[00:00:00] DANIEL: Mhm, Hey there, Spacemakers. I'm Daniel Sih, joined by my good friend and co-host, Matt Bain. We bring you The Spacemakers, a podcast to help you shift the way you live and work. More than a podcast, this podcourse will take you on a carefully curated journey around a simple, but profound idea that the habits and practices that fuel success in our 20s and 30s are the very barriers that hinder maturity in our forties and fifties.

[00:00:29] DANIEL: Big thanks to our sponsor. Bulk Nutrients. Enjoy a 5% discount on protein powders and health supplements. For orders over 45 dollars at bulknutrients.com.au. Just enter the Code Spacemakers.

[00:00:42] NARRATOR: The Space makers with Daniel Sih and Matt Bain.

[00:00:48] DANIEL: Hey everyone. Welcome back to The Spacemakers, a podcast to help you think deeply about how you live and work and live an intentional life. Uh, my name's Daniel Sih and I'm here with my good friend, Matt Bain.

[00:00:59] MATT: Hi everyone. [00:01:00] Great to be here.

[00:01:01] DANIEL: Yeah. And we're talking about a big idea that the habits and practices that help us set up for success in our twenties and thirties are actually kind of intuitively the ones that often hinder us to really thrive later in life in our future.

[00:01:13] DANIEL: 40s, 50s, and 60s. And therefore, what does it look like to unlearn some old things at work in order to set yourself up in the next transition of life? Yeah. So, um, today we're going to talk about happiness. I'm going to talk about the happiness curve. We're going to talk about the science of happiness and in particular, how happiness changes through the different phases of life.

[00:01:34] DANIEL: And look, we've been getting some great feedback from our last two episodes. And I really liked one of the emails that someone sent us. Amy. Uh, so thank you, Amy. She said, my life looks very different now in my 40s. When I was 20, I spent my time hanging around with Finnish rock stars, but now I wipe cat poo off my daughter's shoes.

[00:01:57] MATT: So I got to say when you first showed me that [00:02:00] before the show, it really stopped me in my tracks. You know, it blew me away. I was so surprised. I thought, man, like I've gone through this much of my life and there is such a thing as Finnish rock stars. That's amazing. Finnish rock stars. Is that like a Suga Ross or is that the band?

[00:02:13] DANIEL: I don't know. I was never that cool when I was 20. What I liked about that comment, it kind of summarised our entire show in like one line, you know? So how do you make the transition from hanging around from Finnish rock stars to wiping cat paws into all the shoes. All right. So moving on, but please, please keep emailing us your comments.

[00:02:30] DANIEL: All right. So last week we talked about the different stages of life, particularly the three stages that categorize kind of human development. Do you want to give us a summary for our listeners?

[00:02:39] MATT: Yeah. So based on the reading that we've done, and again, there seems to be like a lot of, a lot of overlap in terms of the stages, the ages.

[00:02:45] MATT: And stage that people kind of identify. Um, and we've given them hopefully our memorable and snappy titles. Okay. So the first one, the first stage is from 20 to 40, and we call that entering adulthood. So that's 20 to 40. The second we've entitled the midlife [00:03:00] squeeze, so that's looking at the ages of 40 through to 65.

[00:03:03] MATT: Hmm. The third. We've called the second mountain and that's from 65 onwards.

[00:03:07] DANIEL: But the whole aim of this is to describe that, you know, again, in human experience, in science, even if you look at the traditions, like the ancient traditions, there's a very clear sense that human development changes in particular phases.

[00:03:20] DANIEL: And while they're broad, wide changes, you know, it's super helpful to have a sense of what stage of life you're in. Yeah. And also to have a sense of what, what's coming up next.

[00:03:28] MATT: Exactly. Which is a nice little segue into the activity that we gave people.

[00:03:31] DANIEL: Great. So give us a summary. What was it?

[00:03:33] MATT: Yeah. So it was three steps.

[00:03:34] MATT: Number one was identifying which of those three, three and a half slash four stages you're in right now. Number one. Number two was looking at, um, so we went through some pitfalls last week, so it was identifying what out of these common pitfalls do you think you're most at risk of being in or falling into?

[00:03:52] MATT: And number three, what can you do to kind of best protect yourself, particularly when it comes to transitioning well from your current stage to the next? Yeah. So [00:04:00] what can you actually do?

[00:04:00] DANIEL: Yeah, that makes sense. And you and I had a really good conversation. We both reflected on this individually, but then you and I had a chat.

[00:04:05] DANIEL: I mean, clearly we're both in the midlife squeeze. Yes. Uh, you know, both in our, mid to late 40s. Last week, so you're even older than you were last week. And wiser. That's true, that's true. You are full of wisecracks. So we were talking about what are the pitfalls that we might be wrestling with, and the one I mentioned at least is that, well, the thing that stood out for me is friendship.

[00:04:27] DANIEL: The importance of investing in friends and not allowing old friends and close friends and even people that I'd like to be closer to as friends to, I don't know, fall off the radar. You in the squeeze of everyday life and what it might look like to put some more energy in my life into reconnecting with people.

[00:04:48] MATT: Yeah. You were talking about something similar.

[00:04:49] DANIEL: Oh yeah.

[00:04:49] MATT: So, um, my life, uh, thankfully, um, and you know, it's a blessing. It's got very little to do with me, it’s full of people, which is absolutely fantastic. You know, it's great family and friends, [00:05:00] but upon reflection, it's become clear to me. And while doing something like this podcast just makes it all the more kind of pertinent, right?

[00:05:05] MATT: Cause it's like you get up here and you do your thing and you think, man, I could be such a hypocrite in this regard. So it was just like, it was made out to be abundantly clear in my life. The biggest pitfall for me now, which again, classic pitfall is neglecting old and dear friends. So the category of friend that most of us are most likely to take for granted in the midlife squeeze because they've been around forever and you think, well, you know, again, like they've loved me for decades.

[00:05:27] MATT: They'll keep on loving me for decades going forward. So they're the ones again, but they're, they are also the most irreplaceable.

[00:05:33] DANIEL: Yeah, definitely. And so you and I, it was interesting. We talked about, you know, what do we do about this? Cause we're actually wanting to office now we're accountable to like 4,000 viewers.

