Always thought about my life like an interior decorator putting pieces together.
“This goes here,” and it’s a collection of achievements I should have gotten at the age of twenty-three. “Place this here” and it’s all the places I want to travel to before I turn thirty. The up-side to this is that I am highly motivated, always seeking new challenges and opportunities to lasso my dreams and pull them closer to me. The down-side is that I sometimes find it difficult to celebrate myself when things don’t happen at the speed or tempo I have imagined they would.
I feel this way especially during birthdays. The need to keep account of everything I have done in the past year, and all the ways in which I have fallen short of my own expectations. Like a good accountant, I do the checks and balances; but my ambitions are taller than me, so I always fall short by some numbers. This puts me in a sober and reflective mood, and I tend to spend the week that way — ambulating between “oh my god I’m getting old and my dream life is so far away” and “wow, at least I’m still alive.”
So the result is that I do not fully enjoy birthdays. They make me very very anxious, actually. I love the fanfare of it all, the sweet birthday messages, the phone calls, and the gifts, but everything else is swallowed by the black hole that is my anxiety. Sometimes I feel like I cannot fully celebrate the life I live because I haven’t achieved much yet. I choose sobriety over wild, unbridled joy because the life I want hasn’t happened to me, yet.
Can you relate?
You feel guilty whenever you’re having a good time because you still don’t have a job, your CGPA is hanging by a thread, you still live in Nigeria, and your relationships are a mess. You sometimes find it hard to celebrate the wonderful things that happen to you because they seem so small, compared to the mountain that is your dreams.
I’m learning that joy is something that should not be put on a timetable. It’s hard, because I do it all the time. But it’s also very counterproductive because for one, life is so unpredictable. Your dreams could morph into new shapes, and acquire new meaning from one day to the next. When I was younger, I wanted to be a fashion illustrator. Now I want to be an internationally recognized marketer. So what do we do then? Do we keep postponing joy even as our desires change? When do we ever pause to celebrate where we are now?
I also think life is like a mango, and you get the best of it when you eat everything—including the skin. I’ve been practicing Pilates, and I have discovered that my workouts are more effective when I pay close attention to the muscles I’m trying to target. Life is the same way, and I think the people who are able to truly make the most of it are those who are able to pay attention to their achievements, regardless of size. They can celebrate everything — the big things and the little things. They are happy when their favourite band drops a new song, and they are happy when they get a new job. If they close a deal, they go out for drinks, and if they perfect a recipe, they invite everyone to come and eat.
I’m trying to be that person. It does not mean there won’t be moments where I sit down and reflect on who I am and where I am going, but I don’t want to keep waiting for life to happen to me before I give myself permission to enjoy it.
As always, that Jean-Paul Sartre quote from The Age of Reason comes to mind:
"I have led a toothless life, he thought. A toothless life. I have never bitten into anything. I was waiting. I was reserving myself for later on—and I have just noticed that my teeth have gone."
Don’t reserve yourself for later on, there is plenty of joy to experience while you’re in the process of building the life you want. Treat your inner child with the same excitement and attention you give little kids eager to show you their new painting, or the star they got at school.
I wrote about this piece after I realised that this year was my favourite birthday yet because I spent more time being grateful for life than being worried about how old I was getting and how far away from my dreams I still am.
It’s very easy to get lost in the despair, but we can try turning our heads towards the sun, no matter how dark it feels.
I hope you have a wonderful week ahead.
I’m rooting for you, always!
Tres.
Media I consumed this week
Watched: I watched The Idea of You (2024) with Anne Hathaway and my new favourite white boy, Nicholas Galitzine. Nicholas has this “I yearn for you” gaze I can connect to on a highly spiritual level. I will watch anything he does, indiscriminately.
Listened: I have been listening to a lot of Venezuelan Rock, trying to get back to my musical roots. I dropped a few gems for you guys on the 20 Something Playlist.
Read: I finished reading The Death of Vivek Oji by Akwaeke Emezi. I thought it was beautiful and sad. I think my favourite type of books usually are. Then I picked up Sally Rooney’s Beautiful World, Where Are You, and I’ve got to say—I’m not really enjoying it. I don’t know what it is, but I feel very outside of it (do you know what I mean?). I like it when I read books and I can feel them slowly envelope me and pull me in. This book hasn’t done that yet, and I’m in page 46.
I totally needed this this moment... the thin thread of hope I'm holding onto just got a bit thicker.
Thanks for this, Treasure ❤
read this at 7:30 this morning. I'm eating almonds and this feels like coffee.