The holidays are right around the corner, and so are those inevitable overbearing conversations with family about your future.
In today’s first…podcast episode? Audio post? I want to talk to you all about growing pains and expectations. Our 20s are so weird yet so exciting at the same time. I’ve learned to love the process of growing.
(Side note: you may have also noticed that What’s Good has a new look hehe)
See below for transcript
Our 20s are an interesting time. Because we are out on our own for the first time, doing things we’ve never done before, being responsible for things we’ve never had to be responsible for before, and we’re learning so much about ourselves. But I think what’s most interesting about our 20s is how many times we have to learn about ourselves. We are constantly changing in our 20s. We’re changing everyday. Our hobbies, our interests, our passions, our opinions can all change within a decade. 10 years is a long time. And everyday we’re becoming a new person. I don’t necessarily think that’s a bad thing, in fact I think that’s mostly a good thing…but as a result, we have to learn who we are…all over again.
I don’t know about y’all, but I’ve felt like I had to learn who I am, like every 1-2 years. The core of who I am is pretty much the same, but like I am all over the place. The things that I thought I knew about myself 5 years ago, were wrong. Or perhaps they were right at the time and I changed as a person.
Our 20s are so…confusing. But at the same time, it’s so exciting and full of potential. Risk and failure are much kinder to us. We have more freedom to explore and inquire and learn.
My early 20s were rough. But I’m LOVING my late twenties. I love how I’m failing. I love how I’m succeeding. I love how I communicate and fail to communicate. I embrace all the negatives because it means there’s potential for growth. I love the rate at which I’m growing. I love the rate at which I’m learning. I love what I do know and I love what I don’t know. I love that I don’t know everything. And I love that I have so much to learn from others. I may not be ready to receive those learnings all the time, but I eventually get there.
In my early 20s, I didn’t love any of this. I didn’t love myself. I was so mean to myself. I made myself feel bad for what I didn’t know. For some reason at the age of 21, I believed that I should know everything and in reality I didn’t know shit. I didn’t know shit about the world. I didn’t even know shit about myself. I barely knew who I was. I wasn’t even entirely comfortable in my racial identity yet.
The closer I get to 30, the more I love myself and who I am. I am much more comfortable with who I am. I have more confidence. I’m able to set boundaries unapologetically. I do more things because I want to do them, not because it’s expected of me. As each day passes, I’m okay with people not liking me. At this age, I’ve learned that you can’t be liked by everyone. But what you can do is improve yourself based on who YOU want to be, not who others want you to be.
When I was around like 23, or so, I saw a tweet that like…changed my life. It said something along the lines of: “Imagine being enslaved by the expectations of people who don’t even meet their own expectations of themselves”
One thing I’ve learned in my 27 years of being on this planet, is that no one knows what the hell they’re doing. We’re all guessing. And we get lucky sometimes. But there’s no blueprint for growing. And all of our parents, uncles, aunties, whatever, they’re giving us “advice” based on their failures and successes. But they are totally different people with different opinions, passions, goals, dreams, and they also grew up in a much different time.
Why should we plan and live out our lives based on the expectations of people who didn’t even meet their own expectations of themselves? Why should we limit our own potential to someone else’s failures?
Now, don’t get me wrong. Failure is inevitable. I fail at something every week. That’s just life. You fail. And you can either dwell on it, or you can pick yourself up and keep going. When I dropped out of college, I felt like a failure because the people around me made me feel like I was a failure. And maybe I was a failure, in the sense that I failed to meet other people’s expectations.
But look where I am now. I am doing such fun, fulfilling work. It’s not a walk in the park everyday. All of these projects that I’m doing—they’re not easy. They’re hard. They’re time consuming. I haven’t had a day off in months and I need a break REAL soon. I fail at this job…ALL the time. But imagine if I was failing at a job that I didn’t enjoy. That breaks your spirit, man.
Dropping out of college was a result of the first major thing that I learned about myself. I didn’t like college. I didn’t enjoy it. I didn’t want to follow this blueprint of getting a degree and working in an office. It just wasn’t for me.
Every year since then…I learn so much about myself, because I’m always changing. It’s confusing to navigate but each lesson is so fulfilling. I’m learning how to do things a different way. I’m learning how to see things a different way. I’m growing.
We always talk about growing pains as children, but we don’t talk enough about the proverbial growing pains in our 20s.
We each have the power to create the lives that we want. What will you choose?
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