43 Comments
Jan 3, 2023Liked by Heather Havrilesky

I truly mean this in a loving and not dismissive way, but I swear something happens between your early and late twenties that causes this type of thinking to just start to go away. Not to say it doesn't take some work but I used to be so caught up in this exact tangle, "wait, I used to be the smartest most precocious person in the room, and now I feel like I'm just like everyone else, and I don't know what makes me me anymore, I haven't spent time working on or growing anything I care about, it all used to come so easily and now I feel like I'm in a pit of quicksand and I'm doing nothing meaningful because I'm not as effortlessly talented as I thought and I suddenly need to do everything all at once to get my worthiness back!" Getting closer to 30, I feel more like... "I'm so lucky to be alive! What is it I want to do today? Let's do that, and enjoy it, and appreciate everything around me and the ways I've cared for myself! I'm stressed about XYZ, but I believe I can handle it and there are still all these other things to be excited about too." I think it's partly just realizing that specialness/=worth. Starting to learn what worth truly is and how you find it in yourself, by building trust with yourself and making decisions that are for your deepest good/authenticity. I wish I could give TIMTQ a hug and Polly's advice is great. You just have to go through this struggle to realize how little what other people think of you/expect of you/want for you truly matters and how crucial it is to learn to enjoy the everyday experience of being yourself and honor who you are and what you most deeply want.

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Jan 3, 2023Liked by Heather Havrilesky

I saw something earlier that said “slowly is the fastest way to get where you wanna go” then I wrote that in my journal a bunch of times then I immediately read this letter. I’ve been feeling a manic need to achieve lots of impressive stuff this year and I’m realizing it’s my anxiety about getting older (which is hilarious reading this letter bc I’m the dreaded awful age- 40!!) LW, I’m sending you so much love and peace. It’s really hard growing up in a family where you have to be exceptional all the time.

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Jan 3, 2023Liked by Heather Havrilesky

This was crazy to read because I had the exact same feeling after turning 24, even up to the point about music and creativity! But so much can happen in a year, and your advice here hits the nail on the head.

Things that helped me: Practicing gratitude. Waking up every day thankful for being alive, for getting through all of the shit from the past. Stop comparing, delete social media apps if necessary. More time to be creative. And most importantly, don’t wait for things to be perfect or to be wonderfully skilled at something to do it - just go for it! Be messy.

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Okay okay okay. I'm going to read this every morning from now on. No. wait. I'm going to edit it just a bit to match the details of MY life and then I'm going to read it aloud over voice recorder and THEN I'm going to LISTEN to MYSELF saying it every morning from now on. Is that creepy? I think I'm beyond caring. It feels like it could work. Thank you thank you thank you for everything, HH. You are the BEST.

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Jan 3, 2023Liked by Heather Havrilesky

And for God's sake, get off social media. It's heartbreaking watching what comparison through these channels is doing to young minds and hearts.

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Please all young people, it is good to get older. One learns gratitude, patience and compassion (if this missing in your person) through loss, lessons, regret and appreciation. Be grateful for what you have and learn to serve others. Find faith. Find balance, be nice to your parents, understanding and forgiving at least. Find joy and forgiveness. Dance, exercise, study. Live!!

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"When you commit to honesty and commit to slowing down and savoring the luxury of being alive as much as you can, when you commit to drinking in knowledge and embracing beauty and delighting in the unpredictable weirdos around you, you will be misunderstood regularly. "

Ugh. I need line imprinted somewhere in the interiors of my eyes so I can remind myself of this everywhere I go. Being misunderstood is inevitable, and yet I still crave being understood so much. SO MUCH. And I think this is why so many people are so afraid of slowing down and being honest with themselves, afraid of showing the people around them who they authentically are. Because the moment who we really are is revealed, there is this impending fear not just for being misunderstood, but then for being abandoned.

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Jan 3, 2023·edited Jan 3, 2023Liked by Heather Havrilesky

Hey letter writer!

