What is your opinion well-off people whining about their lives?

[Xithras]

By all accounts, my life is pretty good. I own a nice house, live in a nice town, have a good job AND own a profitable company, I have great kids, a beautiful wife, secure retirement accounts, and have money in the bank.

So am I being a whiny brat if I admit that my entire existance has seemed pretty damned bland and pointless for the past two months? I look at everything I have and can't help but wonder...what's the point? I drag myself to a job that I once loved, but now seems bland and repetetive. I run a company that I used to enjoy, but that now consumes far too much of my time and makes me money I don't really need. I love my kids, but dealing with them seems like the same old grind every day. I love my wife, but after 11 years the spark seems to be going out. My hobbies no longer interest me, my cats don't like me, and my friends bore me.

I have this voice in my head that keeps telling me to shut the fuck up and enjoy this great life that I've been given. It says "Man, people would kill for your life." But over the past few days I've been watching these runaway bride stories and I can't help but thinking...wow, that chicks got some real balls. The whole idea of just saying "fuck it" and walking off into some vast and unpredictable unknown suddenly has this incredible appeal to me. To have no responsibilities, no daily grind, no employees clamoring for paychecks or kids clamoring for attention. It just sounds so...inviting.

I'm not really asking anything, this post has just been forming in my head all day and I needed to post it somewhere. I'm probably being a dumbass for even having these thoughts.

[Bok_Tukalo]

1. Just buy the damn Porshe

<ope>

[Xithras]

2. I'm only 30, it can't be a midlife crisis yet

I'm way too practical to buy a Porsche anyway...I'm more of a Vespa man :)

[democracyindanger]

21. Not if your ticket's gonna be punched at 60

A rich person whining about being rich would be silly. A rich person reassessing where they are and where they're headed is simply good mental health.

[Xithras]

23. Nah, I'm planning on living until I'm 120

Seriously, I want to irritate my great-great grandkids with my "When I was your age..." stories :)

[n2mark]

3. I'm not as well off but

I have a decent pension plan and collect SS... I'm happy and live the life when I was working. If SS was taken away from me or cut, I would be in deep s---. My social security is my insurance plan.

[ScreamingMeemie]

4. My opinion is that you should talk to your wife about how you are feeling.

See if you can work through it before it destroys something that you may regret destroying later. My father is a miserable man today because he had these thoughts 15 years ago and didn't do anything. I haven't walked a day in your shoes so I cannot judge you, but I beseech to you speak about it with your wife, and not me. I wish I could help, but I can't. :hug:

Laura

[Xithras]

10. No, I can't do that.

I love my wife very deeply, and this conversation would probably scare the hell out of her. I couldn't do that to her.

I have no intention of actually leaving, I'd just never thought about it before and was surprised at how appealing the whole idea actually was.

[MissB]

5. Well, if your cats don't like you

Eh, I don't know. Sounds like a mid-life crisis. Sounds like something is missing from your life- from what you've posted, it sounds like you are having a problem being satisfied with what you have.

Getting more stuff probably won't help. Running away definitely won't help.

Consider doing something fulfilling in your life. Like volunteering. Giving a part of yourself to your community may help you feel good and help you appreciate what you have - which is a wonderful life. Along the way, maybe you'll rediscover whatever spark you're missing. Maybe you'll find you want a new career. :shrug:

[Xithras]

17. Yeah, I don't know what's up with my cats.

They just stopped playing with me a few months ago. It's not that they run away from me, but they no longer climb up in my lap or approach me voluntarily. It's like they sense something's up.

I'll look into the volunteering thing, but I'll have to pass on a new career...30 is too old to go back to college.

[all.of.me]

22. you're only 30?!

i have friends who have changed careers over 50! one went to midwifery school at 50, and another went to art school full time at 60. 30 is NOT too old for anything!

we all go through changes at about 30. it's part of a 27 year cycle. it's time for reflection and change, if necessary.

[Quakerfriend]

6. The 'symptoms' you speak of can sometimes be

those of clinical depression. Perhaps, you should talk to your doctor.

[gardenista]

7. That's what I was going to say.

First of all, don't feel guilty for the way you are feeling.

Second, talk to your doctor before this gets any worse. You owe it to your kids and wife.

[Xithras]

9. But it's not so much depression as disinterest.

It's not like I want to lock myself in a dark room all day. I feel like a ship without a rudder, drifting along with the current but not goign anywhere in particular. I'm going through all of the required motions and achieving the desired result, but it seems like the result is an illusion. It's like I suddenly realized that my road of life is actually a well worn rut on the road to nowhere.

