The one that surprised me the most was this: I stopped caring about being the best in the room.

We all want to be someone. Leave an impact. Live to our fullest potential. Prove a few people wrong. live a great big life. Make a difference. Escape the rat race and live a life with little regrets. Most of us grow up believing that if we can become exceptional enough or excel in the path we choose, we'll become that person.

I’m not encouraging a loss in ambition or settling for average. I still want all of the above. The difference is that I no longer measure that against everyone else.

From a young age, we're taught to believe that meaning comes from standing out. School rewards the highest marks. Universities rank students against one another. Employers accept only a handful of applicants. Promotions are competitive etc etc etc So it's easy to start believing that a meaningful life is one where you outperform enough people.

We begin chasing the best career, try to find the best partner, work for the best salary, seek the best opportunities. Even self-improvement can become so exhausting. Constantly tweaking our routines trying to be the best version of ourselves. I’m definitely generalising, it may not be everyone’s dream to be the ‘best’ in the room. Ambition presents differently for different people ofc. Some people will build companies, others will raise families, teach, create art, conduct research or spend years travelling the world. Or maybe do all of those at the same time. None of those paths are bigger than the other. The mistake is believing that someone else's version of a meaningful life should become your own. That achieving a list of milestones would reassure both you and everyone else that you are doing a good job at life. That if you can collect the same milestones as the people you admire, you'll eventually feel fulfilled too. bc you should at that point. no? if not then, when will we ever be content?

When you’re in highschool your 20’s seem so distant, they’re almost imaginary. You build your life in your head the same way you build a Sims character. By X age you'll be living in X dream city, earning an X amount of money, have met the perfect person, be married by X age.

Then your twenties arrive … (which will happen so suddenly and quickly).

The Sims life you pictured will look a bit different, a bit rogue and unpredictable. Some goals happen earlier than you expected. Others don't happen at all. All the daily habits, decisions and priorities catch up and shape how your life feels and looks like.

After all, life is made up of a string of daily decisions and commitments we return to again and again. So build a life where you can wake up without dreading the day ahead. Whatever path and decisions can get you there, follow those priorities. For me, I stopped caring about becoming the best but building the best life, however that looks like.

Sometimes, it’s because someone is so themselves. They’re just there, as they are.

There’s no sense that they’re trying to impress or say the right thing or keep things flowing. They’re not mirroring you or holding back parts of themselves. They’re just present, and real. Which makes interactions feel easier. You’re not overthinking what they mean or reading into things. You’re not trying to figure them out. You just leave feeling like you actually spent time with a genuine person.

So, after this interaction I started thinking about how to put this feeling into words (or lists, bc I can only understand things in lists). Below are the final 10 traits I think make someone radiate that kind of energy.

1. When they back their opinions:

   I admire people who can hold an opinion even when it’s unpopular, not because they’re stubborn but because they stand by their beliefs. Even in situations when it would be of their benefit to be agreeable either to impress someone or fit in, they still stay true to what they really think. There is nothing less attractive than someone who bends their values in whatever direction for the sake of approval. These people have their own opinions, formed by their own conclusions but are also open to new ideas and if presented with new evidence or a better perspective they can adjust. They understand that changing their mind doesn’t weaken them and it doesn’t threaten their core values.

2. Detached connection:

   They have a deep understanding that no one in this world is made to “complete them”. Instead, they know we choose to be with people as an addition to our own lives. There’s a difference between wanting connection and depending on it and you can usually feel it straight away. When someone is dependent and attached to connection there’s some kind of pressure to it. They’re a little more reactive and a bit more affected by how they’re being received. The most magnetic people I know are those who are open to connection but are not attached to others, their expectations, their opinions or needing to be valued a certain way. They can be close to people, care about them and invest in them without it becoming something that defines their sense of self and easily affects them.

3. Are not afraid to be vulnerable:

   I find this to be real aura. A common pattern of thinking is this: being nonchalant —> not caring enough —> not affected by others = strong character. This is so off. That is the easy way out, in my opinion. It’s a way to avoid being exposed, to avoid caring too much, to avoid rejection or shame. Having a strong, admirable character means facing these fears, being open anyway knowing there’s a chance you might be judged or misunderstood and being okay with that. It comes from a level of self-acceptance where you’re not trying to protect an image of being perfect or unaffected. You can be wrong, you can show your failures, you can care more than the other person and it doesn’t shake who you are. They don’t try to hold power by caring less or pretending they’re not hurt. Truly charismatic people all have one thing in common and that is authenticity. they can have a laugh at themselves and own it. I think thats what makes someone so easy and fun to be around.

4. Their moods aren’t spoiled easily:

   They don’t react to everything. What other people say or do doesn’t immediately shift how they feel. They can keep cool under stress and don’t internalise every bit of outside noise around them. There’s a level of internal stability there that is very grounding. I recently saw a tiktok by @drtroylee that described this perfectly. She says “the most powerful skill you can develop is to learn how stay in a good mood” and advises to repeat: “I’m a thermostat, not a thermometer.” She explains that thermometers change and adjust depending on the outside environment, whereas thermostats set the tone and maintain it. Even when something goes wrong, they don’t spiral or lose their good energy. There’s a sense of gratitude there and they can still appreciate what’s good and stay present. Being around someone like that is calming and makes people naturally gravitate towards them.

5. Don’t always correct people:

   They don’t feel the need to point out everything, especially in front of others.

   Even when they know something is wrong like a mispronounced word or incorrect fact they won’t always jump in to correct it. There’s a difference between correcting to actually help someone understand something and correcting just to be right. A lot of the time, that urge to correct isn’t really about educating. It comes from wanting a bit of control, or wanting to feel more knowledgeable. Admirable people though, know when something actually needs to be said and when it doesn’t. If it’s important, they’ll say it in a way that doesn’t put the other person down and if it’s not, they’ll just let it go. They’re not trying to prove their superiority or knowledge in every interaction.

6. Enjoy doing things without absorbing it as their personality:

   They do not extract their identity from what they do, their hobbies or interests. All of these things are what they’re into at the moment and all just part of their life. They don’t over identify with labels and make them their main identity. I saw someone recently that said amateurs tend to label themselves by what they do, whereas someone who’s actually good at something is more aware of how much they still don’t know. These types of people shift from defining themselves by titles like “I am a manager” or “I am a runner,” and more towards internal labels like “I’m someone who is disciplined” or “I’m someone who enjoys learning.” This means they derive their identity and value less from what they produce and more from who they are.

7. Human humility

   They don’t believe they are above anyone or anything, not above the law, not above things going wrong for them, not above making mistakes. There’s an understanding that they’re human like everyone else and that bad things can happen to them too. They don’t need to make themselves seem bigger or make others feel small. They are ok with coming off badly or failing in order to learn and better themselves and are not afraid to ask a stupid question or to take a risk. Because they’re more focused on learning than protecting how they’re perceived. I think that’s what makes it so charming. There’s no pressure when you are around them or unspoken expectations for how you should treat them and no need to walk around eggshells. They disarm people and make them feel comfortable enough to be themselves. Because they don’t come across as someone with a big ego or someone trying to be superior, it creates space for other people to just be themselves too without feeling judged.