[00:05:40] DANIEL: Excellent. I was thinking it would be great to basically, just make sure I catch up with someone every fortnight or even once a month for a coffee, you know, and, and just make sure there's space in my calendar to do that. It'd be great to have more time on the weekend with friends and do more family stuff, but at the very least I could catch up with kind of old friends and have lunch.

[00:05:59] DANIEL: But you're going to do [00:06:00] something a bit more creative, weren't you?

[00:06:01] MATT: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:06:01] DANIEL: Yeah. So I have to keep you accountable.

[00:06:05] MATT: Yeah. I, um, yeah. So looking at my calendar and trying to be realistic, cause you know, one thing that I really value about doing this with you is that I want to keep the lens always realistic and not naively idealistic.

[00:06:16] MATT: Okay. So. uh, so that's really important to me need to have that note of realism. So realistically looking at my calendar, I'd love to have like the kind of impulsive spontaneity in my life where I can just call up someone, you know, at the start of Saturday morning, say, hey girl, it's free time. Let's hang out.

[00:06:31] MATT: But that's just, again, that's not going to be happening. For all intents and purposes, so I need to structure something in. So I've, um, I've got this idea of wanting to, um, bake into the calendar. Like it'll be something like, you know, the first Saturday of every month, just booking the same venue, same time, inviting the same crew of old friends, um, along.

[00:06:49] MATT: Yeah. And whoever can make it, you know, can make it that way.

[00:06:52] DANIEL: So you have this regular rhythm where you're catching up with people you care about. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it's just baked into your schedule.

[00:06:57] MATT: And, you know, it's, um, at its kind of, um, at its [00:07:00] um, at the most is going to be literally three or four months in advance, but that's, that's the only way that I can currently, at this stage of life, guarantee that's going to happen.

[00:07:09] DANIEL: That sounds good. And look, if we announce the place and the time, uh, you might be able to meet lots and lots of new friends. Uh, but look, let's keep each other accountable through, uh, this interview. We're going to have a, an episode on friendship and what it looks like to really invest in friends and it might be good to be able to even come back and say, Hey, we did some of the stuff we said we do.

[00:07:25] MATT: Yeah, that would be good.

[00:07:34] DANIEL: All right. So let's get into the happiness research. I love this research. I didn't know about it a few years ago and I have found it super helpful. In fact, I was having a conversation with a friend and he was telling me, Oh look, the last five, six years have just felt like walking through mud. And he, he just gave a throwaway line.

[00:07:55] DANIEL: And he said, oh, the other week, my wife said, I feel like you're back. [00:08:00] And I'm like, what do you mean? He said, I don't know. There's just like a, a light heartedness or maybe I'm being a bit more funny or just not as serious. And it's not like anything's been terrible. I just haven't been myself. Uh, and I said to him, how old are you?

[00:08:13] DANIEL: And he said, oh, nearly 53. And I'm like, you know, the research that basically, you've gone through the bottom of the midlife slump and he's like, no. And we had a great conversation and he was like, oh wow, I wish I knew this before. So um, so the, the happiness research has been popularised by a guy called Jonathan Rourke.

[00:08:29] DANIEL: We've got the book here called The Happiness Curve. Uh, but basically he popularised research that's been around for a long, long time. There's been numerous studies, like hundreds of studies since the seventies looking at life satisfaction and happiness across decades. different stages of life across multiple countries and the results have basically come across as being the same.

[00:08:50] DANIEL: So there's something embedded in the human experience, which is represented as what we call the happiness curve. And so imagine you're mapping a kind of a graph with life [00:09:00] satisfaction or happiness on the vertical axis and then the horizontal axis is your age. So how long you've lived for, uh, and imagine an upside down curve.

[00:09:08] DANIEL: So like a smiley face. And essentially. When you're in your 20s, people are typically the happiest in life. And we'll talk about the tweak that's happened since COVID at the end of this bit. But generally, in the research, people are happiest in their 20s, and then throughout their 30s, they slowly dip in life satisfaction and happiness, so the curve goes down, until they hit this kind of midlife slump, where uh, across broad population trends, people are less happy, particularly around 45 to maybe 55 with 47 being the kind of the global trend.

[00:09:42] DANIEL: If you put all the countries together, being that kind of smashing point of unhappiness just in 48. Yeah. I'm turning 47 very soon. Lucky me.

[00:09:48] MATT: My condolences.

[00:09:49] DANIEL: Yeah. I thought it was you making me depressed. It was my age. Um, I think I play my part, but, uh, [00:10:00] after that, and this is why we call it the paradox of aging, not just the happiness curve, is that people tend to get happier.

[00:10:06] DANIEL: You know, they get happier in their late 50s, they get happier in their 60s, happier in their 70s, and even in their 80s, or even in our 80s, we are happier than we were in our 40s, so happiness keeps increasing, which I find incredibly encouraging, particularly when I sit in this midlife squeeze right now and think, oh, mate, life is just, and it's harder than it has been to be thankful and to be grateful and to just to get through life.

[00:10:30] DANIEL: It's really encouraging to know that actually as I get older, even if I get sicker and even if I lose some of my mobility, the research suggests I'm actually likely to be happier even than in my thirties. Yeah. Which I think is cool.

[00:10:41] MATT: It's cool. Um, just to like make a couple of clarifications or, or, or distinctions.

[00:10:45] MATT: So we're talking, I assume when we're talking about that slump, we're not talking about a midlife crisis, are we? Because from what I've read, like midlife crises, like proper, I guess full blown, they're only, I think they're only in about 10 percent of the population, people in midlife. Yeah. So there's [00:11:00] that.

[00:11:00] DANIEL: When I think of midlife crisis, I think of more the suboptimal responses that you and I talked about last time, like the avoidance responses or the denial responses that lead to the kind of behaviours that you might classify as a guy in their forties and fifties having that midlife crisis. So it depends on how you want to define it.

[00:11:19] DANIEL: But what we're saying is this is a universal thing.

[00:11:21] MATT: Yeah. Yeah. That's right. That's right. So the, um, So like the, the, the term, and I like, it's kind of fancy, it's a 10 word, but I like like the term that I've heard for it again. So slump is different from crisis. Slump is more like this almost, this almost, um, epidemic sense of ennui.

