We Have Pork Chops Two or Three Nights a Week
We Have Pork Chops Two or Three Nights a Week
I'm the cook in our house. I like doing it.
And we have pork chops two or three nights a week. Salmon most of the others.
Jana has told me, more than once, that she cannot eat pork chops and salmon anymore. She's said she'd rather have popcorn for dinner. I've heard her every time.
Then I go to the grocery store and buy pork chops.
Not because I don't care what she thinks. Because I'm tired, and it's easy, and the list is the list. I go in hungry and grab the thing I know how to make fast.
That's the whole article, honestly. The rest is just explaining why a man keeps buying pork chops his wife has asked him to stop buying.
Fine
Jana asked on the episode when the last time was that you felt truly alive. Not good. Not handling it. Lit up about something on the calendar.
And the answer, for a lot of people in the middle of their lives, is that they can't remember.
Nothing's wrong. That's what makes it hard to catch. You're not burned out and you're not sad. Somebody asks how you're doing and you say you're here, or you say fine, and you mean it.
Everything's fine. Everything's the same.
It's like the TV went back to black and white one night and nobody noticed.
There's a term going around for this, mostly in conversations about work. Quiet cracking. And the image is a good one. It starts as a hairline fracture. Water gets in. Next thing you know there's a gap you could lose something in.
What opens up is distance. Between you and your partner, or you and something you wanted, or you and the person you were before everything got efficient.
I had this at nine years old
End of summer, every year.
The first few weeks were great. Then somewhere around the last stretch I'd hit a wall. Done it all, seen it all, nothing left. I would genuinely look forward to school starting, because school was new.
Then I'd go back to school, and three days in I'd be asking when the next break was.
So I've known about this since I was a kid. I just didn't have a name for it, and I didn't figure out that it doesn't go away when you grow up. It gets slower. Summer used to take eight weeks to wear out. Now a whole decade can do it.
Why it happens
You get used to things. That's the short version.
Whatever you do repeatedly, your mind stops registering. Same route to work, same restaurants, same people, same meal on Tuesday. Your brain's very good at this. It's how you can drive home and not remember the drive.
And it's useful, mostly. Routines save you from having to think about everything.
But the same machinery that stops you noticing the drive also stops you noticing your life. And it doesn't ask first.
The train and the track
Here's how I picture it.
A train can run on the exact same track, going the exact right place, every day, and it'll still wear the track out. The destination can be perfect. The rails still get worn.
So the move isn't changing where you're going. It's inspecting the ties. The habits the track is built out of.
One tie at a time. What's one thing I do every week without thinking that I could change.
For me it's the grocery store. Don't go hungry. Maybe don't go alone. Jana offered to come with me, which I'm told was not entirely a romantic gesture.
Living Lucky® Practice
Find Your Rails
The habits your week runs on. List the ones you do without thinking, then pick one to change. Not all of them. One.
What I always do
Same meal, same route, same restaurant, same show, same conversation.
What I could try instead
Small is fine. New enough that you'd have to pay attention.
The one I'm changing this week
And when.
Firsts
When you were young, everything was a first.
First kiss. First date. First time holding somebody's hand. First time living on your own, first job, first house, first dog. Some of those went badly. Didn't matter. The newness itself was the thing, and it made everything feel like it had color in it.
Then you hit an age where it feels like you've met every kind of person there is. Travel turns into another trip. A cruise is another cruise.
Jana's most recent answer to when did you last feel alive is the ski jump. First time she'd hit one. Scariest thing she'd done in a very long time, and she said it was the first time she'd felt that alive in decades.
She came out of the water with a look on her face I hadn't seen in a while.
That's what a first does. It doesn't have to be a ski jump. It just has to be new enough that your brain can't run it on autopilot.
The rookie lens
Here's the part I've been chewing on.
We lost a muscle. We used to be able to remember phone numbers, and technology took that job, and the muscle went away.
To be fair to ourselves, we picked up a new one. Now we all remember passwords. Several dozen of them.
I think the same thing happened with awe. We got so used to seeing everything that we stopped looking, and the looking muscle went slack.
A rookie hasn't decided they've seen it all yet. That's the whole difference. Same room, same people, same Tuesday, and somebody new walks in and finds something interesting in it, because they haven't told themselves in advance there's nothing there.
You can't become new. But you can go looking like you are.
What Jana asked for
When we got to the end of the recording, Jana said the thing she wants to experience is luxury. A really nice dinner out, where somebody else is doing the work.
I cook for us most nights, so this was a fair request. And I thought about setting the table with a white tablecloth, which would be a nice first for our house.
Then I thought, no. Let's get dressed up. Somewhere we haven't been. Maybe some dancing afterward.
Not pork chops. I've been told.
The Living Lucky® Practice
Exercise: list ten things you do every single week without thinking. Meals, routes, restaurants, shows, conversations.
Reflection question: when did I last feel truly alive, and what was new about it?
Journal prompt: what's my pork chop, the thing somebody has asked me to change that I keep doing because it's easy?
Action: pick one tie from your list and change it this week. Just one.
Frequently asked questions
What is quiet cracking?
A term that's been circulating, mostly about work, for the slow disengagement that happens when nothing's broken but nothing's alive either. It starts small and widens into distance between you and the things or people you used to feel strongly about.
Is midlife malaise the same as depression?
No, and the difference matters. Malaise is flatness, not sadness, and it usually lifts with novelty and change. If you're experiencing low mood that doesn't respond to anything, or it's affecting your sleep or appetite or ability to function, that's worth talking to a doctor about.
Why does a good life feel boring?
Because you've adapted to it. Anything repeated enough stops registering, including good things. It isn't that your life got worse. It's that you stopped noticing it.
How do I break out of the same routine?
Change one habit at a time rather than trying to overhaul everything. A different grocery list, a different route, a restaurant you haven't tried. Small novelty is enough to wake something up.
What's the rookie lens?
Looking at familiar things as though you've never seen them. It's how a newcomer sees your town or your job or your house, and it's available to you anytime you stop assuming you already know what's there.
Do I need big experiences to feel alive again?
No. A ski jump works, but so does a first you'd barely notice anyone else doing. What matters is that it's new enough that your mind has to pay attention.
We went deeper on this on the Living Lucky® Podcast, Season 11, Episode 36.
We Create Our Luck®.
