I turned 40 a few months ago, but since I was too busy watching the entire framework of my life as I’d known it fall apart, I didn’t get to write much of anything. Now happily settled in Mexico for a stretch, it felt important to me to put together a little something that honors the ending of one decade and the beginning of another. Here are 40 things I’ve learned in 40 years on good ol’ Mother Earth:
Human beings are outrageously resilient. I am so much healthier, stronger, more youthful and alive at 40 than I was at 20. (Don’t do cocaine, kids.)
One of the secrets to getting healthier and feeling more alive every year is by engaging in deep, emotional healing work. Specifically — as I’ve discovered — grieving. Grief (like laughter) is a fountain of youth. The more I cry, the better I feel (and look). Imagine if we had written that kind of advice to men back in my GQ days…
Life is, by nature, messy. We get in trouble when we try to keep it — and ourselves — pristine, protected, untarnished. In coaching, like in life, the biggest breakthroughs tend to happen when we feel totally out of our comfort zones.
Unless you’re one of a truly tiny percentage of people on the planet who grew up in a household with two emotionally healthy and supportive parents, your relationships to people, places and things for the first 30, 40 or so years of your life are probably going to be pretty fucked up. That’s intended. It’s meant to break you down and get you to look at yourself and your past, and ask: “Why do I do the things I do?”
“Why do I do the things I do?” is the first question on the path to waking up.
The first thing you’ll encounter when you really start to wake up and go within is pain. And, like most of us, you’ll likely look away a few times - or a few thousand - before you decide to go deeper into it.
Go deeper. It’s worth it.
There is nothing glamorous about true, nitty gritty, spiritual work, just like there is nothing glamorous about adulthood. Glamour is a pastime for the young. Grown ass adults have scrapes, battle scars and stories. They’re a little fucked up. (Or a lot.) And if they’re lucky, their hearts have been shattered so many times they finally bust open and love just spills out everywhere.
To have a busted wide open heart is both the greatest and most painful thing in the world. A paradox, surely, because…
Life is full of paradoxes.
Learning to like yourself and treat yourself with respect will change everything in your life. Especially your relationships.
People who like and respect themselves tend to treat other human beings like they treat themselves — damn well. People who don’t like or respect themselves tend to treat other human beings like, well, read the headlines in today’s news…
Worthwhile relationships will be challenging at moments and test you often, but they will feel easy and joyful the majority of the time. If they don’t, move on.
If something feels forced, it is.
Some of the unhappiest I’ve ever been was when I had the most money and most possessions.
Some of the most content I’ve ever been was when I had the least.
(This isn’t an opinion or an indication of my belief system, necessarily, just a fact.)
Have someone snap a few photos of you every so often, and be willing to look into your eyes and ask: Do I like the person I am/am becoming? (Looking in the mirror and asking the same question is one thing, but looking at a photo another entirely. It’s the difference between having a thought and writing it down on paper, where you can’t escape or distract from it.)
Speaking of writing, consider writing your thoughts, feelings, and deepest murmurings down in a journal every day. Leave it to your loved ones to peruse when you’re gone. I would give up anything I own to have my father’s or my grandfather’s journal.
If possible, do a bulk of your trauma work before you get married, or become a parent. (If you plan to.)
But don’t go kicking yourself if you’ve already got kids or a partner and are just realizing this personal growth stuff exists. It was all perfectly timed, because everything is.
“Mental health” is a misleading term. While intellectual awareness of what’s happening (the “why”) is crucial, the majority of healing takes place in the body. Simply put: Whatever remains unresolved from our pasts is stored energetically in our bodies and dictates the direction of our lives - how we live, what we do, who we choose to be surrounded by, etc. But if we integrate and heal those unprocessed parts, we begin to get free from our autopilot functioning and are able to create a life that is aligned to who we are at our cores, not what we think we’re supposed to do or be.
The more whole and aligned you become inside, the more calm and peaceful your life will become on the outside. (And when it isn’t calm or peaceful, you’ll be able to stand taller and stronger amongst the crazy.)
You only achieve peace inside by releasing pent up emotional energy i.e. allowing yourself to totally lose your shit in a safe space every so often — cry, scream, howl, throw a tantrum, rage, burn or destroy shit, go wild, punch the couch or the steering wheel, or maybe just run around naked in the moonlight cursing your enemies, your parents, God, aliens, whoever created this crazy game we’re all playing.
