How to Cope with a Midlife Crisis

By middle age, we spend our days rushing about, swept along by the tides of life and its endless chores. Life stalls; body and mind are overdrawn. We look around in bewilderment, looking back on the past with regret and imagining the future with fear. Our physical capacities decline, friends and family drift away or pass on, and our children become their own people. We agonize over our children or become caught up in greed, anger, and delusion. The awkward, wretched, dark side of it all leaves us drenched in sweat late at night. We pound every inch of the railing in anguish.
We are in the midst of a midlife crisis—or, in psychological terms, a crisis of psychological challenges combined with an existential crisis.
This is the final dividing line between spiritual rebirth and the death of the soul. We still need to awaken, love ourselves, and be ourselves.
I. What Cannot Be Resolved vs. What Can
From a social or Marxist perspective, a midlife crisis “cannot” be resolved. It is the problem of an isolated, atomized individual in a cyberpunk world confronting alienation as a whole. From Zhuangzi’s perspective on the inner life, it can be resolved: the key is to stop seeking outward and look within. Finding peace and contentment is itself the resolution.
What cannot be resolved means that we cannot fantasize about solving it by becoming an all-knowing, all-powerful Wang Yangming, or a financially free Warren Buffett—by becoming some kind of superhuman. We are destined to accept that we are ordinary and unexceptional.
This is why we need “Marx + Zhuangzi.”
II. The Wrong Way Out: Higher, Stronger, More Powerful
Many people still approach life with an exam-taker’s mindset, hoping to break through by working harder. They expect to find a way out through wisdom, career success, more money, and still greater wisdom. This, too, is attachment and greed. If we could not do it through all those years in our prime, while the economy was growing, can we really force our way through during a midlife crisis? At heart, we are still failing to settle into the present, to appreciate it enough, and to feel grateful for it.
Instead, lie flat and practice non-action. Your energy will recover. Perhaps, even from a pragmatic perspective, your abilities and social influence will improve. It is like my own work as an independent content creator. Relax; be still and practice non-action. Your deeper mind will naturally work things out. —This is a philosophy of inner life that many friends may not yet be familiar with, which is also the point of this article.
Simply put, sometimes reading and thinking too much is less helpful than taking your child for a stroll by the lake, haha. After an outing, you discover that many things have been resolved and much has become clear.
Daoism says: “Do not go against the few; do not make a show of your achievements; do not scheme over affairs.” Zhuangzi says: “The skillful toil, the clever worry, while those without abilities eat their fill and roam at ease.”
III. A Method for Finding Resolution
In methodological terms, as I wrote in “An Overview of the Marx + Zhuangzi + Psychology Framework,” the key is to move toward awakening: innate wholeness, tranquility in one’s true self, and unconditional confidence, freedom, and ease.
The specific method is, with guidance from Marx, Zhuangzi, and nature, to build a connection with yourself—your deeper mind—your inner light—other people—society—history—the world—nature—the universe. Through a profound sense of connection, presence, and unity between humanity and nature, you can find tranquility in your true self, innate wholeness, and ease in presence.
Heal the petty-bourgeois malaise and reclaim your agency. Stop seeking outward and find peace in the present.
From the perspective of energy, as discussed in “Using Marx + Zhuangzi to Refactor the Spaghetti Code of Our Worldview, Outlook on Life, and Values,” gather your energy back in and restore your vitality. Your libido will naturally explore new directions. “Why People in Their Thirties and Forties Should Study Marx and Zhuangzi”
IV. The Psychological Exam-Taker
The discussion above is rather abstract, so let us approach it from another angle.
People’s psychological problems, which I call karmic obstructions, are the accumulated result of all kinds of challenges over the years. That is why it is so important to love yourself, be yourself, focus on your own tasks, and separate them from other people’s tasks.
Through journaling and studying psychology, you can observe your various challenges, such as petty-bourgeois malaise, instability at the core of the self, inferiority–conceit–self-hatred, a harsh superego, toxic shame, object-relations issues, differentiation issues, and so on.
For each specific small challenge, there are relevant good books, good posts on Xiaohongshu, and friends who have worked through these challenges whom you can consult.
As shown in my earlier articles, “How to Overcome Inferiority About Your Educational Background,” “How to Deal with a Harsh Superego,” “How to Deal with Not Allowing Yourself to Lie Flat,” and “How to Embrace Your Dark Side,” behind each small challenge lies an entire system of challenges that needs to be worked through from beginning to end.
It is like discovering that you have prediabetes: you need to address it across the board, including your mental state, stress, sleep, diet, exercise, and so on.
Fortunately, just as with prediabetes, each challenge you resolve, such as sleep or diet, helps resolve more problems along with it, creating a virtuous cycle.
Many middle-aged people begin caring for their health and loving themselves because of prediabetes, turning their physical and mental well-being around. Others begin caring for their health and loving themselves after a relative dies or their own tumor markers come back abnormal, turning their physical and mental well-being around. These are all cases of good fortune emerging from adversity.
The Adlerian psychology book *The Courage to Be Disliked* is very popular precisely because it discusses courage, tasks, and the present.