we beginliving this kind of groundhog
type day.
And that was me.
I had the same pattern day inand day out, but I wasn't
changing anything.
We know that our currentsituation isn't what we want it
to be, but we really don't doanything, I mean, not fully, to
change that.
And then we rationalize with theshoulds.
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We beat ourselves up for feelingthe way that we do.
We stay in terrible jobs orenvironments, maybe even
relationships that don't serveus anymore, all for the should.
Should is a trap.
For me at least, as I startedthis midlife evaluation, my
needs were not getting metbecause I was not willing to be
that uncomfortable in my life.
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I was not taking responsibilityfor the results I had because I
was, I was shoulding all overthe place.
My weight loss journey wasreally just the first awareness,
though, in seeing how I wasletting myself down with this
passive context.
And there would be many more ofthese journeys over the next
couple of years, but the Pelotonexperience was the first time
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that I gained this insight.
And I felt so much shame aroundthese unmet expectations and
really how I looked.
Shame, which actually could bedefined as feeling of distress
about who we are or ourbehaviors, is a very, very
destructive thought.
Gerald Fishkin in The Science ofShame found in his research that
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shame is connected with thelimpic system, which I imagine
all emotions are, but shame isconnected with the limpic
system, which influences ourautonomic nervous system, which
is actually responsible for ourfight or flight response.
Now I don't want to get too deepinto the nervous system with you
guys, but I do think that it'sreally important.
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But when we interpret somethingas shame, our brain actually
reacts as if there is a physicaldanger and it activates the
sympathetic nervous system,which generates that fight,
flight, or freeze response.
Well, shame activates the freezeresponse.
When they study the freezeresponse, it's usually an
indication of feeling trapped orpowerless or even in trauma.
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So shame upsets our ability tobe able to think clearly, which
results in beliefs that we'rereally stuck in a situation or
that we don't have any power inthe situation.
Or in my case, we think there'ssomething wrong with us.
It really shuts us down.
And this was me.
I would ride that damn Pelotonand I would get stuck in an
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abyss of should.
I'd feel shame and I wouldreally hate myself for where I
was at.
I would get stuck in that freezeresponse, which would lead me to
grab the support cookies andtotally numb out.
Now, there's a reason that weactually numb out when we feel
shame or any other emotions thathave our nervous system in that
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activated state.
The numbing out with food oralcohol or even endlessly
scrolling on social media orshopping, porn can be used to
numb out.
We gravitate towards thosemaladaptive behaviors because
those behaviors are pleasurableand they trigger our reward
system.
Well, they release dopamine inour brain.
And because we are in thatactivated nervous system state,
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when we have the dopaminereleased in our brain, the
dopamine will bring us back to abaseline level in our nervous
system, kind of restoring thathomeostasis.
And it feels good in the momenttoo, because our brains are
wired to value the present morethan the future, preventing us
from reaching our full desiresor goals because we choose the
present outcome over the longerterm.
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And to me, I felt a lot ofrelief knowing that numbing out
was a neurological response toshame that had activated my
nervous system.
I'm sure a lot of you guys haveread the book Atomic Habits by
James Clear, but he has this onequote in the book that I think
describes this whole point sowell.
He says, every habit producesmultiple outcomes across time.
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Unfortunately, these outcomesare often misaligned.
With our bad habits, theimmediate outcomes feel good,
the ultimate outcomes feel bad.
For me, the food soothed and thescale never budged.
So my attempts at numbing outgave me that instant dopamine
hit when the shoulds triggeredthat state of shame.
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And I felt helpless and like Ireally thought I was going to
carry these 20 to 25 poundsforever.
And as the months went on andnot losing that weight and
constantly thinking about it,really obsessing about it and
feeling that cycle of shame andthen punishing myself and
beating myself up, I reallystarted to feel a diminishing in
my worth as a person.
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And I had this voice in my head.
We all have that voice of minewas nasty.
It was like an abuser.
And I would never speak tosomebody the way that that voice
in my head spoke to me.
And in August of 2021, I reachedan absolute new level of
dissatisfaction with where I wasat physically.
And this would become a definingmoment in my midlife.
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And it really helped me see thepotential that I had to make
changes in my life.
And it would become where Iwould see the difference between
self-punishment and takingpersonal responsibility for my
results.
So here's how it went down.
I was sitting on my patio,drinking wine, numbing out, and
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I saw somebody post on Facebookabout a book called The Obesity
Cure, and it was written by aguy named Fung.
I bought the book immediatelyand I devoured it on my Kindle.
Now, the book was importantbecause it gave me some good
information about dietaryfasting.
It also empowered me to look atsome of the habits that I had
been choosing around my eating.
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When I first started fasting, Iincrementally increased my
fasting window or the windowthat I was not eating by 30
minutes each day.
So those that are not familiarwith fasting, fasting says
delay, don't deny.
Well, what I discovered aboutmyself by committing to fasting
changed everything, not just thescale, but it really changed my
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approach to doing challengingthings in my life that I had
been avoiding.
As my fasting window grew longerand longer, I was still feeling
a lot of shame about my physicalbody.
Like when I would get dressed inthe morning or I would see
myself in the mirror, I did notfeel good about myself at all.
But because I was fasting, Iwould resist that need to run to
the kitchen when I would feelthose feelings after I looked in
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the mirror and eat during myfasting window because I knew
that I was just delaying.