[00:11:36] MATT: All right. So ennui, classy French word. You've heard of that. Don't pretend you haven't heard that word. Okay. So it's like, I don't speak, I can hardly speak Tasmania. It's like, it's like feeling listless, almost like continually like low grade dissatisfaction. Okay. Not having very much energy. But just like feeling like that something's off.

[00:11:53] DANIEL: But you're talking about the idea that, uh, in your midlife slump, and again, this is, this is what Jonathan Rourke would say. It's quite [00:12:00] common to feel dissatisfied in life without necessarily having any reason to be dissatisfied. Yeah. Yeah. That's right. Yeah. That's good. Actually, what's interesting is in almost every country you see the same slump, except for Russia.

[00:12:11] DANIEL: So in Russia, you get less happy in your 30s, you get less happy in your 40s, and then you never become happier ever again. You just stay slumped, which is probably why they drink so much vodka. But, for the general population, you see this curve.

[00:12:23] MATT: That's good. I feel like we've just risked losing a whole segment of our audience, our global audience.

[00:12:26] MATT: Now there goes the reach.

[00:12:29] DANIEL: Yeah, I know. We've just lost a particular subsection of our audience. Uh, and, uh, so to summarise the happiness curve, life satisfaction or happiness starts to slowly decline after your 20s into your 30s. It slumps and you're at your kind of bottom of the dip in your late 40s, early 50s, and then you become happier.

[00:12:44] DANIEL: Which I think is really encouraging, we'll talk about that a bit later. Uh, the only caveat is a lot of this research has been done, you know, for 20 years up to let's say COVID and what we're noticing, well, probably actually not just COVID, but what we're noticing in the last five to eight [00:13:00] years, particularly in young people, is that their levels of happiness has increasingly skydived in comparison to all other generations gone before.

[00:13:09] DANIEL: to the point now where young people are actually more unhappy, or at least as unhappy as people in the midlife slump. So you're not seeing a happiness curve anymore, or at least we're suspecting there may not be the same curve. But I don't think that changes the trajectory of the human condition. I think what that says is there's something going on in teens and Gen Z in terms of their mental health, their anxiety, their depression

[00:13:33] DANIEL: levels that is completely unique. Uh, it's, it's very different than any other generation. If you look at the research from Jonathan Haidt, who wrote The Anxious Generation, he would suggest that it's the main factors are the shift from a play based childhood to a phone or screen based childhood. So basically as soon as you give teenagers smartphones with open access internet, with social media, their mental health, uh, and that's been shown again [00:14:00] and again that social media causes depression and anxiety in teenagers.

[00:14:04] DANIEL: Uh, I've written a lot about this in my book Raising Tech Healthy Humans, which really goes into it in great detail, um, about why we should slow down with social media. Some tech with young kids, uh, particularly kids in primary school, preteens, uh, and particularly internet based technologies as opposed to like old fashioned television screens, because you need your kids to have a healthy brain, healthy social skills, and healthy mental health in order to be great in a tech economy as they get older.

[00:14:32] DANIEL: So it's not an anti tech book, but it is, it is, very much expressing that there are a number of factors going on right now. While mental health and happiness is very multifaceted and there's lots of different components that are happening that might impact young people, the big pointer is the way they're using social media and the way they're not doing other aspects of life as a result.

[00:14:53] DANIEL: Particularly friendships. And in person community. Sure. Which we've talked about as a key predictor of happiness in all stages of life.

[00:14:59] MATT: [00:15:00] Yeah. It feels like we're in the middle of a vast social experiment with our kids and the results are starting to show that it's going bad.

[00:15:18] DANIEL: Okay. So we've talked about the happiness slump and the midlife squeeze. Yeah. Before we dive into what do we do about it, it'd be good to just clarify what we mean by happiness because it's a bit of a loaded term. It's like, it's like the vibe.

[00:15:39] DANIEL: Tell me what is happiness.

[00:15:40] MATT: So you're right. It's like the vibe, I think, apart from the fact that as you hinted at before, it's, um, it's also something that was kind of nebulous. It's also been studied now. So it's, it's got like its own kind of branch of study, I suppose, in science, right? Which means that the, the, the term is often contested because they even fly for the person on the street.

[00:15:57] MATT: If I ask you, are you happy? And I asked the person [00:16:00] next to you, are you happy? You probably got two slightly different conceptions of what we mean by happy. Yeah. Yeah. So classically throughout history, I reckon you can argue there's been two broad types of happiness. And it's really important to remember that these to some degree, you know, they, they do intersect and overlap.

[00:16:15] MATT: Okay. So they're not, it's not, you know, clear, hard and fast boundaries between the two, but still. So the first is usually a kind of term, this is the most recent. So this is like kind of common, almost vanilla understanding of happiness for most people. And you can call it hedonic. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So hedonic happiness right, is about how I feel subjectively, so it's gonna be largely caught up with my emotions or my affect.

[00:16:36] MATT: And it's usually gonna come down to, again, some, um, something that I've experienced recently, which has made me feel happy in the moment.

[00:16:43] DANIEL: Mm.

[00:16:43] MATT: Or perhaps something that I've acquired recently. Happy.

[00:16:46] DANIEL: So you're saying basically hedonic.

[00:16:47] MATT: Yeah. Hedonics is what you feel.

[00:16:50] DANIEL: You feel good. It is happiness based on a feeling.

[00:16:52] MATT: Yeah. Yeah. Feeling a feeling. But again, if I feel good, I'm happy. If I feel bad.

[00:16:54] DANIEL: Yeah. That's right.

[00:16:56] MATT: But again, it's really important to remember that feeling is largely going to be [00:17:00] directly and distinctly related to something that I've done, all that's happened to me. Okay. So that's a dynamic happy. And that's important, right?

[00:17:07] MATT: That's like that. You want to feel happy. You want to feel happy. There's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with that. But related to that is this other, and I'd say more kind of, um, I guess like long lived historical notion of what is meant by, um, happiness here. And if you really love the dynamic, you're going to love this one.

[00:17:23] MATT: Okay. So eudaimonic. Monic. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, monic. Monic. Yeah. So E-U-D-A-I-M-O-N-I-C. Alright. Yeah. Eudaimonic. Right. And this is like, this goes all the way back to say, um, uh, the uh

[00:17:36] DANIEL: it’s a Greek word.

