What I Wish I Would've Known in my 20's and What I Still Need to Remember Today

I wrote a letter to my 20-Something Self (Circa 2008) and still need help remembering this today.

I think you will be able to relate.

Dear 20-Something Christi:

Put down your frosted lip gloss, stop back-combing your jet black/platinum blonde hair and toss that Ed Hardy shirt aside because WE NEED TO TALK. This is your 30 Something self, coming in hot, and you- my grungy babe with the heavy black winged eyeliner- are in for a comeback hotter than a scrunchy tied to a crop top. Future you is coming up on the ripe-old age of 33 and I need to talk to you about your 20-something life. But please don’t throw your VonDutch trucker hat at me like you know everything, because you’ve got a decade of hard lessons about to come your way.

You've just landed for first, safe job and you hate it. This adult life is actually way harder than anyone ever told you it would be. But you start to think the next step to happiness is a mere iPod Shuffle skip away. Because you think happiness lies within your next big transformation.

With all of the bull you are dealing with now (inside and out), you think this new you and future extravagant life will be so perfect once you get everything aligned. You think that once you get the husband, kids, big house and the perfect body in the mix, THEN you will be happy. Surely all of these problems and issues with self-confidence, bad body image and lack of self-care will disappear once things start calming down in the real world. But seriously, how could life possibly get any busier and chaotic than it is right now? You think there is so much pressure from parents, relationships, and comparison through friends that you honestly don’t know what all these 30 somethings are complaining about when they literally have it ALL!!!

20-something Christi, I need a giant ladle to scoop these eyeballs out from the back of my head. Can you pick up the sarcasm I’m laying down? It’s as thick as that avalanche of Aqua Net that’s taking over that Snooky poof in your hair. I know you think you’re struggling now, and you are in your own way, but there is something you need to know. You think that struggle will disappear ONCE you get that job, ONCE you get that house, ONCE you find that perfect guy, ONCE you get the perfect body, and ONCE you have mini you’s running around. But the struggle will NEVER EVER EVER STOP. This is when the naive impression of adulthood gets over-shadowed by real life. This is when you start falling down a deep, dark hole of never being or having enough because you are chasing this non-existent, perfectly happy mirage of perfection.

“We are the daughters you told ‘you can be anything’ and we heard ‘you have to be everything’,” From – Perfect Girls, Starving Daughters by Courtney E. Martin.

This is also when I need to pull up a chair, sit in it backwards, put my hat on sideways, and give you the “I’m the cool mom” talk.

Because of the misery gap you were laying in, thinking you should be here and actually being where you were, you developed a skewed perception of adulthood and morphed into this people-pleasing creature. You stripped yourself of all self-confidence and infused your mind with damaging insecurities and violent self-talk. Somewhere down this discouraging and impossible road of perfection, you thought you had to do it all and kept beating yourself up because you couldn’t keep up with your flawlessly impaired vision of perfection. You compared yourself to others and told yourself that you weren’t good enough, pretty enough, thin enough or smart enough. And you believed it.

This lead you down a daunting path of self-destruction. If somebody got offended by your goals, you backed off them. If somebody didn’t like the way you acted, you became a chameleon and changed your personality to fit who they thought you should be. If you didn’t feel like drinking one night, you went out and went hard anyway because you didn’t want to be different and feel left out.

“You were being governed by the habits, fears, and opinions of others.” -Les Brown.

You were so scared of not becoming everybody’s favorite person that you lost yourself for the fear of not being loved. And when you do try to find yourself in your late 20’s and early 30’s, you will have the hardest time trying to dig through all the facades while figuring out which one is truly yours.

You let your fears become wild and untamed. You beat yourself up for not being perfect but then judged others for their imperfections. The metaphorical black eyes were cathartic and legitimized because you thought you deserved them. It almost felt like a badge of honor when you could validate your shortcomings with the imperfections of others. You were a masochist that egged on your verbally abusive inner critic and searched for pain to try and punish yourself for not being perfect.

DUDE… START RESPECTING YOURSELF.

Because that person that you’re waiting on to do it for you will never come. IT HAS TO BE YOU. Stop waiting for someone to laugh at your jokes, stop looking at yourself in disgust as you get out of the shower, stop buying the size 8 jeans when you know you’re a 10. Stop looking at your friends when the waiter comes by and asks if you want dessert hoping they get that “let’s be bad together” look you’re trying to ESP their way. Stop trying to talk about football with your guy friends when you know you only have that 5 minutes of sports talk radio that you heard on the way to the grocery store under your belt. Stop hoping the pretty girl doesn’t show up to the pool party so you won’t get shown up in your tankini while she rocks her barely-there bikini in her seemingly effort-less bod. 

