Three Things Everyone Should Do In Their Thirties

Well - in about 3 weeks, I go from the twirly twenties into the thrifty thirties. It's been a decade of learning, showing up to new places, and moving around the country - but I'm officially saying bye to my twenties. 

As I approach that mark, I have been thinking about what are some things I want to accomplish in my thirties. It just so happen to coincide with me needing a speech topic at Toastmasters, that I thought to myself, I should talk about this! And it forced me to write it out and actually think. I came up with three things everyone should do in their thirties! This could be helpful for all the other millennials and Gen-Z folks who are wondering what the heck this new decade means. 

So, take this from a guy who's never been 30 - here are three things everyone should do in their thirties:

1. Learn how to be on time
   1. OK - STAY WITH ME. I am not a type A drill sergeant who believes everyone should be Type A. But, I do think that we can be pretty lax on our timing in our twenties. Maybe if you're in the military then you're taught not to be late, but the rest of us haven't had to learn that lesson as much. We can coast by and be late and be charismatic and laugh a bunch and play it off. When I talked about this at Toastmasters, I had someone approach me and they said "Does a plane wait for anyone?" and I thought "No." And he said, "exactly, don't pretend like a plane will wait for you." Basically - my interpretation of that was - we're never important enough to be consistently late to things. 
2. Figure out how to be happy with how we are spending our time
   1. In my twenties I felt immense pressure to provide evidence for how I spent my time. Each birthday I would look back and think, "did I spend my time well? What do I have to show for this year?" The year I started this podcast, the Talk to People Podcast, I felt immense pride. I was like "YES! I have so much to show for this year!" Cut to the next year, I get rejected from like 90 jobs, I burn out creatively, and my episodes turn to mush. That birthday was not as full of pride. Most of us in our twenties can vividly recount moments where we're laying in our bed and wishing we spent our time differently that day. Maybe it's getting our brain sucked out of our eyes by hours of social media scrolling or maybe we avoided a big project we want to do. I just want us to get to a point to where we're happy with how we're spending our time - think about people first, projects second, and then dopamine third (dopamine being the digital and physical things like social media, candy, video games, etc.)
3. Become a great parent, aunt/uncle, or mentor. 
   1. No - you do not have to go make a baby in your thirties or force your sibling to. But I do think that we should be focusing more on mentorship and leadership in our thirties than we did in our twenties. I'm not saying we need to focus on leadership because 30 is old - I think it's still very young. I am saying we need to focus on leadership because it will increase the value we add to the world and it will make us more complete people. And it will take a long time to figure out how to be a great mentor or leader but I think we need to be actively learning. Find ways to take younger people under your wing, reach out to nonprofits and do things that sound fun like play sports or fashion galas. There are so many ways for us to grow in leadership - it just takes active energy. 

Thanks for reading my entry. What should I add? Email me at talktopeoplepodcast@gmail.com

xo

Chris