When Does Midlife Start & End?

Photo by wordsnpix.

Late life or older adulthood is the focus of my blog. Consequently, I have made efforts to define "older adult."
Defining "older adult" is complex, because you can't just choose a specific age. 
Roles, function and perception contribute to the definition of this and any life stage.
Recently, people have asked me to define midlife. I'm finding this to be even trickier. 
Midlife starts when young adulthood ceases and before older adulthood starts.  
My forays have found age ranges for midlife landing anywhere between 25 (for those who settle down early) to 75 (for those who still maintain a lot of midlife adult tasks).  The US Census identifies midlife as 35 to 54, a pretty low range. 
Let's look at the age ranges posited by a few well-established psychologists. 

40 to 65 for Carl Jung.   

30 to 60 for Robert J. Havighurst. 

30 to 60 for  Erik Erikson.

40 to 65 for  Daniel Levinson.

These psychologists' definitions range between 30 and 65. However, increased longevity of people in Industrialized nations, the late launching Millennials, and the very vocal and self-directing Baby Boomers are pushing midlife higher. 
From all the information I see about "active aging," I fully expect to see Baby Boomers claiming to be middle aged well into their 70s. Even the American Psychological Association recently moved their definition of midlife from 40 to 60 up to 45 to 65. 
As with late life, I favor a functional definition of midlife. So what are the tasks of midlife?

Rebirth photo by H.A.S.

For Jung (b. 1875), people enter midlife when the focus on the process of individuation.  His definition is the most abstract and spiritual. 
For Jung, this involves shedding the social expectations that children and youth adopt in order to please authority figures and instead finding the authentic self, their true life's work. 
Individuation means changing careers or changing life partners for some. 
For Havighurst (b. 1900), midlife tasks are more specific and tangible. They include the following: 

1. Achieving adult civic and social responsibility.
2. Establishing and maintaining an economic standard of living.
3. Assisting teenage children to become responsible and happy adults.
4. Developing leisure-time activities.
5. Relating to one's spouse as a person.
6. Accepting and adjusting to the physiologic changes or middle age
7. Adjusting to aging parents.

For Erikson (b. 1902), midlife is less complex than childhood and adolescence.  For each stage, people choose between a productive state and a destructive state. For people in midlife, the choice is between Generativity and Stagnation.  Generativity tasks include the following: 

1. Express love through more than sexual contacts. 
2. Maintain healthy life patterns.
3. Develop a sense of unity with mate.
4. Help growing and grown children to be responsible adults.
5. Relinquish central role in lives of grown children.
6. Accept children's mates and friends. 
7. Create a comfortable home. 
8. Be proud of accomplishments of self and mate/spouse.
9. Reverse roles with aging parents. 
10. Achieve mature, civic and social responsibility.
11. Adjust to physical changes of middle age.
12. Use leisure time creatively. 

For Levinson (b. 1920), midlife happens when a person feels his or her mortality, when they start to mentor young adults, and when the re-evaluate the structure of their life and possibly make big changes.  His model was more tightly tied to specific ages and transitions are emphasized:

40-45: Midlife Transition.
45-50: Entering Middle Adulthood
50-55: Age Fifty Transition
55-60: Culmination of Middle Adulthood 

Levinson's work has been criticized because his initial research subjects were all male and from the same social class. 
But these theorists work is becoming dated, and more people today rely on their own perceptions and their social functions to define their life stages.  
As with the adage, "You're as young as you feel," a recent survey of 2,000 Britons pushed the start of midlife into their 50s.  Some of their "signs" are culturally specific (tea, pubs, National Trust), but others are relatable for non-Britons. 
For me, I took the following as signs that I entered midlife:

• seeing my parents moving out of midlife and into old age
• watching my peers become grandparents
• acquiring age-related physical complaints
• boredom with pleasure seeking, thrill seeking, infatuation and pretty men
• seeing young adults as surrogate children rather than as younger peers
• less interest in stockpiling information and more interest in synthesizing information
• worrying about financing my late adulthood 
• feeling the need to connect the generations below me with the generation above me

So how about you? Are you entering midlife yet? Share your thoughts below. 
Related:
What Traits Make a Person an Older Adult?