[00:17:37] MATT: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I, I believe so, right? Yeah. Yeah. And, and the Greeks definitely talked about it. So if you read Aristotle, then you'll pick up this idea of him talking about what does it mean to be happy?

[00:17:46] MATT: And he means more this in our English language now, this would be more wellbeing. So it's more happiness is a sense of wellbeing, or it's a sense of happiness as fulfillment. So it's more about if you want this kind of happiness, then you [00:18:00] need to be living a good life and you need to be doing good things.

[00:18:04] MATT: So it's a life of virtue of like being a good person. So it's not so much about feelings, although they're important, it's more about actions and living in accord with some ideal of a good life. And that will give you over time, like it's not going to, you know, say like, um, it's not going to give you the same buzz as you've got.

[00:18:22] MATT: If you've just gone and bought the new car, maybe, you know what I mean? Or you just got like the job promotion or you’ve just eaten like a really delicious meal, but it's, it's more, you know, life can be hard sometimes. And even in these challenging circumstances, I can say that I've lived it. Well, I've done good things and I feel fulfilled and a sense of well being.

[00:18:38] DANIEL: So you're saying that even if, I won't say if, because we talked about it last episode, when sadness, suffering, disappointment, grief happens, when someone betrays you, when you get sick or you lose a loved one, like when, you know, shitty stuff happens in your life, if, if hedonic happiness is your primary frame, well then you can't be happy, right?

[00:18:58] DANIEL: Yeah, that's right. Because [00:19:00] bad things have happened. Whereas if your happiness is based on good living, and living according to your values, having a purpose in life, I assume contributing outside of yourself, so it's not about, it's not about yourself, but it's about how you give and how you contribute. If that's the frame for how you live, then happiness becomes a by product of that, even if things are happening that, aren't positive around, you can still have this deep sense of purpose and meaning.

[00:19:24] DANIEL: Maybe joy is what I would say in a traditional sense, you know, like, which isn't necessarily a feeling of happiness, but it's just long lasting, deep sense that I'm okay, of okayness in spite of suffering. Is that, are we in the same track?

[00:19:35] MATT: I think, yeah, yeah, that's right. That's right. And just like picking up super quick on something that you said hedonic happiness can be so easily associated with just the individual.

[00:19:44] MATT: And my world, like in my experience, right? Again, the second type that we're talking about, it's going to involve other people. It's going to, which like we all know, right? We all get if you're, you know, um, you've got a, um, a child who you love, you've got a partner who you love to some degree, your happiness is going to be affected by their happiness.

[00:19:59] DANIEL: So there is a [00:20:00] sense where, okay, so you're saying that, um, happiness also has to have a frame of relationship.

[00:20:04] MATT: Yeah, that's right. And I don't like, these are hardly original ideas, right? Like, so there's a whole, that, that whole branch of, um, psychology, positive psychology has been, I suppose, like talking about this now for a, for a long time.

[00:20:15] MATT: I think for our purpose is just to call it, to, uh, to keep it simple. We don't want a thin version of happiness. We're not talking about a thin version. We want a thick multifaceted version of happiness. Yeah. That's what we're talking about. So it's going to involve the hedonic, the eudaimonic and again, institutions of the people, et cetera, et cetera.

[00:20:30] DANIEL: So look again, these are great concepts. Uh, but you and I didn't start this podcast just because we're conceptually interested. I mean, the rea, the reality is you and I find life a bit tough, right?

[00:20:40] MATT: Mm.

[00:20:40] DANIEL: And a lot of our friends are finding life tough. Mm. And when we have conversations about the happiness curve, we actually find it really encouraging.

[00:20:48] DANIEL: Yeah. Because it means, oh, if life's tough right now, it's actually part of the human experience. And it doesn't mean that as I get older, life's just gonna stay hard in all likelihood, because age is an independent variable of [00:21:00] happiness. Yes. Outside of all the other things. It's likely that life is going to get easier, but in this slump, we want to know how to deal with it.

[00:21:07] MATT: Yeah. Yeah. Love it. That's great. So A, you're not alone. Yeah. And B it's highly likely to get better.

[00:21:12] DANIEL: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And look, so I've got to admit like since you and I have been reading this and reflecting on this again, I've, I think I've become, I don't know if I've become more aware or maybe I've just been more honest about some of my dissatisfaction in life.

[00:21:25] DANIEL: There's really nothing for me to be dissatisfied about. Like I've actually been, got a lot of amazing things going for me. I'm so grateful. I've got an amazing wife, my family's healthy, you know, finances are okay. There's a stretch, but it's okay. You know, I love my job. So I'm healthy, you know, so many, so many things to actually be thankful about.

[00:21:42] DANIEL: And yet I struggle at the moment. And, um, I was reading, I was reading your book, actually, the good life. And they talk about the difference between the external life and the internal life. And actually, often in the midlife slump or the midlife squeeze, uh, you might be doing well on the outside. You know, you can look at my [00:22:00] life and think, hey, I wish I had his life.

[00:22:01] DANIEL: But then on the inside, your, your inward experience actually feels quite different. And that's a very hard place to be, especially when I think, you know, people look at you as a leader and you should have it all together, but on the inside, you're just not okay. And I was at the gym the other day and there's all these signs up that say, it's okay not to be okay.

[00:22:23] DANIEL: You know, the most powerful words to say is you're not okay. And I kind of smile at that kind of stuff, but then honestly, I've been thinking, God, I'm probably not okay. And I should probably be honest about it, not into like a podcast necessarily, but, um, so you know, you and I have had chats and, and it's been, it's been helpful just to say, you know what, I'm not that okay.

[00:22:48] DANIEL: Um, and last week I had a bunch of people over, we'd meet once a week for like a church house group type thing. And you know, someone said, oh, who should we pray for? And I, my wife [00:23:00] looked at me and I'm like, okay, it would be great to have some prayer because I'm not that okay. And I was really encouraged by just being able to say that and have people understand.

[00:23:12] DANIEL: There was one guy that said to me, you know, I see you, in the sense of, I can't fix it, but I can see the wrestles that you have and I'm with you in that. And then another friend of mine rung me up and said, do you want to go for a walk? We walked on the mountain. It was freezing. It was raining. We went for a walk on the mountain last week and we didn't talk about really serious stuff, but it was just a place to reconnect.

