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I just finished reading “Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear” by Elizabeth Gilbert (of Eat, Pray, Love fame) and she brought up a related and interesting ide

I just finished reading “Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear” by Elizabeth Gilbert (of Eat, Pray, Love fame) and she brought up a related and interesting idea I can paraphrase: In midlife we’re concerned with status and our outward appearance, which can hinder creative output. Then we get older and realize that we don’t care what anyone thinks about us, which can lead to more creative risk taking and accomplishments. Then we get even older and we find the truth: nobody is thinking about you (except you) so it’s not worth concerning yourself with status or outside validation. In the midst of my own midlife crisis in the making I often find myself coming back to these types of concerns: How do I look to others? How do I compare to others? What am I missing out on? Thankfully I’ve been able to, so far at least, keep any real crisis similar to what’s described in the article or otherwise from occurring. I try to remind myself of what Gilbert explained, that no one really cares about me so I should live my life without worrying to much about what they think. I read a lot of books about creativity and most aren’t great, but I think “Big Magic” is a decent read. I also enjoyed the audiobook of “Creative Quest” by Questlove.

CMCDragonkai 6y ago
Sounds like the loser, clueless, sociopath transition.
- sethaurus 6y ago
  Could you elaborate on this? Are you saying that being unconcerned about how one appears to others is a sociopathic trait? Which aspect of the GP would make someone a "loser"?
  - AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
    I believe parent is referencing this specifically: https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-or-the-office-according-to-the-office/ https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-...
    - fumar 6y ago
      I reread this whenever someone posts it and every time I feel a little pang inside. It is almost too spot-on inside a large and established technology organization.
    - x87678r 6y ago
      Too long to read the whole thing, but the first section is one of the most amazingly accurate insights I've seen in a long time.
  - UnFleshedOne 6y ago
    Those are technical terms of Gervais Principle school of office classifications.
bentcorner 6y ago
I recently read somewhere on twitter that we shouldn't let ourselves be caught up in the quality of our hobbies. That is to say, if you're not a rockstar programmer, baker, piano player, artist, or whatever, don't let that stop you from enjoying your hobby. If it makes you happy, keep doing it. Don't let other people define your success.
borroka 6y ago
"nobody is thinking about you (except you) so it’s not worth concerning yourself with status or outside validation." This is often repeated, but it is so untrue that I don't get why well-intentioned people repeat it. Nobody thinks about me as much as I think about me, but some make decisions, be romantic, professional, based on what they think about me, that is my appearance, my status, my money, my family. As usual, the truth is between the straw-man extremes, which are in this case "nobody is ever concerned about me" and "everyone is thinking about me all the time." Now, it is not that older people realize that nobody is thinking about them and they were previously mistaken when thinking otherwise, they simply become aware that people are not thinking as much about them anymore, since they starting to be (or are) out of the game.
- Retric 6y ago
  Expect they don’t think about you, just the surface details that they can see. At ~35 most people can fake it well enough that external validation is largely meaningless. Which quickly leads to a feeling it’s just fake and by 40 became disillusioned with work, disenchanted with relationships and detached from family responsibilities.
- throwaway2245 6y ago
  > people are not thinking as much about them anymore I disagree. I don't observe much difference in this sense, but I feel more free to be my authentic self without worrying about how that might be perceived by people who are not a meaningful part of my life. I only recognise the meaning in "life begins at 40" since I reached it.
  - borroka 6y ago
    There are different points that need to be touched here. First, as always, there is a distribution of effects, which means that there is individual variation. We can reasonably assume that, _on average_, the older people are, the less they care about other people's opinions. The age after which these effects are noticeable is not immutable since the dawn of times, but depends on when people have kids, are expected to retire, etc. For example, I expect the age at which one cares less to be later in life now that three decades ago, when people at 40 were already considered way past their prime. I mean, for the generation of my parents, physical activity after they turned 18-20 was for wealthy people or "eccentrics". Second, it depends very much on what is settled for the person or what is still fluid. If someone has a family or has reached of the "peace of the senses", they are already caring much less about the major source of frustration (much more than source of joy) and status-seeking behavior for most people: sex. If somebody has also given up on practicing sports (or any king of competitive hobby), put up the classic 40 pounds more at 40 years old, they care even less about others. Lastly, hormones change, testosterone in men visibly drops, women start getting into menopause. And then it depends on personality (see the point above about variation), there are people who are still combative in the status game at 80 and others who have given up at 21. In synthesis, it is not that older means wiser and thus the "who cares what other people think" comes from a place of introspection (between us: sex is incredibly pleasurable), but more simply that hormonal changes, "giving up" (sex, competition) put people, sooner or later, on the bench of life: spectators, more than players.
neuromanser 6y ago
> In midlife we’re concerned with status and our outward appearance That seems completely backwards to me. I've never been more comfortable with being myself, whatever I am, than now, in mid-forties. My midlife crisis is raging out of control, because I'm looking at things that are outside of my reach. Activities I'm too frail to do, girls I'm too old to date... It's more of a temporary Peter Pan syndrome than anything else. Life runs past you really quickly, one day you wake up realizing it's still the 20-something you, just in a 40-something body. Midlife crisis is the process of coming to terms with the physical, temporal reality.
vlovich123 6y ago
It can also just be a reflection. Regardless of what everyone else thinks of me, what do I think about me? Where do I want the next phase of life for me to go? What have I accomplished? What do I accomplish next? I don’t think any one person can claim an authoritative view on what the framing of the experience of it has to be like.

