For Ret McKay here and welcome to another edition of the Art of Manly Desire Podcast.

Now when you think about someone having a midlife crisis, you probably think of a man getting

divorced, stepping out with a younger woman and buying a sports car.

But my guess today says the often joky, mockable trope of the midlife crisis we have in our popular

culture discounts the fact that the sense of dissatisfaction people can feel in their

middle years is quite real and that the questions it raises are profound, philosophical, and

worth earnestly grappling with. His name is Kieran Settia, he's a professor philosophy in the

author of Midlife, a philosophical guide. Kieran and I first discuss what researchers have uncovered

about whether the midlife crisis really exists, how it might be better described as a kind of

midlife malaise, and how Kieran's own sense of life dissatisfaction began when he's only in his

mid-30s. We then explore the philosophical reframing that can help in dealing with the existential

issues that the journey into midlife often raises, including feeling like you've missed out on

certain possibilities and feeling regret over your mistakes and misfortunes. We also talk about how

to shift out of one of the primary causes of the midlife malaise, the sense that your life is

merely about putting out fires and checking off boxes. After shows over, check it out

version as an a-wim.is slash midlife. Alright, Kieran Settia, welcome to the show.

Thanks for having me. So you are a professor of philosophy at MIT, you got a book out called

Midlife, a philosophy, and you take a look at the problems that a lot of people face when they

hit those middle years of their life, and you explore whether philosophy has any guidance

for that time period in their life. And you start off the book doing a cultural history of this

idea of the midlife crisis. Looking at the historical record, what's the earliest reference we have

to the midlife crisis? Well, the midlife crisis is really unusual among

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