Mid 20s

Symbolically, and literally, I’m now in my mid 20s. There’s so much to unpack, and I have no idea where to start.

Things change, time goes by, and things do change. I’ve changed. My friends changed. My priorities changed. What I enjoy doing, even that I think has changed. Things do change.

I learned too, I learned a lot. I learned about myself. About how to be with myself, or at least, I learned it is something that I really want. To be with myself, well, calmly, and in silence, enjoying the quiet of the mind. I learned how to let go, or at least, I was forced to let go, a really hard thing to do; to let go of something you’re so dearly, and dependently, or at least, seemingly so, attached to. Learning how to walk, how to feel, how to smile, how to be, all after letting go of a really hard thing is no easy task, or at least, not one for me.

I learned many more things too, learning probably deserves more body than a single weird paragraph of repetition. I learned about myself, about my past— my relationship with mom, and the one with dad, the one I thought I ought to have, and the one I’m learning to accept to be. I am learning how to love, not ideas, that which I picture in my mind, and what I think I must really want, but what things are. I’m far from it, though, and ideas, I must recognize, still play a protagonist role in that which I think I want. Yet, I am learning how to love. I see the progress, and I see the path— recognizing it, sometimes, getting the opportunity to see that path and to look back, as if walking through a beach where my every step is kept as a footprint in the sand, that is all I want.

I learned I’m a romantic guy. Well, I think I’ve always been — romantic — at least that’s what my mom always says, but I’m learning how to own it, how to enjoy it. How to feel proud of this romance and the urge to approach life in such way. I love and smile thinking about how there’s a romance to life, the building one’s life: taking notice and appreciating those footprints when looking back, that is a romance I dearly enjoy and appreciate, or at least, I try to.

I learned how much I want to be a good friend. How to be there for others in a way that feels healthy. I learned how it’s a lot easier for me to be a good person when having a good day, but how impossibly hard it feels to show up for someone else during bad ones. I really want to show up for those I love no matter the day, or at least try to. I really want to celebrate and cherish the wins of others, even when I feel like my whole life is going adrift. It is in those days that I hope to become better. Yet, I learned how much I struggle doing that: feeling happy for someone else without comparing their wins and lives to my own. It’s annoying, and it’s terribly unhealthy, as I quietly try validating my journey based on that of others. The outcome of which always being an empty feeling of reassurance or comparative despair. It’s happened to me many times this year, and it’s forced me to think about it. I guess I should be grateful for the opportunity to figure this out, but I’m not, honestly, this one feels especially hard, and I’m not excited to pursue it. It goes really deep, and it’s been going for a long time now, so how am I supposed to change it? What if I can’t change it? It scares me, what if I can’t, what if this is me? I wouldn’t be proud of it. Is this what growing up means? Knowing things about yourself that you’re really not proud of and accepting there’s little you can do to change it? Is that what becoming an adult is about? I hope not, I really hope not, that would terrify me. I always lived by the idea that I can change myself, entirely. That I get to control that. But it’s starting to feel increasingly hard to do so— to feel like I can control that. I am starting to see certain tendencies that keep coming back, that keep pounding, hurting, myself and others, in ways that feel really hard to change. What if I can’t change them? What if this is me? It might be me.

I guess this is what adulting means: the rephrasing, it is me. This thing about me is obviously me. Maybe adulting is accepting the hard truths about myself and forgiving myself for it. It is in that rephrasing, from “it might be” to “it is” that one goes one level closer to one’s heart. Perhaps that’s another thing I learned, learning to accept. Wasn’t there some kind of saying about this? Perhaps that is adulting: learning to accept. At the end of the day, there’s too many things to fight against if trying to control the gravity of life. Whatever that is.

Actually, that’s it, now I’m certain, accepting is a big part of it.

Accepting love. Learning how to receive it. Owning to the fact that I do deserve to be loved. All of me. All of me deserves it. Accepting faith. Learning to let go. Allowing people to choose their lives whatever they want, and accepting that that is who they are. No one gives a shit, nor should I, about whether I agree or accept those things. Accepting that true love is in the choice of staying when enjoying absolute freedom, and accepting that life is a bit more complicated than that.

Accepting that great partnerships are not just about love and how that’s not necessarily a bad thing. That there are other things that are similarly beautiful, differently beautiful, which must also be appreciated. Trust. Consistency. Respect. They all matter to me.

[Unfinished writing on the morning of my birthday].