What advice do you have for men who are just now turning 40,
about life in our 40s? Also, what do you remember about your 40s that is
/ was different from when you were in your 30s?
My birthday is today, the 1st of January, so I need to prepare for this new decade of my life. That's why I need you guys to let me know all the relevant advice I need about how my 40s will be different from my 30s.
Like, how will my body change? What will change about social dynamics & interactions between me & anyone else? What will I need to do differently now? Etc.
Thanks in advance, gentlemen.
Each decade has gotten better, but the 60s is when things have started to hurt, but life is still good.
And then the 60s that hurt stay around they don't just go away.
Time to save as much as you can for retirement.
Cannot underscore this enough, along with taking care of your body. Save as much as you can. Before dropping a wad of money on something, pause and ask yourself if you really need whatever it is. Saving money will make the difference between living on SS alone or having a second income stream.
Get whatever your company will match. Try to get it into a Roth investment if possible since that saves on taxes when you take the money out. But save now it definitely builds overtime. Look up how to invest, but index funds are a popular thing to do.
You have 10 more years before your health radically changes. Make sure you take care of your health.
Hopefully new advances in medical science and research will make taking care of our health easier than ever before.
The new advances in medical science are the old advances: sleep enough, eat well, exercise, rest.
Exercise is a mix of high intensity cardio, resistance training, flexibility, mobility, balance work, and rest days.
In terms of your body, it is use it or lose it time. If you don't have a consistent exercise practice, make one now and treat it like a job.
De-stress your reactions to your life wherever possible. Meditate. Practice gratitude. Living in state of constant stress ages our bodies more quickly.
It will. But, if you smoke and drink a lot don’t expect that medical science will help much.
Yes, I started getting sober at 41, and have 9 years (53F) now. So grateful. I see those who kept at it, and it’s not pretty for the wild ones.
You also need to be exercising and eating healthy. Drink plenty of water
Exercise. Go to the YMCA and do the weights. Walk run bike do something to be active. It pays off in the long run. As you get old, you lose muscle mass also the exercise is good for maintaining weight. After your 40s or metabolism goes bye-bye.
In my 30s I was completely family focused raising young children. I was a Mom first and foremost. They were good years
I was in my best physical shape when I was in my 40s. I was also trying to get as far professionally as possible. I felt like the best years of life had passed me by and that I had to fight the aging clock.
I was a mess emotionally because of that. Over worked(ing), 3 children at home in travel sports every weekend, a marriage in shambles…..I cry a little right now when I think of those years. Every once in a while I wish I had a bit of that fire still left in me but I was deeply unhappy so no.
50s and 60s have been good to me. Maybe its because of all that diet/fitness regime which has gone to hello in a handbasket.
OP…..slow down. Enjoy yourself. You are still young. But ….put as much money as you can spare into retirement accounts for your senior years
Whatever ambitions you may have get after them now. Time is not on your side. Fifty will be here before you know it.
Or you can also be satisfied with your life as it is. Maybe throw in some hobbies.
True 👍
40 you do have more energy for unfulfilled ambitions. 50s starts the slide towards retirement.
Exercise. Eat less.
After 40s, you don't have much of a metabolism. Time to stop eating like a frat boy.
Gym recovery takes longer, everything hurts more, had to start using less weights and higher reps and it’s been a godsend. Stopped doing all the heavy compounds and mostly use machines and dumbbells nowadays.
Also if you’re not lifting weights and exercising regularly you’re going to definitely age faster and horribly
The 30s and the '40s are the prime of life. But now is the time to start taking those preventative measures that you wouldn't have thought of worrying about in your twenties. All of the advice here is good. Also, take care of your relationships. If you are married, pay special attention to your wife. This can be a time when marriages become stale and difficult. Find some ways to keep it fresh.
Welcome to the “F” years, forties and fifties. Exercise, eat better and find a good doctor for annual checkups. Before I hit 40, never needed a primary doc, but as I leave the F years (59), I needed all kinds of docs to get this under control and prepare for the sixties.
You’re in your prime career earning years, so get busy. It’ll be tough because your 40s are your least happy decade. But in your 50s, your happiness will accelerate upward hard.
In your 40s, you’ll become the more fully realized version of who you’ve always been.
I Ioved my 40s. I was making great money and loving my job. I was having fun raising my child. I traveled all over the world. And I had no old people health issues. Unfortunately my ex was a PITA, but I fixed that in my 50s.
Get ready for friends and peers to start dropping like flies! And yeah, listen to the advice here — 40s are like your 30s except suddenly you’re actually starting to feel old and whatever mortality you thought you had already faced?? Guess what!? That was just the tip. But hey, you don’t have a choice in this. There’s only one other option to ageing. And it’s probably not as good?
Great question, and happy birthday!
62M here. I kind of woke up to my health and aging process at the age of 48 and now I'm in the best shape of my adult life. Yeah, I have fortunate genes, but it's also a lot of conscious and consistent effort to take advantage of that.
The body changes mostly in that it is time to not take it for granted. We lose muscle mass as we age, so time to work to just keep it, if not doing that already. Generally as we age, recovery times get longer for everything so keep that in mind. All-nighters are increasingly self-defeating. Time to make exercise your daily job, if it's not already. Priority, no excuses.
