35.
I know I’m supposed to dread getting older, but honestly, I never really have. That’s probably at least in part due to the fact that my parents have both aged incredibly gracefully, and I have every hope that I’ll follow in their footsteps—but also, I feel as though I’ve learned and grown so much through my late 20s and early 30s that it’s pretty hard to wish that process would stop. I definitely wouldn’t choose to go back, even if I could.
Still, thirty-five does ‘feel’ like a big birthday on some levels. I mean, I’m a whole new survey demographic now (not an ‘18- to 34-year-old adult’ anymore). I’m officially a CrossFit Masters athlete (yay!). And if I were to have a kid (which at this point is pretty unlikely), I’d now be formally classified as an ‘elderly primigravida’ (sexyyyyy).
At any rate, the steady turning of the earth just has me thinking this year, a bit more so than other years. So, just for fun, here are a few things I’ve learned—some silly, some semi-profound, but all thoroughly true, at least in terms of my own experience of the world.
Any of these ring true for anyone else?
1. In general, seeking out new experiences is more fulfilling than trying to recreate old ones. There are always exceptions — I’ve seen the Broadway show Wicked something like eleven times, in part because I honestly enjoy seeing the different actors’ takes on the characters that I (now) know so well. I ran the NYC Marathon a second time, because I didn’t have the race I wanted to have when I did it in 2014. But in general, our most cherished life experiences are special at least in part because of their uniqueness, and we’re happier when we accept that awesome day or event or moment as a beautiful standalone memory, versus trying to duplicate our joy.
2. At a restaurant, order the thing that you’d never cook for yourself. Restaurants are special, or should be. Most of us don’t eat out every day, or even every week—and we also don’t typically go out on our own; it’s usually a date with a dining companion (or two, or ten) with whom we’re looking forward to spending some quality time. So if you’re in it for the experience, then you kind of owe it to yourself to get the tuna tartare or the fried ice cream or whatever amazing thing you’d never go to the trouble of learning to make at home.
3. Nope, that to-do list is never going to stop scrolling through your brain… One unfortunate fact of adulthood, it seems to me, is that there will never not be something that you ‘should be doing’. There’s a certain level of baseline chatter that you just have to learn to shelve.
4. …but travel is one huge thing that helps with hitting Pause on that list. If you’re only focused on the next couple of hours—where exactly is that ferry port, how do you say ‘bathroom’ in Greek, and what should we have for lunch today?—then it’s hard to remember the closet cleanouts and plant repotting that you’ve been meaning to do.
5. Speaking of which—carry-on only. Always and forever. Even if you’re staying for a month. There is always a way to do it. Bag fees aside, it also keeps you from ever being separated from your stuff, and it’s also just so much simpler logistically—I’m a travel backpack devotee, and I can’t count the number of times my life has been made easier by the fact that I could physically manhandle my own possessions without assistance (up steep flights of hostel stairs in London, through a tropical downpour in Zanzibar, during an hourlong border crossing in Nicaragua).
6. You don’t have to love your job. I mean, it’s easier if you don’t HATE it, either, but… they call it ‘work’ for a reason. You’re not failing if your job isn’t the thing that drives you to spring out of bed in the morning. Despite what social media would have us believe, very few of us actually have the luxury of having our personal interests, our inherent talents, and our actual income all line up—and there’s nothing wrong with that. (And, also worth considering: if my paycheck actually depended on language-learning or CrossFit or international travel, would I still love those things quite as much?)
7. For the most part, vegetables are legitimately delicious. Subtitle: 'Please Stop Steaming Your Brussels Sprouts'. A food you think you don’t like is usually a food that you just haven’t had cooked properly. (Okra isn’t slimy if it’s sliced into medallions, tossed with a little cornmeal, salt, and pepper, and sautéed in just a tiny bit of oil. You're welcome.)
8. Just because you are CAPABLE of doing something—physically, mentally, or emotionally—doesn't mean that thing is necessarily the best FIT for you. As a teenager (with many natural intellectual gifts, but going through a rather unfortunate Shania Twain idolization phase), I was once told by an authority figure, “To whom much is given, much is expected.” Yikes. Talk about feeling like you’re not measuring up. Whether real or imagined, that burden stuck with me for decades—and my resume is sprinkled with some pretty impressive entries from my 20s and early 30s. But what you can’t see there is the associated anxiety, insomnia, weight gain, and general dissatisfaction. It’s taken a long time for me to shake off the reflex that I ‘should’ be aim to be the ‘best’ at absolutely everything—to internalize the fact that, while my abilities matter, so does my own personal happiness. I have a far better work-life balance—and feel like much more of a ‘whole person’—now, at age 35, by virtue of having accepted a position that (on paper) is a little less impressive. In my current role, I still make a difference in people’s lives—but it turns out that I actually have more to give to others by virtue of the fact that I’m also able to take care of myself.