Every asshole in traffic was once an insecure teenager. Every tyrant was once a tortured kid. To be an adult is to understand that things don’t originate from nowhere. Everything has a root cause. And everyone is always doing their best. (Unless they’re a robot, then they’re doing someone else’s best.)
Compassion, forgiveness, and grace are the greatest things you can give yourself or another person. Don’t suffer fools. But grudges only hurt the person holding them.
What the majority of us grow up believing will make us feel good does work, but with limits. More money, more sex, more status, more fame, more friends, and more followers do make us feel good in the short term. (Dopamine, baby!) The problem is that this form of goodness isn’t sustainable. It’s like the big loop and drop on the rollercoaster. No one can live—to paraphrase Denis Johnson—with their head shot off by excitement all the time. People hurt themselves and their bodies trying to do that.
But what you can live with is deep contentment. And deep contentment comes from doing things every day that are aligned with and delight the deepest recesses of your very soul.
Even when you’re living life from your deepest soul’s purpose, however, life will not feel or be perfect. Perfection is a fantasy we create in childhood to avoid feeling tremendous pain and loss. But if we do the deep digging to feel the original pain and loss, the illusion of perfection shatters and we can get busy living our perfectly imperfect existence, alongside all of the other perfectly imperfect fools pretending like we have it semi-together. That’s the dance. That’s humanness.
Speaking of fools, take any spiritual advice I’m giving here with a sprinkle of caution. Have you seen my track record?
But, since I’m already 31 deep here, may as well finish strong…
As a man, it’s so important to have male friends of all ages - young and old. Having both younger and older friends allows us to see ourselves at the different phases of our own lives, reminding us where we’ve been and what’s up ahead. Plus, we get to mentor and be mentored. A lost art.
Do plant medicine if you have the resources to. Nothing is a faster avenue to healing and opening the heart.
Speaking of the heart, consider the concept that true love might feel a lot different than you think. I used to believe love was that intense, gotta-have-you fireworks I felt when I spotted my next ex-girlfriend across the room. What I’m finding as I enter my fourth decade, though, is that good love feels a lot more subtle, a lot more secure, a lot more sweet, patient, tender, and kind.
If all of us on the planet took the time to learn to identify and take ownership for the full spectrum of our feelings and how to express them in the moment we’re feeling them in an appropriate way, the world would be cleared of practically all ills and dis-eases. I truly believe that.
Spend more time creating than you spend consuming. Make your own meaningful work in addition to doing the work you might be doing to pay the bills, even if no one ever sees it. (I wrote a truly terrible poem just last night - something about driving back roads in Baja with Bruce Springsteen and a bottle of Tempranillo.)
At the same time, do not be afraid of boredom. It’s a priceless commodity in the modern world.
My non-negotiable daily intake: sunshine, water, trees/plants/flowers, eye contact, human or animal touch, music, nourishing conversation, body movement, good sleep and/or naps. It may sound like a lot, but I’ve already hit it at 8:41am. We have more time than we think.
Use that time to suck up the best of what this world offers: Drive with the windows down and the wind in your hair. Dance. Do accents. Don’t waste a meal. Kiss slow. Walk barefoot as much as possible. Walk away from anything that doesn’t light you up—it is out there, and you do deserve it. Find a coach, therapist, or healer who moves and inspires you and work with them. Take risks. Take the long way home. Know that life is always working for you, not against you, even when it feels like you’re dying.
Lastly, as much as it can be crappy to hear, we are all actually dying. There’s no way out of this life alive. But, if we can find a way to befriend death, to use it to our advantage, life becomes so much more graceful. Our days are filled with almost constant little deaths. Surrender to them like the seasons. Let yourself die. And let yourself be reborn. Over and over. Again and again. Forever.
This was a great read, especially having lived alongside your soul for all these years. I was cracking up and smiling while I read from my bar seat sipping a Campari and soda. It might have made my night.
Happy 40th. I turned 60 a few months back. Your 40 learnings capture so much of what it means to enter yet another decade. Keep up to great writing. Good to see you post another insightful article. Cheers.