Chasing Titles in Your Twenties and Thirties
We all have a blank in front of our names that wants to be filled with titles to finally be officially adults.
We chase words after words during our twenties and thirties to finally find the right word—the one that makes us proud of ourselves when we are introduced by it.
In our twenties, we think that word should be something acceptable by our community, something flashy and big, to finally see that our community is proud of us.
The Never-Ending Pursuit of Adolescence
But what if the word that your community is proud of is different from the word that makes you proud of yourself and your life?
The word that you say after your name in your sixties while holding your head up, proud of the life you lived, the choices you’ve made.
- Did our parents find that word for themselves?
- Do we see them proud of the life they’ve had?
- They mostly followed society’s rules and ethics, right?
Are they happy now?
Did they live—or just survive life?
Being a “Good Girl” in My Twenties
I chased all of the checklists of society in my twenties.
Being a “good girl” means:
- High education in the best university in your country,
- An acceptable major for girls—one that leads to employment right after graduation, and
- A stable, respected job.
For girls in Asian families, the ideal career is teaching or working in the school system—a safe, socially approved path.
The Realization That Changes Everything
I pursued all of the checklist items one by one, only to find out that all of them were nothing but my parents’ unfulfilled dreams.
These were their words—the words they wanted for themselves to fill the blank in front of their names. But they didn’t have the chance to achieve them, so they only had an idea of being that—not the real experience, which is far from the dream.
They too are looking for that blank. But now, they look for it through our lives, believing it’s too late for them to chase after it themselves.
Reaching the emptiness of the wrong words is what sparks the thirst in your thirties or forties to search for the right words. Words that you want, with an unexplainable need to find them—or die trying!
I’m Finding My Identity in My 30s
The name of my YouTube channel and website is Taraneh BLANK.
Because I couldn’t accept that life is defined by the emptiness I experienced with the wrong words. I believe there are right words for all of us—we just have to search for them.
We may or may not find them while we’re alive, but one thing I know for sure:
Having experienced both the emptiness of living with the wrong words and the uncertainty of chasing the right ones, I prefer the second option 1,000 times.
Because that feels like living—with every breath you take and every tear that falls from the confusion and struggles of the journey.
What about you which option do you choose?
What were the wrong words for you?