9. Almost no decision is actually permanent. The one exception might be the choice to have a kid—once you take that leap, you’re kind of in it for the long haul. But everything else—romantic relationships, career choices, homeownership—sure, it’s all super stressful and keeps us awake at night… but almost all of it IS still changeable, if we need it to be.
10. Most people you meet are struggling in ways that you know nothing about... The ones who seem to have everything? Rest assured, they don’t. And the ones who are acting ‘off’ and making you second-guess yourself? Chances are good that their behavior has nothing whatsoever to do with you. We humans are inherently short-sighted, selfish creatures whose default mode is to look out mostly for ourselves—evolution made us that way—and yet, in this society filled with modern comforts, we can and should be kinder.
11. ...and strong people only get that way by having gone through something. When you meet someone amazing, remember that they usually had to pass through some kind of test to become the person they now are. I often find myself looking at brilliant, kind, steady, smart, capable people with equal parts admiration and curiosity—wondering, “What darkness did you fight?”
12. The way to tell a ‘good’ lie is to include one solid detail. I’ll preface by saying that lying in general just isn't worth it, not least because it becomes super hard to keep track of… and people can also smell overcompensation a mile away. But on the occasions when you need to tell a relatively harmless fib—to turn down an invitation, to spare someone's feelings, to get out of a party, whatever—include just one good bit of realism. “One of my friends is going through a breakup and I told her I’d meet her for drinks tonight.” “Turns out my parents are coming into town next week, so I don’t think I should commit to that quite yet.”
13. Art is the best travel souvenir. Food gets eaten, clothes blend in with the rest of the closet and lose their connotation. But art is a colorful home addition, a perfect conversation starter, and a constant visible reminder of the adventures you’re had. And if you can simultaneously support a local artist from whatever awesome place you’re traveling to, so much the better.
14. Trains are way more pleasant than planes. The trip might take just slightly longer on paper, but think about it. Free wifi, plenty of legroom, a café car, the ability to stroll, zero required ‘cushion’ time for security screening… and, in sharp contrast to airports, train stations are typically right in the middle of the city center, which (chances are) is likely where you were going anyway.
15. If you’re lucky enough to have a cool family, stay consciously grateful for that. Families look all different ways and have all different dynamics—but we hear so much about all the problems that we sometimes take for granted the millions of ‘normal’, down-to-earth, cohesive, functional family units. Plenty of people out there are doing a really solid job—supporting one other’s various life transitions, thoughtfully listening and providing navigational advice through unforeseen challenges, raising reasonably well-adjusted kids, and straightforwardly taking each other down a peg when needed. We all screw up here and there; that’s inevitable—but if you’ve got one of the awesome families who generally puts the ‘fun’ in dysfunction, it’s worth recognizing that fact and savoring it.
16. A little bit of real stuff is better than a lot of fake stuff. (Just read the famous Amazon reviews of the sugar-free gummy bears!) But really, this is true of just about everything. What would you prefer: one deep conversation or six hours of superficial small talk? One dense fudgy brownie or a whole box of SnackWells cookies? One pair of high-quality leather boots vs a dozen pairs of knockoffs?
17. Not everyone is going to like you. And this works in gradations as well as absolutes—some people are going to like you a lot more than you like them, and lots of people won’t like you nearly as much as you like them. It’s the law of averages in action, and there generally isn’t a lot you can do about it. The takeaway is that it’s a huge waste of emotional energy to continue seeking approval from those who aren’t going to give it.
18. It’s OK to make dumb decisions once in a while as long as you accept the consequences. One of the perks of adulthood is that we're allowed to make less than optimal choices. There are times when opting to stay on that sunny rooftop for a seventh cocktail with our friends really is the ‘right’ decision for our mental health.
19. Nobody else sees your body the way you do. For better and worse, 'perceptual adaptation' is very much a Thing. We see ourselves in the mirror twenty times a day. The holiday belly or PMS bloating truly is not visible to anyone else. Not only are we just so much more highly attuned to fluctuations in our OWN bodies than those of others, but, likewise, other people are also generally way too preoccupied with their own physical ups and downs to even notice yours.
