the big 3-0
where's my rejection letter, forbes?
i’ve been working with a grief coach, rachel, on planning my thirtieth birthday party - because of course i have. this is exactly the kind of overkill people expect of me, and that i have come to also expect of myself. i think i put the event up on partiful before I even turned 29, and i’ve been saying ‘i’m basically 30’ for over a year now, just to emotionally prepare myself for… being in my thirties.
i didn’t really have a vision for my grown-up self when i was younger. as a teenager, i thought i’d die before i hit 25. as a child, i thought i’d go to cambridge and become a dermatologist (a ship that has well and truly sailed). i’ve also wanted to be a musician, a writer, a literature professor, some vague kind of tech professional, a psychologist or counsellor, and someone who works in A Charity, and now i handle career aspirations with a great trepidation as i feel like any job i get will be easily ruined by the humdrum of having to do it for 40 hours a week. four out of seven isn’t bad, especially when the three i missed are down to a lack of higher education. now i manage a business, and that’s pretty good. when it’s intense it’s a lot, when it’s not it’s chill, and at least the buck truly stops with me. i find that a lot easier to understand than the office conundrum of being chained to my laptop in case my boss calls even though i actually only had two hours of work to do today.
and here i am now, on the edge of 30, looking back at everything my twenties have brought me. i would hold a moment for my twenties, but it would be literally so long. a decade, in fact. i’ve earned three and a half degrees. gotten married. i’ve settled into my own home, which i paid my entire savings and then some to do. i’ve traveled countless places, lived in about twelve different apartments, learned countless skills, been in and out of my mind on substances, gotten jobs (some dreamier than others) and quit them, picked up hobbies and let some of them fall by the wayside, had health problems, made steps towards recovery, made so many friends and lost some of them, gotten stronger, reprioritised, had so many hair lengths between my chin and waist. my mental health has hit new highs and new lows.
rachel suggested i make a timeline of the decade, which is - no surprises - long as hell. looking back through my 2015 calendar feels like flipping through someone else’s life. who was that person I got coffee with in december 2015? what workshop was that? where was ‘the shop’? so many friendships gone by, so many projects finished, forgotten. so many books read, films seen, places been. so many moods dipped and i don’t even remember why i felt low in the first place. i don’t make much of an effort to remember things. to archive them, yes, but not to reminisce. no rereading old journals, no scrolling through photo logs. i’m usually too busy doing to look back (not in a superior ‘i’m so present’ way, in a bit of a shameful chronically busy kinda way honestly). now, in my most established phase of adulthood yet, ‘big things’ will probably involve spending a lot of money on stuff like the kitchen. like…is getting a new kitchen lifechanging? it is, in sort of a humdrum way. the slow satisfaction with which i oven heat a pizza. smiling at the new colours of my walls. but it’s not, like, agh! moving house! starting a degree! quitting your job! booking a one way ticket! the electrifying knowledge of throwing the life you’ve carefully built out of the window to start again, caution to the winds! though i did quit my job, move house, and start a degree in the past 18 months, by the way (i actually collected the keys for our apartment on the last day of work at the music charity), and it made me DEPRESSED FOR TWO MONTHS. that was my reward. obviously.
there are moments worth holding onto, even without examination. i recently found a box of letters and pressed flowers from will at my parents’ house, and i grabbed it to keep and look through. i have an email from him from our wedding day in my starred folder. i also have an email from a therapist i finished a term with telling me how much progress i’ve made, and one of those crazy 5000-word-long missives from an ex-friend telling me everything that’s wrong with me in there just to humble me (i recently learned just how hard i won that breakup, which is extremely, in case you’re wondering). i should probably delete that last one.
there are things i want of my thirties, but in terms of concrete goals it feels very vague. i want a stronger sense of self, one that doesn’t rely on throwing my own needs under the bus for a project or for other people. i want to call them that - ‘my needs’ - aiming not to deprioritise them to wants or comforts that come lesser to other people’s comforts which are their needs, because my own comfort is actually really important. i want to take better care of myself - not so i can work harder or do more or be ‘better’, but just because i deserve it. i want to stop being afraid of other people’s judgment. i want to soften, to widen my capacity for empathy - not just for others, but for myself too. and i just want to stop giving a rat’s ass about the little anxieties that plagued me most of my life. stop caring about being liked. be confident that people will like me and if i do something that treads on their toes they’ll let me know if it was that egregious and if they decide to stop being friends with me, well…sucks, but there are other fish.
