Breadcrumbs: A Collection of Spiritual and Philosophical Essays, Francis J. Shaw [little readers .TXT] 📗

We begin this journey the same, naked in body and memories of where we have come from. Although our entry here is quite dramatic, the first age of our lives begins with only observation. We look and listen for quite some time before we utter anything other than cries and gibberish. Child development experts may have good explanations on why it has to be this way, but I wonder if non-human reasons are also part of why we start our journey here in the quietness, experiencing a peace we may spend the rest of our lives trying to rediscover.

Although we rely on others to provide for our needs, there is something quite rebellious in our nature. Our silent beginnings and our early words built around physical and mental chewing, as we examine the world in conversations centered on the ‘what’ of our surroundings. When we do encounter the first questions where we can provide a response, our answers are more often in the negative—replying with ‘no’ more than ‘yes.’ It’s true that we don’t like being told what to do and part of being here is the need to make up our own minds, but is it also something deeper? In some studies, young children have shared their recollections of where they were before coming here. With many similar story elements and the doubtful conclusion that it’s all made up, perhaps our first desire to disagree is no more than a memory that the answers our earthly guardians provide are often wrong, and we know it.

By around five years of age, our memories of home have faded. Forced to accept our new environment without prior knowledge soothing the bumps on our path, our questions also change, from ‘what’ to ‘why.’ In the beginning were the words and the words were confusing, but our new abilities with language now demand explanations to our observations. For parents, having just survived the terrible twos, the constant questioning requires a new strength and it can’t be a coincidence that right at this moment, when we express a burning desire to seek understanding, we are dispatched to school for compulsory education. It almost feels like a punishment.

Apart from creating space for parents, the timing appears logical—we have questions. With a whole team of teachers, qualified in different areas and disciplines awaiting our arrival, it appears like a match in heaven, but is it? The education world we now inhabit is firmly behind imparting information and knowledge, caring more about adherence and compliance and little for answering our many questions. Yanked away from the freedom of play, embraced out of desire, hunger, and joy, we experience the first of many diversions from the path, just as our feet feel planted. Although we don’t remember, it is perhaps our first experience of loss. A theme we will struggle to understand, for most, if not all, of our lives.

It’s also the beginning of another transformation, away from the freedom to imagine and create, to rigidity, conformity, and rules. It seems logical. We need to know the rules so we know when we break them, but other changes are more subtle. The letters we learned, to form the words, to communicate our feelings, ideas, and dreams...have new rivals. Behind every moment of our lives is the mathematics of structure and equations to keep us focused and goal-oriented along the road to success as others define it, and paths to reach it. Routine, sold as our Savior, to be our guiding light and capture us in the spell of repetition. Each day the alarm bell rings to usher in the 60 minutes of each hour, 24 hours of each day, and 365 days of each year. We count everything that matters and when we celebrate the unique event of our own birth, it is around a number—the kick-off to a ticking clock which will someday stop.

We agree to the plan because we have to and any sense of our own mortality is somewhere on a far off land we have no desire to visit. Just as we see the light at the end of our school-days tunnel, we rebel. Not since our early days has such passion reached the surface. We question everything and although society may excuse this brief interlude as a rite of passage into adulthood, perhaps its purpose is the first wake-up call to break free of the chains of conformity. A nudge to chase our purpose beyond the bounds of the framework drilled into our being for the past many years of education.

As the first age ends and the second begins, we are full of information. Our teachers hope it’s knowledge and we are thoroughly prepared for the next stage of our lives, but are we? All those school years provided a regimen we endured and learned to navigate and although we saw glimpses of the adult world, once we arrive, it feels foreign. History, taught what happened to others; mathematics, angels, equations, multiplication; geography, the names of countries and capitals...but for many, there was no life map, no quest, no Fellowship of the Ring, no greater purpose to grab and call their own.

Transitioning into adulthood can leave us with a sense of confusion. We want to be confident, secure in knowing what to do and how, because after years of education we feel we are supposed to know. Unfortunately, what school didn’t teach are other necessary skills that touch every facet of our journey for the rest of our lives—how to build healthy relationships with others and ourselves. Adulthood doesn’t provide classrooms, a teacher and text books to digest. It’s why we have so many awkward moments and easily fall into patterns where blame and avoidance become the go to feelings and actions.