20. This country needs a Life Skills class. In recent decades, we’ve (happily) been moving away from traditional gender stereotypes—and yet, objectively, there was a lot of practical value to some of the stuff our parents learned in Home Ec and Shop. When my sister and I were teenagers, my family once sat around the dinner table and drew up a curriculum that we thought every modern public school student should have to learn by the time of their high school graduation, featuring lessons like changing a tire, sewing on a button, balancing a checkbook, and cooking a couple of basic recipes. I freely admit that, while I am a shining example of a very ‘successful’ twenty-first century student, I’m also significantly lacking in a lot of knowledge areas that would have been considered ‘basic’ not so many years ago.
21. The majority of us wake up with an ‘earworm’. Start paying attention. It’s easy to disregard, but I’ll bet you wake up with a random song in your head first thing every morning.
22. Learning a second (or third, or tenth) language literally causes your brain to work in different ways. You know that pleasant collective lingering that sometimes happens after a group of people have eaten a meal together? Where they all stay around the table—conversing, laughing, relaxed, maybe sipping one last drink? Yeah—in English, we don’t really have a word for that. Dutch does, though: ‘natafelen’ (after-tabling). There’s also the well-known ‘gezellig’—which means ‘cozy’, warm, familiar, but can apply to people or events as well as to spaces. Or what about ‘uitbuiken’—which is basically what we do after Thanksgiving dinner, ‘letting our belly out’—that phase where you push back from the table and take a few minutes to relax and digest. And it’s not just untranslatable words—even concepts that are able to be directly interpreted just ‘feel different’ in other languages. 'Onzichtbaar' (literally: 'unseeable' in Dutch) ‘feels’ just sliiiightly different from 'invisible' in English. Another great example is the large number of ‘creative’ names and words that exist in the Harry Potter series—for instance, in English, the name Dumbledore just sort of calls to mind the image of a tall wizard with a white beard. In recreating that same feeling in Dutch, the translator settled on Perkamentus, a derivative of the word for ‘parchment’, which creates that same gut-level impression for native Dutch speakers. This kind of thing is why translation and interpretation are such art forms—and why the opportunity to learn a new language via adult immersion is so incredibly enriching. You don’t simply gain a new vocabulary; your world inherently becomes broader, because with new words and ideas also comes an ever-so-slightly different vantage point for perception.
23. Split your auto-deposited paychecks. Even if it’s just a little bit, diverting a percentage of each check into a separate account that you rarely access is a way of giving yourself a tiny safety net. If you never see it, you get used to living on what you have. And then, when the day comes that you really need three pounds of coffee and a carton of protein shakes, but are trying to survive until payday because Costco doesn’t accept American Express (ask me how I know)… well, you’ll be really happy when you realize you can make that grocery run after all.
24. Not everybody needs a four-year degree. We will always need skilled tradespeople. (Every single one of us has had that moment when we’ve been deeply, overwhelmingly grateful for an experienced plumber!) A college degree is a great accomplishment, but we’ve perpetuated the idea that possessing one is somehow a mark of intelligence and essential for lifelong success. In reality, four years of undergraduate study have become an increasingly expensive commitment that isn’t necessarily the best value—or the best fit—for everyone. Trade schools and community colleges are undervalued resources that are worth considering. Furthermore, a non-linear path is also okay, even preferred. Take a gap year. Do some service work. Try a part-time job or internship. Read some books. See the world. An expensive and lengthy education may, in fact, be the best choice after all—but give yourself the tools to make an accurate cost-benefit analysis before deciding.
25. Athletics are empowering. Being able to unconsciously trust your body is a wonderful thing. Furthermore, you learn fascinating things about your own individual physical and mental machinery when you explore its limits. This doesn’t necessarily mean deadlifting 300 pounds; your own personal light bulb might be learning to differentiate between the sensations of a high heart rate versus true muscular fatigue, or discovering that the reason your back often hurts is because your superior mobility has allowed you to slide through life with insufficient muscular stability. We all need to get more ‘comfortable being uncomfortable’—because that’s how we grow.
26. Let kids fail… The helicopter-parent epidemic is resulting in an exceptionally anxious generation. The fact is, the way that children grow into confident adults is by being allowed to calculate small risks (that feel large to them, developmentally) and experience both positive and negative consequences. Maybe that steep downhill on their bike will be the most exhilarating thing they’ve ever experienced, or maybe they’ll fall and get badly hurt. Maybe they know their exam material well enough that they can get by okay without studying, or maybe they’ll fail and have to work that much harder for the rest of the semester. Either way, their world is slightly broadened—and their fear slightly lessened.
27. …and, as adults, we should continue to move toward things that scare us. It is a reality of life that you will eventually be forced to confront just about everything you fear, whether large or small. So when the moment arises for you to confront a fear on your terms, that’s a growth opportunity—and, as with everything, having that degree of control sometimes makes all the difference. Actively choosing to undertake an experience is usually a lot more comfortable than being forced into it.
