Travel publisher Lonely Planet just sent me an email with a subject line that promised “The top 10 places to have a midlife crisis”—an enticing come-on for a huge load of inexperienced posturing, a smoky glance from a virgin.
The travel article (which was, oddly, two years old when it appeared in my mailbox) presupposed that a midlife crisis is solved by indulgence, reinvention or sexual adventure. This is what a 30-year-old imagines his or her midlife crisis will be. In fact, a midlife crisis is a crisis of meaning, a period of doubt and reassessment that can’t be resolved with a fling or a facelift, except in those cases where the soul was abandoned much earlier in life (in which case you should also get a boob job and hair-plugs and a cigarette boat).
The term—coined by psychologist Elliot Jaques in 1965—refers to the realization that life is short, that the window has closed on many things you half-thought you’d get around to eventually. And you will soon rush past more options, which will disappear behind you like Amish buggies on a Pennsylvania state highway. And you wonder what you want to do in the time that remains. (Side note: Almost 50 years ago, when Jaques wrote “Death and the Midlife Crisis,” he thought midlife started at about age 35, which now—a half-century later—seems young. Psychology Today says, vaguely, that the period of soul-searching starts “at about age 40, give or take 20 years.”)
Thankfully, these thoughts usually pass quickly and you finish watching the game or reading your popular but mediocre book (or web post) and carry on with life. Occasionally, though, the need for something deeper and more authentic sticks around a bit, and becomes an obsession, and then a source of sadness and deep doubt, and you need to fill that hole with something.
This is not a time to check out the gold market in Dubai, the first destination cited by Lonely Planet. Who thinks gold will sooth a troubled pysche? And if you are looking for authenticity, you do not go to Monte Carlo (number 3) and pretend you are James Bond. By now you know you are not, and the time for charades is over.
The fourth destination, the so-called yoga capital of Rishikesh, India, seems reasonable for some. But you must not go to Las Vegas (fifth on the list). If you are having any doubts about the meaning of life, stay far away from Las Vegas. Don’t even go through Vegas on the way to a vision quest in the desert. Vegas should only be visited by those who have an extremely hardy spiritual immune system. If your soul has any vulnerabilities, Las Vegas will find them and use them to crush you. Las Vegas is where crises start.
There are a couple of other destinations mentioned, and several sound OK-fun-enough. But there is no need to over-think this. For a real existential crisis, you go to Paris. Everyone knows this. You walk rain-soaked streets that glitter with reflected light and go back to smoking cigarettes. You indulge your insecurities until you become aware that this city mocks them, because Paris makes you think that possibilities remain for everyone.
Summer or winter, rain or drizzle, Paris (or, for some, Rome) gives life a sheen of enduring romance, and that’s what you need.
Then you go somewhere where you do something for someone else, because that’s what actually brings meaning to life (unless you’re still enthralled with Ayn Rand, in which case you’re screwed). Volunteer. Or just go to a beautiful but desperately poor country and over-tip. Make someone happy and you’ll be happy too, so long as the food is decent and the dogs don’t keep you up at night.
Photo: Paris’ Île de la Cité viewed from the Pont des Arts, by Bruxelles5, via Wikimedia Commons.