When I read your letter, I immediately had to think about the Berlin music icon Christiane Rösinger. She is wonderful, has been making music for decades and I think her songs might be just right for your current state of mind.

"Sinnlos" is about how nothing matters (in a good and bad way), and "Geheime Gesellschaft" is about the secret society of anxious/melancholic people. It sounds a bit weird when I type it out, but believe me, she is great!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vavjQ4vQzjI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LQZGFdsi7w

She's also touring with the "legends of entertainment" and their show is one of the most uplifting and fun experiences I've had in a while, so a huge recommendation for that too.

Bussis from Vienna and all the best from somebody who started to study in her late 20s and was really stressed out by that before realising noone cares! :)

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i felt the same when I was 23-24, sometimes anxious to the point where i woke up at 3 a.m. in a panic because i wasn't achieving. it is crazy now in retrospect. Of course I had a lot of outside pressures (parents not supportive of what I was doing as a freelancer), friends who were in steady jobs with better pay. But I wish someone could've told me then, it's okay. go slow. this is perfect for the moment because you're living things out in a way that no one could have predicted for you. as long as you're doing something that aligns with a personal goal, who cares how the outside world sees it? age helps with this anxiety btw.

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Things take the time they take. Don’t

worry.

How many roads did Saint Augustine follow

before he became Saint Augustine?

Mary Oliver

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This is going to sound morbid, and may not be relevant, but it’s something that shifted things for me when I was in that stage of development: when you’re in your 20s, you typically haven’t experienced death and grief on the level of people who are 30+. You think you have time, and you imagine you’ll spend that time achieving things. Then you lose a friend suddenly in a freak accident, or a family member not so suddenly to slow cancer, and you start to ask yourself: if this is all we get, if some of us turn 24 but never get to turn 25, what do I want out of life? This way of thinking landed me, after experiencing great loss, in exactly the place Polly/Heather describes. Of wanting to savor rather than be seen as superior. Of wanting to know yourself and others deeply, rather than image-manage your way into some fleeting sense of being admired for half-truths and bluster. And of wanting to be of service to the world in some way, as my authentic self. Helping others is not something mentioned above, and is kind of it’s own kind of drug if you overdo it, but it’s a great way to get out of your own head and stop overthinking how you’re spending your time. Just my $0.02. Hang in there.

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Went back to do a Masters at 35. I won't be done until I'm 37. And I'm just so grateful I recognised what it is I cared about at this point in my life and can persue it. Many years of slowing down and listening to myself are what got me here. I hope for LW she can start to connect with herself more. So freaking hard with controlling parents and sensitive brain.

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Damn, this one really hit me. Thank you for writing this.

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LW, annoying advice, but you’re really almost there. Being 24 in the global West is a uniquely universal experience!

I had similar panics when I was 24, especially resonating with no longer being “gifted for your age.” I was always, always the youngest amongst my friends and coworkers and liked being mature and talented. I’m now facing my peers as the “sage” (which always makes me lol) because I’m 27 attending the first year of my university program, surrounded by teenagers and young-20s who also think their life is about to wrap up. I will graduate at 31 at the earliest, but likely 32 or 33.

You can’t change the years that have gone by without as much language and music and education as you now want to, and I can’t go back and get two degrees instead of starting school just now. But you now want to! Make a friend who speaks French and treat them to a glass of wine (or two, it helps the accent come out). Use Alex G on repeat to get yourself into such a zone that music pours out of you. Focus on your studies and be proud of yourself. Don’t become immobilized by the past just to perpetuate the cycle

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This was such a good one; I wish I'd had it to read when I was 24. I'm glad I'm working from home instead of at the office today because when I read the paragraph that starts "Some piece of that work involves disappointing other people" I started sobbing - that is so true and I have to remind myself of that ALL the time, all the time, all the time

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Love Your columns and the art work you choose to accompany them.

I share with you focus this year: slow down and sit with emotions. I hope to carry on beyond January with this purpose

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