Hip Hip Hooray: What Shapes Our Birthday Experience?

I am slow to wind down and retreat to bed this evening. When I do, I find my partner under the covers and absorbed in a film on his laptop. I ask him what he is watching three times. He removes his headphones, looks up at me and says “You will judge me”. He then turns the laptop and I observe a familiar fictional character from my childhood frozen on the screen: Peter Pan.

It occurs to me that my partner is turning thirty-two next week. I can’t help but wonder if this choice in film is related to his approaching birthday. I think of Peter Pan and his desire to “never grow up”.

The role of culture in celebrating birthdays

A birthday represents how an individual or a collective relates to and reflects upon aging and identity. While birthdays are a universal experience, they mean different things to different people and different parts of the world celebrate differently.

Often, in Western culture, there is an emphasis on individualism, personal joy, and material gestures. This contrasts with some Eastern cultures, where a greater emphasis is placed on social gatherings, family, community, connection, intergenerational ties and respect.

How people in my life exhibit to their birthdays is incredibly varied. My nieces and nephews are always excited in the lead-up to their birthdays. But on the day, they are often overstimulated and overwhelmed by the colours, friends, family, sweets, and attention. Their parents, on the other hand, are completely preoccupied, maybe even a little stressed, over the logistics of their child’s birthday celebration, as if the day is a reflection on them.

My mother and father exhibit a kind of staunch indifference, awkwardly accepting gifts and brushing the day off as if it were any other. I have a handful of friends who possess only warm and fond feelings towards their birthday and are known to proudly ask me to participate in their ‘birthday week’.

Personality and how we feel about our birthdays

Many of us don’t give much thought to the individual psychological origins or implications of birthdays. According to researchers, your personality type, upbringing, and degree of introversion or extroversion are all major factors in determining how you feel about your birthday.

For (often extroverted) people who enjoy the attention of others, the expectation to do something special is a point of excitement and anticipation. They may even feel a few days of ‘post birthday blues’, when confronted by the reality that it’s a whole year until they can celebrate their birthday again.

For others, birthdays elicit feelings of sadness, anxiety, or indifference. In an episode of the podcast Lit-Friction titled ‘On Birthdays’, one of the hosts, Carry, explains her birthday is a dreaded event for her. She dreads it because she has self-identified as a non-birthday person all her life; this has become part of how she sees herself. Each year, she denies herself joy and excitement over her birthday. Time and time again she will downplay it, brush it aside, and express indifference.

However, when the day is just about to roll around, she realises she does want to celebrate with someone. She will then throw together some last-minute haphazard plan. But this results in her becoming disappointed by the turnout.  This is an example of how social anxiety and a personality trait like pessimism can influence how we relate to our birthdays. This isn’t an uncommon response as many people messaged Carry after the release of this episode echoing her feelings.

Birthdays are Temporal Landmarks

Researchers consider birthdays ‘temporal landmarks’, which refer to specific points in time that stand out as significant or psychologically meaningful.  Around our birthday, we tend to engage in a greater number of ‘temporal comparisons’. We might feel hopeful and motivated about our future selves, or we might look back and see how far we have come. Alternatively, we might look at how little has changed and see the things we have not done but thought we would. These comparisons are full of both private and public expectations, and can be especially pronounced in your twenties and thirties. This is because it is a time of immense identity change, ambition, and transition.

Personally, the day I turned 25 was a sad birthday for me. It signified that I could no longer enter my creative writing work into two of my favourite literary journals for emerging writers. I was resentful and regretful for not having entered more work when I had the opportunity. However, the real point of anguish was the significance I perceived in the 25-year-old cut-off. At the time, I took this to mean that I should have finished emerging and should now be ‘established’ – maybe with a finished manuscript or a book deal on the way.

While I knew this was an irrational narrative, it also felt very and stressful. As I unpacked these feelings in me, it became clear that I had set myself arbitrary due dates or cut-offs that were not just unhelpful but unrealistic expectations (read more on how expectations can contribute to anxiety here). My therapist advised it is good to have goals, perhaps a rough blueprint about where you would like to head, but to have such a strict timeline is only going to leave you feeling sad about yourself.

Societal emphasis on Youth and Achievement can detract from genuine connection

Fast forward, and my partner is no longer thirty-one years old. I spend the morning ladling batter onto a hotplate and delivering him crepes. We are two people who recently chose to live out of suitcases for a year and spend all the money we have. So this birthday is uncharacteristically frugal, and I do not lavish him with the usual gifts and special dining.

During the week, I fretted over what I had to offer and turned to other ways to show him how much I appreciated him. Therefore, it was surprising to me when he told me that it was his best birthday to date. I’m initially confused, but be explains it was because it was filled with calmness, clarity and ‘nothing over the top’. I consider this closely and realise my expectation of what I ‘should’ have provided him for his birthday was a product of our culture.

Western culture places a particularly high value on youth, achievement, and materially rich celebrations. Thus making birthdays a point of stress, exhaustion, and confusion. Stepping back from the materialism and pressure to be forever young allowed both my partner and myself to quietly appreciate what really mattered; good food, good company, and not adhering to anyone else’s expectation of what a birthday ‘should’ be.

Birthdays are yours to spend how you like

From what I have gleaned, there is no right or wrong way to celebrate your birthday. However, it can be helpful to not solely focus and prioritise the superficial aspects of the day. That is, the big events, extravagant food and new clothes and objects. Instead, no matter where you are or who you are with, you can approach it as a day for celebrating life and connection, acknowledging the joy of existing, and the possibility of progress.

 

If you are experiencing difficult emotions or expectations around your birthday or other milestones, you may find strategies in Russ Harris’ book and online program, ‘The Happiness Trap’ helpful. You can also read more tips on how to cope with the birthday blues here.