Sometimes I would actually haveto spit out the food in the sink
or the trash can because runningto the kitchen when I was
feeling that emotional upset hadbecome so instinctual in me.
And I started to realize that myrelationship with food had
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become a very emotionalresponse.
But I also realized that becauseI was delaying and not denying,
I could actually beuncomfortable with that
emotional feeling that I wasexperiencing, be it shame or
anxiety or anger or boredom,knowing that the reward or food
was coming at the end of myfasting window and it made it
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tolerable.
Sometimes, though, I wasactually a little uncomfortable
as that window grew longerbecause I was actually hungry.
But for the most part, I couldeasily resist that emotional
urge to go numb out.
I started showing up differentlyin other parts of my life too,
because I had figured out that Icould tolerate really sitting in
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that uncomfortableness.
And I learned that my emotionsweren't actually enemies or
something to avoid.
I knew each time that I feltthat wave of emotional
discomfort, I could withstandthe feelings without having to
numb out or get rid of them.
This is kind of interesting.
So our emotions produce achemical response in our body.
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But what scientists have foundis that chemical response, that
initial wave of feeling fromexperiencing something in our
environment, that only lasts 90seconds.
Any remaining feeling to theemotion is a cognitive choice
that we are choosing to stay inthat emotional response.
Now, don't get me wrong, it isnot always easy to get out of
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those emotional responsesbecause we do have this thinking
brain, but knowing that thatinitial wave fades after 90
seconds helps you get through alot of these things to avoid
numbing out.
Even more interesting to me whenI was doing my research, how we
perceive various emotionalstates really does influence our
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body's response way more than weever thought.
There was this study that wasdone with 30,000 adults in the
United States asking them ifthey experience stress.
And they also asked them howthey perceived the stress that
they experienced.
So basically, did they view thestress as good or bad?
Now, during this study, whatthey found is that while people
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who experience a high level ofstress, those people experienced
a 43% increase in death.
But that death rate only heldtrue to the people who believe
that stress was bad or harmful.
And the people that had highstress but perceived stress as
good, they actually had thelowest chance of dying, even
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lower than those people that hadlow stress.
So when we experience stress,our body does physiologically go
under changes.
We have adrenaline and cortisol,our heart rate increases, our
blood vessels constrict andnarrow.
And that's actually the reasonthat prolonged stress can cause
cardiac issues.
However, though, in a differentstudy, those that viewed stress
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as a positive thing, their bloodvessels did not narrow and
constrict.
Their blood vessels, the onesthat viewed stress as good,
their blood vessels actuallyresembled the same blood vessels
of those that were experiencingjoy.
So how we perceive the emotionsthat we feel in response to
stress very much dictates ouroutcome.
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I want to come back to a pointthat I made earlier about how
unknowingly fasting would teachme the difference between
self-punishment, like that nastyinner voice that told me I had
no worth and really caused me alot of stress.
The difference between that andpersonal accountability.
Because as I got morecomfortable with my emotions
that would come out and resistedthe urge to escape, that voice
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actually started getting quieterand quieter.
And I'm not sure why we think weneed to talk to ourselves in
ways that are negative aboutwhat we haven't done or goals
that we haven't accomplished.
I kind of wonder if we do thatbecause it makes us feel like we
have some control.
From my experience with thePeloton, that it is possible to
hate yourself into lovingyourself.
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And in the beginning, too, whenI would ride that Peloton, I had
this mirror in front of me thatI would look at as I was riding.
And because I was overweight,when I would see my legs, I
hated the way that they look andI would think terrible thoughts
about my legs.
But as the process of gettingcomfortable with being
uncomfortable went on, I changedwhat I started to say to myself.
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I used to say things like, mylegs are so strong and they
carry me through theuncomfortable or they can
withstand discomfort.
And I didn't even know that Iwas doing this.
But in hindsight, I think thatis actually when I started to
move out of hate for my body andlove for my body.
And as time went on, I reallystarted to appreciate the
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process of all this.
And the weight did finally startto come off because I was making
better choices for myself.
I wasn't drinking to escape.
I wasn't really escaping in theways that I had been.
And because I wasn't, I was morepresent to my life.
And this clarity of presencethat I was having because I
wasn't stuffing down all ofthese emotions, it allowed me to
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start seeing clearly other areasof my life that needed just as
much attention as my body.
So when it comes down to it,instead of shoulding my life, I
was able to listen and payattention to the whispers of my
life that were telling me wheresomething was kind of out of
alignment.
And because I had now learned towithstand months of
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uncomfortableness, it gave methe courage to start to lean
into other areas of my lifebecause now I trusted and I knew
that I could handle it.
And because of that, myconfidence started to grow.
And this is the point where Iactually realized that
confidence isn't something thatwe're born with.
Confidence comes from followingthrough with the desires that we
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have, even when it'suncomfortable and really even
when we don't want to.
Confidence comes from trustingyourself to show up and do the
thing.
I mentioned in the first podcastof season two that our mid-40s
have been shown scientificallyto be a low point in our
lifespan.
But interestingly, that same lowpoint is observed in apes.
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Now, I have absolutely no ideahow they know that, but they do.
So this must be a very naturalexperience.
