How we train our brains now in our twenties truly matters when it comes to setting ourselves up for a less stressful and more meaningful life. Your brain is a complex system of neurological pathways. It’s more important we start choosing which routes we continue to drive down now because it’ll be much more painful and difficult to rewind your mind 30 years from now.
Adulting is the biggest wish of most of us. Making choices on your own and not always being dependent on your parents is a really great thing, but it is scary how the time passes and you kind of feel like not living at all and every day is the same. I graduated this year, and trust me this is the most difficult, confusing, stressed, anxious, and struggling phase of my life. I believe this is the only time when we are not running in autopilot mode and are finally getting the chance to think about ourselves, our values, our belief systems, and who we really are. During this phase, I have realized that it is essential for me to spend time with myself and reflect on these questions. Stay distant from voices that fade these voices inside of me and continue to REFLECT, REFLECT, AND REFLECT.
Meg Jay, PhD clinical psychologist, notes in her newly revised book, The Defining Decade. 85% of our life defining decisions are made before the age of 35. Your personality and brain change more in your 20s than any time before or after. All these are statistics but we humans often struggle to make decisions in our 20s. We need proper mental and emotional guidance to make important decisions in our 20’s.
Where are our teens struggling the most?
The common thread didn’t have to do with being addicted to their phones. It didn’t have to do with being bullied by their peers or being overly stressed about work or school. The common thread was much more conclusive, A FEELING OF BEING CONSTANTLY AT WAR WITH THEIR MINDS. It’s not because of this 21st century of internet and social media but because we have done nothing for the mental and emotional development skills. We must take radical responsibility as soon as possible as this is where joy & fulfilment are born.
We need change. Our young adults, our children, our parents raising young adults need mental and emotional skills to create a better future for themselves, their families, their communities and society at large. What is happening inside each of us creates the reality of what is happening outside of us. So, how can we bring this change to society? Well, it’s difficult to bring this change to the big level at once.
But there are three core values that can help young adults have a simple foundation of better emotional intelligence, better decision-making skill and empathetic self-guided growth.
· Unlearning
Unlearning is kind of unlearning what society has taught you all your life. Learn to hear how your heart truly says, constantly reflects yourself. Living in alignment is aligning your core priorities, your actions, and your thoughts with your deepest core values. So, when your head hits the pillow at night, you can ask yourself, Am I living as aligned as I can at this moment? And when you truly answer this question, YES, that’s what peace feels like. Because, there’s nothing more to long for with that mindset, the only person who is in charge of your success is you. And that’s a very blissful, fulfilling and freeing feeling. I urge you to take an audit of what social conditioning and mindset you have inherited.
Question why you think, believe, act or speak in a way you do. And from there, you can reconstruct your views to be more aligned with you and the future that you want to have for yourself.
· Being
How can we design in the authentic way for being ourselves? In order to align our way of being, we must become healthier and more self-aware individuals. For this most of us have done meditation, journaling, therapy or reading. If any of you have gone through this process, you know it’s very hard. But I want you all to think like this. For example, you want to build your house. Being is being your true self, ignoring what other people say about how you should “build your house”. Instead of that, start building it in your own way. You’ll feel the most comfortable in the house you made for yourself.
· Doing
You must take action, even if it is the scariest thing to do. People tend to be afraid of the bold changes, because it’s unpredictable. But actually, if you do it right, it will bring more peace than chaos.
That’s what life is about, moving towards your goals with hope and certainly that with the work and effort you put in you will eventually become who you have always wanted to be. Reread all this and find out, the word repeated the most is “yourself”, make sense. Because only if you see through yourself, you find the peace in your soul. And that’s what matters the most.