[00:23:37] DANIEL: And I know, I knew he was chasing me up because I'm not finding life that okay. And I think that's something that can help through the midlife squeeze.

[00:23:46] MATT: Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Both. I'd suggest like say you in this case, but also your peers that hear that. Cause again, it's reinforcing to them, not alone. Yeah. If they're feeling that then they know now tangibly through you.

[00:23:57] DANIEL: Yeah. Well it's not just me. Yeah.

[00:23:59] MATT: Yeah. I mean [00:24:00] you find, you find this period life. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Again, I'm, you know, I'm, I'm. I'm a little bit older than you, and I found, I found, um, and you're gonna die earlier, gonna die like a year earlier, uh, if the internet never gets it wrong. Yeah. Uh, so I have found like the last couple of years, uh, challenging.

[00:24:17] MATT: Yeah. And it's been a combination of things, you know, so I've had like the regular, you get older and stuff, just, you know, um, phys, physiological changes like sicknesses, ailments again, and, and. The really confronting thing about all of that is that, um, there was no kind of obvious cause and effect. It was just simply bad luck and unlucky gene pool and kind of like any other, and none of it was like major, but it's like suddenly, you know, my health started to hit and my form of physical capabilities hit all these speed humps.

[00:24:42] DANIEL: Yeah, you've had a few scares, so significant enough to shake you.

[00:24:45] MATT: Yes, but, and then like there's been also, so here's the big thing, right? So if you want to like the big kind of title, it's being, um, undeniably confronted with the fact that you, are now an older person. Yeah. And that's confronting. And the catalyst for that was like, the [00:25:00] thing just made a stand out for me. Do you watch the bear on Disney?

[00:25:03] DANIEL: The bear made you realize you're old?

[00:25:04] MATT: So have you seen the bear?

[00:25:05] DANIEL: No, but you have, you have tried to get, I just don't watch enough TV. Yeah. So what's the bear, right?

[00:25:09] MATT: The bear. So the bear is fantastic. That's hardly an original thing to say, but one of the things that I really, really dig about the bear is a soundtrack.

[00:25:19] MATT: And I think from my, you know, my half baked research, the creators, the showrunners actually kind of handpicked the soundtrack, I mean, when I was reading like an article in a magazine about the bear and they mentioned the soundtrack, you know, and it started off the line with something like, and the soundtrack is really fantastic.

[00:25:36] MATT: And I'm a guy who, I guess, you know, part of my identity has always been really loving music and thinking that I've been on the cutting edge of music and had great musical taste and blast. This has been part of like who I was as a, younger person. So Finnish rock stars. Yeah. Yeah. So something I could bring to the table when I was talking to older people.

[00:25:48] MATT: Right. So I'm reading this going, yeah, that's great. It feels so validated. I like the soundtrack. This guy thinks he's trying that and then blah, blah, blah. And then the back half of the sentence was, you know, it's a great soundtrack. If you're into dad rock, [00:26:00] man. I've had even this ripped away from me. This has been taken away from me now.

[00:26:05] MATT: Even this thing that I cherish as part of like, you know, who I am or a value about myself. I was a guy who had great musical taste and cutting edge, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And now even this. Sure.

[00:26:16] DANIEL: So I suppose that you're just not as relevant as you are.

[00:26:16] MATT: Yeah, that's right. That's right. I'm just not as relevant and like definitely now in the older dad rock category, you know?

[00:26:23] MATT: And so that like, and seriously, so with that, like comes all the stuff that we've talked about before. Like again, you know, um, there's the regret. So I, I can't, I can't, and I personally don't trust anyone who says they've gotten to our age and doesn't have any regrets. You haven't lived enough or you're not self aware enough.

[00:26:36] MATT: Yep, or you don't have big enough dreams. Yeah, you don't have big enough dreams. So there's stuff now I look upon and now I can regret and it's also like there's the um, what do they call it? There's that, that, that phenomenon of the death of dreams. So stuff that I thought was a real possibility, perhaps when I was younger, something was just like naive and overblown ego, but some of that stuff now, it just, it's not going to happen.

[00:26:54] DANIEL: Yeah. Yeah. And look, I think for me, a lot of it is actually just practical stuff that every day I get up, I [00:27:00] make lunches, I clean dishes. And then I, you know, I'm squeezed for finances. I've got a crap load of emails and I'm always stretched for time teaching people about how to make space because that's just part of what it looks like to run a business.

[00:27:14] DANIEL: And I'm still wrestling with all those other things about, you know, where is my career going and is it actually making an impact and how much time do I have left? So again, they're probably more existential questions mixed up. Yes. The reality that life is just, it's super stretched. Yeah. Yeah. I do think that it's a genetic thing because it's not just a cultural or social thing.

[00:27:31] DANIEL: And certainly with women, you know, menopause is a massive change. The change is much more physiological and much more obvious. And so, you know, we can't really speak to that with expertise, but, um, but there's also changes in male physiology as well, particularly around the brain and hormones around that time as well.

[00:27:48] DANIEL: But something happens. Uh, and the key is to just sit in that acceptance of it. Yeah. So this might be a good time to have our moment of reflective silence, which I love in this podcast. And listeners [00:28:00] have said they appreciate it as well. Uh, there's so much information out there, but knowledge is what you reflect on and apply, not just what you hear.

[00:28:07] DANIEL: So we would love to give you a moment just to think about your own life. You know, you may be 20 or you may be 30 thinking, wow, you know, I'm so glad I'm not irrelevant like these guys, uh, but into dad rock one day you will be irrelevant. No, it's, uh, no, there's something in it for you. And obviously if you're struggling like we are, if you're not okay, or if you're just finding it, you know, a bit muddy or boggy to get through life, well then there might be relevance, uh, or you might be on the other side and experiencing a lot more happiness and thinking, hey, I'm so glad that I'm not there anymore.

[00:28:37] DANIEL: But um, take a moment to reflect what stands out and is there anything you need to do about it?[00:29:00]

[00:29:57] MATT: Dan, let's go back and talk more about the [00:30:00] happiness curve and particularly like what, what can we do based on our own, I guess, experience, but also probably more importantly, like what we've read from people who've gone before us.

[00:30:08] DANIEL: Absolutely. So there's a number of things that you and I have come up with to help us when you're in the middle of the curve.