8. Make excuses for others:

   This is probably my favourite one. Someone with strong character isn’t the one with the best comeback. It’s the one who doesn’t feel the need to have one, they choose to stay positive and make excuses for others even if they do them wrong.

   For example, if they hear someone is talking badly about them, they don’t immediately see it as a hit to their ego or their character. They don’t feel the need to one-up, defend or get revenge. Instead, they make excuses for the other person in the most unphased way. They’ll say something like, “I’m sure she didn’t mean it,” or “I know she’s better than that.” Unless the situation calls for a response, they give people the benefit of the doubt (until proven otherwise). This is not to be confused with empathising with others and analysing or excusing people’s wrong behaviour. It’s about not taking thing personally and staying cool-headed. They’ve already decided how they want to carry themselves, regardless of what someone else does. So, they don’t let someone else’s bad moment change their character and their ability to see the good in others. At the end of the day, the only thing you can control is how you show up. People will always reveal themselves through what they say and do. So people who choose to present their best selves despite this are the ones who stand out.

9. People that pay attention.

   They remember the little details. Even if they met someone once, the next time they see them they’re asking if they enjoyed the movie they mentioned. They have a natural way of making people feel seen and cared about. These types of people are usually hyper-aware of themselves, the group, what each person is doing and the overall dynamic, all at the same time. They possess high situational awareness and emotional intelligence and when launched into a room they can lighten up any social dynamic.

10. Accept people as they are

    If you’ve made it to the end here and picked up on a few traits you want to refine and focus on, remember that the same way you choose to be yourself you have to let other people do the same!

    This leads into the last trait, the ability to meet people where they’re at.

    To see people as they are, not just in accepting their flaws and mistakes, but expecting them. Accepting people does not itself mean agreeing with them or approving everything they do. It just means not trying to change, control, or reshape them. People that have this trait truly understand that everyone is fallible. Everyone makes mistakes. Everyone has flaws, blind spots, and limitations. They believe that even the most accomplished person is still just a person. So they don’t put people on pedestals. They can see people neutrally, as they are, without idolising them and without trying to fix them. They just let people be.

I think the main theme in the end is someone who is charismatic and admirable just knows themselves. They’ve taken the time to understand who they are and naturally, that strengthens how they show up around people. They’re not perfect or the most confident or most impressive person in the room. They are just comfortable within themselves and because of that they let other people be comfortable too.

if you’re reading this and want to be someone like that my advice is to learn more about yourself and lean into the unique things that make you you, not just wearing the coat of a charismatic person. This starts with being honest with yourself, noticing your patterns, taking accountability, working on your reactions and detaching from your ego and your perceived self or the version you want to be.

For me, there was a point where I realised I hadn’t felt like myself in a while. I didn’t feel like a person and felt more like a blob. Everything around me was familiar, my routine, my environment, the people in my life but I felt disconnected from it. Like I was going through everything without fully being in it. I kept waiting for the feeling to pass, for things to click back into place, for me to wake up one day and feel like myself again. But it didn’t happen like that.

At some point or another, we all end up in that kind of place. You might feel burnt out, bored, stagnant, or just flat. You’re still doing what you need to do in the day but it starts to feel like you’re moving through life on autopilot. The days blur together, and even when nothing is clearly wrong, something doesn’t feel right. Sometimes there’s a reason for it perhaps stress from juggling too many things, disappointment in yourself or how you handled situations or changes in your life that you haven’t fully processed. Other times, there isn’t anything you can point to, which makes it even more frustrating.

Even the things you used to enjoy start to feel different. Hobbies and interests that once felt like a treat start to feel like a chore. I’d think about doing them, but I’d procrastinate my way out of it every time. You don’t care anymore. All you want to do is exist in the easiest way possible by scrolling, watching, consuming anything that is distracting. It doesn’t make you feel good, it’s just enough to numb the feeling of being off.

what makes it harder is that you know who you usually are. Maybe you’ve always seen yourself as someone disciplined, active, social, passionate, someone who loves life and enjoys living it. That’s your baseline. So when you’re not acting like that, it doesn’t just feel like a rough patch it feels like you’ve lost yourself. You start questioning what changed, or why you can’t just “get back to normal,” especially when these were things that once came naturally to you. That’s how I’ve always known myself.

For a while, I tried to think my way out of it. I told myself I needed to be more disciplined, more motivated, more consistent. I thought if I fixed enough areas of my life, the feeling would go away. It didn’t though, because the issue wasn’t that I wasn’t doing enough. It was that I had drifted out of alignment with myself.

Reflecting on why I finally feel a little better now, it’s because I’ve stopped waiting for “myself” to just show up again but I’ve started actively building myself up again. A mentor of mine shared a core values test with me that ended up acting like a diagnostic tool. Up until then, I couldn’t explain what was wrong I just knew something felt off which makes it harder, when you can feel the disconnect but don’t have the language for it.

To find better language that helps me understand and explain my feelings I started paying attention to what actually makes me feel like myself. My mentor explained that your top values (the ones that makeup the fabric of your identity) shouldn’t just be words you like but should meet three criteria:

The three E’s criteria:

• Essential: you need these core values to feel like yourself. When they’re missing, something feels off and incomplete.

• Effortless: they come the most naturally to you. You’re not forcing them or performing them, they’re just part of who you are.

• Energising: enacting these values energises you and when you don’t prioritise them or you’re around people who don't you feel drained.

Thinking about it this way shifted the question for me. Instead of asking “what’s wrong with me,” I started asking “what’s missing?”

if you’re anything like me, I love having something tangible to work with. Dot points, frameworks, little tests that help me understand myself better instead of just sitting with my feelings and overthinking.

If you’re not sure what your values are, a good place to start is the VIA Character Strengths Survey. It was developed by psychologists Christopher Peterson and Martin Seligman and identifies 24 personal strengths across six core virtues. We all have all 24 in different degrees, but some feel more natural. The survey helps you identify your “signature strengths,” your most authentic and energising traits. The ones that, when you’re living them, you feel more like yourself.

When I did the test, my number one strength came back as hope.

That made a lot of things clear

During my last "low" period, I felt entirely hopeless and stagnant. I wasn’t looking forward to anything. I wasn’t excited about anything. So, since hope is my most essential value, of course I didn’t feel like myself when I felt hopeless. I was living without something that is central to how I experience life. Once I could name what was missing, I stopped trying to fix everything and just focused on bringing that back in small ways.

