In her book A Short History of Myth, Karen Armstrong makes the point that every time humans take a step forward, they revise and update their understanding of the world.

The difference between success and failure—between a life of fulfillment and a life of frustration—is how well you manage the challenge of making meaning in your life.

I call them lifequakes, because the magnitude with which they upend our lives is exponentially worse than everyday disruptors. Lifequakes involve a fundamental shift in the meaning, purpose, or direction of a person’s life. I think of them as BCE/CE moments (or BC/AD in the old vernacular), in which a person’s life story gets divided into a before

The psychologist Bessel van der Kolk defines agency as “the feeling of being in charge of your life: knowing where you stand, knowing that you have a say in what happens to you, knowing that you have some ability to shape your circumstance.” People who exhibit agency have been shown to be happier and healthier, and have a higher quality of life.

The life I’m living is not the life I expected. I’m living life out of order.

Agency is so important that even deluding yourself that you have it can improve your life. Merely understanding a problem, even if you can’t do anything about it, gives you a sense of control. By forcing yourself to learn what’s happening to you, you come to accept it. You become an agent in your own meaning-making.

How many will you face? Everyone I spoke with, even those in their twenties, had been through one or two; no one over forty had been through fewer than three; some people had been through six or seven. We calculated the average to be between three and five in a lifetime. That sets up an interesting formula: One out of every ten disruptors becomes a

Understanding the connections among what gives us meaning, which personal stories we emphasize at any given time, and the visual representation of those pillars of identity was a challenging and ultimately thrilling part of the Life Story Project.

THE AVERAGE PERSON GOES THROUGH ONE DISRUPTOR EVERY 12–18 MONTHS