Starting over at 30
Hitting 30 was such a curve ball, one that I could have never predicted at the start of my 20s. For some obscure reason, I imagined myself getting serious at 28, having already met my life partner, planning some little ones maybe, working on my career, and generally having life figured out for the most part.
Well for a moment it all seemed to be going in that direction. I had a lovely family-oriented girlfriend and a good job with good colleagues. I could almost touch it. That was it, that was the life that I imagined.
What a naive fool I was. I wanted it to be real so bad, that I ignored all the doubt and pain, and felt the pressure of the world on my shoulders trying to keep all the pieces together. Until when it inevitably all fell apart.
Needless to say, that was the greatest pain that I felt in a long time, followed by a sense of despair and being lost. I was following the plan I crafted in my head so many years ago and then lost everything at once. I had no direction and no idea where to go from there. While I was having this internal conundrum, the world seemed to be going down the shitter too, with social unrest post covid, wars, and global economic crisis.
In other words, a pretty fucked situation. One sleepless night, I questioned what’s the point. Why work so hard, just to be kicked in the nuts by the injustices and all the times I thought it was over for me and I had no one to turn to. It was trying to tell me something, I could feel it.
And then it hit me. It’s not over, far from it. This is another one of those key crossroads of my life, where I could either let the event passively define me or I could once again find the strength to stand up and fight again. I once heard that it’s the worst moments of our lives that define us. We all strive for happiness, but happiness is just a brief celebration of what has been already done, it doesn’t teach us anything new. Failure, however, is the greatest teacher. It gives the opportunity to learn and grow if we’re humble enough to embrace it.
It’s better to shatter an imaginary dream and create your own reality than living in the comfort of an illusion, however painful that might be. Now I know. And I knew even back then. My inner voice was trying to warn me, only to be drowned out by the voice of my logical brain trying to rationalize everything. I forgot all the things that I’ve accomplished constantly trying to get me to compromise, and most importantly tried my best on the things that mattered the most.
I lost so much but found the strength that was lying dormant inside of me. No one has life figured out, and the ones that say they do are either lying or selling something. Life is constantly evolving and the only thing we can do is adapt to it. We may not be able to control the events that happen to us, but we definitely can control how we respond to them. Going forward I will definitely work on being more in tune with my instincts. We’re much stronger than we think, and sometimes we have to remind ourselves that.
0 Comments