I don’t think there’s one right way to do that, or one most effective formula. I’m still figuring it out as I go. But these are some of the things that helped me reconnect and feel like myself a little more:

1. Force yourself out of the slump
   There were days I didn’t feel like doing anything, and if I waited for motivation, I would’ve stayed stuck. When you are in a deep slump, your environment and your appearance usually mirror your internal chaos. Block out 30 minutes on a Sunday to organise the one side of your closet you’ve put off. Tint your eyebrows. Get a pedicure. Wash your sheets. I’d pick one small thing and just do it. It sounds minor, but it interrupts the pattern. Because when you feel stuck, movement matters more than motivation.

2. A little pampering

   Putting on makeup and blowing out your hair isn’t gonna magically fix everything. Look good feel good is real. I know it can feel like a "band-aid" solution or like putting lipstick on a pig but the shift isn't about the makeup. It’s about the effort. When you put in the work to look good, whether it's through wearing cute loungewear, cleaning your favorite shoes, or accessorizing your jewelry in a new way, you prove to yourself that you are worth the maintenance. It isn't relying on aesthetics to improve your mood but it’s the act of showing up for yourself when you least feel like it. Because when you’re in a funk it’s easier to ‘let yourself go’ and not bother.

3. Go outside pls

   Put your phone in your pocket. leave the headphones at home and go for a walk. Breathing in fresh air and the change in sensory input helps to clear things out. Maybe take a different route, walk down a street you’ve never paid attention to, or go to a new park you haven’t been to before. If you like animals, try bird watching. If you like flowers, look them up and try to match what you see. It is soo cliche but it works and it is free, mostly accessible and leaves you feeling more grounded.

4. Lean into nostalgia

   When the present feels too loud, go back to what you love. Watch your favorite childhood movie or listen to old songs you discovered years ago. Go back to hobbies that interested you as a kid and that used to bring you joy. It reminds you that those parts of you are still there. Revisiting movies and tv shows at later time for a new perspective makes you notice new things, think differently, and see how much you’ve changed.

5. Messy craft

   Do something with your hands. Draw something badly, write something with no structure, try mixed-media junk journaling, make slime, cut and paste things with no plan. Let it be messy without the pressure of being "good" at something. Any engaging sensory activity that takes you out of your current mental loop and puts you somewhere else for a bit is a win.

6. Set ‘Just right’ challenges

   Okay by now I have mentioned the word ‘sensory’ a little more than the average person kinda giving myself away as an Occupational Therapy student. In OT, we use a concept called the "Just Right Challenge." It’s any activity tailored to be engaging and slightly beyond your current skill level, promoting growth without causing frustration. It sits exactly between boredom (too easy) and overload (too hard).

   When I was feeling off, I noticed I was either doing nothing at all or setting expectations that were way too high and then feeling worse when I didn’t meet them. There was no middle ground. So I set small achievable “just right” goals that I could accomplish and build self-trust. Maybe that’s finishing a mini crossword or going for a 10 minute walk in your lunch break. They seem small, but that’s the point. They give you a sense of capability again.

7. Reset your basics

   When you don’t feel like yourself, your basics usually fall apart. Staying up too late, waking up tired, eating at random times and then everything starts to feel harder. So instead of trying to fix everything, I just focused on resetting the basics.

   Going to bed a bit earlier. Waking up at a consistent time. Having one or two things in my day that felt anchored. It’s really just about fueling your tank. Prioritising sleep, food and movement in whatever way makes you feel energised.

Feeling like yourself isn’t a destination you reach and then never leave. You don’t stop being yourself just because you’re in a phase where you’re not performing at your usual level.

Sometimes we misidentify ourselves. We tie who we are to things that come and go for example feeling like ourselves only when we’re at a certain weight or fitness level, in a job that feels “like us,” or when we look a certain way.

These things fluctuate and aren’t markers of our identity. So when your sense of self is built on something that can change at any moment, it’s always going to feel a little shaky

Your identity isn’t fixed. It shifts depending on what you prioritise and what you give your time and energy to. But there are parts of you that don’t really change. The things that feel natural. The things that energise you. The things that make you feel like yourself without having to try. Next time you don’t feel like yourself, keep the 3 E’s in mind and make intentional actions to practice your core values. I’ve been reclaiming hope. Hope that everything will work out even if I can’t see how yet.

I have 11 minutes to finish this post.

I’m on the train on the way to a job I don’t hate but don’t love either. It’s not exciting enough to feel like it belongs to the bigger life you imagine for yourself. Somewhere in the background of everything I’ve been feeling like I have neglected Substack lately. But this time with a renewed intention to stop focusing on quantity and outcomes to feel productive but to use writing as an outlet when I need it best. If I’m being honest, a lot of the time I feel like I don’t have much to contribute to conversations that have already been beautifully articulated by people who are more experienced, wiser, or simply better writers than me. Everything has been said before. Every observation, every reflection, every “life lesson.” Of course it hasn’t been said from our exact perspectives, but still. Sometimes I find myself wondering how unique that perspective really is, and whether I’m just adding noise to an already thoughtful space.

So today I set myself a small rule: just write something quickly and honestly. No overthinking, no elaborate planning, no trying to anticipate whether it’s good enough to exist. Just writing for myself. I don’t know why we do this to ourselves sometimes. Setting ourselves up for failure by setting unrealistic or (if realistic) they are just unnecessary expectations. The work will get done eventually. Why stress yourself out about when?

It’s been three months since the new year and something about the way I approach things feels different. I’ve started doing things before I feel ready. Before opening a Google Doc and making tables and lists to plan and anticipate how something will go. Normally that’s how I operate, planning everything to the point where starting becomes almost impossible. This year I’ve tried to interrupt that pattern a little. Starting before the plan feels complete. Posting before I feel confident about what I’m doing.

I kept writing here even when it felt vulnerable and awkward and slightly embarrassing. Pressing publish still feels unnatural to me. But the encouragement I’ve received and the people who say they relate have genuinely been the thing that keeps me going. There is something so heartwarming about knowing that a thought you almost kept to yourself resonated with someone else.

At the same time, I can feel something else happening inside my head. A kind of mental stretching that’s difficult to describe. It feels like the seams of the skin tissue holding my brain together are being pulled in too many directions at once: work, university, hobbies I want to maintain, personal development, volunteering, side hustles, creative ambitions. Each one existing in its own category in my mind, each one asking for attention at the same time. Each with their own to-do lists and deadlines. Eventually it starts to feel like there are barely two functioning brain cells left to allocate to each thing.

I’m hopping off the train now and if I’m honest, I could barely string together coherent ideas while writing this. It actually took me the full eleven minutes just to identify what I’m feeling.

I think the theme for this post is:

Overstimulation

Barely having the mental capacity for the essential tasks, let alone the things you want to do intentionally or creatively. This is making me realise how easily we confuse the side effects of overstimulation with laziness. Putting off writing here made me feel like I lacked discipline or time management skills. Like I needed to be more organised or more clear about what I wanted to say.

But sometimes the brain is simply full.