And lucky for us in our 40s, notonly have we been experiencing
this like lifespan low point ofour midlife, but we are also
experiencing a confoundingeffect from the pandemic.
When COVID hit, we all becamevery inward, kind of in a like a
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contractive state.
And we faced so muchuncertainty.
And in some ways, I thinkbecause of that uncertainty, we
lost a lot of trust with ourday-to-day routine that we had
become so accustomed to prior tothe pandemic.
We were really forced in ways tosideline a lot of our goals and
ambitions.
And we had to reorganize ourlives.
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Now, I don't think that we hadany way of knowing, but all of
those canceled plans andbirthday parties that didn't
happen or weddings that didn'thappen, date nights, and how we
switched all of our friendshipsto Zoom friendships or FaceTime
and not seeing our friends orfamily.
I think all of those thingscontributed to a deconstruction
of the selves that we knew.
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So as we've really emerged fromthis locked-in state after the
pandemic, we emerged learningthat our future was kind of
uncertain.
And so many of us, especially inour mid-40s, not only are we
looking around our lives andseeing where all of the demands
that we've encountered over theyears that have allowed us to
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should and avoid, but we arealso likely emerging from COVID
with these expectations that wechanged in ourselves to
accommodate a pandemic reality.
And just like for me, myexpectations changed around my
diet during the pandemic.
I ate more Cheez-Its, I ate moreFritos, I ate more pizza.
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And I would have made betterchoices because I had a
different level of expectationspre-pandemic.
So recently, though, I have hadthe urge to be more social.
But what I have found with myfriends is that we are all still
very much hiding.
It's like we all want to go outand see each other and be
social, but it's like nobodyreally wants to follow through.
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It's kind of interesting.
So I've been thinking that thiscould actually be explained by
the expectations that we changeto accommodate COVID.
And arguably, as socialcreatures, an expectation that
we probably need to change back.
Because you guys remember at thebeginning of the podcast, and I
told you about that landmarkstudy of 700 men?
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Well, two of the other keyfindings were people who have
stronger connections havehealthier, happier, and longer
lives.
In fact, what they found in thatstudy is that loneliness kills.
It's actually toxic.
And people that experienceloneliness, their health
declines earlier in midlife, andtheir brain function also
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suffers, and they live shorterlives.
Statistically, one in fiveAmericans reports loneliness.
And that statistic is actually apre-COVID statistic.
So I would be really interestedto see what it is after COVID.
But there was another keyfinding from that study that
it's not just the relationshipsyou have, it's the quality of
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relationships.
That is why evaluating yourenvironment is so important in
midlife.
The data showed that the biggestpredictor of living a long and
healthy life was not yourcholesterol, but it was the
quality of the relationships youhad in your life and in midlife
specifically, like right now.
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Quality connection to others andthe relationships that we have,
and I imagine this is friendsand spouses and kids and parents
and work is really kind of theultimate path to living an
emotionally and physicallyhealthy life.
High conflict, mediocracy, andfeeling unfulfilled are not
friends to our emotional or ourphysical health, especially in
(31:12):
midlife.
And that study found that highconflict marriages had extremely
detrimental effects on ouroverall well-being and health
and how long we lived.
So, really, just like my weightloss journey, showing up on Zoom
or FaceTime with my friends,it's kind of a half-ass attempt.
I realize now that that is anexpectation that I altered in
(31:34):
response to the pandemic.
And it's not that I don't wantto see them, but I am
experiencing some resistance inthat change.
For a while, I was kind ofblaming work and life demands,
and I used it as an excuse notto see them that often.
But that was just me shootingonce again.
I need real connection.
I'm talking like putting on realpants, getting in my car,
(31:57):
driving to see my friends, andenjoying them in person.
It's a choice.
Expectations are not somethingthat happened to you.
They are an active decision thatyou are fully in control of
making and upholding.
Upholding those expectations iswhere we grow.
And I think that's where welearn to trust ourselves and our
(32:18):
environment.
But when we live in the shoulds,we are really choosing to be
disconnected from our lives.
We numb out and we languish inthe pain.
Nothing will change when we livein the shoulds.
Midlife, I believe, is aboutchoices and about being present
and active as we look towardsthe next 40 years.
I've said it once and I'llprobably say it over and over
(32:41):
again.
Midlife doesn't necessarily haveto be a crisis, but it is
something you want to payattention to.
So with that, you guys, I amreally glad that you joined me
today on this journey.
And I hope that these honestconversations help and they
resonate with you.
And I really encourage you tothink about where you're
shooting in your life.
And I hope that this podcast canreally be a place of connection
(33:05):
as you dive into your ownuncomfortableness.
And as always, I look forward tomany more midlife conversations
with you.
Admittedly, I would go to the kitchen and I would
(00:02):
eat a few emotional supportcookies and maybe slice a few
pieces of cheese and pour a fewglasses of wine that evening,
and I would feel like absoluteshit about myself.
And that process, I did thatevery day.
I was giving a half-ass attemptto reach my goal, never really
being fully honest with what wasactually happening.
(00:24):
In my mind, I lived in theshoulds.
I had to change the cycle.
I had the desire, but the defeatwas in the should.
Should give us an illusion ofresponsibility without having to
take actual action towards adesire or a goal.
This is the 40 as fuck podcast,where we have worthwhile, real
(00:48):
as fuck conversations aboutmidlife.
