Nobody Wants to Talk About the Struggles of Being a Guy in His 30s
Photo Credit: flickr/Vick the Viking. Usage does not represent endorsement by the photographer.
I’ve heard two pastors that I respect confess that their 30s was a time of confusion, frustration and anger towards God and self. For them it was a decade of abrupt directional changes, unwelcome surprises, disappointments, and a sense that life’s challenges were at times snowballing out of control. It was boot camp for later life, basically.
I really appreciated hearing that because such a confession is rare, and it makes sense to me now for two reasons. One is- I am 32, and I feel like I live that life too often. The other reason is that many guys, myself included, spent much of their 20s being idiots and compiling mistakes. Many of us developed unhealthy appetites at that time, in order to provide cover and a distraction for the pain that grew out of trouble with parents, confusion over identity and career, and the wounds that we took away from failed romantic relationships. We were learning as life happened, and I don’t think a lot of us were prepared for it.
As guys leaving our twenties behind, many of us learned that the wrong appetites can be calmed, priorities can be corrected, and boys can become men. This alone is enough of a reason to fall in love with God, because He’s the one in the trenches with us, able and willing to walk us out of our self-inflicted war. But in the process, all of the wounds and insecurities that were being covered up by those appetites get exposed, and there remains a lot of work to be done. The guy in his 30s may be leaving behind the things that previously defined him, and as a result he may be more “himself” than ever before, but he’s just met his true self recently (the thing previously buried under layers of guilt and vice) so he’s also disoriented, nervous, and insecure. He’s new, essentially. He doesn’t want to lean on the things that used to make him feel good because he knows where those things lead, but sometimes, the right thing to lean on doesn’t show up right away or make complete sense. So he stands, waits, and feels awkward. He loves his wife and his kid, but isn’t really sure what to do with himself beyond that. I’ve had some conversations about this topic with other men in their 30s, and I believe this is not only real and happening, but widespread.
I don’t know why, but I developed a ‘Braveheart’ mentality around the time I graduated high school and it only got worse as my twenties progressed, unfortunately. I think it came about partly from feeling like my contribution was never good enough in earlier years, and from this silly Hollywood Epic idea that all work is not lasting or noble unless it exhausts us. We aren’t living unless we’re Mel Gibson on a torture table getting our guts pulled out. So we dudes must go and go until we have nothing left, so says the myth.
Sure, life is hard at every stage for men and women. Life is hard in Cambodia, and Africa, and Bolivia. But we can’t make the very Western mistake of allowing our guilt over privilege to drive us to keep going too fast just because someone else has it worse. It’s exactly that “man up and get on with it” mentality that has, I believe, a lot of men feeling malnourished and misunderstood. It’s why friendships, while keeping up appearances, often fizzle. It’s why marriages, while still meeting the quota of smiles, attendance at required gatherings, and trips to IKEA, can fall into scandal and end. It has a lot of men operating at a diminished capacity, and searching for answers in ways that we should have outgrown in our 20s. We may not be as emotionally unavailable as the boys in really nice suits on ‘Mad Men,’ but there is still a cultural voice that reminds us “if I vocalize these struggles of mine I am being weak and whiny which is the very thing I’ve been trained to avoid.” So we stay on the hamster wheel, because we’re afraid of the feelings that come out when the room finally gets quiet. It’s no wonder we men get distracted first and weary later.
I’m stepping off the hamster wheel that I’ve created for myself. After next week, I am taking another month-long break from writing. I’ll share some personal reasons why in my next post.
Tell me: if you’re a guy in your 30s, how are you doing? If you are married to a guy in his 30s, how is he doing? You can comment anonymously if you would prefer. What do you do to practice rest in your life?
Thursday, August 4, 2011 at 6:30 am
I have known you since you were eighteen years old, so I have been around for some of your ‘mistakes’ while making a few of my own right along with you. It is good to talk about your feelings and make it plain that even though you have hit a number, you may still feel all the same things you did a decade before. Americans (every human?) tend to put too much pressure on where they ‘should’ be at certain points in their lives. I think it’s a social thing to feel the pressure of ‘the rat race’ even when you are not really in one, or think you have opted out of the race.
