i have always felt this need to get everything done before i turn thirty: trail-blaze. settle down. buy an apartment. have a big fat balance. i know life doesn’t end at 30. but an inner voice tells me if not done by my twenties then it will be too late.
i know i am over-glorifying my twenties. a reflection of my impatience, my desire to squeeze my entire life into one decade. stemming from my obsession to accomplish my goals as quickly as possible.
well, here are some hard truths. being obsessed with my goals doesn’t mean i will accomplish them. in fact obsessing over goals has only left me paralyzed, feeling anxious and pressured. because when i am obsessed with my goals, i don’t really care what my goals are. it deprives me of my mental clarity, making it hard to do something sustainable and worthwhile.
i had to change how i view thirty. not only because getting older is inevitable, but because i don’t want to be someone who is only work obsessed. i want to be obsessed with life. someone who is happy. someone who enjoys the everyday, regardless of the peaks and valleys.
being work obsessed strips the joy from the everyday. this begs an important question: what is the point of working so hard if you don’t even enjoy it? if you can’t enjoy it? there are limits to what professional success can give you. it can’t buy meaningful relationships and the way people genuinely feel about you.
life is a series of trade offs. one of the hardest balance to strike is between work and play. if it were easy, then everyone would be living fulfilling lives. when you are young it is tempting to relentlessly for chase success at all costs. you want to be the youngest and most successful. but put things into perspective a bit: life is finite. as you get older, you’re not going to wish you worked more.
when covid hit, apart from a heavy sense of grief, i felt relief. relief that i feel no regret for the way i have mostly been living my life. for forcing my mom to do a last minute trip down the coast of italy with me. for spontaneously moving to new york. for squeezing my friends as hard as i could whenever i could.
you see, the exact same moment doesn’t come again. you have to seize the present. while work is important to me, i don’t want to be too caught up in work that i forget how to live.
life really doesn’t end when you turn 30. you can still have dreams and chase them even after 30. it is liberating to realize there really isn’t a timer for anything. but it also equally important to realize the significance of the present.