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Jessica May's avatar

' Maybe it's just the time of year, or maybe it's the time of man, I don't know who I am, but life is for learning' Joni Mitchell, Woodstock.

40 in many ways has felt like a staggered coming of age: no big party in lockdown, a breakup, but then, starting an MA which also has made me feel like I'm finally 'begining'. I've just turned 43, and after a weepy pre-birthday week, I found myself writing the lyric: ' You stay in bed to weep at it all, but you don't feel broken, you feel wise and new '. Not high poetry, but the flavour of it. I feel so much more connected to what matters these days, it's very sustaining, even in the hard bits.

I also really feel humanity is at a new beginning, we must be, because we're at and ending, and they are the same thing.

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Maximilien Raab's avatar

Here's one from the Confucian Analects:

The Master said, “At fifteen, I set my heart on learning. At thirty, I found my balance [/stood firm]. At forty, I was free from doubts [about myself]. At fifty, I understood what Heaven intended me to do. At sixty, I was attuned to what I heard. At seventy, I followed what my heart desired without overstepping the line”

Big hug and good luck!

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