This is what I know at 30. These are lessons learned the hard way. Lessons that I’ll sometimes forget and have to remind myself of. These are lessons from 30 years of growth, love, passion, heartache, healing, life experience laid down here for you, hoping you’ll find some comfort or resonance or a nugget of advice that might prove helpful for you too. These are my two cents on surviving and celebrating my 20s.
You’re not going to be the same person forever, and that’s okay. You will change, and even though change is good, you will grieve your change. It will feel like you’re killing an old version of yourself that you’re attached to because you don’t know how to be anything else. A version that you don’t necessarily hate, but one that you’ve outgrown. One that, maybe, you let society build for you. One that you’ve worked so hard to become only to realize you didn’t become it for you. You did it to validate your worth. You did it because that was the only way you knew how to do things. You did it for reasons you once thought mattered to you until one day you found yourself stuck and unhappy. You will learn to shed that skin off and it will hurt like hell. Keep shedding, keep unlearning your old ways until you reach the pure core - your true essence - that version of yourself, hold on to for dear life.
Letting go takes strength. Sometimes, walking away from people, places, jobs, and relationships takes more strength than holding on. And as tough and uncomfortable as endings may seem, sometimes, letting go is the only way to pave for new and better beginnings.
Make sure your worth and identity are not based on something you can lose. You are not your job, or your relationship status, or the figure in your bank account, or the number on the scale, or someone else’s opinion of you. You are the movies, songs, and buildings that make you cry. You are the words that move you. You are the warmth of your hugs, the kindness in your smile, the way you make people feel in your presence and absence.
If you’re lucky enough, you will hit rock bottom early on. That’s not to say that you will not hit it again later. But the good thing about hitting rock bottom is that once you’ve hit your lowest low, you can only go up from there, and if you’ve learned to pick yourself up once, you’ll learn to lift yourself up again.
Give yourself permission to be bad at something. You can love doing something and suck at it, and guess what, that’s totally fine. You’ll find delight and freedom in letting go of your need for perfection. Stop wearing your perfectionism as a badge of honor. Let your ego get bruised - it’s good for you! Write messy, sing out of tune, dance off-beat, enjoy the hell out of every single moment.
Get comfortable with being bored. Then simply observe what you gravitate towards; what you turn to. Pay attention to what fills your soul with delight. Pay attention to what makes you lose track of time (other than your phone).
Learn to enjoy your own company. Take yourself out on dates: coffee dates, long walks, museums, art galleries, shopping... etc. Bask in your own solitude. Make peace with your inner demons. You will often find yourself alone, use that time to recharge and disconnect so you can connect again.
Allow yourself to like what you like. Have cake for breakfast. Wear glitter eyeshadow during the day. Dye your hair pink. Paint your eyelashes blue. Watch all the rom-coms. Listen to commercial music. Read celebrity gossip. Or don’t do any of this at all. Whatever you do, never be ashamed of what you enjoy or give anyone permission to make you feel bad about what you like to watch, read, wear or eat.
Words, words, words… use them wisely. You can’t take them back. Sometimes, honesty is brutal. Sometimes, honesty is insensitive. Sometimes, honesty hurts. Sometimes, you need to choose kindness over honesty.
Make space for the unknown. Don’t always assume the worst is going to happen. Things will work out and unfold in ways that will surprise you. You really can never know what can happen a day, a week. a month or a year from now. Do your best and trust that God will take care of the rest.
BONUS: Always listen to that tug at the gut that tells you whether something is right or wrong for you, always!
Onward and upward,
D