I'm turning 27 tomorrow 🎉
When I think of the age 27, I think of someone who has arrived. It's a big and scary sounding age. It's an age that forms part of the answer to serious questions about serious life milestones and not just how old you are.
27 with a car, 27 with a wife and kids, 27 with 'Head of' in their job title, '27' with their own business. 27 and accomplished.
Do I feel unaccomplished? In a way.
I've achieved a lot of personal milestones, but they're the type where other people would struggle to understand their importance.
I suppose things have to happen in a certain order. You can't achieve milestones other people recognise until you achieve the ones you recognise for myself.
My biggest priority during my 20's has been my healing and health & wellbeing journey. This is what has come first for me so my milestones look different to other people's. In my opinion this journey taken all the time and resources it has needed to take.
Is 27 the age where you finally start to reap some of the fruits of your labour?
Or is 27 the age where you have 'tenure', and can finally stop questioning whether you have the credentials to live the life you want?
I feel like my milestones for 27 aren't ones that other people can easily see and understand (for example marriage, a house, your own business etc).
I don't really sit back and take stock of my achievements, ironically this is the only thing that makes them real.
I probably under-appraise my achievements, either by themselves or when I compare them to the type of achievements people 'should' have by age 27.
27 is also a reduction in the type of restlessness that comes with being in your 20's. 27 is the age everyone in their 20's is kind of aiming for, where they hope the restlessness reduced. Sometimes we're forced to leave it behind us, sometimes leaving it behind is an active choice that needs to be made everyday.
We're restless in our 20's because of uncertainty. We're more conscious about which things might make a difference to our life trajectory, but we still want to keep our options open to see for ourselves what makes a difference. We are conscious of which parts of our lives it works to be firm, and where it's better to be more flexible. I think the restlessness comes from tension between choosing what to hold on to and what to let go of.
And then at 27 we finally arrive, and can see what actually makes a difference. Or at the very least it's the age where a lot of people review what has made a difference.
We finally feel qualified to not question the places we have decided to be firm, and the places we have decided to be flexible.
We finally begin to set in our mould.
How do I feel about the mould I am finally beginning to set into?
I'm pretty much happy with it. Being happy with it depends on your values, what you value, and how much you are aligned with them.
26 has been a good year I would say, I feel like I've really come into my own.
What will 27 be? Not sure, I like the idea of finally being qualified to do, try, and say the things I would like to; not feeling like I have to wait for a better time, or a better opportunity, or until I have enough experience.
There's technically nothing stopping me from doing the things I would like to do, except myself. All the obstacles ae self created.
I've spent a lot of my life chasing shadows, 27 might mean the lights are finally coming on.
If you got this far thanks for reading !!
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