The Best Part Always Comes After The Half!

I spend a great deal of my time thinking about what comes after the halfway point in life (i.e., The Second Half), and what we can do to turn around the negative attitudes and the fears so many of us carry for all that time we will be spending after the half.

After all, when we’re halfway, the glass is still half full by my measure.

Or, is that half empty?

In any case, we still have half. And seeing as the vast majority of us have 40-odd years to go after reaching that halfway measure, why do we waste so much time fighting against what it means to us?!

Then again, that’s not really the point, is it? It isn’t that solitary mid-point in time that gets people so tense.

It’s something about the second half:

> What the second half means to people;

> What our expectations are for what comes after the midpoint;

> How we see ourselves and those around us differently after the half;

> What we feel we’ve lost – and will continue to lose – in the passing of time; and

> Why, when all is said and done, any of this matters at all – if it matters at all.

And the simple fact that we live in a society that does everything in its power to negate, eviscerate, or otherwise overlook the gifts of life’s second half doesn’t help the situation. What’s THAT really all about anyway!

What Is It About Second Halves?

Then again, why do we assess the second half of our lives so differently from the second half of everything else?

(Okay, granted my life is far more personal to me than yours or anyone else’s. And what comes after the halfway mark in MY life is going to have more meaning to me, simply because it IS my life and I’m living it. It’s no different for any of us.)

But really, let’s think about this for a moment:

How many times, when you were reading a really good novel or mystery, have you jumped to the end – the good part – to find out what happened? After all, the middle of so many books is just boring chase scenes, love making, and filler, right?

And how often have you gone to a movie, and stuck it out through all the intricate under-weaving of plot and story, because you really just had to see the ending? How many times have you wanted to walk out of the theater, but didn’t, because “the good stuff” (what brought you to the theater in the first place) could be counted on to appear in the second half?

And what of music? How often have you gone to hear a favorite singer in concert just to hear that one song . . the one they wouldn’t play till they’d worked their way through all the new stuff . . the one that meant everything . . the one you could count on to be played somewhere about midway through the second half?

Are you seeing a pattern here?

I hope so.

Why is it, do you think, that we can barely wait for the second half of the things we like – the things we look forward to (like books and movies and favorite recordings), but look the other way when it’s our own second half under consideration?

What is it about the second half of those things we can’t wait for that makes them so different from our own second halves?

Why do we cherish youth and the stories of our youth, but push aging off to the side . . as if we hope it would quietly move on and leave us as we are? (We know, of course, it isn’t going to do that. But does that set us up for disappointment, or challenge?)

Is there nothing in that half full glass that bids us go deeper?

Is there no thrill left after the half that suggests the best part may still lie ahead?

The Best Part Always Comes After The Half!

Well, as usual, I have some thoughts on the matter. (Just cover your eyes and ears if you’d rather not be touched by them.)

The way I see it, we get to choose how we’re going to respond to everything that comes after the half – just as we got to choose how we wanted to respond in our own unique ways to everything that came before. Nothing’s changed here. We’re still in charge – of ourselves.

If you want to sit in your rocker all day, with the shades pulled down and the television blaring while you complain to everyone you see of how you’ve been marginalized by the rest of society, go for it. It’s your choice.

You can rot in front of the tube just as easily when you’re 20 as when you’re 68. It has nothing to do with how old you are. It’s all about choice and the attitude you bring to the experience.

Personally, I’d choose differently. But that’s me.

If you want to spend the entire second half of your life looking back to how beautiful and popular you were in high school, and how you gave everything of yourself to your husband/wife and children . . and now to your grandchildren – though it never was and never will be appreciated in the ways you feel you deserve, go for it. It’s your choice.

You keep looking to others to justify your existence, and blaming them when they don’t. But doesn’t that get just a bit tiresome? Wouldn’t it be far more interesting to stop worrying so much about justifying and trying always to fit some image you believe others have of you, and start looking around for some new ways to live the second half you’ve been given?

Personally, I’d choose the second option. But that’s me.

You see, you can live the second half of your life as miserably as you want. You can resent the life you’re living. You can become a bitter, crusty old fart biddy person, and miss out on all the good parts entirely. In fact, you can get so used to growing old looking for the bad that you don’t even notice there’s another way. Kind of sad, really.

The thing is: If that’s your choice, you’re going to miss the best part . . you know . . the part that comes after the half . . the part that’s filled with unknowns and unknowings . . the part where the real living – the real good and powerful drama – takes place.

Of course, it’s your choice entirely.

Personally, I’d choose living dramatically with all the unknowns any day . . over going through the motions and landing in bitter, crusty biddyland. But that’s me.

Or, maybe it’s you as well!

What’s So Great About The Second Half

When we’re young, everything is an unknown. And we accept the not knowing as an excitement-filled challenge.

Then we grow up, and the unknowns become less exciting and more scary . . more threatening to our status quo. The older we get, the less we seem to look to the unknowns for sources of meaning in our lives.

And that’s where I think we go wrong.

Somehow, or other, we get ourselves completely turned inside-out-backwards in the overall scheme of things.

We know that we gravitate to the second half of things we love.

> What if there were something in our own second half that drew us ever forward in it as well?

> What if, rather than focusing on all the stuff we don’t like about aging, we had something far stronger pulling on us to engage with the best part – the part that comes after the half?!

> What if the second half really is about engaging more deeply rather than disengaging and pulling back?

> What if the movies and the books we love have something far more important to teach us than we ever imagined – that the answers we’ve been seeking have always been waiting for us to catch up with them in the second half?!

It just makes perfect sense, don’t you think?

Actually, tell me what you think. Challenge yourself – and me – on this. Go ahead. Support me, or try to prove me wrong.  I love it!

Keep growing my friend,

Gail

Tagged as: Aging, life's second half, Old, second half of life