I could technically write during my lunch break or on the way to work like today. But usually when the lunch break arrives, all I really want to do is sit quietly and stare at a wall for a few minutes. Just numbbbb my brain and exist without adding another thought to the pile.

I have a feeling a lot of people reading this know exactly what that feels like. Especially if you’re someone who wants a lot from life and is trying to juggle many different parts of it at once. When everything matters, everything starts competing for the same limited space in your head.

So if you’ve been feeling behind or unproductive lately, or just overstimulated as heck. Maybe pause before calling yourself lazy. Sometimes the mind just reaches a point where it can’t absorb any more noise and competing priorities.

What doesn’t have an urgent deadline can be put off for later. The guilt and procrastination you will feel for putting things off will still be there. Try to reassure yourself to know it will eventually get done and you can later attend to it fully rather than with half the energy if you’d have multitasked. I like to reference the FranklinCovey Matrix when thinking about what can be prioritised or filtered out. I don’t 100% agree with the matrix’s intention to maximise productivity and time-management. But it can be helpful to think about your own quadrants when feeling overstimulated.

Reference: The FranklinCovey Time Matrix®. Dr. Stephen R. Covey

I didn’t finish this post on the train like I wanted to. But this is proof it will eventually get done just maybe not in the timeframes we give ourselves. The important part is that the thought and desire to write didn’t leave completely. It stayed with me long enough to return to it. So whatever it is you want to do, if it sticks you can always get back to it.

💌 💌 💌

A first draft is just getting something to exist and that’s what this space is. I write about being in your 20s, thinking too much, wanting more, and eventually… trying anyway.

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For the last 5 years I’ve used instagram to support my friends and exchange memes but as far as having a social media presence: zero

Not in an I’m “too cool” for social media way. I’m not standing on a pedestal looking down at people taking photos of their brunch. Trust me, I’m taking that photo too. I’m using portrait mode, cinematic mode, my digital cam and hitting every angle. I am deeply, chronically nostalgic and love to document everything. My photo gallery probably occupies the highest screen time on my phone because I spend hours reminiscing my own life, reliving memories and obsessing over old photos. I love aesthetics. I love the art of a well-composed shot.

But that’s exactly why I had to leave. I had to save myself from all the time I would lose perfecting a curated online persona.

I know this might read like “not having social media is a personality trait”. But I’m not making a big statement about escaping the matrix. I just… stopped showing up. In a culture that equates being seen with being valuable, staying unseen has probably strengthened my sense of self more than anything else could have. I realised early on that to be seen was to be defined, and I couldn’t let strangers do that before I had even defined myself. I didn't want to be stuck catering to others and how they perceive me.

There’s something powerful about building yourself in private. When you’re 17, 18, 19, 20... you’re constantly changing and growing. Your opinions, confidence and interests shift. So, I wanted the freedom to contradict myself without a digital archive holding me back. To be honest it’s just added stress. I didn’t want my nervous system to be dependent on the instant dopamine and external validation during those important years of trialling and growing.

This isn’t another “social media is bad” piece. Whether you deactivate your Instagram or not, that’s besides the point. The point is why. I’m actually a deep believer that the internet is what you make of it. Every second article on here is someone saying “they’re going analogue” or “deleting TikTok”. Yet they log on to announce they’re logging off. We see people posting about turning their phone into a Nokia, highlighting their unplugged weekends all on Instagram. They are performing a life that is above social media, while using social media to prove it. I have more opinions on the analogue trend but that’s for another post. I also have issues with people romanticizing disappearing online to maintain the allure of the “mysterious girl.” That is still a performance.

It sometimes feels like it is no longer enough to just live your life. You have to be seen living it, and on top of that people have to like what they see. That’s my biggest issue.

There are moments though where I feel the desire to share online.

When I see someone post a beautiful travel video. Or a photo dump. Or the stack of books they read this month. I feel that small pull. Hey, that’s cool. I want to share mine too. I want to show what I’ve been doing. The cozy café I found. The outfit that felt cool that day.

But every time, I pause.

Where is this coming from? Is it connection? Because if it is, I can connect in real life. I can sit across from someone and talk about the book. I can join book clubs. I can build communities offline.

Or is it validation? Is it the desire for someone to confirm that I’m interesting? That my taste is good? That my life looks aesthetic? We’ve been conditioned to believe that that if our life isn't witnessed it’s not interesting. How would anyone know we are living our uniquely cool life if we don’t broadcast it? In this culture, being invisible is treated like a failure. We’ve forgotten how to be interesting to ourselves without needing a digital audience to confirm it first.

We also love to say we can make Instagram casual. Don’t get me wrong, you can still have a private account for friends and family. But whether you’re trying hard or pretending not to try, it’s still a performance. That’s my issue. Not the app itself. The performance. You’re still building a short highlight reel of yourself. Maybe that’s fine. Maybe that’s just modern life. But I want control over my visibility. I want to decide how much access people get. I think there’s something elegant about that. About choosing when and how you’re seen.

In my real life, I am very active. I have a social bubble. I’m involved in networks. I’m part of communities. People who matter see my travels, hear about my stories, my milestones in person. I have the choice to show or not show. I don’t feel pressure to highlight every accomplishment. As long as I know, and the people I care about know, that’s enough.

When I meet new people, they are often shocked to find out I don't have a social media presence. I cringe writing this because I don’t mean it in a pretentious way, but it is just a normal thing now to at least have a profile picture. Maybe they see the way I take photos and partake in trends and care for aesthetics so they expect a portfolio. My closest friends often tell me it’s a “missed opportunity” and always joke if anyone is most likely to be an influencer it would be me. Now that I think about it, I don’t feel as much digital FOMO because my camera roll is my feed, I make monthly dumps and the latest cute tik tok edits and travel vlogs because I enjoy it but I just dont post about it. Not having a presence is a deliberate and odd choice when there’s an expectation that our life should be publicly accessible, for anyone to research. To confirm that we exist and are important.

you might be thinking, okay but substack is a social media too. I would agree. I do also realise the irony of writing this, I am also one of these people online talking about going offline.

So then why am I here? Why am I writing this on Substack?

Because I want to be connected. I have ideas, reflections, and creative impulses that I want to put out into the world. I want to see if anyone else relates to the "itch" for more. But I’ll be honest, coming back to a visible platform is scaryy. When you’ve stayed in a private bubble for so long, coming out of this hiding spot feels like a massive risk. I’ve been "ghost" for so long that I’ve developed an anxiety about being perceived at all. I want to find a middle ground though. I want to live in real life and have total control over what I share, while still using the opportunities the internet provides. I don’t need to highlight my accomplishments for a digital audience because the people who matter are already in the room and experiencing those memories with me. I want to form like-minded communities and be inspired by others without feeling like I have to "pay" for that inspiration with my own privacy.

Sometimes i think I’m making it too deep, unnecessarily. There are a lot of people with private or public accounts for friends and family and they don’t think twice about posting (or not posting). Ultimately, I think the goal is ownership. Ownership over our time, our energy, and our identity. I find that hard to do that when algorithms and other systems constantly work against that.

