Your Life Is Not a Race

My friend called me crying because she just turned twenty-four and doesn't own a home or have a career path that looks like a polished LinkedIn header. We sat on the phone in a long, heavy silence. I get it. The pressure to have it all figured out by your mid-twenties feels like a ticking clock that’s permanently strapped to your chest. We are watching people on social media buy houses at twenty-two while we are just trying to figure out how to cook pasta without burning the pot.

But here is the thing: your life is not a sequence of milestones to be checked off. It is a collection of moments, most of which won't make it into a highlight reel. There is no "behind." You aren't competing with a 20-year-old CEO or your cousin who just got engaged. You are living a story that has its own pacing, its own plot twists, and its own beautiful, slow-burning character development. Sometimes the best chapters are the ones where nothing seemingly happens on the outside.

Mindfulness teaches us to come back to the now, because the future is just a projection and the past is a memory. When we obsess over where we should be, we completely miss where we actually are. And where you are is usually pretty interesting, if you stop judging it long enough to look around. Maybe you’re in your learning era, or your rest era, or your I-have-no-idea-what-I-am-doing era. All of those eras are valid and necessary for the person you are becoming.

You don't need to justify your existence with a list of achievements. You are worthy of respect and love simply because you are here, navigating a complicated world with a heart that’s still beating. Let the clock tick. You’re busy living, and that doesn’t have a deadline. Your value isn't tied to a timeline that was invented by people who don't even know your name. Take a breath. You are exactly where you need to be to learn what you need to know.