Excerpts from

The Mountains of Our Lives

One day while I attending a business conference,  I happened to drop in on a session where a leading lecturer was discussing the very problems I had begun experiencing several months earlier...anxiety, frustration, lack of enthusiasm for my job and family, and a general dissatisfaction with myself and everything around me.  My normal, enthusiastic approach to the world of business, and life, was fading fast. 

When I began having these feelings, did I share my concerns with anyone?  The answer, sad to say, was No.  I just kept thinking this was a temporary setback, and that by tomorrow everything would be fine.  I started questioning everything, but, not surprising, I wasn't getting any answers.  I learned the hard way that a person can slip into a depressive state without really knowing or understanding what is happening in their  life.  It was a very slow process, and came without any red flags to warn me.

While I may not have recognized the warning signs of where my problems might lead, my family certainly had.  At their urging, we got together one evening and they insisted I seek professional help.  The next morning when I woke, my mental state had gone from bad to worse.  As soon as her office opened, I scheduled an appointment with a psychologist who had worked with a friend of mine a year earlier.

After just one hour in her office I already felt better.  But I had gone too far and carried too much on my own shoulders to be cured in just one hour.  I was diagnosed as being mildly depressed, and medication was prescribed.  It took about three months to come out of my despondent state, but the side effects of the medication had been difficult to handle.  There was nausea, hot flashes at night, and a near-total loss of my libido.  This, in itself, was enough to make me depressed!  It was during this time of therapy and introspection that I learned I was not alone in my struggles with stress and depression.

You know, stress is not just a six-letter word.  Stress is a silent killer which most often leads to depression.  The good news is that it is curable.  The World Health Organization estimates 350 million people are affected by stress and depression.  Depression may be characterized by any or all of these common signs: emptiness, sadness, anxiety, guilt, sleeplessness, or change in diet.  In turn, any or all of them may lead to abusive use of alcohol and drugs, marital infidelity, divorce, or suicide.  Thankfully none of these played a part in my personal situation.

Several years after my own experience with stress and depression, I began an in-depth study of the problems we men face when adjusting, or attempting to adjust,  to changes in our lives.  I concluded that the second half of our life needs to be as exciting as the first half. 

As we move from one stage of life to another, there are going to be some mountains out there that we have never seen before.  And,  lurking in the future are even more mountains to ascend as our lives move forward. It is never too late to make some positive changes in our lives.  How well we handle these changes is largely determined by the ones we set in motion now . . . no matter if we begin when we are forty or when we are seventy years old.

Everyone of us will face potential problems if we are unwilling to recognize that changes will and do occur as we age.  These are the mountains of their lives, but  most men do not know what route to take to get over them. 

That is why I wrote the book, The Mountains of Our Lives.   All of my research was from a personal prospective, as I have not taken classes in psychology or had any formal training in human behavior.  It is my sincere desire that if I can help just one person climb the next mountain—and there will be one—with more understanding and ease, my efforts will have been worthwhile.  Good climbing!

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