For me, the way to do that was to go ghost. To learn about who I was when I don’t have anyone watching. Now that I’m starting to know, maybe I’m ready to be seen.

Originally I planned a well-structured, perfectly defined ‘welcome’ post, introducing what this space is, explaining the username “First Draft Life” with a perfectly curated cover picture that matches the aesthetic I am going for. But after a phone call to a friend, that plan was quickly trashed.

What she said snapped me to a reality that I did not know how to name let alone confront. Suddenly I had the biggest urge to write. I literally hung up the call with a promise to call her back. This thought was jumping to the forefront of my brain and it popped out these words on the screen. No editing. No second drafts. Literally, my stream of consciousness being typed out onto this page right now. I always thought of myself as being logical and on personality type quizzes I would answer 50/50 to thinking with my heart vs head. Today though, I learnt what it means to be impulsively led by your heart.

I think this is a better introduction to this page than any other refined post. (But hey don’t judge when I do end up posting that welcome post). Because you know what? It is so fine to change your mind about ideas and outgrow what you previously liked or prioritised.

Back to the phone call

I was opening up to my friend about feeling stagnant, directionless but worst of all ambitious. And when you’re someone with a lot of ambitions, possibilities, and ideas, that lack of direction becomes even more overwhelming. It’s like being in a room with fifty open doors and standing dead center because you’re terrified that picking one means losing the other forty-nine. Instead of feeling inspired or excited by the choices I have, I just felt paralyzed. I’d get angry at myself for being indecisive and not proactive which are qualities I hate seeing in myself. I became so anxious, lost confidence, was overthinking, irritable, and honestly not like my usual self. I felt like everyone else was doing the things they dream of while I’m stuck overthinking what my dreams are. I complained that I’m getting increasingly frustrated for feeling this way still, and reflecting, maybe I just won’t ever feel like I have my purpose. Maybe nothing I do will feel like enough or be good enough. I’m always gonna want to do more, prove to myself I can take on more, improve more. So I stop myself from starting anything major because I know I will still never be satisfied with what I’m doing.

my friend was silent for a few moments then said:

“I think you’re doing many random things but you don’t actually have a purpose”

ooft kinda harsh. My initial thought was to explain they’re not random but actually commitments I value, hobbies and communities I learn from and contribute to. Whilst that is all true, it also does not invalidate the fact that I also am doing many random things with no overall purpose. It’s not always a bad thing though. I’m against the word “purpose” when it is used synonymously with the word “plan”. Not everything we do needs to funnel into our long term life plan and makes sense with our career goals. there doesn’t need to be a skill learnt or accomplishment earnt for it to count . I think side steps are so important and teach us a lot, bridging the gap between passion and hobby. But then I also can’t argue against that. She is right. I don’t have a purpose. I have passions. I have activities I enjoy, tasks I’m good at it, things i do to make the time go by and still feel like I’m being productive. But deep down its like they are filler tasks until I actually find my purpose.

Our purpose in this life is to find our purpose, and there are so many people dedicating their life to helping others find theirs. It’s literally the question of our existence. The more I reflected, the more I thought I’m distracting myself from doing the hard thing. The hard part isn't always doing the work; it is to sit and figure out if the work is meaningful and contributing to your purpose.

I was keeping myself busy with so many side quests and helping build other people’s life goals and passion projects, but I did not give myself time to think long enough about my own. I can sit here and over-intellectualize why that is and trace it back to specific fears and anxiety, but you know what? I’m starting to think that is more unproductive. It helps to know why you are the way you are and what mindset is holding you back. But it can also keep you stagnant in the same state. The more time you spend in analysis and understanding, the less time you give yourself to act, gain experience and practically learn new lessons instead of revisiting old ones.

The Two Sides to My Stagnation

a. The Over-Planning: Meticulously researching and strategising all possible major moves before starting. Constantly seeking external inspiration from others dreams. Drawing up every life planning tool I find on google into my planner: the frameworks, the five-year visions, the habit trackers. Here, planning is safer and more comfortable than execution. It feels like you’re working towards your goals because you’re planning the logistics, but nothing has changed.

The logic here is: “If I have the perfect plan, I can’t fail, I can mitigate any risks.”

The reality is: “If you never start, you’ve already failed by default, just more comfortably”.

I know this more than anyone. I can tell myself a thousand times over: starting is the hardest part, just start. But I am terrified that I’ll pick a direction, pour all my energy into it, and realise six months later that it was just another side-quest. I’ve been so worried about "misplacing" my ambition that I’ve kept it locked in a box.

b. The Side-Quest Collector: Doing many, scattered things and calling it progress. This is where I live most of the time. It’s me working a part-time job that perfectly aligns with my degree. Being in roles I’m objectively good at, but I know aren’t my ultimate passion. They are placeholders. I volunteer for multiple organisations, I’m a regular at social clubs, and I sign up for every personal development course in my city. I am a professional student of "improvement," yet I never seem to actually apply the lessons to anything high-stakes in my personal life. On the surface, it looks like I’m constantly stepping out of my comfort zone. I’m always the new person in the room, always trying a new hobby, always "putting myself out there." But I’ve realised that everyone’s comfort zone is built differently. For me, activity is my hiding place. I am safe when I am performing a role in someone else’s project because there is a built-in safety net there. I can be the best employee, the best volunteer, or the best student, because if the project fails, it’s not solely my failure. .

What lies outside of this safety net is not having structure, betting on myself and building something that is completely mine. That’s the scary part that I have been avoiding. I’ve been treating my life like a series of side-quests because I’m too terrified to start the main mission.

At the moment, I don’t know if this page is another side-quest. But for the first time, it doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is that I hung up the phone, I felt the urge to write, and I didn't let my "logic" talk me out of it. I will try to pour into this space to learn as much as I can, not just about content or writing, but about myself. I know myself, I have this internal mechanism that takes a hobby I love and immediately starts treating it like a job I have to clock into. Very soon, I’ll probably start a color-coded content calendar, a rigorous writing schedule, and a list of personal deadlines that I’ll use as a stick to beat myself up with the second I fall behind. But, I will try my best not to focus on the outcome because I’m not planning how this will help me escape my 9-5. I want to enjoy the process.

So I’m just gonna write.

I’m going to pour out the thoughts as they come, in their raw, unedited, "first draft" state.

If a post is messy, hard to read and doesn't have a takeaway for the reader, that’s fine.

It’s for me first :)

I had a simple goal: give myself a proper, restful holiday but it turned into a confrontation with a version of myself I wasn't ready to meet.

