The Lengthiness of Life

Reflection, future regret, and talking my way around a quarter life crisis

It’s barely (almost, if you’re going to be technical) spring, but I feel myself preparing for summer, which will mark a year since I moved, took a big step away from social media, attempted traveling more often, and decided to try writing/sharing writing a little more.

I have found myself in a space of increasingly valuing privacy, which is an interesting place to be in when writing relies on disclosure in so many ways. I believe strongly that all writing and art, even fiction, is only going to be as good as it is honest. Yet I find myself resisting, maybe protecting, the tender parts of myself.

With exception of the periodical scroll down Instagram, I’m off social media, and it seems hard to want to go back. In the time I’ve moved more offline, I’ve done a few big cool exciting things, as well as a lot of boring normal whatever things. And I feel protective of both. Protective, too, of myself, from expectations, real or perceived, as I move through the life in front of me to live.

A disproportionate amount of my mental space goes to how I want to spend my time, which is really, of course, a question of how I want to spend my life. In part of an ongoing conversation I have with myself, which looks like a lot of scheduling and goal setting, is really a constant wondering and taking stock of if I’m living authentically, aligned with my values, in a way I am proud of, and will hopefully not regret.

But the troubling thing about regret is that there is no way of me knowing what I will regret in the future, because I do not know what my future self will value.

I’m turning 26 this summer, and while, yes, I know that I am still so young, thank you, it feels like the most turning a corner of birthdays I’m reached so far—a consensus it seems that my friends have also been reaching as I’ve interviewed them over coffee, dinners, and car rides about their latest/upcoming birthday.

Part of it could be because this is the age the federal government decided it was time to hop off your parents insurance, the last vestige of being a dependent, but I think there’s something more illusive about 26, and I find myself comparing myself to both the friends who settled down early and the ones who moved to NYC after college and somehow traveled to Europe twice last year.

My last few years would fall somewhere in the middle of the two ends of the spectrum I measure myself by. And thinking about 26 comes with a lot of wondering of enoughness—have I set my future self up for enough success? Have I had enough fun and adventure? Has setting up my future self for success come at the cost of adventure? Am I accomplishing enough? Traveling enough? Building enough identity capitol?

Questions of enoughness can be questions of scarcity. Over the last several years, I’ve been trying to reframe every area scarcity has dictated or distorted how I live and see the world around me—a task that never ends, I suppose.

This first started as trying to root out an omnipresent sense of interpersonal competition—that if one person succeeds, someone else does not—that I was starting to understand as the driver and mindset of so much oppression and dehumanization. That there’s a limit to opportunities and goodwill in the world, only so much attention to be given, and one must try to rise above the rest to stand out.

I was first confronted with this paradigm from the teachings of Fannie Lou Hamer, Dr. King, and other civil rights leaders.

No one is free if they are rooting against someone else. The thriving of another can only contribute to my own thriving because it makes for a healthier, more abundant culture. Every flourishing person shifts the needle to an atmosphere where flourishing is more possible, where there is enough for all of us.

Slowly this has been taking root in other areas of my life and eventually into my view of time, to the point where I heard myself saying that I’m starting to believe whatever time we have is enough. And I think I believe it—most days.  

Because the truth likely is that resources can be both limited and enough, and if I see it only as scarce, I might rush past moments, conversations, connections, and all the things we claim to want the most out of life.

A week into January, I met up with a friend of mine when driving through Kansas City. She told me that ever since talking to her partner's aunts about all they have done in their lives, she has been thinking about how long life is. (I am learning that the best conversations turn into mile markers that reflect back to me how I see the world at that point in time.)

I loved the spaciousness of that framework. 

Life is short, of course, but for many of us, it’s also long and we can live so many lives within one.

It seems like sometimes the shortness turns into a marketing strategy, because it’s not as sexy (and often profitable) to tell people to save for retirement, wash your face even if you’re tired, and do some cardio even if it really freaking sucks.

And while I’ve been consoling myself with the lengthiness of life, that I am not wasting it because I haven’t quit my job and moved to Europe or started a business at 23, I’m trying to find the balance that these years, my 20s, as well as my 30s, 40s, and beyond, are limited, but can also be enough.

Like life’s shortness is an inhale and its longness is an exhale. 

Life is short
(Hop on the plane)

Life is long
(It’s ok if you don’t have the capacity for a spontaneous trip right now) 

Life is short 
(Tell that person how you feel!)

Life is long 
(Take good care of all your relationships, not just the romantic ones)

Life is short 
(Live deep and suck the marrow out of life)

Life is long
(Pace yourself, there’s a lot of life to take in)

Because like many things, the truth is not in the middle but found at both ends at the same time, and the most impossible, and I hope freeing, thing is to live within them both at the same time. 

And since I can’t know what future me will regret or thank myself for, I can only look at what I have valued so far and what I wish I’ve done differently, and do what every person seems to be trying to do: their best.

Life is short enough for midweek concerts and dropping $80 for one really good meal.

Life is long enough to rest now. It’s long enough to take care of yourself now. To do what each period of time calls for. It’s long enough to have regrets (I guess 🙄) because we’ve evolved and grown into different and, hopefully, better people.

Spending less time on Instagram and TikTok helps.

Choosing to rest first helps. 

Ruminating on joy helps the most. 

And when talking to friends who have made it out of their 20s alive, they diagnose a quarter life crisis, and somehow that helps a little too.

Until next time ❤️