CMCDragonkai 6y ago

Sounds like the loser, clueless, sociopath transition.

sethaurus 6y ago
Could you elaborate on this? Are you saying that being unconcerned about how one appears to others is a sociopathic trait? Which aspect of the GP would make someone a "loser"?
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
  I believe parent is referencing this specifically: https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-or-the-office-according-to-the-office/ https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-...
  - fumar 6y ago
    I reread this whenever someone posts it and every time I feel a little pang inside. It is almost too spot-on inside a large and established technology organization.
  - x87678r 6y ago
    Too long to read the whole thing, but the first section is one of the most amazingly accurate insights I've seen in a long time.
- UnFleshedOne 6y ago
  Those are technical terms of Gervais Principle school of office classifications.

bentcorner 6y ago

I recently read somewhere on twitter that we shouldn't let ourselves be caught up in the quality of our hobbies. That is to say, if you're not a rockstar programmer, baker, piano player, artist, or whatever, don't let that stop you from enjoying your hobby. If it makes you happy, keep doing it. Don't let other people define your success.

borroka 6y ago

"nobody is thinking about you (except you) so it’s not worth concerning yourself with status or outside validation." This is often repeated, but it is so untrue that I don't get why well-intentioned people repeat it. Nobody thinks about me as much as I think about me, but some make decisions, be romantic, professional, based on what they think about me, that is my appearance, my status, my money, my family. As usual, the truth is between the straw-man extremes, which are in this case "nobody is ever concerned about me" and "everyone is thinking about me all the time." Now, it is not that older people realize that nobody is thinking about them and they were previously mistaken when thinking otherwise, they simply become aware that people are not thinking as much about them anymore, since they starting to be (or are) out of the game.

Retric 6y ago
Expect they don’t think about you, just the surface details that they can see. At ~35 most people can fake it well enough that external validation is largely meaningless. Which quickly leads to a feeling it’s just fake and by 40 became disillusioned with work, disenchanted with relationships and detached from family responsibilities.
throwaway2245 6y ago
> people are not thinking as much about them anymore I disagree. I don't observe much difference in this sense, but I feel more free to be my authentic self without worrying about how that might be perceived by people who are not a meaningful part of my life. I only recognise the meaning in "life begins at 40" since I reached it.
- borroka 6y ago
  There are different points that need to be touched here. First, as always, there is a distribution of effects, which means that there is individual variation. We can reasonably assume that, _on average_, the older people are, the less they care about other people's opinions. The age after which these effects are noticeable is not immutable since the dawn of times, but depends on when people have kids, are expected to retire, etc. For example, I expect the age at which one cares less to be later in life now that three decades ago, when people at 40 were already considered way past their prime. I mean, for the generation of my parents, physical activity after they turned 18-20 was for wealthy people or "eccentrics". Second, it depends very much on what is settled for the person or what is still fluid. If someone has a family or has reached of the "peace of the senses", they are already caring much less about the major source of frustration (much more than source of joy) and status-seeking behavior for most people: sex. If somebody has also given up on practicing sports (or any king of competitive hobby), put up the classic 40 pounds more at 40 years old, they care even less about others. Lastly, hormones change, testosterone in men visibly drops, women start getting into menopause. And then it depends on personality (see the point above about variation), there are people who are still combative in the status game at 80 and others who have given up at 21. In synthesis, it is not that older means wiser and thus the "who cares what other people think" comes from a place of introspection (between us: sex is incredibly pleasurable), but more simply that hormonal changes, "giving up" (sex, competition) put people, sooner or later, on the bench of life: spectators, more than players.

neuromanser 6y ago

> In midlife we’re concerned with status and our outward appearance That seems completely backwards to me. I've never been more comfortable with being myself, whatever I am, than now, in mid-forties. My midlife crisis is raging out of control, because I'm looking at things that are outside of my reach. Activities I'm too frail to do, girls I'm too old to date... It's more of a temporary Peter Pan syndrome than anything else. Life runs past you really quickly, one day you wake up realizing it's still the 20-something you, just in a 40-something body. Midlife crisis is the process of coming to terms with the physical, temporal reality.

vlovich123 6y ago

It can also just be a reflection. Regardless of what everyone else thinks of me, what do I think about me? Where do I want the next phase of life for me to go? What have I accomplished? What do I accomplish next? I don’t think any one person can claim an authoritative view on what the framing of the experience of it has to be like.