Life is full of widely held beliefs that mislead us in our pursuit of happiness and success.
These ideas shape our lives and set us up for disappointment when reality doesn’t match our expectations.
In this article, we’ll debunk 15 misleading expectations we must let go of before turning 30.
Letting go of these common expectations about personal growth, success, and self-worth, will offer you a more grounded perspective on how to navigate life’s challenges.
From understanding your true potential to recognizing the importance of mindset over outcomes, these insights will help you create a more fulfilling and authentic life.
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15 False Expectations You Must Let Go in Your 20’s
1. You Can Be Whoever You Want
Although you can manifest a lot of things in your life with the right amount of hard work, consistency, and luck, you’re lying to yourself if you believe you can be whatever you want.
Wanting something badly enough and working for it doesn’t mean you actually deserve it or qualify for it.
We’re all unique and gifted with different talents and abilities.
If you don’t have a high IQ, you’ll probably not qualify to become a renowned scientist.
If your vocal range has less than one octave, you’ll probably not become a successful singer.
However, this doesn’t mean you need to forget about your dreams and settle for a mediocre job.
Understanding your limits and abilities will help you find an activity that aligns with your dreams and capacities, allowing you to live a fulfilling life.
2. You Will Start Loving Yourself When Others Do
This is something we will cover extensively later in this article, but for now, here’s what you need to understand: no matter what people make you go through, how you feel about it is up to you.
Just like you can decide not to let personal attacks hurt your feelings and bring you down, feeling loved will not automatically translate into more self-love.
When people love us, we feel worthy of love and so authorize ourselves to love ourselves.
But in reality, love is everywhere.
So, waiting for others to tell you how much they love you actually to love yourself is nothing but a mind game.
A silly game in which we wait for others to validate our feelings.
3. You’re Meant to Live an Extraordinary Life
Not everyone is meant to be extraordinary.
Because extraordinary is just that – rare.
Admitting this doesn’t mean you’re giving up on yourself.
It just means that you stop living up to unrealistic expectations and are ready to live your most authentic life.
We consider the exception—the one-in-a-million success story—to be the norm and see ourselves as failures if we don’t make it into that circle.
But the truth is that most of us won’t be capable to live up to these expectations.
So when making plans for your future, instead of assuming you will be part of this club and successful no matter what, ask yourself what’s worth suffering for even if no one claps for you.
Would being surrounded by people who love you be enough for you to live a happy life?
If not, what makes you believe you need more than that to be happy?
Finding the extraordinary in every moment of an ordinary life is the secret to living a balanced, happy life.
4.You Have Plenty of Time
No one, not even the most pessimistic person, assumes they will die today.
Yet, some of us won’t make it through our 30s.
I’m not saying you should start each day with a prayer and end it with a gratitude dance to the Universe.
But we all assume we’re just at the beginning of our lives and have plenty of time to work on our goals and enjoy life.
Truth is, for some of us, this is simply not true.
Keeping this in mind is important, especially if you’re a high-achiever and think sacrificing 10, 20, or 30 years of your life to make as much money as possible is worth it.
You might not get a tomorrow, so don’t forget to enjoy life and the company of your loved ones today.
5. Your Faults Matter Less Because You’re Young
Being young is not an excuse to deliberately hurt people’s feelings and make irresponsible decisions.
To ensure you don’t repeat the same mistakes over and over again, you need to take accountability for your past actions and understand the Magnitude of your poor decision-making.
If you continue to act as though your actions are excusable just because you’re young, you will waste years not living up to your full potential.
6. You Can Silence Negative Feelings
You cannot play hide-and-seek with negative feelings.
Just like you cannot pretend they don’t exist. At least not forever.
Avoiding negative emotions will not make you happier. Doing so will only deprive you of a lot of your life experiences and severely limit your personal growth.
7. If You Work Hard Enough, You Won’t Struggle Anymore
Working hard is not a guarantee of success.
Once you fail to achieve a goal despite working hard, you understand that no matter how many obstacles you overcome in your life, struggle will always be part of it.
And you will quickly understand what struggle is really for.
8. You Can Control the Image Others Have of You
Just like I can guarantee you no one thinks about you as much as you do, I can guarantee you you will never be able to control the image others have of you.
To live up to your true self, you need to accept that a different version of yourself exists in the heads of every person you have ever met.