[00:30:14] DANIEL: Yeah. Uh, and look, the first one, uh, came from this quote that I read from Jonathan Rourke again from the Happiness Curve. Uh, he says, the midlife slump is completely normal and natural. Like teething or adolescence, it is a healthy, if sometimes painful transition, and it serves a purpose by equipping you for a new stage of life.

[00:30:33] DANIEL: You may feel dissatisfied, but you don't need to feel too worried about feeling dissatisfied. And I read that and I'm like, oh, that is a ripper because there's nothing, it's a bit like anxiety. The worst part of anxiety is worrying about the fact that you have anxiety. Yes. And I think the same is true when it comes to the midlife slump.

[00:30:48] DANIEL: There's, you know, there's nothing worse than feeling dissatisfied and concerned about the fact that you're. So, uh, the first thing that you and I came up with is we would encourage you to practice [00:31:00] acceptance and acceptance is simply firstly knowing that there's a happiness curve, but the second thing is just to accept that that's part of life and, and that there's a purpose to it.

[00:31:09] MATT: That's it. Yeah. Yeah. That's it. So like Richard Rohr, who we both like has that, that, that cool quote about in the second half of life, you must and will lose at something. And he sees that as like a transition, something to help get you again from the first, the second half.

[00:31:24] DANIEL: Uh, and I think the difference between you that quote from Rourke, you know, when your kids are teething, everyone knows they're teething.

[00:31:30] DANIEL: When your kids are in adolescence and they're doing crazy teen things, everyone's like, oh, well, they're just learning to be an adult. Right? But when someone who's 45, who's a CEO of a company starts to feel like they're not okay on the inside, everyone laughs at you. Yeah. You know what I mean? And so, um, It's, it's a harder transition because it's not societally accepted or understood or supported.

[00:31:51] DANIEL: So the second thing we'd recommend outside of acceptance is to start reflecting on your bigger picture. So we said reflect on your why. Uh, and there's a great, I think, I [00:32:00] think this is part of the purpose of the period is to rethink what you value. Rethink what your imagination of your life should be, and maybe take a deeper dive into the inner life, even to reflect on your strengths, to reflect on, uh, your experiences of life and, and maybe even to reframe them for the future.

[00:32:17] MATT: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Definitely. The, um, like the kind of pithy summary that I've heard of this is, is asking, answering the question at this stage of life, how do I make my life count?

[00:32:26] DANIEL: Yeah. I do think you moved from being a kind of a producer and a doer where you're at the centre of it and you're trying to, I don't know, change the world by yourself.

[00:32:34] DANIEL: Yeah. To, to being a person who starts to, to mentor others, to, to give beyond yourself.

[00:32:41] MATT: Yeah.

[00:32:42] DANIEL: And the sense of what it means to leave a significant legacy changes.

[00:32:45] MATT: I think in psychology that the, the term that I use for this is generative. So you want to move like towards a generative mindset and perspective in life.

[00:32:53] MATT: And that is instead of again, being largely and understandably kind of preoccupied with the project of self and building that [00:33:00] container that we talked about before. Now in this kind of midlife slump, I start to turn intentionally direct my resources, my time, my gifts towards people and causes beyond and outside of myself.

[00:33:12] DANIEL: That's interesting. And we're going to talk a bit more about the different intelligences next. week, which actually give you a bit of clues into why this is important from a physiological scientific makes sense.

[00:33:22] MATT: Yeah.

[00:33:22] DANIEL: Yeah. Okay, cool. So if you're in this place of feeling dissatisfied or having this internal churn of wanting to ask the bigger questions, my encouragement to you would be what David Allen says, give attention to what you're giving attention to.

[00:33:35] DANIEL: And that requires making space, which is why we're the Spacemakers. It typically requires not ignoring the problems and not overly fixating on them, but at least doing activities that might help you reflect deeply about your purpose, your vision, your why. Um, it might involve, for example, learning to forgive or learning to reflect on what [00:34:00] your values are and becoming clear about that, or starting to think about what has worked in your past that you want to take forward and what would you like to let go.

[00:34:08] DANIEL: So those, those kinds of questions, they take time.

[00:34:10] MATT: And to answer them, I think is an endeavour that's probably not best taken alone. So, um, I've had this idea and this might be like one of the few completely original ideas I've ever had in my life. So I'm going to, is there a great word for it? No, no, no.

[00:34:24] MATT: Mattamonia. Yeah. Not yet, but I'm going to try to coin one eventually. But this is for now, like the working title is like, uh, the paradox of middle aged self knowledge. And here it is, so I, I've now been around the block long enough to be really familiar with my faults, with my predispositions, you know, with, uh, with my biases, with my personality, temperament, like I've done all that stuff, you know, so I'm really, really self aware.

[00:34:46] MATT: Yeah. Yeah. I didn't have that earlier, but the paradox is at the same time, I've also like lived long enough to know that my capacity for self delusion is really extreme, right? I could talk myself into believing anything, justifying, rationalizing anything. [00:35:00] So I put those two things together, right? That's a paradox.

[00:35:02] MATT: Pretty snappy there. So when it comes to reflecting, I need to have at least one or two people in my life that have like an access all areas backstage pass, ask me anything who can come in and help me answer those questions honestly, for my sake.

[00:35:16] DANIEL: Now what I love about that. So you're saying that on the one hand we understand ourselves more, but on the other hand, we're more aware that actually we know nothing.

[00:35:23] DANIEL: We are deluded. So therefore it's helpful to, uh, process with others.

[00:35:26] MATT: It's necessary. Yeah.

[00:35:28] DANIEL: Yep. So look, if you're interested, we are big fans of CliftonStrengths. That is one small thing that you could do, which is a Gallup tool to help you reflect on what your top five strengths are or your top 34 strengths based on heaps and heaps and heaps of research.

[00:35:40] DANIEL: I'm a strength coach. I'm a big believer that we should focus on what's working, not what's not. And, uh, so yeah, like I'd encourage you to do that test or, you know, Myers Briggs. There's other kinds of assessments that are useful. That's a good place to start. Uh, we do have coaching at, uh, spacemakers.au/strengths.

[00:35:58] DANIEL: If you're interested, there's strengths based [00:36:00] coaching. There's kind of reset coaching that, or just again, talking to friends and, you know, asking them honest questions and having that type of authentic relationship that helps you walk through this period of life and actually get some gold out of it.

