Life stages are part of the normal growth process. Adult development, like that of children, occurs in a predictable, if not always orderly, pattern. Bodies change. Responsibilities shift. Goals are revised. Dreams are restructured. Self-image fluctuates.
Each life stage poses unique developmental tasks. There are challenges to be met, skills to be developed, issues to be resolved. The young adult must leave the family, establish independence, test values. The older adult needs to accept mortality and personal limitations, nurture deep friendships, deal with grief.
Each stage has its unique stresses. The striving for success after leaving school, the values upheaval of the ‘mid-life crisis’, and the loss of companions that accompanies aging, are intrinsically stressful. Adults have ‘growing pains’ too.
The stress of growth is compounded if we fight the process or don’t give ourselves permission to experience a stage fully.
Following are brief descriptions of the issues commonly encountered from late adolescence onward.
Breaking loose (late teens): Leaving home, focus on peers, testing your wings, loneliness, attachment to causes, changing life style, throwing out family morals, conforming to friends.
Building the nest (twenties): Search for identity, intimate friendships, marriage, intoxication with own power, great dreams, making commitments, taking on responsibilities, getting launched in a career, working toward goals, doing ‘shoulds’, finding a mentor, having children.
Looking around (thirties): Raising questions, recognizing painful limitations, gathering possessions, moving up the career ladder, declining satisfaction in marriage, settling down, desiring freedom, asking “What do I want to do with my life?”
Mid-life rebirth (around forty): Awareness of mortality, diminishing physical energy, emotional turmoil, parenting teenagers, finding new friends, deep questions, changing careers, second adolescence, sense of aloneness, divorce, remarriage, conflicting pressures, remodeling life structure, learning to play again.
Investing in life (fifties): Life reordered, settling down, acting on new values, focus on people instead of possessions and power, selecting a few good friends, last child leaving home, grand-parenting, more financial freedom, enjoying life, empty nest, lost dreams.
Deepening wisdom (later years): Softening feelings, mellowing wisdom, steady commitments to self and others, deepening richness, simplifying life, adjustment to limitations, loss of energy, financial pressures, retirement, quiet joys, self-knowledge, self-acceptance, facing death.
Twilight years: Loneliness, freedom from ‘shoulds’, dependence on those who once depended on you, mind sharp/body failing, body fine/mind failing, loss of mate and friends, preparing for death, sense of peace and perspective.
Toward the Light 