1. Midlife: Crisis or Opportunity Kathleen Brehony, Ph.D.

2. 1. What is Midlife? 2. Why Midlife can be dangerous and difficult? 3. How to use Midlife for Self- Growth.

3. There are lots of us in Midlife… 81 Million Americans between the ages of 35-55. 10,000 Americans turn 50 every day (one every 10 seconds)

4. Midlife is a specific developmental period of life.

5. Life as a Teleological Process

6. How we get off track… We are born whole but quickly become shaped by family, religion, culture, gender role, etc. etc. etc.

7. Midlife Gives Us Wake-Up Calls  Physical  Psychological  Emotional  Relational  Professional  Spiritual

8. Sometimes Midlife is a Crisis… “Danger” and “Opportunity”

9. Sometimes you just hear Peggy Lee singing… Is that all there is, my friend? Is that all there is?

10. Midlife Demands: A Change in Consciousness Consciousness is Awareness and Self-knowledge

14. Major Illusion: Things Don’t Change Most of us grow when life pushes us to do so You know what I’m going to do this weekend, honey? I’m going to grow. What the hell is he talking about??!!

15. Knowing an Underlying Secret

16. The Answer

17. An Underlying Secret of Mathematics “The Rules of 9” Rule #1: When any number is multiplied by nine, if the individual digits in the resulting product are added together, they will ALWAYS total nine as long as you keep summing the digits produced at each step until you get a one-digit number. That Number will ALWAYS be 9.

18. The Underlying Secrets of Midlife  Realization: Life is half-over  We recognize our mortality in a new way.  Life as we have known it is now over.  A major change in consciousness.  Losses and change initiate a path to a new sense of meaning and greater passion.

19. Ego The Self The ego has believed that everything revolves around it. Wrong!

20. At Midlife, the Self is asking – “When will you get around to me?”

21. In the first half of life, we devote our psychological resources to developing the persona.

22. The Shadow Knows…

23. How to know your Shadow… Make a list of every adjective that describes you, then write down its opposite. This is what is demanding to be acknowledged. Important hint: Find the Middle Way

24. Repressed Shadow Material Can Explode Out Like a Dam Bursting

25. In our culture we tend to discount the inner life but that doesn’t make it any less real. Unconscious versus Conscious Midlife Passages

26. We don’t like to think about or talk about the losses associated with Midlife

27. “We have only to follow the thread of the hero path, and where we had thought to find an abomination, we shall find a god. And where we had thought to slay another, we shall slay ourselves. Where we thought to travel outward, we will come to the center of our own existence. And where we had thought to be alone, we will be with all the world.” -- Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth Poised for the Hero’s Journey

28. The Call The Separation The Adventure The Return (Hero is ALWAYS changed) Stages of the Hero’s Journey

29. The Agony of the Chrysalis

30. The Alchemical Metaphor “We are born to be awake, not to be asleep!” -- Paracelsus, 16 th Century Swiss Alchemist

31.  Nigredo: “The Blackening”  Albedo: “The Whitening”  Rubedo: “The Reddening” Stages in Alchemical Transformation

32. The Vitality of Transformation  Like the Buddha WAKING UP  Realize the values of the first half of life are not sufficient for the second half  Change in philosophy and worldview  Psychological and spiritual maturity  Coming to our senses  Live differently – with greater joy, meaning, and passion

33. Rowing & Flowing: The Sailboat Metaphor

34. To be Conscious is to be AWAKE! I’m AWAKE!

35. Seeing Ourselves Differently Schopenhauer - Embroidery Michelangelo – It was already inside you.

36. What do we do with this new-found insight? Stay just as we are? Move to Tahiti as Gaugin did? Um, are you sure you don’t want to call your wife and kids?

37. The Journey is frightening and we have a natural desire to get over it! JUST DO IT!!!!!!!

38. Holding the Tension of the Opposites

39. Tools for the Journey

40. Dreamwork

41. Containers

42. Meditation, Prayer, Silence

43. Creative Expression

44. Physical Body

45. Stay in the Present “Stay here, quivering with each moment, like a drop of mercury.” -- Rumi

46. On Tigers and Goats

47. Late Bloomers & Don’t Die Guessing

48. Thank You and Godspeed on Your Journey Kathleen and Co-author Dorothy Kell y www.fullpotentialliving.com 252-473-4004