Trying to control each and every one of them is a massive waste of time and energy.
And even if you could, acting in a specific way to shape the image others have of you would do nothing but prevent you from becoming your true self.
9. Hard Work Equals Success, Always
The point of hard work is to appreciate the process and the person it helps you become.
If you work hard only to get a particular outcome and achieve a goal, the chances of you ending up disappointed are rather high.
No matter how hard you work and how much you want to be successful, nothing can guarantee your success.
Focusing on the process and what it teaches you will help you ensure you grow from it, no matter the outcome and whether you reach your goal or not.
10. Your Mindset Will Change When Your Life Improves
Most people assume their mindset will change as soon as they achieve their goals.
As if being successful will suddenly change who they are.
What they do not realize is that changing their mindset is what will actually turn their lives around.
Achieving your goals is not what will shift the narrative and improve your self-talk.
Working on your internal narration is what will boost your self-confidence and help you make things happen.
Your mind creates your reality.
Not the other way around.
11. Making More Money Will Solve Your Problems
Just like your thoughts and mindset won’t change after you reach your goals, your attitude toward money won’t improve when you start making more money.
According to Forbes, 39% of the households earning $200,000 per year or more in the US live paycheck to paycheck.
And that’s because people usually think making more money will magically solve all their issues.
The truth is that money problems, just like every other problem, requires a profound mindset shift to resolve.
Adopt a new mindset about money, tackle debt, and start saving money every month and your financial situation will improve.
Create additional income streams while keeping the same bad spending habits and you’ll end up in the same situation despite being in a different tax bracket.
12. Other People Are Responsible for How You Feel
We’ve already covered this a little when talking about love and how we wait for others to love us to feel worthy of love.
And this applies to every other feeling as well.
You, and only you, decide how you react to what happens in your life and how you feel about it.
People are likely to upset or offend you at some point. If you decide to take everything at heart, you will go through some very difficult times.
Remember how things happen for you instead of to you?
Decide to take every experience, good or bad, as a lesson and ask yourself “What can I learn from this?” and “How can this make me grow as a person?”
Answering these two simple questions will help you shift your narrative and go through unpleasant situations with a little bit more ease.
13. Your Goals Are Worth Sacrificing Your Health
One of the most important expectations you must let go of before turning 30 is that you’re still young and can sacrifice your health to work on your goals.
Sure, growing old is a mindset, and 30 is not old.
But assuming you can neglect your health today because you’ll always be healthy is a false assumption.
Your health is your wealth.
Protecting your health is important for achieving long-term goals and living a well-balanced, happy life.
Living up to high expectations and achieving your life goals will take you time, energy, and consistency.
And all these things require you to stay healthy.
Compromising on sleep, exercise, and healthy eating is a counterproductive approach to increasing productivity.
The sooner you understand this, the better you will be equipped to create your ideal life.
14. You Will Find Happiness When You Solve Your Life Problems
Happiness is not something you can postpone.
Thinking you need to solve your life’s problems to be happy is just another way to self-sabotage.
Expressing gratitude daily will show you that you already have many reasons to be happy every day.
Your happiness is not based on whether or not you lose the weight, save the money, get rid of the debt or get the job title.
At every given moment in your life, you have countless reasons to be happy.
You either seize your chance to feel it or miss it.
The only variable is whether you decide or not to hit “Pause” and feel the moment.
15. Opportunities Will Present Themselves When You’re Ready
You will never be ready to go after your dreams.
Waiting to “feel ready” to have a child, buy a house, move abroad, or quit a job is how people end up stuck in a life they do not want.
The truth is that we will rarely feel ready when opportunities present themselves, and our ability to seize them even though we’re not fully prepared is what helps us grow and create a life of purpose.
Final Thoughts
As we grow and start shaping our lives, it’s essential to break the illusions that hold us back so we can embrace our most authentic selves.
Realizing that not everyone is destined for extraordinary success and that our happiness isn’t tied to the resolution of all our problems are liberating revelations.
No matter the goals you set for yourself and your vision of the ideal life, your ability to appreciate what you have now is what will help you live a happy, fulfilling life.
Because the most profound changes do not come from external achievements but from a shift in mindset and perspective.
Embracing these truths will help you create the life you deserve, your most authentic life.