“Never knew 30 candles can be quite a scary sight especially when they’re all lighted up. Hard to believe half of your life just passes by at a blink of an eye...” so says a blogger on blog.galvintan.com. For all of us 30 somethings who are clawing our way up the corporate ladder, fighting tooth and nail (albeit discreetly, shrouding our war tactics in sophisticated innuendoes) to become Vice Presidents by 40, mid-life existential angst has just decided to target a younger audience.
The term “mid-life crisis” was originally coined by Jaques who claimed that people encounter a crisis as they realize their own mortality and a change in time frame, from “time since birth”, to “time left to live”. Usually by the time a person approached the mid-century watershed, he would loose his earlier gung ho attitude about meeting life’s challenges head on and would start fretting about retirement, deteriorating health, a listless marriage, and a stagnant career trajectory. Add to that worries about his child’s higher education costs and wedding expenses, plus an ailing parent who needs constant nursing and life couldn’t really get any more complicated!But that was at 50! So when a 29 year old says, “will be turning 30 in less than a week. They say life begins at 30 (we thought that was what was said to pep up those close to retirement – “life begins at 60!). If this is true, well I guess the only way to find out lies ahead. Growing old is a breeze...growing up is exhausting”, mid-life crisis takes on a whole new meaning.For young greenhorn business graduates and software professionals, earning more than 6 lakhs per annum, life’s big investments, a house of one’s own, a luxury sedan, aren’t a distant dream. At the age of 28 K Ghosh, a software professional had a house of his own in Bangalore and drove a Chevrolet Optra. When he got married, he could afford to buy his wife a second car and told her she needn’t bother doing the rounds of placement agencies. Now at 32, he holidays in Sydney, puts aside a lump some for his retirement and travels to the USA on work, every three months. He is happy with his success but fears that by 35 he will have nothing else to aspire for. “I doubt I’ll find anything challenging enough in another couple of years”, he sighs. “Of course work is exciting, but I barely get to spend two hours a day with my wife. We haven’t started a family because where’s the time to even contemplate such a serious step!”So Ghosh is a very busy ‘techie’. What’s new about that? Just that he confesses that he is toying with the idea of quitting his job and doing something drastically different by the time he is 35. He feels he has achieved all that he had dreamt of when he went in for a professional course. Coming from a middle class ‘service’ background, owning a house and vacationing abroad for the past three years was the penultimate middle-class dream. Though he barely gets time to indulge in philosophical reflections, before dropping of to sleep every night, and as he munches on his sandwhich at breakfast, he can’t help feeling a certain ennui creeping into his life.T Mishra is 34 years old and is desperately trying to complete her PhD from Chicago University. With a three year old son who demands her constant attention and a marriage slowly getting sour, she often wishes she could just “chuck up everything” and disappear into the Himalayas. In her early 20s she had been a firebrand feminist and did her MA in Women Studies, before getting disillusioned by the constant male bashing that had become the sole mantra of her colleagues. So she switched to English Literature, got married, and had a baby, while pursuing her PhD thesis. But unfortunately along the way, the stress of managing a baby while doing all the household chores, shopping for grocery and trying to do her thesis turned into an extended post partum depression that slowly ate into her marriage. The fact that her husband was busy furthering his career and pursuing a part-time management degree in the evenings didn’t help matters. Mishra feels her life is unraveling before her eyes; she doesn’t care for her insensitive husband, her academic career has yet to take off and with a young baby she has that many lesser options before her. When she came to India for a three month summer break last year, she decided to leave her baby with her parents to trek in the Himalayas with a childhood friend. She needed to sort out things in her head and rediscover who she was, what her priorities are, what she hopes to achieve in life. And how do younger men react when in the throes of a mid-30 crisis? Confessions on WebMD message shed some light on men on this side of 40 