Midlife and the Emergence of Soul

The fields of Psychology and Spirituality often make a distinction between Ego and Soul. The Ego is the part of us that assumes various roles in life, or what we might consider to be our identities. When you identify yourself as artistic, achievement-oriented, laid-back, or hard-working… as the jokester, the caretaker, the leader, or the shy-one… or as any number of other roles you play, you are in the realm of ego. The ego develops over time; first within our family and peer relationships and later through our work relationships and adult friendships.

In some ways the ego is like the mask we wear out in the world, and everyone’s mask will be unique in some way, depending upon what has “worked” in our particular situation. The ego marks a way-of-being that has helped us to survive very difficult circumstances, gain approval from others, and/or identify a unique place for ourselves within our families, and then within our larger worlds. A little boy who is the youngest of four children notices that in order to get attention from his parents, it works best to be very funny. A young girl finds that she plays the role of peacemaker when her parents are fighting, and then they begin to calm down and she feels better. Another young girl suffers physical abuse when her father is tense or unhappy and so she learns to be as invisible as possible and to stay out of the way. These children then grow up to be the class-clown, peacemaker, and “good girl” respectively, and each may derive some fulfillment from these roles that they are now very good at (we tend to become expert at those things that work well for us). And because we become expert at these identities, and because they may help us to win approval from others, developing our egos may also help us to develop a sense of self-esteem, effectiveness in the world, and purpose; all of which will be more precarious for some than for others. For most of us, though, regardless of the exact nature of our developmental history, our egos have a way of keeping us moving along in the world. For the first half of our life, this is usually a pretty good thing.

Then, around mid-life, something happens. In one way or another, our egos start to break down. It no longer feels so satisfying to be the class-clown. Being the peacemaker begins to cause trouble because one’s own needs are always put on the back-burner. Being the good girl starts to feel boring, or enraging. For some, the break-down can happen as the result of a crisis—an illness, job loss, or relationship difficulty, for example. For others, a vague dis-ease marks their awareness, a sense that they just don’t feel happy or fulfilled. Still others may wake-up one morning feeling as though their life is just wrong. In these ways, a mid-life crisis begins; or, stated another way, the Soul emerges. I see the emergence of Soul and mid-life crisis as different sides of the same coin; and sometimes even the same side of the same coin. But why would the emergence of Soul be a crisis? It sounds like such a good thing...

I think we have to go back to the part about ego development to understand this well. We learn that in order to receive love or connection or approval, we must be this way ____ (fill in the blank for yourself). And so we develop, that way. But, “deep down” we are also so much more than this. And the needs and desires and talents and propensities that don’t fit with what becomes solidified as ego (and what we often call Shadow Material) get left out. Furthermore, because essential parts of who we are get left out, a tension develops—very slowly and over time. And at some point, usually when our internal sensor knows that we can handle it and around mid-life, the tension no longer holds. Our souls gets louder and our egos, less satisfying.

If you are awake and aware and a little lucky, your soul will whisper to you and you will listen. If you don’t listen it will grow louder, and louder still, until the tension is unbearable and something gives. The soul can speak in the form of a crisis, a feeling of discontent, or a compelling sense that a change is needed. At some point, though, it will speak, and the sooner and more carefully we can listen, the sooner we can begin to experience freedom. But it is hard to listen to Soul because it often asks us to give up our attachment to Ego—that mixture of identities and roles that has allowed us to survive and sometimes even thrive in the world. We come to love our ego, and the Soul asks for its death. This is why it is so challenging, and why many of us don’t listen to the whisper. Fortunately, the Soul is pretty relentless. The message of what needs to die in order that something more fulfilling can emerge will come to us again and again. And when we do listen, change and transformation and death and rebirth all become possible. But change is hard, and the emergence of Soul can mean changes to relationships, our life’s work, and even day-to-day activities. The friendships we have counted on for a long time may no longer serve us, marriages may break-up or require intensive re-formation, a career change may be in order. For these reasons, mid-life crises can be experiences that we go through alone—not necessarily without support, but alone in the sense of deciding for ourselves, and maybe for the first time, what we really love, who we really are, where our values and priorities lie, and how we wish to be connected with something larger than ourselves. Thus, the challenging path is not without its rewards. Relationships, our life’s work, and our day-to-day activities become more fulfilling and more real. The emergence of Soul, which requires the death of our attachment to Ego, results in an Authentic Life. And this is a reward worth dying for.

(P.S. Notice that it is the death of the attachment to the ego, and not necessarily the ego itself, that is required. Those roles and identities that helped us to thrive or survive and that we become so expert at don’t need to disappear. We just need to learn that it is not all of who we are--- in fact, it’s not even close to all of who we are.)