What you're gonna hear on thispodcast is not the fluff you see
scrolling Instagram, it's themessy parts of midlife because
midlife feels a littledifferent.
I wouldn't say midlife isnecessarily a crisis, but it's
worth paying attention to.
(01:15):
So I have a confession for youguys.
Since 2007, when I first joinedFacebook, I was always hoping
with every seemingly perfectFacebook post or even later with
my Instagram post, I really didtry to convince you that I have
my shit all together.
Not only was I trying toconvince you, I was actually
(01:36):
probably trying to convincemyself as well.
My mission with this podcast isto normalize not having our shit
together in our 40s.
And even if we feel like we haveit all together, I still want to
normalize this middle part ofour life as an exploration into
ourselves.
Using this time to redefine anddecide how we want to show up
(02:00):
and really thinking about who dowe want to show up to, I think
that that's really important.
It's not actually necessary thatyou have a crisis, but asking
yourself, does my present selfalign with my future self?
Fundamentally, that is what isat the core of this evaluation
period.
At this stage of our lives, weare really lucky because we have
(02:23):
this vast backlog ofexperiences.
And all of those experienceshave very unknowingly or
unconsciously formed thiscurrent version of ourselves.
And the current version ofourselves may or may not have it
all figured out yet.
And honestly, there's a prettygood chance that we will never
have it all figured out.
It is really hard, though, tolook at ourselves and
(02:46):
acknowledge the areas of ourlives or even ourselves that
need some attention.
And it's even harder to admitout loud to other people who
care and love us that we'restruggling.
But announcing it to the socialworld and telling the world
about our flaws and ourweaknesses and areas that we
need growth in, or even wherewe're completely failing in our
(03:09):
life, I don't think being fullytransparent or 100% authentic on
social media is actuallynecessary.
I really don't want myex-boyfriends or my grade school
nemesis knowing that I gained 20pounds over COVID.
No thanks.
I will use the perfect selfieangle to hide those 20 pounds.
(03:32):
And yes, I did do that duringCOVID.
My point is that there should beno judgment in posting photos or
videos that portray ourselvesthe way we want to be seen
online.
We're human.
We're going to want to do that.
Like I said before, to gothrough this period a crisis is
not required.
But it does require a level ofauthenticity and transparency
(03:55):
and really vulnerability withourselves.
But what you post on socialmedia really doesn't matter.
But how you look at yourself inthe mirror, I think that
matters.
And I mean that bothfiguratively and literally.
Most of us have these reallygreat intentions, even
motivations to make changes.
But when it comes down to it, welet ourselves down.
(04:17):
We don't follow through and wekind of flake out on ourselves.
And we do this day after dayafter day, but we have this
desire for change.
We want something more ordifferent, and that's normal and
healthy.
It isn't selfish, and it alsodoesn't mean that your life is
crap either.
In labs, scientists haveactually found that without
(04:38):
desire, our action stops.
Rats that were neurologicallydeprived of dopamine, and
dopamine is a neurotransmitterin the brain that is largely
responsible for movement,motivation, taking action in our
lives or going towards somethingpretty much describes desire.
The rats without the dopaminelost all of their will to live.
(05:00):
Now, I'm not actually sayingthat you're going to die by not
having some version of a midlifecrisis, but what I am saying is
this work isn't selfish.
Improving who we are and wherewe want to go kind of seems like
it's life essential.
I think rethinking what thisperiod of time looks like for us
and not calling it a crisis ishelpful.
(05:21):
Hitting rock bottom or needingto implode our life or making
these huge sweeping changes, Idon't think that any of that is
necessary.
I think this evaluation shouldbe about defining what's
important in our lives.
And basically at the core of it,we're aligning the trajectory of
the next 40 years of our livesso that we end up where we want
(05:43):
to be, hopefully, knowing thatwe lived out our lives
contentfully, with joy, andspending it with people in
places who love and support us.
In a landmark study by Harvard,and it's called the Harvard
Study of Adult Development, itwas conducted over 80 years.
And during this 80-year study,they followed over 700 men.
(06:05):
And what they found by analyzingtons and tons of data on these
men is that good relationshipsare what keep us happier and
healthier, nothing else.
It came down to having goodrelationships in our life to
keep us happier and healthier.
This is in stark contradictionto surveys of millennials who
(06:26):
80% say being rich is a lifegoal for happiness.
And 50% of millennials say beingfamous is also a major life goal
for happiness.
Think about that.
So I would say that hindsight ofthe 700 participants in the
Harvard study gives us a waybetter glimpse of how aging and
(06:49):
experience alter and define whatis actually important in life.
And that's why I think that thismidlife marker that we're in is
so important.
But unfortunately, asking thesehard questions and doing this
work isn't necessarily lookedupon positively, not always by
our family or culture.
And I think most importantly,it's not always looked upon
(07:11):
positively by ourselves.
I think that we've beenconditioned to feel that by
evaluating where we are, bystanding in some pretty
uncomfortable truths and somecourageous vulnerability, and
maybe admitting that we aren'tsatisfied and that we do
actually need to make changes,somehow that conveys weakness
(07:33):
about ourselves or the choicesthat we've made over the years.
And I think when we operate fromthis place of deficiency and
inadequacy, shame, guilt,anxiety about ourselves, when we
do that, what we're actuallydoing is we're we're kind of
rejecting parts of ourselves.
