Reflections on turning 30

I have successfully survived 30 years on this tiny blue dot - yay! And while I celebrate this moment, it probably is a good time to take stock of my own evolution: look at things over a larger time frame and get in touch with parts of me that are new and parts of me that no longer exist.?

From “infinite possibilities” to “less is more”

This has probably been the biggest change in me personally. I spent most of my twenties with the singular objective of experiencing as much as I could, taking random risks and going out of my way to put myself in places where I could get a unique experience. I have always been excited at the idea of there being infinite possibilities at any given moment and just so much to see and do and explore and learn and experience.

And while I still continue to seek new of experiences, I have also reached a stage where I have gotten a lot closer to who I am and the things that resonate with me. I see myself appreciating depth a lot more, being selective on where I am spending my time and being very aware of how experiences and people serve me.?

In other words, I can see myself spending the rest of my life doing very specific things and doing them well and being happy while I do them. New experiences will always have a very important place in my life, but they are not going to be front and center anymore. The next years of my life are going to be spent in doing work where I feel I am being true to myself and creating things which align with my identity and purpose.

Gratitude and celebration

Which brings me to the immense sense of gratitude I feel for having lived the kind of life I have so far. Probably the reason why I am drawn towards finding greater depth in certain areas is because this sense of wanting and seeing and feeling more (“chull” to be precise, no direct English synonym I know of) has been satisfied to a large extent.?

Today an old friend (friendship is old, also probably the person) shared a high school photo and I tried to imagine what Aditya ‘12 would think of me now. The overpowering feeling was a sense of pride in what I have done with my life in the last decade; like I have had the privilege to live through and achieve all the dreams I had back then, and even things I was too scared of dreaming. And this realization fills me with immense gratitude and happiness.

At the same time I do realize that I have done a very bad job of celebrating these moments. In this constant rush of moving forward, I have hardly spent any time celebrating all the moments I have been lucky enough to experience, all the things I have been able to achieve and all the lovely and amazing people I’ve had a chance to know.

If there is one thing I’ll do more of is to be intentional about celebrating wins and highs and just things which matter to me.

R.I.P. “the chip on my shoulder”

Probably the other reason I have not done this celebrating bit is because I have been too hard on myself. For the 20-something Aditya, nothing was big enough or grand enough to be celebrated, there always had to be more.?

This comes from a middle class upbring where you are taught to be competitive, and if you are a good student (hard to believe but I was one, ask folks who went to school with me) you end up being extremely competitive in everything. So there is always a chip on your shoulder, always someone to beat and everything becomes a competition.

I spent a lot of hours over the years working on this to finally reach a place where I can channel this energy in productive ways, focus on things I really care about and not have this constant urge to win at things which don’t even matter. As I write this, I no longer have this urge to prove myself that I can do this thing just to impress someone else, or to sound better in a discussion I don’t even want to be a part of, or just to one-up someone who hasn’t even been a part of my life for years. This, to me, is a big win.?

There are so many other reflections I have. Around love and loss, around success and failure, around dreams, and growth, and meaning. But I think those can wait.

For now, I am just excited for what is to come. I am in the best shape of my life, focusing all my energy on my dreams, spending time with people I like spending time with and staying in a space which makes me feel authentic to myself.?It's almost like a lot of the unwanted frequencies have been tuned out, the ones I love have been amplified and beautiful new ones have been added to create this beautiful symphony of life.

If you have read it till here, I am thankful. I hope this inspires someone to make the right choices.