28. Pro-birth isn’t the same thing as pro-life. Meaning, if you’re staunchly anti-abortion, then you’d better also be pro-social programs to support those kids once they’re actually on the planet. (And ideally you’ll also be pro-contraception, pro-health education, and pro-living wage / paid family leave.) In other words: please make sure your moral opinions line up in a way that makes logistical sense.
29. Knowing what you don’t know is just as important as knowing what you do know. And people respect you more when you own that fact confidently. This is true of any life situation, but is actually a concept that I learned firsthand as a healthcare provider. We PAs are exactly (and only) as good as our own self-awareness; we can do so much, but only if we remain acutely aware of the boundaries of our knowledge and experience.
30. The relationships that stick (romantic and otherwise) are the ones that you don’t have to look for—they just find you. This is true of lots of things, actually—career options being another big one. The takeaway is that when something is ‘meant to be’, it tends to be ‘easy’. That’s not to say that we don’t still have to put in work—rather, that the way forward is clear and obvious; the path opens itself up to you, unforced.
31. On the flip side, letting go of a relationship that is no longer serving you—romantic, friendship, or otherwise—is a vital skill. It’s also one that we never truly master, because the context is different every time. But this is one of those situations where life experience pays off big time—not because you necessarily have more tools in the toolbox, but because you’ve had more practice at the flexibility with which you can wield them.
32. Parents learn just as much from their kids as the other way around. I’m not a parent, but I have parents—a couple of pretty awesome ones, as a matter of fact. And while I definitely have one of the ‘good’ family stories and still tend to run straight to my folks anytime I have a ‘life question’, I also recognize that they’ve been stretched, pushed, and challenged in many ways by virtue of the people that my sister and I are. I’m sure they’ve lain awake at night worrying about me at times, but I’ve also nudged them into traveling to new cities and countries, have introduced them to people from different walks of life, and have indirectly forced them to examine their own ideas and beliefs. I’m at a point in my life now where it doesn’t look likely that I’ll end up having kids, at least not biological ones, and this is really the biggest piece of regret that I feel about that: missing out on so many unknown (and unknowable) experiences. What might I have learned—how might I have grown—from those hypothetical kids?
33. Stress is stress is stress. Your poor little body is always trying to compensate for the various abuses of life. It does not know whether your cortisol is high because you had a crazy workday, because you’re in a calorie deficit, because you did a two-a-day training session, because you had a fight with your partner, or because you only slept four hours. It does not know whether your sympathetic nervous system is activated because you just did 100 GHD sit-ups, because you had an awesome birthday cheat day with a couple thousand more calories than usual, or because you just completed a 12-hour road trip in bad weather. It just knows that it’s stressed. Treat your body kindly. After all, you only get the one.
34. One of the absolute greatest things about getting older is self-awareness—learning how to drive your own individual machinery. There’s a lot to unpack here, but basically: life gets a lot better when you can ‘manage yourself’ proactively instead of simply reacting to every small event. Personally, I know that I’m wired for an early bedtime and an early wakeup; that I need a lot of time alone to recharge my batteries; that I’m a more settled and positive person when I make time to write first thing in the morning; that I am prone to become unduly stressed in a competitive setting; that I shouldn’t commit to anything in the evenings after a full workday; that week two of my monthly cycle consistently delivers my strongest days in the gym; that I’ll sleep poorly if I don’t eat enough on a given day; that my emotional intuition is generally accurate even if I can’t put it into words; that endurance training beats up my body much more than heavy barbell work; that I consistently underestimate the physiological stress of driving a long distance; and that despite often dreading a task beforehand, I will almost always immediately commit to doing it perfectly once I’ve actually started. TL;DR—if you know your inherent patterns and tendencies, you can build your life around them in a way that makes you a better, happier, more optimally functional human.
And, 35… Comparison is the thief of joy. A pediatric surgeon I used to work with, when discussing his surgical outcomes with parents, would often put it another way, “The enemy of good is perfect.” Either way, this is probably the single most important thing I’ve learned thus far as an adult… that it’s so much easier to savor your own small accomplishments if you aren’t constantly focused on how you stack up next to others. Social media perpetuates this issue in spades, because there will always be someone smarter, prettier, stronger, funnier, or more accomplished—and nowadays, it’s harder than ever to avoid having that fact thrust in one’s face. But if we’re happy inside ourselves—if a patient tells us we’re appreciated, if we squat five pounds more than we did last week, if we love the way a new shirt looks in the mirror, if we’ve internalized a few more life lessons at the age of 35 than we had by 25—shouldn’t that quiet satisfaction be enough?