If You Aren’t Messing Up In Your 20s, You’re Doing Something Wrong

Allegra Messina
Allegra Messina

Your 20s are not meant for only stepping foot into a great career and working on achieving your goals. They aren’t only meant for days filled with meaningless work and downing five cups of coffee just to keep your eyes open.

No, your 20s are meant for much more.

You see, your 20s aren’t only for internships, unpaid freelancing work, and entry-level jobs. They aren’t only for hiding in your old high school bed, working your ass off on a Saturday night, choosing to not socialize for the third weekend in a row.

Yes, it’s important to work hard. Yes, it’s important to have enough money to take care of yourself. And it’s important to work for what you want, whether that’s a fancy car, or a fancy career.

But this isn’t all there is. Your 20s aren’t supposed to be about perfection. Your 20s aren’t supposed to look like a collection of countless Instagram pictures that look like they could be on the cover of Teen Vogue. They aren’t supposed to be flawless like the glossy magazine we collect, just to admire when we feel blue. They are supposed to be ripped and blurry, a collection of bold and beautiful pictures that tell a real story. Your real story.

Your 20s were also meant for fucking up.

For saying something that you weren’t supposed to, and for making someone really pissed off about it. It’s for learning how to own up to your mistakes and learning how to apologize sincerely.

Your 20s are about your failures. For trying your hardest at something, and realizing that you weren’t meant to do that. They are for working endlessly at a painting or a book, and then giving up on that dream. But your 20s are also for trying no matter how terrible you are. And they are for trying even though you know it might not work out in the end.

Your 20s are for letting go of friendships that you used to hold so tightly to your heart. They are for wrecking something that used to be golden, and letting it rust in the rain. They are for hurting people, even if you didn’t mean to, and for learning how to let it go.

Your 20s are for letting go and moving on. 

Your 20s are about forgiving yourself. For all the mistakes, for all the things you shouldn’t have said, for all the things you shouldn’t have done and for all the things you told yourself you would never quit.

Your 20s aren’t meant to be perfect. No, they are so much more important than perfection.

Your 20’s are about failing, dusting yourself off, and trying all over again. They are about losing people along the way, and gaining new people in your life. They are about learning how to navigate yourself along the uneven pavement sometimes by yourself, and sometimes with the help of your friends. They are about causing hurt and pain, but also causing an incredible amount of happiness and love to others.

Your 20s are where you hurt the most. They are where you feel the most. But they are also when you learn how to grow, when you learn how to bloom and blossom even in the August heat.

They are the years where you lose yourself, and find yourself over and over again. They are meant for mess ups, make ups, but mostly for maturing – in your own time. Thought Catalog Logo Mark

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