And the parts of us that we shyaway from are the parts that we
(07:53):
unconsciously formed during thedemands and the experiences and
the choices that we've made fromthe first 40 years of our life.
Our current version of ourselveshas quite honestly and with the
best of intentions formed allthe unhealthy habits that we
have.
It's been the reason that we'vetaken lackluster jobs and stayed
(08:14):
in it.
We've stayed in unfulfillingrelationships, we've, you know,
maybe acquired some financialissues, and we have notebooks
and notebooks of unreachedgoals.
This is not to be ashamed of, orit's not something that we
should hide.
It's really how we got to thispoint.
It has served us well.
But because it is so hard tostand in those areas that need
(08:36):
attention, we rationalize ourdiscomfort about them.
And we tell ourselves that we'rejust not being grateful enough,
or that we should be satisfiedwith how it is, or that it
really is good enough.
And don't get me wrong, Ibelieve gratitude and blessings
are at the heart of humanity.
But my own evaluative state inthe last couple of years that
(08:58):
I've been going through, it'sshown me how I have bypassed my
own experiences and grief andthen chose to wear a mask for
the sake of looking like I havemy shit together.
And I did this veryunconsciously.
And I did it until I didn'trecognize myself anymore.
Rationalizing and disguising ourdiscomfort removes us from being
(09:21):
present in our lives and itcreates this dissonance.
And when we do that, I think theworst thing that comes of that,
that comes of it, is that ourconfidence begins to wane in
ourselves because we don'tactually honor the parts of
ourselves that we know needattention.
It could be that you would gothrough this whole midlife
evaluation period and decidethat everything is good for you.
(09:44):
But it takes an awareness todefine what is good enough for
you.
And that comes throughself-realization and paying
attention and staying present inyour life and to the emotions
that you're feeling.
You can't be rationalizing andnumbing out to avoid the
discomfort of the truth todecide that you are good enough.
(10:06):
Back in 2020, I purchased aPeloton.
When I bought it, it was becauseit was going to be the answer to
losing those 20 pounds that Icouldn't seem to get rid of that
I gained from having my thirdkid at the advanced maternal age
of 39 and a half.
So that peloton came and I lovedit.
I rode that sucker everyfreaking day.
(10:28):
But something wasn't happening.
I was not losing the weight.
In fact, I was actually gainingweight despite riding that bike
with like serious determination.
If I had to describe myself, andactually I used to make fun of
myself when I would ride thatbike, but I was kind of like the
wicked witch of the West in TheWizard of Oz.
(10:49):
You know that scene when she'sriding her bike into the
tornado?
She's like, dun dun, dun dundun, dun, dun dun, dun, like
that was me.
I was so determined to lose thatweight on the bike.
I just pedal, pedal, pedal,pedal, pedal.
But I felt so defeated.
I felt like there was somethingwrong with my body.
Like, why was I not losing thisweight?
(11:11):
After all, I'm riding this bikeevery day.
And I would beat myself up.
I would tell myself, you shouldbe skinnier.
What's wrong with you?
And I would look in the mirrorand not seeing results, I would
hate myself.
And if I'm honest, admittedly, Iwould go to the kitchen and I
would eat a few emotionalsupport cookies and maybe slice
(11:34):
a few pieces of cheese and poura few glasses of wine that
evening.
And I would feel like absoluteshit about myself as I looked at
my Instagram scroll and seeingall the skinny girls.
And that process, I did thatevery day, over and over and
over again.
I had all this determination,then I wasn't seeing the
results.
So I had all of this self-hateand then shame and then guilt.
(11:58):
And I think that we could allagree that buying my Peloton was
definitely a step in the rightdirection.
I did have the desire forchange.
I recognized I was uncomfortablewith my weight and I did want to
make a change.
I did what I was supposed to doon the Peloton.
I rode like a crazy lady.
But I wasn't honest.
(12:18):
I was giving a half-ass attemptto reach my goal.
And then I was feeling like shitabout it the next day.
But I was never really beingfully honest with what was
actually happening.
In my mind, I lived in theshoulds.
Riding that bike should bepaying off.
Should allowed me to blame mybody for not performing like I
(12:40):
wanted it to.
Should kept me feeling bad andhating myself.
And I wasn't even aware at thetime of how I was using should
to sabotage my weight lossjourney.
Should was just keeping mestuck.
Should allowed me to feel badabout my results.
And then I used it as an excuseto numb out.
Like those were my supportcookies.
(13:00):
But then I had this realizationthat if I was going to achieve
my goals, which I thought aboutlosing weight day in, day out,
obsessively, because I wanted tobe back to my pre-pregnancy
weight so bad.
I had to change the cycle.
I had the desire, but the defeatwas in the should.
Should was keeping me fromresponsibility.
(13:21):
And I think should is where alot of us get stuck.
A lot of us think we should notstruggle.
It should be easy.
We should be happy.
We should be grateful.
We should be healthy.
Should keeps us in inaction.
In many ways, it keeps us awayfrom our desires because should
is a passive statement.
(13:41):
We repeat the patterns, we allowthe maladaptive behaviors over
and over again in our life.
We stay in unhealthyenvironments or relationships
because we should.
Should give us an illusion ofresponsibility without having to
take actual action towards adesire or a goal.
