Brad's Status and Me

As a movie buff, I sometimes take my ideas for Creative Thoughts from films. Recently I saw Brad’s Status, which one reviewer called “one of the most humane movies you’ll see this year.” 

It stars Ben Stiller as Brad, who at age 47, is experiencing a midlife crisis. Youth has faded, roads have not been taken, and as he takes stock of his life he compares himself against friends from his college days.

There’s Billy, who sold his tech company at age 40 and now lives a life of luxury in Hawaii; Jason, wealthy hedge-fund manager cavorting in his private jet; Nick, a successful Hollywood director, also living a a lavish lifestyle; and Craig, a best-selling author, Harvard lecturer and political pundit. Brad fantasizes about their lives, and how his life pales by comparison.

He’s comfortable, runs a non-profit that links needy organizations to wealthy benefactors. has a loving wife who works in government, and a musical prodigy son who is Harvard material.

But it’s not enough. He’s insecure, jealous, just not measuring up to his fantasies, and time is running out. You’ll have to see the film to see how Brad works through his insecurities, how the fantasies about his friends are not what he supposes, how everyone, despite outer appearances, has their challenges in life, and how he comes  to realize what matters most in life.

The film reminded me of my own mid-life crisis, sometime in my forties. I looked at time left. What would I do with it? After some bouts of anxiety and insomnia, answers came. Time to  leave the stay-at-home mom role to go back to work, and then on to graduate school in counseling psychology. The insistent frenzy in the outer world about women’s liberation prompted me to do more, be more, and to move out of my comfort zone.

So now, some forty years later, I find myself well past the mid-life crisis and into what I call my “late-life crisis.” The ten-year anniversary of my husband’s transition is coming up, giving me pause. My old nemesis anxiety, accompanied not only by insomnia but some heart irregularities, brought me to nocturnal self-examination. 

What have I been doing for the past ten years? And not just the past ten years, but my entire life so far? Should I have done more? Been more? Somehow made more of an impression in the world? A bigger footprint? Did I waste my gifts and talents? Yadda yadda yadda! Monkey-mind was having a field day.

At these times it’s good to see what Ernest Holmes has to say. In Science of Mind he writes:  “Man does not exist for the purpose of making an impression upon his environment. He does exist to express himself in and through his environment. There is a great difference. Man does not not exist to leave a lasting impression upon his environment. Not at all. 
It is not necessary, if we should pass on to tonight, that anyone should remember that we have ever lived. All that means anything is that while we live, WE LIVE, and wherever we go from here we shall keep on living...It is quite a burden lifted when we realize that we do not have to move the world.”

In the final scene of Brad’s Status, Brad is in bed, having gone through some gentle transformations. He turns to the camera and says, “I’m alive!” He is fully present in the moment, and can experience love, joy, beauty and and all that this gift of life has to offer.

 And so it is.