Hey Degenerates,

Most people who turn 40 go through at least some amount of self-reflection, questioning, and emotional turmoil.

Lately I’ve become acutely aware of the transitional time of Midlife Crisis that I’m navigating and the importance of leaning into the unknown. I’ve been looking into the research on how to best grow through this phase of life and doing some thinking about how that lands for me, a reasonably-high-functioning-yet-still-degenerate of an adult.

According to Calm, the Midlife Crisis is characterized by three stages: the trigger, the search for meaning, and acceptance.

Let’s talk about each.

Stage 1: The Trigger

The trigger is the event that makes you stop and think. Approaching 40 has certainly been that for me. Where I can look back and remember a distinct vibe to my 20s and 30s, it’s really hard to imagine what life will look and feel like going forward.

Other events come into play for me as well. I recently found out a friend of mine from my early LA days passed away of a heart attack. This came as a shock and sent me down a path contemplating my and my family’s health, the fragility of life, and a growing sense of unease around time spent unfulfilled.

All of this is happening at a time when something about my career feels… different, in a way that’s hard to put words to.

Meh. Fine. “Mid”, as Gen Z might call it.

I feel incredibly fortunate for the professional opportunities I’ve been given and proud of how hard I’ve worked to take advantage of them. But there’s a certain sense of disenchantment with the whole thing that’s increasingly hard to ignore. This begs the question: who am I beyond my work?

Stage 2: The Search for Meaning

Following the trigger, there’s a period of intense self-reflection and search for purpose. This has been an odyssey of putting distance between me and a lot of long-held beliefs to question everything and see how I really feel about the narratives I’ve been telling myself.

This has gone everywhere from where I want to live, to what I want to spend my days doing, to who I want to spend life with, to everything in between.

There’s been a lot of asking myself: Why?

According to research, while Baby Boomers typically did things like buy luxury cars, start affairs, and make other impulsive life decisions, Millennials have had more of an internal journey (partly because we’re 20% less financially well off than the older generation).

For me, the “thing” I’m finding myself doing a lot of us listening to my inner child.

I know, I know. Sounds woo woo. But hear me out.

When I get really quiet, turn off the screens, silence the social media, and just sit in silence, there’s a voice inside that speaks up.

He knows what he wants. He knows what feels good. He knows what brings joy. And like any child, he doesn’t have the words to explain itself logically. He just knows.

Creating space to listen to this inner intuition has been a huge unlock for me because increasingly I’m seeing a metaphor playing out in my life, which I read about in a book called The Second Mountain.

Every so often, you meet people who radiate joy—who seem to know why they were put on this earth, who glow with a kind of inner light. Life, for these people, has often followed what we might think of as a two-mountain shape. They get out of school, they start a career, and they begin climbing the mountain they thought they were meant to climb. Their goals on this first mountain are the ones our culture endorses: to be a success, to make your mark, to experience personal happiness. But when they get to the top of that mountain, something happens. They look around and find the view . . . unsatisfying. They realize: This wasn’t my mountain after all. There’s another, bigger mountain out there that is actually my mountain.

I think a lot of this phase of self-reflection is about listening to that inner voice as it looks out in the world and spots our second mountain off in the horizon.

Stage 3: Acceptance

Eventually, there comes the phase of acceptance, which I don’t know if I’ve reached yet, but I’m making my way toward it.

Acceptance for me is about making peace with my past, embracing the present, and embarking on the next phase of my journey with hope.

I’m focusing on a few things.

First, it’s hard to ignore that my health has to be priority #1. My mind, body, and spirit are the vessel through which I navigate this crazy life, so the best gift I can give myself is continuously investing in my health.

That means nerding out on getting enough high-quality sleep every night; eating a natural, unprocessed diet; and being consistent in exercising with a mix of cardio, strength, and flexibility.

Next, I’m leaning into the inversion in value between money and time. When I was in my 20s, it felt like I had all the time in the world and not enough money. So I went to work where I traded my time for money, saved and invested diligently, and eventually started seeing wealth grow.

At some point in my 30s, this equation flipped.

Now that I’m entering my 40s, I have enough money but not enough time. I can generally afford to have the things and experiences that I want (and a lot of that has come from accepting and being grateful for what I already have). But I have to acknowledge that the clock of life is starting to tick faster and faster.

This might sit well with future employers, but it makes very little sense to trade even more time for more money.

That’s not to say I’m done working very hard on things I’m passionate about and see as purposeful.

But it no longer makes sense to trade my precious time only for more money.

To look at it another way, check out this startling visual.

The truth is that we actually have relatively little time left with our families, friends, and children.

Consider Warren Buffett, worth $146 billion at the age of 94. Ask yourself: would you trade places with Warren Buffett?

No, because even with all of his wealth, he has very little time left with the ones he loves.

I don’t know what’s at the top of my second mountain. The summit is off in the clouds, and I can only see the next few steps along the path ahead of me.

But I think the North Star I’ll be following to get there is exactly that: sharing experiences with the ones I love most.

Have a lovely week you Degenerate!

Ron