Ok, that's enough analogies...I'm BORED, and I feel guilty for being bored.

[gardenista]

11. But you don't have to lock yourself in a dark room all day

for it to be depression.

People with low-grade depression function just fine at work, at home, etc.

They just stop experiencing joy and wonder and satisfaction.

Really, consider talking to your doctor, and your wife, about what's going on.

[Xithras]

15. Dr. first. Wife, maybe.

I don't really know what my wife could do anyway. She's a pretty pragmatic person and would probably just suggest that I take a vacation.

[SOteric]

8. In general,

I'm more tolerant than most of the art of the whinge. I go in phases, but most folks, I think, just need to hobby-whine from time to time.

But in specific, this little rant of yours is a classic statement of clinical Depression. I'm not a doctor and I don't play one on TV. And yet, - be good to yourself; Go to see your physician. Tell him/her what you've told us and explain that Depression was suggested. There's a simple set of questions you can be guided through.

[wysi]

12. I second that...

... xithras, and I'm a psychologist. You'd probably fit the diagnostic criteria for subthreshold depression (based on your description). The key here is the low level of emotion, which tends to cause people to experience life events as less meaningful.

[Xithras]

14. Alright, I'll talk to my Dr.

I don't think I'm depressed...I've been "lock myself in a dark room" depressed after losing jobs and loved ones in the past and this feels NOTHING like that kind of depression...but I guess it can't hurt to run it by a professional.

Thanks

[bridgit]

13. fuck'em...

hubby & i just went through an entire day long rigmarole with a dude on the calif arts council (brags no-end about his ties to ah-nold) about his studio space; he & his wife run the complex & their property mgt company as do republican slum lords; he makes so much 'green light' money from marshaling cali taxpayer monies into projects & slip streaming money from tenets that he no longer has an affinity for just how it is made for real = like where 'we the people' live.

i say they should shut the fuck up & be happy like reagan always used to say they were trying to be and leave the straight people the hell alone be happy with what they have in that so many have so little imo

ps, yeah-yeah, we have money we have stocks what-the-fuck-ever fuck the whining & keep it real says i

[Xithras]

16. But "things" don't make me happy.

Like the old saying goes "Money doesn't buy happiness". It sounds trite, but there's a certain truth to it (I'm not rich, btw, just comfortably middle class). Being happy with "things" is about as empty a life as a person can have, IMO. My problem is that I don't want "things", I want meaning. At this moment it's all looking a bit meaningless.

[bridgit]

19. nope, it ain't about 'things'...

imo it's about the bond created from within your 'word'. living your life straight up & down, so as to say; with honesty, is golden again imo

[all.of.me]

18. i have run off two times, almost a third and am contemplating a fourth

not from the altar, but from every day life.

the first time was in 1978. i was 24. my boyfriend and i had lived together for 5 years, and things were not going so well. i went to visit a friend in another state and never went home!

the second time was in 1987. i had lost a great job and found a crappy one, had built a house at the same time they changed the tax rate to reflect the housing boom, lost my crappy job and was miserable being single. a friend of a friend stayed at my house for a few days. when he left (i'd never seen this guy before!), he gave me $500 and told me to take a road trip. i left and only went back to sell the house a year later.

when the kids' dad left in 1998, i almost ran away again, 2000 miles away. i met a woman here who helped me with my kids and my crisis. that is the only reason i stayed put.

i'm ready to run again. life is boring, i'm ready to see other countries.

your life may seem great to others, but it's not great to you, and that's no crime! you need to find what will now make you happy. i think we're raised to believe we need one family, one house, one job our entire lives! i watched my dad do that, and it bored the shit out of me.

don't feel you're whining. be glad you're aware enough to know you're not happy.

[Ready4Change]

20. 99.99% of all humans who have ever existed

Would KILL to have (had) your life.

Revel in it. Don't waste it.

[SheWhoMustBeObeyed]

24. It sounds like you need a challenge.

Or you want to take a risk. To not know what will come next. To live by your wits. It might be more productive for you to identify what you want instead of what you don't want, and it may lead you to different solutions than just walking away from what you have.

Maybe you can bring some risk into your life in a way that will not jeopardize what you have now, e.g. moving your family to another city, or another country. Or maybe that will not satisfy your yearning, and the risk you seek will change your life in unforeseeable ways.

But I suggest you wait, and think about it, at least for a while. Life has a way of delivering challenges unbidden.

And see the doc anyway. It's amazing what kind of mindsets can be traced to organic causes. Good luck!