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Your 20s can feel like everyone handed you the keys to adulthood and somehow forgot to give you the directions.

 

Suddenly, there are decisions everywhere.

 

Who do I want to be?

 

What kind of work do I want to do?

 

Who should I love?

 

Where should I live?

 

Am I making the right choices?

 

And underneath all of those questions can be an even quieter one:

 

Am I already falling behind?

 

This is one of the hardest parts of your 20s. You’re expected to make choices that could shape years of your life while you’re still getting to know the woman who is making them.

 

You may choose a career and realize a few years later that it makes you miserable.

 

You may love someone you were certain would be part of your future and eventually understand that love alone wasn’t enough.

 

You may outgrow friendships you thought would last forever.

 

You may move away, move back home, change jobs, change plans, lose confidence, find it again, and wonder more than once whether you have any idea what you’re doing.

 

That doesn’t mean you’re failing at your 20s.

 

A lot of this decade is learning through living.

 

You’re discovering what feels right by experiencing what doesn’t.

 

You’re learning which people make you feel safe and which ones make you question yourself.

 

You’re beginning to understand the difference between what **you want** and what you were taught you were supposed to want.

 

And sometimes, the life you thought you were building at 22 will look nothing like the life you want at 28.

 

That’s allowed.

 

There can also be enormous pressure during these years to keep up.

 

Someone you went to school with gets married.

 

Someone buys a house.

 

Someone announces a pregnancy.

 

Someone gets the career you thought you would have by now.

 

Meanwhile, you may still be trying to pay your bills, heal from a breakup, figure out your next move, or decide what you even want your life to look like.

 

It can make you feel late.

 

But another woman reaching a milestone before you says nothing about the timing of your life.

 

Your 20s aren’t a race to become the finished version of yourself.

 

They’re often the years when you begin separating who you really are from who you thought you had to be.

 

So give yourself room to change your mind.

 

Leave what no longer fits.

 

Try something and realize it wasn’t for you.

 

Begin again when you need to.

 

You aren't supposed to have every answer yet.

 

You’re gathering them.

 

And one day, you may look back at the woman you were in your 20s with far more compassion than you have for her right now.

 

Because you’ll finally see what she couldn’t see then:

 

She wasn’t lost.

 

She was learning how to become herself.

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#EvolvingWomanhood