Many of us find that family dynamics are demanding in the 40s if you have kids and spouse and aging parents all at once. (Apologies in advance for projecting my life onto yours; maybe you are a single orphan guy with a fishtank; how should I know?) Not a novel observation. Just expect it, and prioritize what needs to be prioritized. Like, you'll have plenty of time for hobbies later when the kids are bigger, the parents are (sadly) gone, and work becomes less central to your identity. But now is the time to be present for those you love and who love you. (Well, that's always true, but this realization starts to hit harder in the 40s so expect it and don't resist!) Which is not to say don't take time to recharge yourself, but maybe now is not the time to have a 20 hour a week gaming habit, for example, if the family is there to use your time.
I recommend a book called "Younger Next Year" -- it gives a great overview of what's coming, physically especially, and gives great practical advice. It's aimed at slightly older people but 40 is a great time to put all this stuff in place.
40 is great time to take stock of your financial plan, too. Enough decades left to take advantage of the time value of money, and enough runway left in the working years to change course if need be.
Social dynamics: most of us are very busy at your age, but one of my regrets is not paying enough attention to nurturing friendships. It doesn't take a lot, but they are easy to neglect with everything going on and by the time I hit 60, I missed them. (I've made more since, but would be better not to have had to make it a big project.)
Somewhere in here, if not now then in the next 4-8 years, you'll be hitting the mid-life crisis, so may as well read up on that and prepare for it. Crisis just means inflection point -- doesn't have to be a disaster of any kind. Mine took the form of realizing I had risen as far in my career as I wanted to and backing off of ambitions that people kept telling me I should have, and understanding what I really wanted out of life, and redirecting a bit. In my case, it was a simple as getting out of corporate management and back into an individual contributor role that was more satisfying if a bit less remunerative. Yours may be something else, or nothing much at all. But better to understand the causes and dynamics of what's coming than be blindsided. "Awakening at Midlife" by Kathleen Brehony is the book that occurs to me at the moment.
Happy Birthday! Treat yourself, you deserve it.
Fitness is key. I played flag football into my 50s. You tend to keep that quickness and flexibility way more than you’d think
Your 40s is when you have to start watching your health, weight, sleep, and exercise. Even if you've always been in shape, your metabolism may start changing significantly, and the lifestyle you've gotten away with so far may no longer sustainable.
You'll notice at first by just not feeling good all the time but not understanding why. When that happens, go on a diet, reduce your intake of unhealthy foods and alcohol, go to bed earlier, start taking walks or working out if you don't already.
Do the things you are physically able to do now, build muscles now and maintain them..after you leave the 40s, getting in shape will get so much harder & even impossible. …but staying in shape is possible,
Drink less.
Sleep more.
You are old enough to know that whatever you shove down your throat is either going to help you or hurt you. Don't give me any B.S. about eating reasonably healthy when you make excuses to eat junk food. And do 2 hardcore workouts per week, preferably outdoors like chopping wood or some other manly-man kind of rugged stuff.
Your body’s metabolism will change this decade so, if you aren’t already, time to take your health and what you put into your body seriously.
Studies show men can build muscle way into old age so muscle training is a great low impact, high reward exercise.
If you haven’t, find a GP and see a doctor at least once a year. Start a baseline of health. You want to stay on top of basic things like blood pressure, diabetes type 2, heart health etc.
You don't quit surfing because you get old. You get old because you quit surfing.
Or running or walking or biking or…
Happy Birthday! Here's the best advice I can give: Know your bloodline and what's in it that will come for you eventually. If theres cancer in that line like mom, dad, siblings then backwards. If so find a genetic specialist, usually if there's a deep history the government pays for it. Same for heart but no genetic testing for that. Say bye bye to sugar and anything in a package, same with soda. Smoking just don't unless its weed which really will benefit you even just a few edibles a day. Walk. Alot. Stretch daily in a hardcore way. Meditate daily and be unforgiving about it. You need it. And don't make a habit of being sedate. Move. Hobby something. Were late 70s and wish we'd done it all sooner but we now still physically feel as we could hang with 50 year olds.
Find balance. Set boundaries at work and disconnect from work on vacations. Pursue hobbies, sports, entertainment and enjoy your life. Take good care of your body and mind. Cherish and spoil your loved ones. This advice is unisex.
Happy Birthday. Hopefully you have already started to save for retirement. I noticed in my 40’s my patience for bs kinda disappeared. It also slowly got harder to go to the gym.
I just learned that there are biological aging “bursts” - at 44 and at 60 years old. And yeah, that tracks. I felt fine at the start of my 40s. The same or even better than I had in my 30s. But then things took a dramatic turn at around 44. Weird aches, arthritis, bifocals, etc. So be prepared. If you want to do something very physically demanding - say, backpack through the Australian Outback - better do it in the next few years.
40’s were my best decade by far. I was in the best shape of my life and I stopped giving a shit about what people thought about me (the key is to realize that nobody’s thinking about you, everybody’s thinking about themselves). Then I was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis at 50 and the last ten years have been, well, all over the place. I just turned 60. I’m ready to start a new, healthier decade.
How did you get your rheumatoid arthritis treated?
I’m on Rinvoq and plaquenil now but I’ve been through a myriad of medications that didn’t work. It’s been a journey.
Likely Auto immune suppressors like he advertised on TV. I don't have them, but one of my close relatives does.
Eat less, move more.
At over 60 the only thing I can tell you is enjoy the hell out of everyday during your 40-55 years because the body keeps on getting older and like with everything in life the older something gets the more repairs it needs to be maintained!
I found my groove and started to excel in my career in my 40’s. 40-60 were great years.