WHO IN THE HELL ARE YOU TRYING TO IMPRESS?! And do they even matter? Because that guy you were trying to throw googly eyes to at the bar is now living in his Mom’s basement, has 5 cats, and “works for the state” while he volunteers his time picking up trash on the side of the road in an orange jump suit. Do you realize that your insecurities blare the brightest when you’re trying to hide them?

You think you’re in this unique box that has been viciously cast aside. When in reality, you were tossed right by another unique box and another one and another one. We are all unique boxes that feel cast aside. But here’s the kick in the bedazzled jean butt… WE ARE ALL MISFITS AND WE ARE ALL INSECURE. That girl that you think has the perfect life and the one you’re currently trying to compete with is feeling the EXACT same way you do. She is scared, feels unprepared, and is just as terrified about her life and her body as you are.

You are at your best when you are not feeling judged or criticized. So, forgive yourself for the abuse, forgive yourself for the past, forgive yourself for hurting others and forgive those who have hurt you.

Now, are you ready for the tough-love part? Tougher than knowing that Blink 182 will one day become Classic Rock and played on the easy listening station?

Speaking as your future (badass) self, it took me forever to finally realize that when we are unhappy it’s because we are not progressing anymore. Think about it: we graduated from college, got a job, got a husband, got a house, a dog, had kids… soooo now what? We have no more goals to achieve by society's standards. So, we wear ourselves to the bone trying to search for some meaning in our life. We go on meaningless diets, work jobs we hate, go home to a house that reminds us of all the projects it needs done, work out because we have to and not because we want to, and stay up until midnight to make those Pinterest cookies for daycare because we don’t want to be the mom that brings the store-bought ones to the party. (PS you will end up being that Mom that brings in the store-bought cookies.) #dealwithit

Just getting by is killing us, Christi! What happened to your dreams as a kid of becoming the big director for the next Mary Kate & Ashley movie, the cat veterinarian for homeless Kitty Kitty Kittens, or the next Businesswoman of America (I totally made that up). I cry just thinking about the bright, energetic and creative little girl you once were because you shoved her down into a hopeless pit of despair and forgot about her. You grew into an uninspired people-pleaser who has no self-confidence, no inner courage and no sense of self-worth. You think that your body is the problem when in reality, your mindset about your body is the problem. Then you carry this into other aspects of your life like your relationships, your family and your career. But you do not understand the potential that is curled up in a ball inside of you.

BE THE PERSON YOU NEEDED WHEN YOU WERE YOUNGER.

You are worth so much more than what your inner critic is telling you. You are valuable and you matter. Keep progressing and don’t try to avoid the failures or embarrassments life will throw at you. People are going to judge you whether you’re 20 lb heavier or 20 lbs lighter. People are going to judge you whether you are 30k richer or 30k poorer. You will start this process of finding yourself again in your late 20’s and slowly start to listen to your issues instead of shoving them down a muddy butt crack of shame.

In your late 20’s, you start the process of finding yourself. You start journaling and reading books… well, more like listening to them on Audiobook because you’re a Mom of two now and you don’t have as much free time as Donald Trump does on Twitter (you’ll get this reference in about 10 years). Eventually, you start to listen for hurtful cues towards yourself and examine why that self-talk is surrounding you. Plot twist: 99% of the time it stems from your fears and insecurities being projected onto others, not because Amanda actually has a better rack than you. For God's sake, woman…

You are worth so much more than what TV tells you, than what social media tells you, than what your friends tell you. My dear sweet girl, who are you? You are a body living in other people’s lives and you have no clue about your own. Spend some time with yourself. I know you can’t even stand being alone in a room without the TV, music or something on to distract you from talking to yourself; but get to know who you really are because she is F@!KING RAD. Have the courage to rustle up the past and bring that pain to life. See it for what it is and learn from it. Talk about who you want to be and who you are un-becoming. You are more than your body shape and your value isn’t placed on your ability to follow a diet.

Darling, you need to love yourself first and you need to stop trying to shine up that flashy-outer-shell. The soul inside is what’s begging for attention. From there, you can change the world by changing yourself. You were born to BUILD and CREATE, and you were put here on this earth to help others. I wish I could tell you that you won’t experience another episode of getting knocked down by life’s vicious baseball bat, but it’s coming. However, don’t change that for the world. Don’t wish against it, don’t try and tiptoe around it, go in with guns a-blazin' and FIGHT. Because you are worth fighting for. That’s right, you actually turn out to be pretty cool. You eventually give up on perfection and start working towards progress. THAT’S when you become unstoppable.

My dear, you are now 33 years old and I cannot wait to write to you again in 10 years. You are meant for greatness. Buckle up, because this decade is going to be full of your life’s greatest lessons, miracles, struggles, and breakthroughs!

Love,

Your Hero (that’s you in 10 years ; )

P.S. Invest your entire life savings on Pinterest, Facebook, Instagram & Snapchat. Oh, and burn all of your R. Kelly CD’s. He’s a monster.