[00:36:21] DANIEL: Okay, so we've talked about acceptance and we've talked about, uh, spending time thinking about your why, uh, then there's just the practical stuff like invest in your happiness because actually hard to experience a sense of, feelings of happiness, uh, when you're in the midlife slump. That's just well documented.

[00:36:40] DANIEL: So you have to, it's not that you can't feel happy. It's not that you can't have life satisfaction. It just, you have to work a bit harder at it to get the same effect, which is probably no different than like exercise.

[00:36:53] MATT: It's harder to get fit when you're 50 than it is when you're 20, but you can get there.

[00:36:54] DANIEL: You just have to approach it differently. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. So, um, Some of the clear things in the research, you know, sleep and [00:37:00] exercise help with happiness. Eat more vegetables, you know, have less sugar, eat a healthy diet. Drink less alcohol. It matters what you put in your body. Yes. And particularly when you're in midlife onwards.

[00:37:11] MATT: Yeah, that's right. Uh, can't get away with the stuff that you used to when you were younger.

[00:37:15] DANIEL: Can't get away with the stuff you used to. Yeah. So things change. Yeah. Uh, practice gratitude and thankfulness. That's one of the things I've really picked up over the last five years. Every day I write in my thankfulness journal, just I write three things I'm thankful for because I'm naturally more of a, you know, glass half empty type of guy.

[00:37:32] DANIEL: So it's, again, it's a practice. It's a rewiring of the brain and that's really helpful.

[00:37:36] MATT: And I've got to say, hearing it from you, I think lends more credibility to me. Cause you are a guy who's half empty as opposed to half full. So to hear that from you, that it works is great. Yeah. It means a lot. It's good.

[00:37:46] DANIEL: Yeah. Well, I mean, again, I, it, it works. I think when you practice the habit and when there's an internal desire and that there's wisdom to be happy rather than to complain all the time, like that was actually a mindset shift. That actually, I want to be a happy [00:38:00] person and I want to be positive because there's wisdom in that, rather than just critiquing everything.

[00:38:04] DANIEL: And the second thing is I'm going to put in the hard yards to try to let my mind change. So I think it's not just writing down stuff in your journal, it's actually writing stuff down as that daily practice with that internal desire. It's like stopping smoking. You've got to stop the cigarettes, but you also have to change the internal beliefs and story along the way.

[00:38:21] DANIEL: Uh, but yes, I agree with that. I think it's very helpful. Uh, and the last one though, is, uh, is examining the inner life, which is probably partly thankfulness and gratitude, prayer, meditation, taking the time to start to think about your inner journey, not just your outer journey. And we'll do a whole episode on this.

[00:38:36] DANIEL: Yeah. Yeah. That's it. Yes. Yeah. But the big one, yes, because we do have to go to the research. It's great to say exercise because I'm a physio by background and diet and sleep. But none of them are the main key factors for happiness.

[00:38:48] MATT: No.

[00:38:48] DANIEL: Drumroll. If there was one research based factor or thing you could do to help you through the midlife slump or actually help you to become happy at any age,

[00:38:58] MATT: Mm hmm.

[00:38:59] DANIEL: what's the [00:39:00] number one thing?

[00:39:00] MATT: It is, and probably like for a bunch of our listeners, no surprise, it is social connection. I think that will be a surprise to a lot of people. You think so? Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. I feel like we've been, you know, like we've been threatening to kind of pull back the curtain for the last couple of episodes now.

[00:39:12] DANIEL: Maybe they'll pull it onto that, but yeah, maybe not. I suppose when I open up, you know ABC.com, there's always articles about health, fitness, exercise, mindfulness. There's very rarely articles that say the number one thing you can do to make your life healthy and happy is to have a regular coffee with a friend.

[00:39:31] DANIEL: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So again, one of those things we might know in our head. Yes. But the culture doesn't support it. It definitely doesn't support it. So this isn't just a half baked idea. Yeah. The data supports this. It's not a hypothesis. It's actually a fact.

[00:39:43] MATT: Yeah. Yeah. That's right. That's right.

[00:39:45] DANIEL: Where do we get this from?

[00:39:46] MATT: Yeah. So the most, as far as I know, rigorous, robust, verified study that supports this is again, the Harvard study of adult development that we referenced a couple of episodes ago, um, which again has been promoted in this book by, um, the director, I think, and co director of [00:40:00] the, of the study.

[00:40:00] DANIEL: Yeah. For the Good Life by Waldinger

[00:40:03] MATT: Yeah.

[00:40:03] MATT: Who would the current, uh, directors and co directors. So I've been going for, um, 80 years plus now. And they came up, um, they kind of summarized it again in this beautiful headline quote, the people who were the most satisfied in their relationships at age 50 were the healthiest. That's both mentally and physically at age 80.

[00:40:21] DANIEL: So if you're, let's say in your mid forties, you're struggling with, you know, relationships, you're, you're time poor, you know, all the stuff we're talking about, the number one thing you can do to set yourself up for a great life is to start investing in regular meaningful relationships with a fairly wide group of people.

[00:40:35] DANIEL: It doesn't have to be huge, but it has to be bigger than your spouse and kids.

[00:40:39] MATT: Yes. So it has to go beyond your immediate family. Yeah.

[00:40:41] DANIEL: And yet friendships is what we often neglect. And I've read a number of other books and a number of other studies. I loved a book by Susan Pinker called The Village Effect.

[00:40:49] DANIEL: She's a social neuroscientist, which I reckon is a cool term. And she looked at the randomized control studies and the systematic reviews, uh, and she summarized it, all the [00:41:00] happiness research and longevity research with this pithy quote that neglecting to keep in close contact with people who are important to you is at least as dangerous to your health as a pack a day cigarette habit, hypertension, or obesity.

[00:41:11] DANIEL: And this research is in my book Spacemakers as well, uh, where they looked at what are the factors that help you live longer and obviously stopping smoking is important. It's important. It helps you live longer, uh, living in a place where you can breathe fresh air. So Hobart rather than Jakarta will allow you to live longer.

[00:41:28] DANIEL: Having exercise therapy after a heart attack will help you live longer. But the number one and the number two things are wide social relationships and deep connections with people you love. They're the ones that matter more. So, therefore, it's a simple message, but it's a hard message, and we're going to explore this more in the friendship episode.

