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Turning 30

Turning 30

Can’t believe I made it.

I used to stupidly glamorize not reaching 3 decades.  The path I used to be on was headed in that direction.  If I wasn’t literally dead at 30 I would have definitely been spiritually or morally deceased.

It’s hard you know,

saying goodbye to the 20’s.  I think we all fall into a trap of thinking that an age was more fun then it really was.  Oddly, I feel like I am finally approaching a healthy 20 (that just happens to be a decade later.) I know that I had to birth myself through the melodrama of my 20’s to reach this peace. Reflecting back on those 10 years I can’t imagine what the next ten are going to serve.

We are 30 now.  Wow… 30.  It feels good doesn’t it?


Yeah, we’ve lost friends, jobs, loves and our mind, but I think you have to earn  30.  I don’t think age is given to anyone easily.  You have to travel around the sun to get it.  That’s a feat.  Especially when you have no idea what direction you are going.  I think about what my idea of 30 was and what the reality is and it makes me chuckle.  It’s amazing when we think that we know where we are going.

Sure, I’m different– that’s inevitable, but the magnitude of the internal change that has taken place is inconceivable.  The older you get the less time you have to worry about frivolous things.  Your patience is thin when dealing with concerns of yesterday.  Time really is infinite and finite simultaneously.  

I’m oddly free of anxiety about getting older.  It’s weird.  I’m not old and neither are you by the way- even if your birthday was 100 years ago because what we truly are isn’t what we think. Take a moment to consider that truth.  Yes, we have thought, but we are not what we think, we just are.

The strong hold I’ve lusted to have over my life has loosened. 

I think we all have that same impulse to control, but for several different reasons. Life is scary.  Once we think we have an idea of what is going on, God is sure to throw us off course and make us realize that we haven’t even scratched the surface.  The biggest lesson I have learned in my thirty years is that you must be willing to change your lens.  You must be flexible enough to change angle.  It is necessary to change perspective.  

We drive ourselves crazy with expectations.  We formulate this perfect life that needs to happen in order for us to be satisfied.  If anything challenges that idea, we deflate like an old birthday balloon.  Why?  Why is it that we believe the thoughts we have in our head to be true?  I’m not saying that some don’t hold truths, but to solicit that all the mutterings knocking around between your ears are worth abiding by is ridiculous.

I’ve learned that just because I am conscious doesn’t mean I have control.

We confuse these things.  

 

I welcome 30.  I embrace it mostly because I don’t have a choice! I grow more and more aware of the difference between my circle of influence and work each day to make that the most productive and loving space to live in.  The only expectations that I can place on myself are to be grateful and conscious in all the moments I am given.  Of course, I am not perfect and will sometimes get sucked back into the comparison game, but I have expanded so much further then that and I am glad to say that the metaphorical blank page I am looking to write my story on inspires more then terrifies.

For the first time in my life I can say that I am not living to get the approval from other people.  We all like to think that we are SO independent of other’s judgements, but we care

I can confidently say that I don’t.

Not because I am oh so wise –no.  It’s because I know that I will never get the approval that my unrealistic, petty mind craves.

So, screw it.

Releasing the expectations that I have looked to as gospel for so many years feels like free-falling.  No front, back, side, top, or bottom. Existing purely here and now despite the pressure to check the clock. All I care about is doing what makes me feel good, fulfilled and happy.  Turning 30 has reinforced that if I chase those feelings earnestly it is impossible to be dissatisfied.

The best gift I received this birthday is myself.  My full self.  Mentally, physically, emotionally and spiritually. Receiving this gift is strange because no one else can give it to you and it’s there to have your whole life, yet some of us wait decades to gift it.

I am no longer stingy, I want to continue to keep sharing myself with me. ???????


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