As I am about to graduate from uni, I realised I was carrying a feeling of dread that was slowly growing bigger and darker in the background. If you’re in a transitional phase of your life whether that’s the unknown future after graduating, or maybe you graduated already and landed a job but you’re feeling unfulfilled and wanting a career change, or you’re in a gap year and have no clue what you should be doing, then you know the feeling. When you’re a student, you sometimes end up treating your uni years like you’re in a bubble before “real life” actually starts. At least I did. So, any thought that passes about the future is shooed away to figure out later, because I am too busy being a student and enjoying my limited time at uni. Of course the anxiety is still there and so is the pressure to set yourself up for success, have long-term plans after uni, where to work, what to specialise in. You feel the weight of needing to support yourself because after uni you can’t use the excuse of being a student anymore. You’re expected to transition immediately into a fully-formed adult that knows themselves, their path, and is already on their way to get there.

To cope with this feeling and avoid thinking, I maxed out my social calendar and stayed booked and busy. I did the brunches before class, the beach trips, and the karaoke after class to take advantage of the fact that the 9-5 will eventually deprive us of our time and these small luxuries. I was dreading a life I hadn't even started yet. I was trying to "bank" fun, as if I could store up enough happiness to get me through the decades of rat racing I assumed were coming. But living in this bubble and being avoidant makes the crash even harder when you do enter the transitional phase. You realise that while you were distracting yourself, you were supposed to be figuring out who you are. Now, you are under a time crunch to pick and solidify what your life would look like if not permanently then at least for the next few years. There is a pressure to not "waste" your degree, and whilst I agree with that I’ve come to realise the skills you learn are never actually wasted, they can always transfer to wherever you end up. But, that still doesn't stop the feeling that every choice you make now is a permanent branding of your identity.

The dangerous comfort of living a "fine" life

I could see the path laid out. I could continue to move through the comfortable, predictable pathway: graduate, get a full-time job, numb my brain, and just fill my life with hobbies around my 9-5 hours so I don’t completely hate my existence. This is the safe route. It’s the one everyone expects of you.

Obviously, questioning your career and moving towards your passions is a very privileged thing. I recognise that many people on this planet don’t have the luxury of choice and they work to survive, period. It’s a first-world problem to complain about fulfillment. But what I am complaining about is tolerating and living a “fine” life.

"Fine" is dangerous because it’s not painful enough to force a change, but it’s not fulfilling enough to feel like you’re actually living your most fulfilling life. If you are in a "fine" job with a "fine" routine, you can stay there for forty years and wake up wondering where the time went. If you’re anything like me, you don’t want to live a limited life. I don’t want to limit myself to one career path, one city, one friend group, one identity. The world is too big and life is too short for us to stay in our comfortable circle. We are meant to leave an impact, to live to our fullest potential, and to see what we are truly capable of.

But in those two months where I turned my brain off, I lost this motivation and didn’t recognise this mindset in me anymore. For the first time, I burnt out emotionally. Emotional burnout is a state of chronic exhaustion from prolonged, overwhelming stress, leaving you feeling drained, detached, and unable to cope with daily demands. This was the most confusing part. Usually, we associate burnout with overworking, multi-tasking and grinding. But I experienced the burnout of doing nothing. Worst of all, I didn't feel like I was justified in my burnout because I didn't do as much as I could've done. I hadn't earned the right to be burnt out.

This emotional burnout comes from persistent and unrelenting stress. My stress was the fact that I was running away, avoiding the brave thing of questioning what I actually wanted and how to get there. I just distracted myself. I spent so much emotional energy dreaming up possible future life paths. I would sit there and detail them, painting the walls and decorating the homes of these alternate versions I’m living in. But dreaming like that is exhausting. You spend so much brain power imagining and planning all the ways you could live that you have no energy left for your current reality. So, you fill your day with small achievements and watch the distance between your dreams and your reality grow every day. Because I had a billion tabs open in my mind about these possible life paths, making even small daily decisions made me so overwhelmed. I was easily irritated because opening one more tab even for something simple just pushed me over the edge. The biggest thing, though, was being so frustrated at myself for being less capable, less effective, and less productive. I didn’t recognise myself. My mindset was so off.

So I tried to rest. I completely sunked into holiday mode. No work, no studies. My rules were simple: don’t think, just live. I abandoned my disciplined routine, my meal prepping, my step counting, and my planners. I just lived day-to-day with no agenda. I was going to follow any desires and craving.” I thought: Isn’t this the dream? No work, no hard routines, no discipline. I thought I should be the happiest I’ve ever been. I thought, "Surely I should get better now, there is no obvious source of stress."

I was wrong. The stress went on holiday with me.

From the outside, I was on the ultimate vacation, but my brain was scatterbrained. When you have all the time in the world but no direction, you just feel bad about all the time you’re wasting. I knew I should be optimising it or using it to get a head start on the things I’d regret later, but I couldn’t. When I finally tried to turn my brain back “on,” it was twice as hard to have discipline. My tolerance for discomfort was non-existent after living in constant comfort for two months. I realised that the peace I thought I wanted was actually just a slow rot.

The smart anxiety

The silence from resting only made the noise louder. When you remove the distractions of uni and a busy social calendar, you’re left alone with the very thoughts you were trying to outrun. I realised that my anxiety didn't need a source like a deadline or an exam to thrive. It was self-sustaining and fed by the gap between who I was being and who I knew I could be. It’s the kind of anxiety that uses your own logic against you to keep you small. It’s a sophisticated defense mechanism that uses gratitude to kill ambition.

I always tell myself that I am “blessed and grateful.” And I am. I recognise I have things now that I prayed for years ago. But there is still an itch and as I get older, that itch just grows. You know you’re made for more, but with this ‘smart anxiety’, you convince yourself you don’t actually want it bad enough. You chalk it up to comparison and tell yourself to just be content. This smart anxiety tells you that wanting more is a sign of being ungrateful for what you already have, so you stay still out of guilt.

On the outside, I was "busy." I was studying, working, volunteering and sticking to a career path that I was interested in enough to keep me motivated. But after trialling a 9-5 environment, I quickly realised it drained me. I love structure, but I hated feeling like I wasn't in control of my time especially doing something I was not passionate about. Like many, I could feel every single minute on the clock until it was time to clock out.

But my fears were smart. They disguised themselves as rational questions. Every time I thought about escaping the typical professional life and pursue my hobbies instead my anxiety would say: “Why do you feel the need to monetize your hobbies? Don’t participate in this capitalistic race. Just enjoy your interests without making a side hustle out of them.” Or “you need to give this path a shot, you’re helping others in a good, stable career”. Another says “Even when you get to the dream life you’ll still be unhappy, so just find contentment now.”

It made me feel better. It made me feel like I was smart for choosing not to fall into a trap. But it also left me exactly where I was. Nothing changes if nothing changes.

What i learnt from those 2 months is that I’d rather have the discomfort of trying and the anxiety of the unknown than the "peace" of a life I’m just watching pass me by. Anxiety is very smart but don’t let it outsmart you! We need to very simply get over ourselves! and get out of our own heads. I’m not some president’s daughter and even if I was (who cares!) if I change careers or start something then end up hating it or failing at it. Trying gives you data quickly. The more data you have the quicker you can find out your likes & dislikes. In uni, you’re protected by the title of "student." Once that’s gone, you’re just a person with ideas and choices you have to make. So make small daily choices that reflect the person you want to become.

