24 Not-So-Soul-Crushing Truths About Being 24

1. Life is no longer the rat-race you thought it was at the age of 23, because you have come to learn that everyone moves at a different pace and that it is more important to take the time to enjoy things and create memories instead of speeding right past them.

2. You are no longer at that point in life where you have to consciously and begrudgingly care about what is trendy, be it cultural trends or the new viral hashtag, because you would rather just be your own person.

3. You spend less time laughing at others and their societal contributions. Instead, you celebrate them for their fearlessness.

4. There’s quite no other feeling like the one that comes from completing taxes. There is quite no other joy like the thought of the returns you will be getting from them. Making new “adult friends” is no longer a terrifying concept, but rather it’s something you look forward to.

5. You’re old enough to know enough for your age, but you will constantly be learning new things too.

6. At 23, we thought everyone was getting married. At 24 we learn that’s not the truth, that, in fact, marriage is on the decline and those who do marry are waiting longer to do so.

7. You’re not biding your time for anyone; you go out and make things happen, and if things don’t pan out the way you had anticipated, it’s only for the best.

8. You’re not fretting over what may happen in 15 years. You’re thinking about what you can do to make yourself financially stable today and doing it.

9. You’re comfortable with just drinking beer, which is relatively inexpensive and always tastes great.

10. You stress less about the past and qualifying your age with the year you graduated, and think more in terms of what you can do today.

11. With regard to sexual experience, you’re at a good place. You stop measuring your experiences in terms of what society regards as “too much” or “too little.” You are at a place that is just right.

12. You revel in the bands that you felt embarrassed with yourself for liking at 23. Somewhere on your regular playlist, there is a Blink-182 song or three.

13. You learn how to deal with the repercussions that arise from eating fast food or how to keep them at bay.

14. Balding and grey hair start to become a thing, and you own it.

15. You’re never too old to be the person you want to be.

16. Five minutes from now, you may become really tired, but it’s only because you were working hard at something.

17. Drug addictions no longer seem to be cost-efficient alternative to dealing with life, and you just don’t have eight hours a day to come down from an MDMA high. Instead, you grow a pair of balls.

18. You no longer have to pretend to like or do things you’d rather not in order to maintain a social life.

19. People over the age of 30 begin to take you seriously. They stop to listen to what you have to say. Your parents start to take you seriously, as well.

20. You learn that all friendships cannot last a lifetime, that change is inevitable within all of us.

21. You say things like, “pesky kids” out of jest, because you’re not old at all, but find the idea that people consider being in your 20s or 30s as “old” to be hilarious.

22. You aren’t afraid to voice your thoughts, and no two people are the same, so there is always something new that you can say or do.

23. You could identify all too well with the song that I don’t even need to bother to tell you the name of.

24. When you look at yourself in the mirror on your 24th birthday, you say to yourself, “Damn, I look great for a 24 year old.”