My years in middle and high school were rough for a lot of reasons. The last thing I needed were adults telling me “these are the best days of your life!”. That was the most demoralizing thing I could have imagined back then.
Once I was 18 and in control of my life, things got so much better. There have been different chapters, but they’ve all been good or at least memorable in their own way.
What I would (and have) told kids who are clearly having a rough time is that things can and will get better. When you’re a kid, and bad situations that are entirely out of your control to change are happening, life can be miserable. Eventually you get some agency, and that goes a long way. Sometimes as an adult, things come and happen too, but telling a kid who is currently miserable to look forward to something better is a lot more helpful. Barring some outside tragedy, life as an adult is much less grinding than being a kid shaped cog.
Yeah, high school is some of the worst times in my life. If my kid complained, I wouldn’t say “it only gets worse,” I’d say “this is a rough time, but remember, none of the stuff that is hard is real. It’s all just training. The school stuff is training you for deadlines and heavy workloads. The social stuff is training for personal and professional relationships. Try to think of this as the tutorial for life, where you must do X action to proceed, and maybe it’s hard because it’s new, and it’s frustrating because you don’t realize it’s a tutorial and think “this is the game.” It’s not. It becomes an open-world game after this. It’s harder, but it can be WAY better, and you have a lot more control.”
Thirded. And even when I got control, I had a better time in my late 30s than I did at any time prior to that. I had a lot of absolutely great misadventures in my 20s and I’ll be forever grateful. But in my late 30s I had the wisdom to know what bullshit I could get into and out of, enough money to do it, a body that wasn’t beat to hell just yet, and very few shits to give.
Things started to even out at 40 and have been pretty steady the last couple of years. It’s amazing in a different way.
I can’t speak for anyone else, but if I were giving advice to 15 year old me I would definitely say that the best is yet to come. Just gotta keep your eyes peeled for the opportunity.
I struggled with this as well, having not enjoyed my teenage years that much.
How I coped was to tell myself that people asserting that period X is the best years of your life are people whose lives peaked at that time, and that this won’t be true if I made sure to not have my life peak then.
I’m happy to say that I’ve proven the assertion wrong in my case. It’s been a steady climb upwards, with every year being better than the latter.
Lmao
Choose to be happy.
That quote from everything everywhere all at once really got me. Kindness is how I fight. In a world of hardship and bravado being jolly and soft is my act of rebellion.
This would have sounded like absolute woo-ey bullshit to me a few years ago. Until I worked at a place that turned openly hostile toward me. On a work trip, I realized quite literally:
“If I’m smiling, those people who care about me will be happy I’m happy. And those people who hate me will be PISSED I’m happy.”
It’s perfect. It really is the ultimate “fuck you” rebellion, as silly as it may sound.
The best way to piss off your haters is to live a happy life.
I don’t necessarily say that to my kid as a warning. In fact, yesterday it was said to her as an encouragement. She has a significant sum of unspent allowance and she saw something she really wanted but decided she didn’t want to spend her money on it. I told her that she is at a point in her life where she can spend money on whatever she wanted and not have to worry about bills or rent or what happens if she runs out and she should take advantage of that. So she bought the thing she wanted and she was happier for it.
That’s good advice, and I’m glad she took it.
I remember, before I bought my first car at age 17, I had a bunch of money from working, and nothing really to spend it on. My dad said, “When you buy a car, that will all be gone.” He was definitely right about that.
Ha! Jokes on you, I’ve never been happy.
I’m older than most here and I lead a mostly good life. I think the saying is mainly regarding death. In youth, you don’t experience as much of it, but as you age, more and more people pass around you until it’s you, alone.
The realization that life is one day at a time wether you like it our not is a heavy one.
Good Luck kid. Try not to lose that spark.
honestly when I was younger it was mostly nicer because you looked forward to having a nice life. Seeing it not come to pass and realize its not going to get better is sorta a downer.
This confuses me. If you grew up in hardship, what made you think that the future was going to be better than the present?
Also, your description sounds overly general. Nobody has a life that consists entirely of nice moments. I’m not sure why or how anyone would ever have expected otherwise.
My young life was not hardship but not a life of excess. Type where I made some homemade toys and such and my father had not completed high school. Thing is at that time there was an idea that if you did well in school you could go on to get a good job that would provide for a family and a decent home and (yes im just old enough) have a pension to retire on. The trajectory was different with the environment pre reagan as it seemed like we were polluting less and cleaning things up. Took awhile to realize just how much they had torn that stuff apart or moved it overseas. Now it feels like you have to be incredibly successful to have the American dream. Paid off house (yes the dream was not to have a lifelong mortgage that you never get out from under) and a rustic summer vacation place (or just yearly nice vacations) is possible if your a doctor or lawyer. Now a two bedroom condo on a mortage you can afford the monthly nut and retirement savings where the math does not look good is doing pretty darn well.
“Joy as an Act of Resistance”
Fuck em all will find the silver lining
I’m 35. I’ve had some tough times. I’ve struggled and I’m sure I’ll struggle again at some point, but aside from politics and covid, I’ve been in a sort of golden age for like six years, and things have been getting better throughout. There have been some shitty spots, but it’s been joyful in general. There was a time about ten years ago that I truly thought about giving up for good, and I’m really glad that I didn’t. I never thought I’d have so much to live for; I didn’t even think I deserved a shot at it.
Work hard (but also rest), stay curious, and tell jokes. Joy is possible, but you may need to be the one to provide it, but it pays dividends.
This isnt even a settled fact.
For example: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/happiness/happiness-over-the-lifespan
Argues a few things:
Does happiness decline with age?
People often worry that happiness diminishes with age, but that’s actually not the case. One large study found just a slight overall dip in happiness between age 20 and age 70—on a scale of 1 to 10, average life satisfaction went from 5.8 to 5.4.
What is the happiness curve?
The happiness curve refers to the trajectory that happiness tends to follow as we age. People begin life fairly happy. Around age 18, their happiness begins to decrease, reaching a low point in their 40s. But after age 50, happiness begins to rise again. This U-shaped happiness curve has emerged consistently in large studies of Western societies.
So there is a common curve, but the curve is gradual.
It also notes the likely causes are that financial stability rises mid-life and improves happiness, while free time is at a minimum at the bottom of the curve and reduces happiness.
This has nothing to do with age and everything to do with culture, which can be changed.
I fucking hate this soo much! People always tolled me this when I went to school. I fucking hated my life and if it would only get worse, then why even bother living? Well turns out I was right, and way more than I could’ve imagined. Now as an adult I make my own rules and I’ve never been happier!
In the US, at age 18 you become a debtor.
Somewhere in your 20s or 30s you become a real estate speculator.
Eventually people start owing you money, and then the cycle repeats itself with the next generation.
This system is anti-joy, and I will never accept it into my heart. I will fight it with every ounce of my strength until the day that I die. This is my joy.