[00:41:44] MATT: That's right. That's right. Like, just tell me. Don't neglect friends. Okay, cool. But if I smoke with friends, like, does that cancel out everything? So, I'm just like, neutral? Is that okay?

[00:41:51] DANIEL: As long as you're doing your diabetes exercises at the same time. Okay, cool. Um, so, if you're in the happiness slump, we've said practice acceptance, reflect on your why, do the types of [00:42:00] things that will invest in your happiness, particularly, reconnect with and build meaningful friendships.

[00:42:06] DANIEL: The last one is simply to wait it out. And I like how Jonathan Rourke said, out of everything, if you're in the happiness dip, wait until you get older because age is an independent variable of happiness. And I think that's encouraging. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So keep on going, keep living your most valuable life.

[00:42:28] DANIEL: And eventually you'll start to feel happier according to the research.

[00:42:31] MATT: Yeah. Yeah. There's great comfort in that.

[00:42:32] DANIEL: So we've talked about heaps of stuff. Hopefully this has been a useful episode looking at the science and some of our experiences, but we always like to finish the Spacemakers podcast with a practical activity because it's what you do for a living

[00:42:45] DANIEL: that counts. What's our activity to help you through the happiness curve or to help you if you're approaching it.

[00:42:50] MATT: So we've got not one but two. So the first one, so this is for you if you're like in your 20s and 30s right so and um and we talked about this we want this to be almost a [00:43:00] preventative. I would put money on the fact that you've got people in your life that you know you are at risk of, um, neglecting or having kind of just drop out, yeah, drop out.

[00:43:09] MATT: So we're going to encourage you this week, make, build a regular pattern in which you can start people again, it could be monthly and monthly is probably like realistic, you know, fortnightly, maybe if you're fortunate enough to have that kind of free time. So that could be like go to a movie that could be like start a book club that could be like just catch up for a beer or a coffee, but build it into your calendar and your schedule now because it's going to be, um, we talked about this last time.

[00:43:34] MATT: One of the, uh, one of the risks, common risks for, um, um, entering adulthood. So that 20 to kind of, you know, 30 up to 40 age range is that you can be so understandably preoccupied with building your career, doing well at that, that you neglect close friendships,

[00:43:49] DANIEL: even family, obviously, but you miss on, you miss the broader community.

[00:43:52] DANIEL: You miss the broader community. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that's for the twenties and thirties. Tell me about what we recommend for the old farts like you and I. Yeah.

[00:43:59] MATT: Yeah. So again, like [00:44:00] we're probably going to have people like older friends in our lives, hopefully. And again, our risk is that we have neglected them like me.

[00:44:06] MATT: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So this is about not so much a preventative measure, but more about, or, um, more about reconnecting. So start a podcast with a friend. Yeah. Yeah. That's right. If you've got the drive, yeah. Start a podcast with a friend. Um, so I want you to think about someone who you haven't seen for ages, but, um, and usually if you're like me, you haven't seen them for ages, but they're just going through your head.

[00:44:26] MATT: Like the name is just popping through your head. Like every couple of days, he can always think, man, I've got to reconnect my issue. I'll call that person. It's like the classic things you run into them in the street and you're always finding yourself saying to each other. And you made it like at the moment, hey, we should catch up.

[00:44:37] MATT: We should grab a coffee sometime, but it doesn't ever go any further than that. We're asking you to be more intentional and specific about doing that. Yeah. So actually make it happen. So again, pull out the calendar, you know, like give them a call, text them, and then book something in that's face to face. Yeah.

[00:44:53] DANIEL: So the only difference is we're saying if you're in your twenties and thirties, we'd really encourage you to book a rhythm. So have a higher [00:45:00] bar and actually build in patterns in your life, that's still a great idea in your forties and fifties. But if you're in your forties and fifties and you're feeling like you're really super stretched and you just haven't connected at all, then at least phone a friend and book a time to have a coffee or a walk or something.

[00:45:16] DANIEL: And we would encourage you to think about who. you're going to spend time with, think about what you're going to do specifically, think about when you would like to do it, and also when you're going to contact them. Really like you to grab a sticky note at the end of this podcast, just spend five minutes before you move to the next thing and think about who you're going to contact, what are you going to do, when you're going to call them, or how you're going to connect.

[00:45:40] DANIEL: If you have a mini plan, Even if it's for like, let's call them and book a time a month in the future, it's likely that something will happen. We would love to hear listeners email us at [email protected] and say, hey, I did it. We find that really encouraging. Even in the last series, people photoed [00:46:00] sticky notes and showed us what they were going to do.

[00:46:02] DANIEL: And I found that really helpful. Yeah. Yeah. It was cool. So next week, we would love to have you back here on The Spacemakers. We're going to explore our next topic, which is productivity and the idea that when you're in your 20s and 30s, it is great advice to say yes to a lot of things and to swing at everything.

[00:46:20] DANIEL: And then when you hit your 40s and 50s, it's great to say no to a lot of things. and to be selective in your swing and how do we make that transition to learn to say no for a greater yes. In the meantime feel free to check out spacemakers.au/strengths if you're interested in strengths coaching or reset coaching and at the same time we also have a link in the show notes spacemakers.au/s2

[00:46:46] DANIEL: if you want to download all these activities for the whole season to get a summary of where we're heading as a bit of a pod course. But until next time, be happy.

[00:46:57] MATT: Or if you're not feeling happy, don't worry about it so [00:47:00] much if you're in the midlife slump, okay? It's perfectly normal.

[00:47:05] MATT: And make space.

[00:47:06] NARRATOR: The Spacemakers with Daniel Sih and Matt Bain.

[00:47:09] DANIEL: Big thanks to our sponsor, Bulk Nutrients. Enjoy a 5 percent discount on protein powders and health supplements for orders over 45 dollars at bulknutrients.com.au. Just enter the code Bulk Nutrients.

[00:47:20] NARRATOR: Looking for a speaker at your next big event?

[00:47:25] NARRATOR: Daniel Sih is a best selling author, TEDx speaker and productivity consultant who speaks with audiences around Australia and beyond about productivity and making space. To download his speaker kit and start a conversation, visit spacemakers.au

[00:47:40] NARRATOR: Until next time, make space.