Six Things The First Year of My 20’s Taught Me:
We spend so much time trying to grow up as kids that we solemnly forget to embrace every moment we get to live through. As a child, (at least for myself) I spent so much time wishing I could grow up to create my own rules and schedule so that I didn’t have to abide by my parents rules anymore. 10 years later, here I am abiding by my non-existent rules and late night study grinds and early morning coffee kick-starters. The funny thing about being a kid is thinking that the routine your parents had was so strict such as eating dinner exactly at five, going to bed by no later then eight, and doing your homework every night. Now here I am, wishing I had a routine of being told to get ten hours of sleep over five, making sure you at least eat three meals a day in your busy schedule, and knowing that it’s okay if you don’t get all your homework done.
Driving along the back routes of lower-base line, I see the sunset over the escarpment every evening. Each time I pull over and watch the sunset disappear below the horizon, no matter how busy I am — something always draws me in. So, I made myself a promise and started to remind myself of some things that we tend to forget as we grow up. Although I’m only on the verge of turning 21, it is important to remind yourself to hit pause on your life and grasp all aspects it has to offer over isolating some.
1. Take care of yourself:
At some point or another we have all experienced the busyness that follows us in our lives. You have to work and go to school, find time to do homework, manage to make enough to pay bills, stay up late to get work done, skip out on meals to get your work done, over indulge in coffee over water, and the list goes on.
This year, I learned how important my own health was. After battling a sickness for two months, I realized that I allowed myself to become overwhelmed and overworked in ways I could have avoided if I had just taken those few extra seconds, minutes, hours or day to rest. The excuse of saying you don’t have time is wrong — you have time for everything you want to make time for. So make time to care for yourself, after-all you succeed better if you’re at your fullest potential (being sick takes away from that).
2. Keep in Touch:
There’s a statement when you graduate highschool that states, you were only friends with certain people back then because you saw them everyday at school. For whoever has graduated highscool — we can all relate to this. Of course, we have all had friends who have only been friends based on that statement above. Although, the fact that you don’t see someone everyday shouldn’t deter you from maintaining friendships.
In a digital savy era, we are consumed by our technology. We can snapchat someone instantaneously, whether it be you cooking a bomb-ass dinner, out at the bar taking tequila shots or at a sports game chirping the fans next to you. Whatever it may be, we have this capability of being able to reach our friends or strangers with a click of a button.
As busy as life gets, we seem to always be able to make a designated amount of time towards our devices. Ensure you keep in touch with your friends too. I have always grown up where I haven’t had to message my friends on a daily basis, where I’ve gone months without seeing them and then when I do, it is as if we just hung out yesterday. We all know those friendships are the best, they require minimal effort. Although, it is important to remember that a few small text messages or calls here and there can go a lot further in maintaining friendships then going without them. Make time for friends and family in your life because they will always be there, your job may not be — don’t lose focus of the balance.
3. It’s okay not to be okay all the time:
Nobody ever told me that life was going to be full of roses. Life is rarely full of roses, what makes your life full of them is designating the right time and effort into the things that make them grow and sprout into the beautiful flowers they are.
I always remind myself that you are what you surround yourself with, so try and keep that in mind when you have a tough day. By all means, I believe we all need to have our own days to cry in bed, sit in the shower and contemplate life, and mourn and engulf ourselves in some of the sadness life provides us. But there is a major difference in experiencing the sadness and reflecting on it, in comparison to experiencing the sadness and allowing it to engulf you. Make sure you dedicate the appropriate time to feel the emotional rollercoasters life throws at you, but to learn from them rather then become them.
4. Be adaptable to change:
Change is sometimes (most of the time) the best blessing in disguise you can receive. Change is like a curve ball, it can go in any direction, hit you in any way it wants, but how you stand afterwards is what matters.
When I define change as the best blessing in disguise, in my experience some changes I have had to adapt to have truly fucking sucked. However, here I am in one piece, stronger then ever because of these life changing events (no matter how big or small they may have been). Don’t let fear hold you back from change, if you chose not to adapt to change when life provides you with it you are only closing yourself off of opportunities, growth, and improvement. At the time of change, it may be the thing you dread or hate the most but in the end every adaptation or choice in life is a reflection of how you want to handle it and how you want it to change you. So, my advice is to embrace all change, even if it may be the worst in that moment. After-all, my motto is I would have rather taken the chance and experienced the failure or success, then to have not done it and always wondered what could or would have been different.
5. Take advice that people give you with a grain of salt:
Take it from me, I can be so stubborn in hearing someone’s advice (because whether you want to admit it or not — we all think we know more then someone).
It’s like when you give your friends advice on not going back to deal with that same guy or girl that fucked them over the last time, meanwhile they still go and do it anyways. But then, when they offer you the same advice you don’t listen either — so neither of you come out the winner.
It’s important to take yourself out of the equation. Everybody has something to offer you in life and that’s how you have to see advice. People are going to have different perspectives, opinions, and experiences. But the best part about advice is that someone is giving it to you because they have lived through that part of their life.
Now, I’m telling you to hear and truly listen to people’s advice in life, but I’m not telling you that you need to apply it. Not all advice is going to be correct, not all of us are going to have similar agreements, but taking everything with a grain of salt adds to your experience, wisdom and reflection if you ever chose to use that piece of advice. However, don’t be to stubborn for your own good to ignore the advice that people can provide.
6. Embrace every aspect of life:
We are all familiar with the statement of appreciating all the little things life has to offer. I live by this saying, however I also think it is overgeneralized in the aspect of blocking out that sometimes the little and big things in life go together in embracing everything. The statement focuses so narrowly on embracing the little things that you tend to forget to embrace the big things, which in turn add up to embracing every part of your life.
Embrace everything as if it were never going to happen again. That sunset that disappears behind the escarpment, I watch every evening no matter how cold or hot that day might be. Sure, I may see the same sunset every night, but I’m embracing it in every aspect, differently each day without knowing it. Everyday I watch that sunset, it allows me to relax and reflect on my day — reflecting on what I accomplished, what I have left to do, and what I have forgotten to do that day (the sentimental things).
Overall, some individuals are going to embrace certain aspects of life in more dosages then others and thats okay. However, I believe that by embracing as much as you can in life you are only filling your cup of water rather then retaining it to be half full.