The one thing I can say about living through your thirties is that you will see a lot of the same “problems” (in quotes because sometimes they are not really problems, but they feel like they are) and issues come around again. Guess what? They come around in your forties too. I truly believe that we are given the same set of problems/issues over and over and over in our lives. They just come in different disguises, and our task is to LEARN the lesson and how to deal or overcome the hurdle. There have been times in my life, luckily, where I have seen the same wall pop up again and again in my way. The first time that wall showed up I was miserable, scared, and felt it was futile for me to try to survive it — I was sure I wouldn’t survive it. Lo and behold, I came out the other side. Hell, I even learned something about myself; which I didn’t immediately realize that I had. You know when I realized I learned something? The NEXT time that same damn issue came around. But this time it was a little bit easier to deal with and understand, and instead of screaming “Why me?!” all over again, I used a little knowledge from the last time to get me through it. It’s like when your body makes antibodies from that virus you had last flu season to keep you from feeling the effects of that virus ever again. Your body recognizes the invader/problem and deals with it. Life, in a grand sense, can be that way.
I have noticed that I have hit that same wall a few times in my life, and each time I leap over it with a little more ease. Is it totally comfortable to do that? Nope, but it’s easier each time. And it’s not the ONLY wall in my life, but I am learning to scale the others better each time as well.
Tuesday, August 9, 2011 at 7:20 pm
Thanks man- for your friendship (an understatement) and for your encouragement.
Thursday, August 4, 2011 at 3:59 pm
Thank you Ian, for being honest and vulnerable in your blog and sharing your experience of life as a 30 something. I can’t say that I relate with the nervous, disoriented and insecure 30something man you describe above.
I do at times feel the ‘Braveheart’ mentality of needing to suck it up, accomplish everything, and never stop until my last breath has been given, however I feel that stems predominantly from the yearning to live and provide a life for my family that I was neglected when I was younger and that meets the standards of God. That motivation, and the motivation of pleasing my Lord drive this internal hunger for stretching my limits to gain and create a better existence for them, not so much a discontent for my contribution.
Forcing myself into a position of ‘sink or swim’ fresh out of high school and entering the business world at the age of 20 I believe forced me to mature very quickly. I stumbled often and had to learn on my feet in order to survive. People who know me best know that I can be stubborn at times and this didn’t always allow for the easiest learning. Although, I do think it provided a more thorough learning. Looking back, I don’t think I have ever felt so insecure, disoriented, or nervous about life and the challenges it presented as I did in my early 20′s.
Having met my wife, who is my better half undoubtedly, at the age of 24 and marrying her 2 years later allowed me the comfortable calm of which to learn my true self within a loving environment without judgment or ridicule with the constructive attention to help me grow into a better person overall. Having a safe environment to grow, make mistakes, learn, and test life allowed for growth for the both of us in every area possible and therefore makes me feel, now at the age of 31, more confident, secure, and poised for my future than ever before. Having two children that take direction and leadership from me also allows for a certain amount of confidence as well.
Ultimately, I feel the experiences I have personally gone through in my twenties and younger have allowed me to grow abundantly and secure my relationship with God in a way never before thought to exist. This is a continuous, ever changing relationship in which I embrace and thus feel safe, confident, excited, and even exuberant about tackling whatever comes next because of the security and love he provides me. Thanks again for your blog Ian as this is something worth diving into, and has allowed me to search within myself to see exactly where I stand within this topic of discussion.
Tuesday, August 9, 2011 at 7:23 pm
Thanks B for your honesty and for engaging this topic on your own time. Always good to hear from other men.
Thursday, August 25, 2011 at 8:56 pm
This website is fabulous!! I’m up late because I can’t stop reading. This post is wonderful and I as a 32yo woman feel a lot of what you wrote. I have never felt so unsettled as I have felt since hitting 30.
Tuesday, August 30, 2011 at 12:48 pm
Thanks for that Amber and for sharing a bit of your story.
Thursday, February 2, 2012 at 4:09 pm
This is definitely not exclusive to guys in their 30s.
Tuesday, March 27, 2012 at 3:16 pm
I’m catching up with my reading and this is just awesome writing. Although I’m not a guy in my thirties, I know both men and women go through changes in different stages of their lives. Sometimes change brings maturity and direction and other times it creates havoc on beliefs, relationships and the sort. I can agree that being in your thirties is undoubtedly different than it is in your twenties or teens. Life is so full of many opportunities to learn from our good/not so good experiences and it gives us ample time to transition into the person we want to be…