When we do little to change thescaffolding or the architecture
(14:04):
that we operate from, we beginliving this kind of groundhog
type day.
And that was me.
I had the same pattern day inand day out, but I wasn't
changing anything.
We know that our currentsituation isn't what we want it
to be, but we really don't doanything, I mean, not fully, to
change that.
And then we rationalize with theshoulds.
(14:25):
We beat ourselves up for feelingthe way that we do.
We stay in terrible jobs orenvironments, maybe even
relationships that don't serveus anymore, all for the should.
Should is a trap.
For me at least, as I startedthis midlife evaluation, my
needs were not getting metbecause I was not willing to be
that uncomfortable in my life.
(14:46):
I was not taking responsibilityfor the results I had because I
was, I was shoulding all overthe place.
My weight loss journey wasreally just the first awareness,
though, in seeing how I wasletting myself down with this
passive context.
And there would be many more ofthese journeys over the next
couple of years, but the Pelotonexperience was the first time
(15:07):
that I gained this insight.
And I felt so much shame aroundthese unmet expectations and
really how I looked.
Shame, which actually could bedefined as feeling of distress
about who we are or ourbehaviors, is a very, very
destructive thought.
Gerald Fishkin in The Science ofShame found in his research that
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shame is connected with thelimpic system, which I imagine
all emotions are, but shame isconnected with the limpic
system, which influences ourautonomic nervous system, which
is actually responsible for ourfight or flight response.
Now I don't want to get too deepinto the nervous system with you
guys, but I do think that it'sreally important.
(15:51):
But when we interpret somethingas shame, our brain actually
reacts as if there is a physicaldanger and it activates the
sympathetic nervous system,which generates that fight,
flight, or freeze response.
Well, shame activates the freezeresponse.
When they study the freezeresponse, it's usually an
indication of feeling trapped orpowerless or even in trauma.
(16:14):
So shame upsets our ability tobe able to think clearly, which
results in beliefs that we'rereally stuck in a situation or
that we don't have any power inthe situation.
Or in my case, we think there'ssomething wrong with us.
It really shuts us down.
And this was me.
I would ride that damn Pelotonand I would get stuck in an
(16:35):
abyss of should.
I'd feel shame and I wouldreally hate myself for where I
was at.
I would get stuck in that freezeresponse, which would lead me to
grab the support cookies andtotally numb out.
Now, there's a reason that weactually numb out when we feel
shame or any other emotions thathave our nervous system in that
(16:56):
activated state.
The numbing out with food oralcohol or even endlessly
scrolling on social media orshopping, porn can be used to
numb out.
We gravitate towards thosemaladaptive behaviors because
those behaviors are pleasurableand they trigger our reward
system.
Well, they release dopamine inour brain.
And because we are in thatactivated nervous system state,
(17:19):
when we have the dopaminereleased in our brain, the
dopamine will bring us back to abaseline level in our nervous
system, kind of restoring thathomeostasis.
And it feels good in the momenttoo, because our brains are
wired to value the present morethan the future, preventing us
from reaching our full desiresor goals because we choose the
present outcome over the longerterm.
(17:41):
And to me, I felt a lot ofrelief knowing that numbing out
was a neurological response toshame that had activated my
nervous system.
I'm sure a lot of you guys haveread the book Atomic Habits by
James Clear, but he has this onequote in the book that I think
describes this whole point sowell.
He says, every habit producesmultiple outcomes across time.
(18:04):
Unfortunately, these outcomesare often misaligned.
With our bad habits, theimmediate outcomes feel good,
the ultimate outcomes feel bad.
For me, the food soothed and thescale never budged.
So my attempts at numbing outgave me that instant dopamine
hit when the shoulds triggeredthat state of shame.
(18:25):
And I felt helpless and like Ireally thought I was going to
carry these 20 to 25 poundsforever.
And as the months went on andnot losing that weight and
constantly thinking about it,really obsessing about it and
feeling that cycle of shame andthen punishing myself and
beating myself up, I reallystarted to feel a diminishing in
my worth as a person.
(18:45):
And I had this voice in my head.
We all have that voice of minewas nasty.
It was like an abuser.
And I would never speak tosomebody the way that that voice
in my head spoke to me.
And in August of 2021, I reachedan absolute new level of
dissatisfaction with where I wasat physically.
And this would become a definingmoment in my midlife.
(19:05):
And it really helped me see thepotential that I had to make
changes in my life.
And it would become where Iwould see the difference between
self-punishment and takingpersonal responsibility for my
results.
So here's how it went down.
I was sitting on my patio,drinking wine, numbing out, and
(19:26):
I saw somebody post on Facebookabout a book called The Obesity
Cure, and it was written by aguy named Fung.
I bought the book immediatelyand I devoured it on my Kindle.
Now, the book was importantbecause it gave me some good
information about dietaryfasting.
It also empowered me to look atsome of the habits that I had
been choosing around my eating.
(19:46):
When I first started fasting, Iincrementally increased my
fasting window or the windowthat I was not eating by 30
minutes each day.
So those that are not familiarwith fasting, fasting says
delay, don't deny.
Well, what I discovered aboutmyself by committing to fasting
changed everything, not just thescale, but it really changed my
(20:08):
approach to doing challengingthings in my life that I had
been avoiding.
