Reflections on my 25th year
In the weeks leading up to my 25th birthday, I started getting very depressed about the state of the world. My view of the human race was getting increasingly pessimistic. I began to seriously question whether or not I wanted to have my own kids- something I used to take for granted. What we do to our earth and to each other is heart-wrenching, and to belong to a species that causes harm on such unfathomable scales at times brings me great shame.
I was born into a world (we all were) where the destruction, devastation, violence and the pain we see around us were centuries in the making, and yet throughout my life, adults would say, “Your generation has a lot of work to do, cleaning up our mess…” These comments bothered me, and it wasn’t just the slightly detached way they’d say it - as if they were exulting in the fact that they were off the hook, as if in their 55th year of life, they were no longer able to clean up the mess they kept on making. But it wasn’t just that.
Years later, I understood why those words bothered me so much, and it’s because no amount of work, sacrifice, blood, sweat, or tears from my generation or those who will follow can undo what they’ve done, or what the people before them did. The broken pieces of our world can’t become unbroken, and this is a pill I’m still trying to swallow, but accepting this reality can’t mean we stop trying. Our task is to accept this fact without letting its weight crush us into inaction and apathy.
On top of that, I began to slip into the western woman’s greatest fear: getting older. I could feel time slipping away and I wanted it to stop, but it won’t. Time has no regard for us. The only words that offered me any solace were from my sister:
Don’t run from these feelings.
Sit with them.
And what a relief it was to stop running. I eventually began to see these feelings as keys to doors that opened up deeper versions of myself, and through those doors, a deeper understanding of other people.
So amidst global wars, mass deportations and right-wing governments on the rise, I didn't feel like celebrating, but the pressure and expectation to enjoy myself made things worse; but one thing became clear: when we let go of the idea that we’re supposed to feel good all the time and accept how we do feel - without judging it or trying to contorting it into something else - a weight is lifted. Meeting myself where I was at emotionally lifted a huge burden, and allowed me to find the quiet joy that was there.