The second age lasts anywhere from twenty to thirty years and lays the foundation for our lives. We go searching for purpose and meaning. To establish ourselves in work and relationships and to pursue goals we hope will lead to success and contentment. They are the years we have the most questions—who will we meet to share our life...where are we heading...how will we get there...when will we find happiness?

We experience responsibility and accountability, success and failure, joy and rejection. We spend much time and energy on our ‘wants,’ and despite our best efforts, lessons keep returning until we learn what we need to grow. Change is a constant companion we love or hate, depending on what it brings us and then when we are around halfway home we experience disappointment, anxiety, and a drop in self-confidence. Although these have been our companions before, there is an increase in their intensity and combined with fragile emotions, melancholy and sorrows rise to the surface.

If there is a watchword that sums up our heightened brain activity and amplified worries, it’s confusion. Although we may be aware of transformation in our bodies—hair loss or graying, changes in weight, and having less energy before we feel tired, there are other factors at play. For men, who often judge their self-worth by work accomplishments it’s often a time to reassess career goals and whether the results match the vision they had long ago. For some, Thomas Merton’s words provide a painful truth and little consolation—“People may spend their whole lives climbing the ladder of success only to find, once they reach the top, the ladder is leaning against the wrong wall.”

Women are also experiencing changes and not just hormone adjustments. For much of their lives they have fulfilled multiple roles, which may have included a combination of motherhood, a career, and frequently responsibility for caring for family members—there is often a strong desire to create a different future. As the earthquake of these events shake up the lives of men and women, the loss of important relationships, like parents, adds to the growing list of pressures. As though it’s a last chance, we are pulled to anything that makes us feel young again, perhaps in the hope that we can return to who we once were. In 1965, psychologist Elliot Jaques gave us two words to surmise his findings...midlife crisis—the third age of our lives.

Back in Middle Earth, Frodo experienced his own changes. The great quest wasn’t going well. The Fellowship of the Ring starting with such hope was in disarray. Gandalf, his larger than life wizard, believed lost to a very upset dragon and the others scattered to who knows where. Perched on a rocky hilltop, tired and worn out by the burden he carried, he looked toward Mount Doom and realized the awful truth of his journey—despite all his adventures and losses, there was no going back.

Every story has a beginning, middle, and end. Each has a protagonist faced with a question and a problem they need to solve. It’s why the most important part of any story is the middle, because halfway through every story something profound and impactful presents itself. It’s where Frodo found himself, thinking of home and perhaps wondering why it wasn’t the biggest, the strongest, or the wisest, called to undertake such a hard journey.

Reaching the mid-peak of our lives, with more years behind than those left ahead, we have spent much of our time asking the who, what, when, where, why, and how questions. We may be satisfied with some answers we have found, while others sit in limbo waiting to rise to the surface again, but what we need now is not an old question, but a new one, because our midlife is a crisis. There is more to it than we imagine because no matter what has occurred in our lives: successes and failures, we have been comfortable far too long. We are dying and our future is dependent on how we react to what we experience as we sit confused on our mountaintop. Our response to the discomfort we feel.

What we learn and experience in life only gets us halfway down the path. The rest comes from within and the reminders begin in midlife. We are meant to get lost because it’s the only way we can hear the voice calling out to us to connect with ourselves in our own story. Sméagol lost himself in his—he chased after the wrong ‘precious.’ It’s the reason why we are captivated by crime novels. There is a mystery to uncover in our lives and the first step is to recognize the confusion we experience in midlife is not an invitation to judge our memories or attempt to go back to the past through youthful actions. The new zest for life we feel is the burst of energy we need, not to relive the journey we have had, but to accomplish what is left to do—to begin the last adventure and find the key to unlock the mystery of our lives.

Although much of life revolves around work it’s not our purpose for being here, no matter what it brings. If you have journeyed with someone dying the words they speak are never, ‘I wished I worked more.’ As we move closer to that time for each of us, we need to re-examine the clues, because midlife is not about confusion, but a calling to find our individual purpose for being here. It’s no coincidence that we worry less about what people think of