I don’t want a brain-off life; I want a life that is so engaging and aligned that I don’t feel the need to turn my brain off. So, I’ve decided that I am going to try everything. every creative whim that I previously dismissed as "superficial" or "unrealistic." This page being one of them :))

At night, when the house finally grows quiet after a long day of solving problems I didn’t cause, and reminding everyone of things they should remember themselves I finally have time to indulge in free time. Shutting my brain off and numbing it with my distraction of choice, whether that’s TikTok or a book. It is at this time that I pinch myself for being the snappy eldest daughter. I think of the way my words bit before I could even identify the emotion they were supposed to be guarding. It’s a strange, embarrassing thing to realise you’ve spent the day being a sanctuary for strangers, only to come home and be a raging rat for the people you love. As I’m scrolling, trying to disappear into someone else’s life, I catch a glimpse of my own reflection in the black screen of my phone. I think about the way I spoke to my siblings or my mum two hours ago. I think about how I didn't just ask them to do something I practically barked it.

The contrast is what makes it so ugly.

I have all the time in the world for a client who can’t get to the point. I sit through brunch with friends and listen to the same stories about the same toxic guys for the tenth time this month and I don't scold them for wasting their time and mine. I have the grace not to jump to the punchline when someone retells a story I’ve heard five times. I don't summarise their stories to make them go faster. I am the employee who controls my emotions during conflict at work and hears the other person fully during arguments without interrupting. I accept criticism and actually sit with it. I am the one always praising my friends for their simplest positive behaviours, gladly doing favours before they even have to ask and do it all without a single heavy sigh.

so i pinch myself at night that this side of me does not always show up for the closest people to me, my family. They are stuck with the worst versions of me. We tell ourselves it’s because family is a “safe space.” We say it’s because they make us feel so comfortable that we can finally drop the performance, that we won’t be reprimanded or judged for our flaws. We call it unmasking. So because I know they won’t punish me, I’ve stopped holding myself accountable.

But they don’t deserve the version of me that’s left over after everyone else has taken their cut.

If I can hold my tongue for a client who is wasting my time, I can definitely hold it for a sibling who is just being a child. In a day, I spend 10% of my social battery and energy on the friendly barista, 40% on the client, and 50% on my friends. By the time I walk through the front door, my energy is drained and I am at zero. We tell ourselves we are tired but the truth is we have unconsciously decided that since there is no social or financial penalty for being snappy at home, why bother to use any energy to be the best version of ourselves, respond in a better way. We prefer to save it for people and situations that buys us something eg; trade our energy for approval, acceptance, validation. what we risk in doing that is far bigger. We cut small holes into the relationships that matter most to us, the ones that actually sustain us long-term, not just validate us short-term. This made me realise that if I am only patient when I’m being watched or paid then I’m not actually a patient person. I’m just selectively patient.

The “eldest daughter” trope usually comes with a specific kind of arrogance. The belief that everyone around us is fundamentally less competent. I find myself constantly looking for the most efficient way to do things, micro-managing the way my siblings pack a bag or my parents handle a task. I snap because I’m answering questions that they could easily Google. In my mind, the resentment builds If I had to figure this out myself, why can’t you? So, I insert unwanted opinions and point out their behaviour like it’s a public service. As the first born particularly eldest daughter, you see others being allowed to mess up, while you have to be the responsible one with the answers. Naturally, we’d be angry and as the reliable ones it feels like we have earned the right to be snarky. But what does this actually achieve? Being snarky won’t make people (or us) more competent it just makes everyone more hesitant to be around us. Being like this doesn’t make the house run smoother it just makes it louder and more tense. Being right and efficient is a poor trade-off for being kind.

It’s easy to blame this attitude on burnout or “eldest daughter syndrome”. I can scroll through TikTok and find a thousand videos of girls nodding along to the same struggle, validating my behaviour as a natural reaction to the weight of my responsibilities. It’s a comfortable lie to live in. It allows me to stay the victim instead of the perpetrator of my own temper. It convinces you that your character is fixed, that your temper is just a tax your family unfortunately has to pay because you’re their therapist and you manage the calendar. There are definitely exceptions and there is a psychological element to this eg; restraint collapse. It’s the same thing that happens to children after school, after long periods of self-control and emotional regulation their fuse runs thin and the threshold for frustration tolerance drops. While that explains the mechanism, it doesn't excuse the behaviour.

Because the thing is, I do know better. That’s what makes it unbearable. I know how to speak gently. I know how to pause. I know how to listen. I know how to ask instead of command. I know how to soften my tone. I know how to be patient. I do it all day. I just don’t always choose to do it at home.

What I am realising is that my anger most of the time isn’t in response to others’ behaviour. It comes from the pressure I put on myself to always be capable, to always have the fastest, most efficient solution. It’s about never asking for help and then being furious that no one offers it. It’s about silently assigning myself responsibility and then resenting everyone for not carrying it with me. No one agreed to these rules. I made them and then I punished everyone else for not following them. I don’t say “I’m overwhelmed.” I don’t say “I need a break.” I don’t say “can someone else handle this?” I just do it and then explode when I was the one that chose to do it all myself.

I think the answer isnt just: be less angry. its to be more regulated. That’s the hardest skill to continually practice and master. It has to happen before you enter the irreversible, ticked off mood. This looks like:

• naming what you are actually feeling instead of defaulting to irritation.

• Voicing and painting a picture of your inner world so other people at least have a chance at understanding and meeting you where you are at.

• It also means letting people do things differently than I would. Maybe it is slower. Less efficiently. Messy even. But it is essential not to intervene because control is not more important than connection.

Trust me I know in the moment it feels like it’s time wasted or the most frustrating thing in the world to just watch something be done ‘wrong’. You feel like you could just fix it in ten seconds but get annoyed why you even have to. Why can’t anyone else do it instead. But what you are really trying to fix sometimes is your own discomfort, not the actual problem itself. Everytime you correct, take over, rush, you’re basically telling the other person (worst of all your closest loved ones): i don’t trust you and the way you do things. Your behaviour and annoyance tells them that your standards are more important to you than their experience and way of life.

That’s not the kind of presence I want to give off around the people I love. i don’t want to keep pinching myself at night, wondering why I’m so generous with my energy for the world and so stingy with it at home.

Of course, we know that everything has been preordained. What you will eat for breakfast, the detour you take to avoid traffic, the substack article you’ll pick to read. It’s all written by Allah, he knows the outcome and we make the choices.

But somewhere along the way, many of us begin to over-rely on ourselves and our abilities. We start attributing productivity to how organised we are, how disciplined we feel, how well we structure our days. So when that structure collapses, the lazy, rotting days feel heavier than they should. We become harsh on ourselves for procrastinating, for lacking discipline, for “wasting time.”

