That feeling when you wake up in your 40s and you don't know what you actually like
What are my hobbies? My interests? I had no idea.
You've heard about people pleasing. How we, as women, grow up doing what we're supposed to do, saying what we're supposed to say, because we're conditioned to be good girls who excel at everything we touch.
But here's what no one talks about: the long tail of that conditioning isn't just exhaustion. It's waking up at 40 and having no idea what you actually like.
Recently, I caught up with my friend Stacy London for her Hello Menopause! podcast (you'll be able to listen to it on My So-Called Midlife tomorrow). She told me about being in a dance class—something she thought she loved—but getting irritated when she couldn't nail the Beyoncé choreography. She realized she was there to excel, not to experience joy.
Yep. Familiar.
It's a funny moment, when you realize you are doing something even though you don't actually enjoy it. And no one forced you to.
You find yourself in a spin class thinking, "I'm not having fun, I'd rather be reading a book, why am I spending my time this way?" And then comes that sinking realization: What else am I doing that I don't actually like?
Meanwhile, I watch the men in my life enjoy activities because they enjoy them, not because they're good at them. I've seen Obama miss basketball shots and keep playing with pure joy on his face. When was the last time you did something badly and smiled about it?
We learn at the youngest possible age how to people please, how to be a good girl, how to gravitate toward the things that we're good at. And that's how you end up 40 years into your life thinking: Wait, what do I actually like? How did I spend half my life not knowing this?
The most successful people I know are energized by what they do even if they’re not good. They have that internal compass that says "yes, this, more of this." They make decisions from a place of knowing what lights them up, not just what they should do.
But how can you follow your passion if you've spent decades burying it under layers of "what I'm supposed to want"?
Here's the thing: when you don't know what you want, you default to what everyone else wants from you. You become infinitely adaptable. Infinitely available. Always optimizing yourself to fit whatever shape the moment demands. Enter, midlife burnout.
It's not an accident that this awakening often happens around the time women hit 40 or so. It's when we finally have enough life experience to recognize the pattern, enough distance to see what we've been doing.
So, do you know what you really enjoy?
Recognizing that you don't know what you like isn't a failure. It's data. It's the beginning of the most honest relationship you'll ever have. The one with yourself.
And maybe, just maybe, it's the first step toward building a world where women get to be whole human beings instead of perfectly calibrated supporting characters in everyone else's story.
With love,
Reshma
Photo of Stacy London: Kent J. Edwards for The New York Times
The best way to figure out what you like is to try something out.
You’ll never truly know if something fits until you try it on.
I related strongly to the sentiment here, except for the needless gendering of it all, because, well, I’m a man.
I think getting to grow up doing what you like has very little to do with gender, and everything to do with growing up in wealthy, privileged families (and the “right” type of family, even then). The fact that the author’s only actual example is an Ivy League-educated president who was globe-trotting since he was a literal baby is quite telling.
Does she assume janitors, garbage collectors, oil rig workers, etc., all fields near-solely occupied by men, do those jobs because it’s what they grew up dreaming of doing as boys?
For us working class folks, being able to get enough time to discover and do something we actually love doesn’t happen until late in life. For me, it was my late 20s. And none of it had anything to do with gender.