Have I become a dinosaur?

Hmm. I haven’t finished a successful tour of 30s life yet, having only arrived at the prime age of 34 — which for some young people makes me seem as ancient as a dinosaur. However, I like to think that I am still enjoying the spring time of life and that the comet that will ultimately result in my extinction isn’t due to arrive for some time yet.

However, despite my positive feelings towards growing older, our age obsessed society encourages a certain level of anxiety as an individual approaches the big 3.0. As such, I couldn’t help but partially subscribe to this superficial cultural narrative. Fidgety and unsettled, I was unable to sit down at kitchen tables for more than 5 minutes during the closing chapter of 29 — instead, I found myself frantically pacing up and down rooms in moments of sporadic restlessness.

Society had convinced me that an onslaught of monumental changes were going to take place on the 1st morning of my 30th year. Suffice to say, I was somewhat let down when I woke up at 30 and literally nothing happened. It was by and large an overwhelming anti-climax —similar to how I felt after watching the first Disney Star Wars movie — or the time I had sex with a blow up doll.

Note: That may or may not have actually happened.

So at 30, I lay in bed relieved that my world was still in one piece. To be sure, I checked that I hadn’t suddenly become bald, and also that my penis was still attached. It was. Overjoyed, I looked up and down to check the floor and ceiling still existed. They did, confirming that the world and my journey through its medium would continue. Clambering out of my sleeping quarters, I continued my life as I was still in my 20s.

But after a while, I intuitively felt something was off.

Cue unsettling violin music.

Something was telling me that I needed to step off the hazy merry-go-round of 20s life. I tried to, but the solid ground left me without momentum, and I felt somewhat dazed and confused. My natural tendency was to try and get back on the ride, but again something was stopping me…

I began to hear a voice that that told me a very specific message

Don’t repeat your 20s in your 30s, you absolute moron.

I did mention it was a very specific message.

You need to change the way you are living, it’s not helping you at all.

What was this voice that was talking to me? I wasn’t entirely sure, but it haunted me for the days and weeks that followed.

After a while, I came to understand that this phenomenon is what we generally call a conscience. That part of the psyche that gives you sensible suggestions on how to navigate life, forewarning you on disasters that lie directly in front as well as people and situations you should avoid.

Of course, I did the right thing and ignored it. After all, who needs a conscience when I could just let my ego run the show. At least it supported my actions by telling me that’s its completely fine to stay exactly the same, no matter how stupid I behaved.

However, there would be no ignoring it this time. For a long period of self loathing and self-deprivation ensued, smashing my confidence into pieces, and leaving me painfully unsure of myself, and my place in the universe.

I began to question myself often. I wondered what I had actually achieved in my 20s that I could be truly proud of. More to the point, what had actually happened in my 20s? From here, it all seemed like a blurry mess, a string of drunken social interactions and sloppy conversations that led to nothing of true lasting value. A period of trying to be everywhere and everything but ultimately becoming nothing useful. In the process of trying too hard to please others, had I neglected the most important thing — being true to my inner self?

As the writer typed the awful cliche, a little bit of vomit spilled out from his mouth and continued to seep into the depths of his keyboard. Pondering its relevance, he came to the conclusion that the sticky vomit drenched keys would act as a future reminder, never to repeat such a thing ever again.

I went through a long period of self-reflection, which meant I had to shut myself off from the outside world. What I came to realize was that I had neglected my ambition, substituting it for a never ending cycle of temporary value fulfillment. I was scared of failing, so I used that as a justification to never try anything new — instead allowing the outside world to dictate my life story. My conscience was witness to my inaction, but I had smothered its voice, turning away everytime it tried to communicate with me. The payback came when after being ignored for too long, my conscience conjured up a psychological storm — perhaps a last attempt to gain my attention. It worked, I started to pay attention.

Stumbling out of the wreckage of my mind, I realized I needed to change my life.

First, I had to simplify. This could only be done by removing its unnecessary parts. I began the process of cutting out life’s wonderful distractions from its colorful, glossy pages so I could focus on the most meaningful sections.

The first for the guillotine was an increasingly problematic social life. It had run its course and my arms were tired from propping up a fake version of myself. Equally tiring was the human drama that would often manifest around drunken people, some of which I had help to perpetuate.

Many of my other bad habits had to be culled. Quitting smoking allowed me to visualize a future in which I was alive. I liked this idea — it made planning goals a lot more viable. I also felt the future would be a great place to be if I didn’t have to the carry the additional burden of lung, throat and mouth cancer.

Bad relationships and my attachments to the past also had to go. This was hard. Very hard. For I had sub-personalities inside me that were unwilling to let go. Unfortunately, the only way to ensure their silence was to execute them with a mental machine gun — needless to say, it was a messy ordeal.

But it was for the best. On self reflection, the relationships I had with people in my 20s were like flying through asteroid fields — the chance of successful navigation was minimal and often I was left both mentally and physically damaged. I was going to do that again, so yeah, all those toxic relationships had to fuck off.

Spending 300 hours leveling up a character on a role playing game on my phone lost its appeal. As did binge watching YouTube like an addict on crack. I would have to excuse myself from the meaningless banter of others and instead start to tell the truth to people more, and in doing so, I would have to reveal who I actually was, rather continuing the mirage of what people assumed me to be.

I also started to develop the idea of a long term.

In my youth, long term thinking was very much an abstract concept - even the idea of a tomorrow was something I didn’t quite grasp until my late 20s. This perspective, or lack of, invited too many late night drinking episodes, followed by poor decisions, followed by awful hangovers, followed by minimal productivity. Sure it was fun at the time, but the islands of sobriety were punctuated by long stretches of meaninglessness.

It became apparent that I needed to reality to be my friend rather than my enemy.

I also needed to control my drinking. It was a sort of unspoken agreement between me and my peers that the persistent problem of reality could and should be temporarily forestalled with another glass, or several, of wine.

So what’s the point of all of this? And what does it have to do with dinosaurs?

Well that’s a difficult question. In all honesty, I actually just wanted to use a picture of a dinosaur and write about how fascinating they must have been. But as you can now tell, I got a little distracted. However, there may be a connection.

The dinosaurs are dead. And there are some things about you that need to die off. Turning 30 just seems like a fitting time to do it. All of those self-destructive tendencies that are also spilling out into your social sphere are good candidates for extinction.

The other connection is that people may call you old like a dinosaur when you reach 30.

But don’t take it personally. You are old-er and that’s probably a good thing.

There are many aspects that define 20s that I’m glad are going away, like being really insecure, impulsive, lost, whiny, very ego-controlled, lacking in gratitude and general foresight, only being able to see the world through one narror dimension. Of course, these can all define your 30s too if you so wish. But I believe for the average person, 30 marks the shedding of some of these attributes.

Anyway, I guess what I have taken all this bloody time to say is, if 30 is coming up for you, don’t start freaking out like the world is going to fall apart. Instead, embrace the the quarter life crisis that is about to happen. Oh wait, shit that isn’t very reassuring…ummm. Ok lets start over, everything will be fine! And if you do have a quarter life crisis, it could be teaching you something really invaluable for the rest of your life. OK yeah, that sounds a bit better doesn’t it. Fucking dinosaurs totally distracting me now.