suddenly ‘cracking up’. “I went through a midlife crisis last year. I went to a funeral on Friday and a motorcycle show on Saturday and the next thing I knew I had bought a motorcycle. I never wanted one before. Heck I wouldn't even ride as a passenger. I knew right away it was a midlife crisis, but that didn't help. I couldn't stop it. It lasted all year, I went out and took motorcycle safety class and got my license. All my friends keep looking at me and saying "Who are you?" If you knew me, you'd be saying it too. I'm usually one of the most cautious people you'll ever meet.” Vicky_122.In response to Vicky_122, a fellow sufferer laughed off the eccentricities that come as a bolt from the blue, by sharing some of her own “mid-life” quirks. “I had gone to this festival and suddenly spotted this harem looking outfit I simply had to have. It had a little halter top (that didn’t really fit me), and a little vest that went over it and a long wrapped skirt that hung to the ankle (made in India). I kept leaving the booth and then going back over and over again to look at it. “I HAD TO HAVE IT”. And I bought it. After wearing it to the mail box, and once to the grocery store, I felt foolish wearing it. Outside anyway.I still have it and once in a blue moon I wear it around my house when I know no one is coming over. I always wanted to be Jeanie in the TV show “I Dream of Jeanie” and that’s why I was so enamoured of the outfit. (My mom would never let me dress up like Jeanie on Halloween when I was a kid).Rebellion against parental conservatism or a mid-life crisis? I’ll let others judge. I have just turned 40 and found out I was going to be a grandmother. Hmmm...Well Vicky, get on your bike and ride out to the tiki bar where I will be not-so-inappropriately dressed in my harem outfit.” Island_lisa.Officially or medically, a mid-life crisis is defined as a personal turmoil arising from coping with challenges brought on by fears and anxieties about growing older. It usually affects men and women in their mid 40s and continues till they are in the late 50s. The feeling of dread or hopelessness that overpowers the person stems from the realization that time is running out and there is still so much he or she wants to do. Hence the sudden giving in to harem outfits and motorbikes. For the first time death isn’t something that happens to other people. Extra-marital affairs seem particularly tempting (normal is boring!)In “In Men in Mid-Life Crisis”, Jim Conway refers to the mid-life crisis as a “second adolescence”. He says there are three deadly foes that attack the hapless man. His body fails him. He starts losing hair, his good looks and physique. His work: a previously exciting job becomes dreary and monotonous. His wife and family: he feels trapped by his responsibilities.If one thought a “second adolescence” was a prelude to the “second childhood” stage of geriatrics, here’s an eye-opener. “I believe that my husband is going through this (mid-life crisis) now, but he's only 35. The thing that doesn't match up symptom wise is that he suddenly has a very high sex drive and is considering leaving the marriage because he's only had sex with two people including me. In the past four months he has been exercising obsessively, worrying about his hair (even though it hasn't receded further or fallen out worse), bought a new wardrobe, bought a new and extravagant car...” A message posted on the malehealth.co.uk message board.A 33 year old wonders if what he is facing is a mid-life crisis or an existential crisis. “I don't know if I'm having a midlife crisis or an existential crisis. They are described very similarly. The facts are that I'm a 33 year old, male, highly creative musician who has, until recently been employed as a... decidedly NOT creative corporate slave. I've dumped that dancing monkey suit and am now in the throes of trying to launch a successful music publishing career. I don't want to do anything that doesn't satisfy my creative needs. I feel like it's hopeless to imagine I can support myself through music because.. well, how many rich musicians do you know? But I refuse anything else. Absolutely refuse, like a child, to do anything else because this is what I KNOW is what I'm supposed to do because it makes me so completely fulfilled spiritually and emotionally. And without it I am morbidly afraid I am nothing.”His decision to try an alternative career regardless of the financial implications reminds one of the Wagon R television commercial. A handsome 30-something, corporate achiever decides to switch careers to become an adventure sports entrepreneur. Was he bitten by mid-life angst as well? One wonders! 
