Milestones

James, circa 1999

On Monday 4th October, 25 years ago, I started my working life as a Business Analyst at a company called "Andersen Consulting" (I realise with some concern that this is so long ago, that there are people in the workforce who will have been born after the rebranding to "Accenture").  My first few months were overshadowed by concerns about the "millennium bug" - another blast from the dim and distant past - before I eventually meandered into healthcare, which I have made my home. 

This professional anniversary coincides almost exactly with an even more significant personal event - I turn 50 on Tuesday (8th).  With these milestones in mind, I hope you will indulge me a few existential reflections on ageing and the passage of time.

Physically, I am in reasonable nick, having realised about ten years ago that I had better move a bit more and eat a bit less.  That said, I am not quite as sprightly as I was, and I do take comfort from the doctor who said "If you get to 50 and nothing hurts, you are probably dead."  Psychologically, I am not faring too badly either, with many good and lovely things in my life. 

I do notice, however, an occasional sense of melancholy, also echoed sometimes in my work with clients. It is well captured by Eliot Jaques, the man who coined the term “mid-life crisis”, who describes a patient (thought to be a disguised reference to himself) as follows:

"Up till now… life has seemed an endless upward slope, with nothing but the distant horizon in view.  Now suddenly I seem to have reached the crest of the hill, and there stretching ahead is the downward slope with the end of the road in sight – far enough away, it’s true – but there is death observably present at the end."

This reminds me of the great existential psychotherapist, Irving Yalom, who wrote that there are four "givens" in life: death, meaninglessness, isolation and freedom (to which I might add a fifth: that existential thinkers are unlikely to brighten your day with their joyful insights into the human condition).  Death is unavoidable; the meaning of our lives is at best fleeting and contingent; we are ultimately alone; and we are free to make our lives as we will.

It is this last "given" that I have learned most about in recent years - I am free, far freer than I usually acknowledge, to shape my professional and personal life.  Of course there are challenges and constraints, and of course that freedom, when faced, can be as terrifying as it is empowering.  But the alternative - hiding from difficult choices and ploughing the same furrow by default - is only ever going to hold us back and deny us fulfilment.

As the years have passed, and the end of my journey gets inexorably closer, it is this knowledge of freedom - bracing, anxious and intimidating freedom - along with the support and love of those close to me, that has enabled me to find an increasingly happy and authentic professional life.  I wish you the same.