Life is too damned interesting to not talk about.
There are daily wisdom nuggets that catch you off guard in weird places like the bus stop, the local grocery store, driving home from work and the best one yet, your bathroom. While life lessons keep coming in various size and shapes as ideas, as people and more, age keeps hitting you in the gut CONSTANTLY.
And before you could realize, you are still wearing those childish birthday caps on your 30th birthday. Your friends are the same, yet your life has changed in every way possible.
So here are 10 things, I believe, we all really wish we knew before we turned freakishly 30!
1. Biryani’s, Pancakes & Nutella cannot solve life problems. Shocking, right?
While I personally believe that food starts tasting better as you grow older, I do have my days of doubt that pancakes cant’ indeed solve my problems. Treating your body like the huge Deonar dumping ground isn’t the brightest of ideas. And at the risk of sounding clichéd as Shilpa Shetty quotes ‘Take care of your body, it’s the only place you have to live in’. Your body is the home, if unhealthy lifestyle and food start getting in the way of tying your shoelaces, it’s time to stop the Nutella binges. Take care of ‘what’ you eat and ‘when’ you eat.
2. You can’t fix old broken cassettes or people
As much as we’d love to hear “Kaho Na Pyaar Hai” or “Country Roads, Take Me Home” on our old cassettes, it’s gone. Accept and move on. Similarly, if you take the ginormous task of fixing people personally, good luck to you. See you never. We aren’t here to fix anyone. We are only here to fix ourselves. It is all about loving people until they don’t damage you. And if their brokenness starts to create cracks in you, it’s time to let go, honey. You aren’t a soul doctor, no one is. Life lessons are meant for a reason, everyone deals with it on their own accord. If you are hanging on to him/her just because you think fixing will make everything better, start typing a good long ‘I love you but can’t stay’ goodbye message. Expert tip: the sooner the better.
3. Waste less time on people who mean nothing
As you grow older, the one thing you do realize for sure is that ‘not everyone stays, not everyone is meant to’. Like I said earlier, even on my 30th birthday the core people who stayed are the ones who always did. New people come. They may be smart, intellectual, and the kind of people you tell yourself you ‘should’ hang out with. But if you don’t feel it, don’t do it. Old friendships grow stronger, mature like a good wine. New friendships are like temporary highs. They come and go. But stop wasting too much time, money and most importantly precious energy in trying to please someone who doesn’t really care or matter. We spend so much of our time trying to please a person who wouldn’t remember our names 2 years down. So quit it. Call the same old best friend, narrate the same old story, laugh the same old way.
4. Parents are getting older
And you start to feel oddly emotional about these things. Your mom’s eyes have more wrinkles than you last noticed, your dad has started to bend a little bit more as he walks. Your parents start asking for your advice about crazy important decisions. And just like that, you start to realize who the real caregiver is and how that dynamic has just changed overnight. Your parents start to rely on you and you start to call them more often than you ever thought you would. You may even get offended if they don’t call you all day. Spend more time with your parents, their age is starting to show.
5. Money is great, but peace is everything
How often have you heard 30+ people saying ‘I just want to be home on time’, ‘Cant party this weekend just want to sleep’. Well, you realize that the grind, the hustle and everything that seemed important at 23 is now starting to fade. Peace starts taking precedence over everything else. What’s the point of having a Hummer if you are busy typing in sales figures on New Year’s night? Balance, however, is the key here. Responsibility is important. Money is more important. Yet peace is the only piece of cake at the end of every meal!
6. Marks don’t matter
While of course, they matter enough for you to make the career choices you want, to get into the college you want, course you want. And yet for most people, we know, ‘What they want’ changes as you grow older. That’s when marks don’t matter. That’s when what you do about it starts to matter. There are so many ‘A’ grade students who are stuck in jobs they hate. And Yes! There are so many ‘I hate studying’ students who have gone on to do what they love. And doing it successfully. Success is a term that needs to be redefined or your own definition. It’s all a matter of perspective. Soon enough people will stop asking what your 10th std. marks were.
7. Parental guidance is advised
And just while you start clocking close to thirty you realize you are this weird person. You begin to realize that mentally you feel 20, and yet your perspectives are so much more mature. You begin to think like your mom! You start carrying anti-allergic medicines everywhere, you start to wear flats to parties (because dancing is more important than a good posture). You start to mother the younger lot and a lot of what they say infuriates you. Welcome! You can now be successfully initiated into the 30’s cult.
8. ‘No’ has a new meaning
The best part of growing older is how you learn to say “NO” more confidently. You start to care a little less about what people think of you. That’s the beauty of inching close to thirty and thereafter. This one’s priceless though. If you don’t like it, if you don’t believe in it, if your values don’t approve, you just say no. PERIOD.
9. Certainty means nothing
Nothing is certain, nor should your values be. Most people with set belief systems find it excruciatingly hard navigating through life. Circumstances changes. Governments change. Belief systems change. And they all must. Grow every day. Be like water. Stay open to everything.
10. Take care of your mental health
‘I am a mental mess’ – a statement you will begin to hear more often than you should. Beginning to be more self-aware of ‘who you are’, ‘what works for you’ starts getting important. To be more mindful of your mental health is very important in your twenties. You will be going through too many changes, paving roads for your life and here’s when everything could get a bit flustered. If you need help, please go get it. This is the most valuable advice to offer to any pre-30 batch or anyone in general actually.
Now go on. Get some more exercise before your flexibility is really affected and you start to feel the knee pain kicking in. Also, stay hydrated!
Welcome to the 30s club!