i think there is the great temptation to aspire to develop an aesthetic or an image for my thirties. some muscular, toned person with full tattoo sleeves (but no fear about sun damage!) and flawless skin, who has the time to do their hair in an intricate hairstyle with cute little clips, with the perfect cohesive wardrobe that has exactly three descriptive words that anyone would get from a glance, who is thin but still has enough facial fat to not look gaunt, who gets carded at the grocery store every time, who eats their greens and stretches every day and has a high powered impressive sounding job like Doctor or Journalist or Director of Operations but still has the time in the day to live a fabulous life full of sensory and intellectual pleasures. and i am trying to be those things, but trying to hold space for myself and for the unknown at the same time, and to know inside me that labels aren’t everything - i’ve had enough of them to know. i have posted a bunch of my outfit pictures now and they aren’t all cohesive. i’m not all cohesive. life isn’t a very cohesive thing. the grocery store guys know i’m definitely not 18 and these days i’m not even buying alcohol to test the theory.
what i have found (for myself!) is that there is never a moment where everything slots into place, where i can look at myself as i am and say, ‘this is it! i’m doing it!’ - that comes after, and it’s a temporary state. so i can’t aspire to that level of permanent wholeness, because i know it not to be true to who i am right now. i hope that someday it can be, but in lieu of me becoming a bodhisattva this lifetime, some things i do want to do in my thirties are:
be comfortable in my community. have friends i love who love me, be at low levels of general passive aggression, chat with my neighbours politely in the hallway, keep my ire towards my blood family fleeting, and be a friendly face in my city. appreciate the community i have, which has shaped and built around who i am, not what i want to be or what i want to make. there is always the temptation to create community out of effort and the will to build, and that is important to honour, but the community that is there for me as i am myself, that is most important to be with.
create a home environment which serves me. a space that doesn’t feel overflowing or like it doesn’t have things that i need just for the sake of minimalism or maximalism. a place in cute colours that make me happy, that is easy to clean and take care of, where i host my friends and my family, where people feel they can come and be safe too. a place for people to crash and for me to be quiet and to gather - myself and others.
make art that won’t kill me. art has nearly killed me a few times now, but it never has, so i guess carrying on in this vein, but also working on projects without taking them so seriously that it really affects my health. and being willing to let go of projects that i can’t reconcile with my own health, if that’s what it takes. i come first. i need to be good so that the art can be good. the opposite doesn’t happen.
continue to set myself up for the future. keep contributing to my emergency funds, keep taking care of my health, keep expanding my brain. go new places, keep reading, keep building forwards and investing in myself in every way possible.
take good care of my body and mind. keep lifting, keep stretching, keep flexible and moving, have a skincare routine, wear my retainer, do my allergy protocol, and try to eat well and drink more water than i do pepsi max.
learn a new skill every year. usually i learn a bunch of skills, from small stuff (little DIY jobs around the house) to big things (learning to ski, learning to paraglide, a new sport or hobby). i want to keep this up. there are so many things in the world to try and this is one of the things i have that stops my brain from forming a crust.
get a pet. i have major dog lust at the moment, but i have to find one i’m not allergic to first. i had a dog from 2008 to 2022 and it was very nice. i would like to have that for myself again someday, probably in 2026 when the house is more together as i don’t want a dog to potentially run into home works and get into trouble.
learn to say no. saying no without the fear that no opportunity will ever come my way again, that they won’t want to hang with me again, that no one will approve of or care for me again, that i don’t deserve chance or care for myself again. and maybe that person or that opportunity won’t be available to me anymore, but something else will, no matter how small or quiet. i always have myself and my life to come back to.
be grateful for what i have. i am. i feel like often i let my drive for change take over my body and i forget all that i have, which is a massive shame! i have so much! i have a beautiful husband, a wonderful and changing home, excellent, hilarious, effervescent friends, a community that envelops and cares for me and is there when i reach out if i only let it be, a job that gives me the money to do things i really care about and time to do it (the relationship i am currently comfortable having towards work). my life is full of love and care - some of it planted by me, but a lot of it seeded by the folks around me.
my twenties have been full - of people, of projects, of change. but as i look toward the next decade, i want it to be about less and more. less pushing. less proving. more care, more space, and more ease. more breathing out, more soft gazes, more trusting that the magic will come if i let it and that just because i can make it happen through sheer force of will doesn’t mean i have to. more appreciating the magic that is and not the magic i have to make (which i can also do very well).
let us see what this shift brings. let us see where tomorrow takes us. farewell. xxx