Life Advice From a Weathered Heart
The 5 most important things I have learned while navigating young adulthood.
There are days were I am filled with a great sense of loss. These days are many and they are hard. There are also days were I am carried, and those days are much easier.
When my world ended most recently, it felt like I had just barely caught my breathe from my previous cataclysms. All the feelings and lessons I hadn’t addressed before, came barreling at me full speed. It was falling apart to piece myself together - to fall apart again. Learning and making mistakes. Healing and breaking.
A few things became apparent during this time though. Number one being I have plenty more lessons in life to learn. Well, to discover, struggle with, understand, and finally learn (I usually have to find things out the hard way). Number two, I have started to feel like I might actually be getting wiser.
These tips may not work for you, or even apply, but here are some things I learned the hard way, so hopefully you won’t have too.
Every day is full of choices.
From the moment we wake up to the moment we go to sleep, we make choices. What to eat, what to do, what to say, when to go to bed, who to hang out with. It is extremely easy to get caught up in the day or an environment and forget that every choice you make is infact a choice. However, I think it is important to check in with yourself and recognize you are responsible for your choices and thereby your actions. Another point to that effect - your attitude, the way you treat others, how you carry yourself? Those are choices too, and very important ones at that. Make the time to be aware of the decisions you make and think them through, even the small ones.
Life shouldn’t be so hard.
It is expected that life will be hard. No one will tell you otherwise. You’re going to break down, you will make mistakes, you will have to restart, you will have to grow. Theres lots to life that makes it … hard, plain and simple. However, there is so much more to life that helps mitigate that struggle. The people in your life, your hobbies, coping mechanisms, your environment. Those should be sources of joy in your life. Nothing is perfect all the time but more times than not, those things should make you happy. If they do not, you are effectively making your life harder. My advice? STOP. Stop being around those people, doing those things, being around those places. Sometimes we form toxic connections or rely on unhealthy patterns to comfort us in times of strife. We get attached or placated and then we stay with things or people or habits that do not serve us. It can be uncomfortable to change, leave, or stop, but it is necessary for your own happiness.
Your choices are your own.
Some things are out of our hands. They truly are. We cannot control others and their actions, anymore than we can control the weather or the passing of time. However, when it comes to our lives and ourselves, we are in charge of that. How you react is a choice, even if it is a reaction. Someone may tempt or persuade you to behave in one way or another. In this case, the first step is being cognizant of the role you play in your life and taking responsibility for that. In order to do that, you need to know your values. Make choices based on what you want for yourself and your future. Others may talk down or not understand which can feel isolating and frustrating. On the other hand, living a life built by choices you made for others is absolutely suffocating. This is your life, which means the choices contained within it belong to you. The only person that needs to understand your choices is you. As well, when you make a bad call, it is crucial to accept the consequences of your actions. It was your choice, so shirking that accountability will only harm you down the line.
You are not a bad person, you just made a mistake.
So you had the opportunity to make a choice of your own on a regular ol’ Tuesday - and it was a mistake. This obviously means you are a horrible person and are taking the express way straight to hell. Ha, yeah right. The truth is, you would be hard pressed to find someone who has not made a big mistake at least once in their life. That’s the reality of being human. It IS messy, and we don’t always make the right choices. People just don’t blast their blunders and failings. You just have to realize that you aren’t that special - NO ONE is perfect, because that is impossible. When you make a mistake, especially a ‘bad’ or ‘big’ one, your initial reaction needs to be one of accountability. To be frank, this is one that is hard for me. Not only is it difficult to own up to what you’ve done wrong or the hurt you have caused, but to also not OVER punish yourself. You need to know you have done wrong, and understand why it was wrong, but you don’t have to spend the next year hating yourself. The biggest take away from this lesson in my life has been making better choices - if you don’t want to hurt anyone, then don’t. Sometimes, it is that simple. Do better, but love yourself even when you feel you have lost that right. I promise, you haven’t.
Pick your battles.
Somethings are worth dying for. Like arguments. The phrase, ‘the hill to die on’ is one I cherish. The key point here is to know what hill to die on. Again, having a sense of your values and being actively aware of yourself and your choices helps quite a bit. Having a strong sense of self helps you understand what is central to who you are and what isn’t. As well, people gossip and hurt feelings. We have all done it - some things just aren’t worth taking personally. If you have a friend who has done something you strongly disagree with, you have to decide if the principle of the offense or the value of the friendship mean more to you. In relationships, familial/platonic/romantic, you will annoy one another. You will get in arguments. Knowing why you are arguing your point is important, as it also allows you the perspective of understanding whether or not this is something worth speaking on. This isn’t to say that you should not speak your mind or address things that bother you - you should! It is rather a balancing act. If everyone addressed every single bothersome trait about a person, place or thing, this world would be very tense and negative (more than it already is). Sometimes, it is better to allow things to pass when they are not infringing on your mental health or overall wellbeing.
The MOST important thing I have learned is to be yourself. It is exhausting being someone you are not. Who you are is what you like, what you tend to think, your patterns, your behaviors, your ideas and beliefs. Everything that goes into who you are is important and valuable. You deserve to like yourself. You don’t have to be perfect either, just amendable to growth and changing.
For me, life is not about how much money I can make, or about how much better I can be than another person. It is about loving (yes, I know that sounds corny). It is completely true though! I went through my life believing there were steps I needed to take and milestones I needed to hit in order to be happy and successful. I enrolled in programs that did not interest me, stayed in friendships that did not support me, and betrayed myself at the core of who I am to make others happy. All in the vein of being successfull - and I was miserable. At the end of the day, I will say; I am grateful, to a certain degree, to have been through that. Those experiences taught me what I valued and what my path entails. I value love and kindness, and knowing that now means I know that is how I need to lead in my life. That is now my definition of success. When I have lived my day knowing I made choices to be kind and loving, I feel fulfilled. When I know I have made others feel loved through kindness, I feel successful. When I live my life with love and kindness, I feel like myself.
As a young adult, your world is going to end and fall apart soooo many times. Like, sooooo many times. It is devestating and challenging. It hurts and is lonely. But you learn so much about yourself and your world when it comes crashing down. I truly believe I would not have had the self awareness or courage to change my path, had my life as I had known it not changed so drastically. Take every apocalypse as an opportunity to reflect on yourself and what you want.
Every now and again, things really do have to fall apart in order to fall together.