As my fasting window grew longerand longer, I was still feeling
a lot of shame about my physicalbody.
Like when I would get dressed inthe morning or I would see
myself in the mirror, I did notfeel good about myself at all.
But because I was fasting, Iwould resist that need to run to
the kitchen when I would feelthose feelings after I looked in
(20:31):
the mirror and eat during myfasting window because I knew
that I was just delaying.
Sometimes I would actually haveto spit out the food in the sink
or the trash can because runningto the kitchen when I was
feeling that emotional upset hadbecome so instinctual in me.
And I started to realize that myrelationship with food had
(20:52):
become a very emotionalresponse.
But I also realized that becauseI was delaying and not denying,
I could actually beuncomfortable with that
emotional feeling that I wasexperiencing, be it shame or
anxiety or anger or boredom,knowing that the reward or food
was coming at the end of myfasting window and it made it
(21:15):
tolerable.
Sometimes, though, I wasactually a little uncomfortable
as that window grew longerbecause I was actually hungry.
But for the most part, I couldeasily resist that emotional
urge to go numb out.
I started showing up differentlyin other parts of my life too,
because I had figured out that Icould tolerate really sitting in
(21:36):
that uncomfortableness.
And I learned that my emotionsweren't actually enemies or
something to avoid.
I knew each time that I feltthat wave of emotional
discomfort, I could withstandthe feelings without having to
numb out or get rid of them.
This is kind of interesting.
So our emotions produce achemical response in our body.
(21:59):
But what scientists have foundis that chemical response, that
initial wave of feeling fromexperiencing something in our
environment, that only lasts 90seconds.
Any remaining feeling to theemotion is a cognitive choice
that we are choosing to stay inthat emotional response.
Now, don't get me wrong, it isnot always easy to get out of
(22:20):
those emotional responsesbecause we do have this thinking
brain, but knowing that thatinitial wave fades after 90
seconds helps you get through alot of these things to avoid
numbing out.
Even more interesting to me whenI was doing my research, how we
perceive various emotionalstates really does influence our
(22:42):
body's response way more than weever thought.
There was this study that wasdone with 30,000 adults in the
United States asking them ifthey experience stress.
And they also asked them howthey perceived the stress that
they experienced.
So basically, did they view thestress as good or bad?
Now, during this study, whatthey found is that while people
(23:04):
who experience a high level ofstress, those people experienced
a 43% increase in death.
But that death rate only heldtrue to the people who believe
that stress was bad or harmful.
And the people that had highstress but perceived stress as
good, they actually had thelowest chance of dying, even
(23:25):
lower than those people that hadlow stress.
So when we experience stress,our body does physiologically go
under changes.
We have adrenaline and cortisol,our heart rate increases, our
blood vessels constrict andnarrow.
And that's actually the reasonthat prolonged stress can cause
cardiac issues.
However, though, in a differentstudy, those that viewed stress
(23:49):
as a positive thing, their bloodvessels did not narrow and
constrict.
Their blood vessels, the onesthat viewed stress as good,
their blood vessels actuallyresembled the same blood vessels
of those that were experiencingjoy.
So how we perceive the emotionsthat we feel in response to
stress very much dictates ouroutcome.
(24:10):
I want to come back to a pointthat I made earlier about how
unknowingly fasting would teachme the difference between
self-punishment, like that nastyinner voice that told me I had
no worth and really caused me alot of stress.
The difference between that andpersonal accountability.
Because as I got morecomfortable with my emotions
that would come out and resistedthe urge to escape, that voice
(24:34):
actually started getting quieterand quieter.
And I'm not sure why we think weneed to talk to ourselves in
ways that are negative aboutwhat we haven't done or goals
that we haven't accomplished.
I kind of wonder if we do thatbecause it makes us feel like we
have some control.
From my experience with thePeloton, that it is possible to
hate yourself into lovingyourself.
(24:57):
And in the beginning, too, whenI would ride that Peloton, I had
this mirror in front of me thatI would look at as I was riding.
And because I was overweight,when I would see my legs, I
hated the way that they look andI would think terrible thoughts
about my legs.
But as the process of gettingcomfortable with being
uncomfortable went on, I changedwhat I started to say to myself.
(25:19):
I used to say things like, mylegs are so strong and they
carry me through theuncomfortable or they can
withstand discomfort.
And I didn't even know that Iwas doing this.
But in hindsight, I think thatis actually when I started to
move out of hate for my body andlove for my body.
And as time went on, I reallystarted to appreciate the
(25:41):
process of all this.
And the weight did finally startto come off because I was making
better choices for myself.
I wasn't drinking to escape.
I wasn't really escaping in theways that I had been.
And because I wasn't, I was morepresent to my life.
And this clarity of presencethat I was having because I
wasn't stuffing down all ofthese emotions, it allowed me to
(26:03):
start seeing clearly other areasof my life that needed just as
much attention as my body.
So when it comes down to it,instead of shoulding my life, I
was able to listen and payattention to the whispers of my
life that were telling me wheresomething was kind of out of
alignment.
And because I had now learned towithstand months of
(26:25):
uncomfortableness, it gave methe courage to start to lean
into other areas of my lifebecause now I trusted and I knew
that I could handle it.
And because of that, myconfidence started to grow.
And this is the point where Iactually realized that
confidence isn't something thatwe're born with.
