Hollis (1993) is a Jungian psychologist who taught the Humanities 26 years in various colleges and universities, and then served as a licensed Jungian analyst in private practice in U.S.A.). He expounds his theory in his book The Middle Passage—From Misery to Meaning in Midlife. He divides a whole life into two parts: the first half and the second half of life. In the first part, one identifies any such reflexive, feeling-charged response with the nature of the personal complex with animistic thinking or magical thinking (in childhood) and heroic thinking (in adolescence). In the second half of life, one shifts identities from dependency of the ego (in childhood), spiritual confusion and ego lability (in puberty) into an individuation and finally mortality which involves learning to live with the mystery of death. During the individuation process, “the sense of betrayal, of failed expectations, the vacuum and loss of meaning which occur with the dissolution, creates the midlife crisis (Hollis, 1993, p. 26)”. “Most of the sense of crisis in midlife is occasioned by the pain of that split. The disparity between the inner sense of self and the acquired personality becomes so great that the suffering can no longer be suppressed or compensated (Hollis, 1993, p. 15)”. Thus, he claims that symptoms of midlife distress are actually to be welcomed, because they represent “not only an instinctually grounded self underneath the acquired personality bit a powerful imperative for renewal (Hollis, 1993, p. 15)”. He also addresses that the Middle Passage, “less a chronological event than a psychological experience”, represents a wonderful, though often painful opportunity to revision our sense of self, and “represents a summons from within to move from the provisional life to true adulthood, from the false self to authenticity (Hollis, 1993, p. 15)”. Moreover, he concerns about going through the Middle Passage as a necessary way to achieve one’s potential and to earn the vitality and wisdom of mature aging.
According to Levinson’s (1986) theory, the life cycle is divided into four eras: (a) preadulthood--an initial segment before roughly age 22, including childhood and adolescence; (b) early adulthood—the second era from about age 17 to 45; (c) middle adulthood—the third era from age 40 to 65; (d) late adulthood—the final era from 60 to death. The most distinct view of Levinson from other theories about stage development is that Levinson conceived of the transition between two eras: there were three obvious and important transitions in the whole life course—Early Adult Transition, Midlife Transition and Late Adult Transition. “A transitional period terminates the existing life structure and creates the possibility for a new one. The primary tasks of every transitional period are to reappraise the existing structure, to explore possibilities for change in the self and the world, and to move toward commitment to the crucial choices that form the basis for a new life structure in the ensuing period. Transitional periods ordinarily last about five years (Levinson, 1986, p. 7)”. Levinson (1986) also asserted that adults spent almost as much time in the structure-building periods and the structure-changing periods, and both played a crucial part in adult development. In addition, he emphasized development was not synonymous with growth; rather, it had the twin aspects of “growing up” (adolescing) and “growing down” (senescing). In early and middle adulthood, adolescing and senescing coexist in an uneasy balance. Biologically, the forces of senescence gradually come to the balance point and then exceed after adolescence. Psychologically, twin aspects of growth are possible in the whole life course and “they are by no means assured of realization and they are jeopardized by external constraints as well as inner vulnerabilities (Levinson, 1986, p. 10)”. At a given time, personality, social structure, culture, social roles, major life events, biology--these and other influences exert a powerful effect on the actual character of the individual life structure and on its development during adulthood (Levinson, 1986). Viktor Frankl (1967) proposed the existential emptiness of people. This existential vacuum is explained by Frankl (1967, p. 57) as that people have been lost in the process of becoming a truly human being. Yalom also implied in the middle age period, concerns about the meaning of life and death anxiety are more natural than in other periods (Weaver, 2009).
References
Frankl, V. (1967). Psychotherapy and Existentialism. New York, NY: Simon and Schuster.
Hollis, J. (1993). The Middle Passage: From Msery to Meaning in Midlife. Toronto, CA: Inner City Books.
Levinson, D. J. (1986). A conception of adult development. American Psychologist, 41, 3-13
Weaver, Y. (2009). Mid-Life -- A Time of Crisis or New Possibilities? Existential Analysis: Journal Of The Society For Existential Analysis, 20(1), 69-78.
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