Live While You're Young

 

When do you start to get older? When are you officially 'old'? When I was in my teens, I thought that people in their twenties were old. I thought that being old meant having your life together - having a full-time job, buying a house, getting married. Now that I'm finally in my twenties, I don't have any of those things. And I know many other women just like me who also don't have those things. So where does that leave us? When are we supposed to feel like we're adults? What even is 'adulting'?

With a rocky start to my twenties, I felt like it would take a lot of hard work to get my life back on track. I tried my hardest to 'be more adult'. I tried to save as much money as possible, to shy away from socialising and drinking with my friends, and spent most of my days and evenings working or Googling things like 'best mortgage rates uk', etc.

I started dressing more conservatively and speaking in a certain way in the hopes that people would take me more seriously, to make them think that I was older or that I knew what I was talking about. The truth is, I don't know what I'm talking about, most of the time. Do any of us? 

I was faking a more 'grown up' life in order to convince myself and the people around me that my life wasn't falling apart. Why? Because I was afraid that people would say to me 'look, you're [insert age here], you should really get things together and stop acting like a teenager'. I was constantly paranoid that other people were going to judge me and make me feel terrible for not leading a more successful lifestyle, because I already felt terrible - but if I could convince others that I was right on track, then I could escape judgement.

After a time I realised that this way of living was just plain exhausting. Essentially, it's lying, and keeping up a facade after telling a lie is always more exhausting than telling the truth and dealing with the consequences. So I decided to own my age, and own the way I live my life. Because who writes the rule book? Who said, 'at X age you should be doing X'? Who said that you need to feel like you're under constant pressure in order to succeed in life? 

Your life, your rules. And if you feel young, live young. Laugh really loud in public, eat pizza and ice cream, daydream. And, more appropriate to this blog, dress how you want. I've decided that I can wear smart trousers and a blazer if I really want to, but at this moment I want to wear a hoodie, ripped jeans and a camo jacket, and go to an arcade and take pictures of my outfit because it's bomb. 

SHOP THE LOOK

FROM LEFT TO RIGHT: WHITE FLATFORM TRAINERS, £22 // GREY CHICAGO CROPPED HOODIE, £18 // HIGH WAISTED MOM JEANS, £25 // KHAKI CAMO JACKET, £31.50 (All Missguided)
BELOW: ZEROUV MIRRORED SUNGLASSES, $9.99