Confidence comes from followingthrough with the desires that we
(26:48):
have, even when it'suncomfortable and really even
when we don't want to.
Confidence comes from trustingyourself to show up and do the
thing.
I mentioned in the first podcastof season two that our mid-40s
have been shown scientificallyto be a low point in our
lifespan.
But interestingly, that same lowpoint is observed in apes.
(27:12):
Now, I have absolutely no ideahow they know that, but they do.
So this must be a very naturalexperience.
And lucky for us in our 40s, notonly have we been experiencing
this like lifespan low point ofour midlife, but we are also
experiencing a confoundingeffect from the pandemic.
When COVID hit, we all becamevery inward, kind of in a like a
(27:37):
contractive state.
And we faced so muchuncertainty.
And in some ways, I thinkbecause of that uncertainty, we
lost a lot of trust with ourday-to-day routine that we had
become so accustomed to prior tothe pandemic.
We were really forced in ways tosideline a lot of our goals and
ambitions.
And we had to reorganize ourlives.
(27:59):
Now, I don't think that we hadany way of knowing, but all of
those canceled plans andbirthday parties that didn't
happen or weddings that didn'thappen, date nights, and how we
switched all of our friendshipsto Zoom friendships or FaceTime
and not seeing our friends orfamily.
I think all of those thingscontributed to a deconstruction
of the selves that we knew.
(28:22):
So as we've really emerged fromthis locked-in state after the
pandemic, we emerged learningthat our future was kind of
uncertain.
And so many of us, especially inour mid-40s, not only are we
looking around our lives andseeing where all of the demands
that we've encountered over theyears that have allowed us to
(28:42):
should and avoid, but we arealso likely emerging from COVID
with these expectations that wechanged in ourselves to
accommodate a pandemic reality.
And just like for me, myexpectations changed around my
diet during the pandemic.
I ate more Cheez-Its, I ate moreFritos, I ate more pizza.
(29:02):
And I would have made betterchoices because I had a
different level of expectationspre-pandemic.
So recently, though, I have hadthe urge to be more social.
But what I have found with myfriends is that we are all still
very much hiding.
It's like we all want to go outand see each other and be
social, but it's like nobodyreally wants to follow through.
(29:26):
It's kind of interesting.
So I've been thinking that thiscould actually be explained by
the expectations that we changeto accommodate COVID.
And arguably, as socialcreatures, an expectation that
we probably need to change back.
Because you guys remember at thebeginning of the podcast, and I
told you about that landmarkstudy of 700 men?
(29:46):
Well, two of the other keyfindings were people who have
stronger connections havehealthier, happier, and longer
lives.
In fact, what they found in thatstudy is that loneliness kills.
It's actually toxic.
And people that experienceloneliness, their health
declines earlier in midlife, andtheir brain function also
(30:08):
suffers, and they live shorterlives.
Statistically, one in fiveAmericans reports loneliness.
And that statistic is actually apre-COVID statistic.
So I would be really interestedto see what it is after COVID.
But there was another keyfinding from that study that
it's not just the relationshipsyou have, it's the quality of
(30:28):
relationships.
That is why evaluating yourenvironment is so important in
midlife.
The data showed that the biggestpredictor of living a long and
healthy life was not yourcholesterol, but it was the
quality of the relationships youhad in your life and in midlife
specifically, like right now.
(30:49):
Quality connection to others andthe relationships that we have,
and I imagine this is friendsand spouses and kids and parents
and work is really kind of theultimate path to living an
emotionally and physicallyhealthy life.
High conflict, mediocracy, andfeeling unfulfilled are not
friends to our emotional or ourphysical health, especially in
(31:12):
midlife.
And that study found that highconflict marriages had extremely
detrimental effects on ouroverall well-being and health
and how long we lived.
So, really, just like my weightloss journey, showing up on Zoom
or FaceTime with my friends,it's kind of a half-ass attempt.
I realize now that that is anexpectation that I altered in
(31:34):
response to the pandemic.
And it's not that I don't wantto see them, but I am
experiencing some resistance inthat change.
For a while, I was kind ofblaming work and life demands,
and I used it as an excuse notto see them that often.
But that was just me shootingonce again.
I need real connection.
I'm talking like putting on realpants, getting in my car,
(31:57):
driving to see my friends, andenjoying them in person.
It's a choice.
Expectations are not somethingthat happened to you.
They are an active decision thatyou are fully in control of
making and upholding.
Upholding those expectations iswhere we grow.
And I think that's where welearn to trust ourselves and our
(32:18):
environment.
But when we live in the shoulds,we are really choosing to be
disconnected from our lives.
We numb out and we languish inthe pain.
Nothing will change when we livein the shoulds.
Midlife, I believe, is aboutchoices and about being present
and active as we look towardsthe next 40 years.
I've said it once and I'llprobably say it over and over
(32:41):
again.
Midlife doesn't necessarily haveto be a crisis, but it is
something you want to payattention to.
So with that, you guys, I amreally glad that you joined me
today on this journey.
And I hope that these honestconversations help and they
resonate with you.
And I really encourage you tothink about where you're
shooting in your life.
And I hope that this podcast canreally be a place of connection
(33:05):
as you dive into your ownuncomfortableness.
And as always, I look forward tomany more midlife conversations
with you.
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