Lately, I’ve felt completely out of routine after coming back from a long holiday. My daily to-do list keeps growing, but the time I have in the day feels shorter and shorter. To make up for time I multitask everything, under the guise of “habit stacking” to feel productive. And yet, nothing really feels completely done.

A month passed. The business ideas I had remained imprisoned in my head. The holiday was almost over and I still hadn’t ‘life admined’, cleared out my closet, started that sewing project, or written down the journal prompts I saved for later.

Later had come. And I was almost the same if not in accomplishments, then definitely in attitude and behaviour. There was absolutely no barakah (blessing) in my time and I realised why: it’s because I treated it as mine. Time feels like it’s constantly running away when we chase it. The earlier we accept that we live on borrowed time, the more content we become with how it’s spent.

It was when I voiced my frustrations to my mum about time escaping from me. Feeling like I disassociated and a month had gone by that she asked:

“How are you going with your daily dhikr (remembrance of God) and Quran?”

Arghhhh.

Bitter pill to swallow but it made things clear amidst the brain fog

While out of routine and on “holidays” from my usual structure. I had also gone on vacation from my wird: (regular sets of dhikr and portions of Quran) I blamed a busy schedule and a disorganised routine, and found comfort in telling myself I’d get back to it when things settled.

Truth is, when you neglect your daily dose of worship using the excuse of being busy, know that very little will be achieved.

You don’t lose productivity because there’s too much to do. You lose it because the blessing is missing.

Solution:

Treat remembrance as the foundation of your day, not something you fit in when there’s time.

• While eating breakfast: 5 minutes of dhikr.

• On your daily commute: listen to 2 pages of Quran.

• While getting ready: supplication and duaa.

The goal isn’t to do more. It’s to bring barakah back into what you’re already doing.

Priortiiiiise this and watch how time will stop feeling so tight by the will of Allah.

Many substackers have beautifully captured the turbulence of our twenties. The paralysis of choice in our individual fig trees. And as Amber writes in her gorgeous piece ‘the hunger to be everything’, being in your 20s often feels like:

‘A daily flirtation with who I am not, what I don’t have, and what I haven’t done’ . @odetoapoet

I find myself stuck there sometimes. Decision fatigue mixed with the fear of choosing wrongly stops me from plucking a fig for fear of missing out on another, more sweeter, more riper fig. What Sylvia Plath failed to mention in her fig tree analogy is that tending to even one fig with small, consistent effort will nourish you more than waiting endlessly for the perfect conditions to grow the biggest, shiniest one.

Done is better than perfect and 5 half-ripe figs are better than none.

Choosing one fig doesn’t mean you have deprived yourself of the others.

Picking one passion, one path doesn’t define you forever and picking all the figs at once is gluttonous so it is best to leave some for later as they will ripen in their own time.

If I had to go through life again these are the lessons I’ll carry forward, a small manual on how to make the journey gentler on the heart and life feel a little lighter. There are billions of tips I could list but for now these were the most pressing. Maybe at 23 I’ll revisit the same lessons with a deeper understanding or maybe (most probably) I’ll write a new batch of tips. That is the thing about your twenties, learning and unlearning is relentless and the drafting of who you’re becoming unfortunately doesn’t really stop.

1. Detach from yourself to find contentment and peace. Get. Over. Yourself.

Seriously if there is one thing you can do that will apply in all areas of your life and is the key to happiness it is to look beyond yourself, your idealised self, your past or future self. Most of our suffering comes from being overly attached to the idea of who we think we should be. Decentre yourself to actually care for yourself. Sometimes the best self-care is stepping out of your own head.

2. Not being honest with yourself is cheating your way through growth.

When you’re dishonest with yourself about what you want, what you feel and what you’re avoiding you stunt your own self-improvement. You can’t build a better version of yourself on a foundation of denial.

3. What attracts you while you’re broken will disgust you when you heal

4. Absorbing everyone’s conflicting ideas about you and internalising them will turn you into a jester, juggling identities just to keep everyone else comfortable.

5. Widen your window of reaction.

Stretch the space between how you feel and when you respond. Make sure your mind is a nice space to be in for yourself because it will reflect in how you show up for yourself and others.

6. Clumsy discipline > perfection and all or nothing mentality

7. There is no one size fits all friendship.

Make friends to satisfy different purposes/interests. Different people bring out different parts of you so expecting one person to meet every need is not only unrealistic, it’s unfair.

8. Rest should not be earned

9. Don’t give into the pressure of niching down.

It’s ok to be a lot of things. Life maxing is the best way to live life.

10. You don’t need to choose deen over dunya. Embed deen into your dunya.

11. Align with what brings you contentment.

Life is about creating ourselves, not attaching to aesthetics someone else invented. Like steve jobs said (hes not the greatest of idols but ill borrow his quote to prove a point): “Everything around you that you call life was made up by people no smarter than you”. Why would you let strangers decide how you dress, how you decorate, how you spend your money, or what you chase?

12. Reflect on your intentions and surrender to Allah’s plans.

Never rely on your control, trust, you will get humbled!!!

13. Speak your mind early, set that boundary.

Silence can be mistaken for approval which is harder to undo later. Name the discomfort before it becomes resentment.

14. Everyday show up as someone you’d want to be around at that present moment.

15. Balance is a scam!!!

It’s about shifting attention and reallocating percentages. Sometimes your career gets 70% of you, some months your family gets 80% and other times your wellbeing needs 100%. That doesn’t mean you’re failing at balance. No one is distributing their energy evenly.

16. The price of success is embarrassment & persistence is how you pay it off.

I’ve seen different iterations of this same idea pop up in a few different places. In short, awkwardness and discomfort are the the toll you pay to get anywhere worth going.

17. Communicate.

It won’t all come out perfectly or all at once. Be patient and just communicate anyway. Communicate irrationally. Communicate awkwardly. Communicate emotionally. The people in your life deserve your imperfect, half-formed thoughts more than your ‘polished’ silence.

18. We all are unique but don’t get too caught up in being perceived as unique and interesting.

As long as you know, you’re good. Don’t rely on others to confirm this.

19. You don’t always have to be seen.

Constant visibility breeds performance. Controlling your visibility is empowering and not having a social media presence was the best thing I have done for my mental health over the last few years and into my 20s. Existing isn’t enough anymore, you must be visible and not just visible, but interesting, impressive, desirable. There’s this quiet demand to provide something worth perceiving as if it is no longer enough to simply live.

20. When someone is drowning that’s not the time to teach them how to swim.

21. Look at the best as an example, look up for direction.

Don’t use the worst as a reason to settle or an excuse to stay complacent.

22. Finally, stop punishing the past versions of you who didn’t know what you know now and will continue to learn.

You’ll figure yourself out through insight and clarity gathered slowly, on your own timeline.

May Allah place barakah in our time and allow us to use our knowledge to please Him and draw closer to Him. Ameen 💌