If you’re reading this that means you're somewhere in the mist of your twenties: fumbling around with school, your job, your family, your finances, your future and somehow managing to have a social life. What a time to be alive.
You are lost and it is okay.
Being lost in your twenties is inevitable, sometimes you get found and sometimes you lose yourself in ways you don’t think you’ll ever be found, but that’s the fun in growing up. Your twenties is the time to be selfish with yourself: travel, take time off from work, adopt a pet, take photographs, start a journal, try new food, explore everything, just live in the moment. The world is yours for the taking.
There are things people don’t tell you about your twenties like the fact that you’ll be lonely, you’ll get lost, you’ll be poor, you’ll get confused, you’ll have your heart broken, the dating world is a whole new ball game, money will define you for a while but they also don’t tell you that your twenties is when you feel most alive, you are adventurous, you have minimal responsibilities, you are free, you find yourself after losing yourself, you will reinvent yourself and you are the one who is in control even if it doesn’t seem that way.
You are lost and that is exactly where you need to be. Do you ever think of all the people who wait to realize they’re lost? Or how many never do? Have you ever thought of all the people go through their entire adult life only realize it was wasted years filled with a job they hated, a partner who they no longer love and a list of unchecked boxes. Those are the people who thought they had it all figured out at 22, they thought having a degree and a dream was all they needed in life but they lacked purpose and that’s where it all went wrong. The amount of people that coincides with is a lot more than you’d think. You are lost and that is exactly where you need to be.
As you make your way to graduation and beyond you realize your life is in your hands from here on out, you are the one who controls everything your life could or should be. Your twenties is your time to feed the wanderlust in your soul, find the people and things that make your heart beat faster, that make your smile brighter and your love louder, that give your life meaning and hold onto them. Be humble, be kind, be generous, be a humanitarian, be selfless but you need to remember to be selfish, too, for yourself. I cannot stress that enough, be selfish as hell with your time and don’t you dare apologize for that.
The hardest chapters in your life are often the best ones because they enable you to reach, succeed, fail and learn. You spent the first 18 years of your life being told what to do and you’ll spend the next 18 wondering what the hell you’re doing. One day you’re 20 and eating easy-mac in your apartment the next you’re 24 and starting your dream job while four years later you can’t seem to pry yourself out of bed to go to work. It's okay to not be okay, you’ll find yourself again. I know it isn’t where you would like to be – amongst the failure and confusion and your what seem to be far-fetched dreams. This is not the place you thought you’d be when you entered the “adult” world when you turned 18, when you started the journey through college and your young adult life and it sure as hell was not where you pictured yourself once you had a degree but here you are – here we all are riding in on the same current wondering where we go from here. You’re sitting there reading this realizing you are not where you saw yourself when you pictured your future. At 20 this was not where you saw the next decade of your life going but this is where it led you so just breathe.
By now you’ve gone through things that have made you weaker but ultimately made you stronger. Chances are you probably lost someone close to you in some way, shape or form. As you evolve and grow you soon realize the impact you have on the world and the impact it has on you. You are stronger than you think I want you to remember that. Anyone who tells you they have their entire lives figures out at 24 is full of shit, nobody has everything figured out at 24 not even Mark Zuckerberg when he became the worlds youngest billionaire.
The fact that you are lost right now tells you something, it tells you a lot of somethings. It tells you that you are not a person who settles for ordinary because you are extraordinary. It tells you that you enjoy the adventures life offers, that you are okay with uncertainty and that you can thrive in the worst of scenarios. It tells you that you would rather live in complete unpredictability than a life that makes you eternally miserable. You are a rare breed if you can choose your path of happiness now because some people don’t find it till they’re 55 going through a mid-life crisis, consider yourself one of the lucky ones even if that doesn’t seem so right now. We need more people like you, those lost souls who are still pushing themselves to do better – to be better.
You’re lost because you want to escape. You’re lost because you love. You’re lost because you care. You’re lost because you have dreams. You’re lost because you aspire and often forget to perspire. You’re not lost because you failed one too many times, but because you will allow people to realize getting lost is the best thing that could happen to you in your twenties. You have to be lost to be found, remember that.
To put things in perspective at 20 Warren Buffett was working for his dad making less than 10,000 annually, at 21 Jessica Lange was a college drop-out, at 22 Jeff Bezos was flipping burgers at McDonald’s, at 23 Tina Fey was working at a YMCA, at 24 Stephen King was working as a janitor and living in a trailer and at the age of 25 Mark Cuban was a bartender in Dallas.
Your life in your twenties is a box of broken records, shattered glass along the cracked floor boards in your bedroom. You cannot pick up the pieces without cutting your fingers, so stop trying to. Once you hit rock bottom, and you will, you have nowhere to go but up use that to your advantage. Remember what I said, you are lost and that is exactly where you need to be right now in this exact moment. Lost. Nobody gets found by hiding, by running away or by fighting the things that make you want to be better. You get found by being lost, don’t stay lost but when you find yourself and you are found you will know this was everything you wanted, do not stop until you reach that moment because the possibilities are endless and so is your willpower.
You may be lost but you are a person worth searching for while the world awaits.
