Every smart woman worth her salt looks back at her 20s and thinks, “God, what a hot damn mess I was!” – and that’s normal. Because no matter how many cheesy motivational posters you saw this on, it never ceases to be true: Mistakes are the stepping stones to success. As for your 20s, let them be remembered as the era of experimentation. Your 20s and some mistakes just go together – don’t even try and run away from it. These are the mistakes you SHOULD make in your 20s – trust us, you’ll be better for it!
1. Try those blue streaks
Never mind that you will cringe when you look back at the photographs. You will never be as wild, young and free as you are at this point in time. Besides, if Katy Perry can, why can’t you?
2. Drink the night before a big presentation
You are going to feel like death in the morning, and it will make you swear off shots. About time that happened, anyway.
3. Get competitive over nothing
If you’re the Monica Geller of the group, that’s cool. Even if your friends make fun of you for getting too competitive over simple things like board games (remember the Pictionary incident, anyone?). That’s a case of misplaced competitive spirit, sure, but in the long run what stays is the spirit – we’re pretty sure it will make you win some day. Just remember that you’ve got to, over time, learn to pick your battles. 🙂
4. Hit on a guy you like
Even if you’re sure he’s not going to be your Mr Forever. Don’t worry about settling down, you’ve got the rest of your life to think about that. Learn to enjoy the chase and the flirtation for at least a little while.
5. Spend way too much money on a road trip
Yes, it’s a road trip. Yes, it’s supposed to be a frugal means of travel. But you and your girls have taken time off work and you deserve that exorbitant spa-cation. So spend on it. Don’t get us wrong, you will cry about it the rest of the month when you have no money left to do anything else. But it will also be your fondest memory from your 20s!
6. Disagree with your folks
If you are normal, we are pretty sure you and your folks disagree on some stuff in life. For instance, your choice of career or when you should ideally get married, etc. (Yep, we’ve ALL been there.) Argue with your parents, reason things out with them, tell them your opinion. Cry. Be obstinate. But don’t ignore them. They are your parents and they are getting old. A few years down the line, you will look back at these very times and remember how it helped you bond in more ways than you could have imagined. It WILL help you grow closer to them.
7. Take career risks
Yes, your career path is nothing to be trifled with. But having said that, you can’t learn in life if you keep doing everything right. You will never know where you truly belong till you try to belong where you don’t.
8. Watch trashy TV shows
Go on, keep up with those Kardashians. Sinfully voyeuristic television viewing is just good for the soul. Also, if you really want to justify this one…there are BIG business lessons to be learnt here.
9. Take theme parties too seriously
Back to school? Halloween? Bollywood? You will typically get quite a few invitations to theme parties in your 20s – and we suggest you make the most of them. Spend too much time, money, effort and energy coming up with the perfect costume – you’re going to cherish that memory later. Don’t wait to get older and realize that theme parties went out of fashion while you weren’t looking!
10. Have unrealistic expectations
Our 20s are ALL about unrealistic expectations. We all have this weird timeline chalked out in our heads, where we think we know what kind of guy we are going to marry and when, in a wedding that’s as clear as a Pinterest board in our minds. We know what salary we want to be earning at what age and where we want to vacation all over the world. What we don’t know is that things don’t always go as planned. And there’s no fairy godmother in the real world so, we’ve got to find our own path and figure things out, stumbling along the way. But having these expectations is awesome – it’s a mistake that we need to keep making, for that’s what keeps us going in life: the belief that one day we are going to live all our dreams.
Images: tumblr, forums.achaea.com, imgur.com, www.huffingtonpost.com, www.teen.com, suitupbros.com, thedishh.com, party.io, bollypop.in
MUST-READ: #YOLO: 30 Things Every Woman Should Do At Least Once!
MUST-READ: 16 Signs You Are Succeeding in Life Even If You Don’t Think You Are
