New_Passages

Outline of New Passages by Gail Sheehy Gail Sheehy’s publication New Passages is a sequel to her bestselling book Passages. Since Passages there has been a transformation in the adult life cycle and a shift in the stages of adulthood. People are taking longer to grow up and longer to die, up to ten years longer. The baby boomer generation is throwing out the notion of middle age and charting a whole new second life or adulthood. These adults are going through new passages finding lives with deeper meaning and creativity. First adulthood in western culture divided human life into ages and stages with the need for order and predictability. Until the middle of the 1970s notable events such as graduation, first job, marriage, and children, for most people, occurred at predictable ages. Since then age norms have changed, people are leaving childhood sooner and taking longer to grow up and much longer to die. Actual adulthood is not beginning until age thirty, young adults are living at home longer and most baby boomers do not feel like they are completely grown up until they are into their forties. The population is by and large healthier today because people are taking better care of themselves as they enter old age. “Already the average healthy man who is 65 today-an age now reached by the great majority of the U.S. population- can expect to live until eighty one” (Sheehy, 1995, p. 6). These new passages have caused changes so dramatic opening up a whole new world known as the second adulthood in middle life. Imagine being reborn at the age of forty five, that is the meaning of second adulthood. There is life after youth, layoff, retirement, menopause, widowhood, and even cancer. Second adulthood involves the shift from young adulthood, wanting to please and prove yourself, to a sense of controlling what happens in your life. You yourself must decide what is relevant for your future. A person may ask themselves how they find a real sense of community or try to find meaning in their life. The person must search for and experiment until they find the right answers for themselves. A person may call upon qualities that were hidden in their youth to shape a new self in adulthood. Many women that were studied admit to becoming more accepting, more outspoken, and less self-conscious. Men have typically always been able to start over at any time, what is new is that women now have the option of a second life in their forties and fifties. Women admit that they had become too involved in their children’s lives and found it hard to live their own. Men and women become freer to convey both the masculine and feminine sides of their personalities. The tension of male and female differences is relaxed. In my experience I believe that Sheehy’s arguments are accurate. I personally still live at home with my parents at the age of twenty eight and am still attending school trying to decide what I want to be when I grow up. As my parents age into their late fifties and early sixties I see definite changes. My father has survived cancer and his outlook on life has changed, he has become very laid back. He spends a lot of time with his friends and my mother doing activities that they enjoy instead of constantly working. Not everyone takes advantage of the second adulthood, most people do not realize that the possibilities are there or have not prepared for it. Second adulthood is about deepening friendships, the satisfaction of mentoring, and the liberty to explore creativity. Sheehy has done hundreds of personal and group interviews and surveys to develop insight into the new passages. Her writing allows people going through similar situations to better understand their lives. References Sheehy, G. (1995). New Passages. New York: Random House, Inc.