By Tori 
Adulthood is a crazy place that nobody truly prepares you for. All your life’s aspects come to the surface for you to deal with and ideally, thrive in. It is not easy and you learn most things on the job. Here are some things I have learned so far as a new adult.
People are going to talk regardless, so just do you: Living for others is always set up to make you lose. You can never win if you are seeking people’s opinions or trying to impress them. You can be ‘doing everything right’ but they will still find something wrong to point out; so you might as well live for yourself and do what makes you happy. When you find yourself asking “What will ___ think?”, cancel that thought, ask yourself what you want, and go after that. You may think you are immune to this but this mostly doesn’t apply to what random people think of you. It applies to those close to you like friends. Are their expectations of you higher than what you want for yourself? Are they subconsciously controlling your life? Or making their decisions for your life through you? Is their influence healthy or consuming? LIVE FOR YOU!
Socializing is a skill: This one was a painful lesson to learn because the opportunities I have missed! I have been to a Celebrity VIP section in a concert and spoke to no one not because I had anxiety but because I didn’t know what to say, or how to start a conversation. The area was pretty open and all your favorite Kenyan celebrities were just there. Like what? I look back to that day and almost cry but I learnt my lesson which was working on my people skills. How to hold engaging small conversations. This is a crucial skill that even applies to just making new friends. This is adulthood where friendship is no longer random and you just find yourself in friendships. All good relationships in adulthood require some sort of strategy and intentionality.
Bad days don’t mean a bad life: I know nobody wants to hear this especially when they are having a bad day but I had to unlearn this. Whenever I was having a bad day, I used to conclude that I have a bad life filled with problems. Luckily, that is not true. Bad days happen to everyone and we should be able to isolate them as bad days and not draw conclusions about our lives based on them. Truth be told, we want our lives to feel as light and positive as possible, so the trick to this is to really recognize and amplify the good days we have. By good days I mean, the really good days and the days where nothing ‘bad’ happened and it was just a normal day. You will realize that your life is going fine and you are going to be okay. Doing that will bring a light to the end of the tunnel during those bad days.
You can never make people like you: This lesson was delivered directly to my door. Listen to me when I say this: YOU CAN NEVER MAKE PEOPLE LIKE YOU; people like who they like naturally. I learned this through some of my friendships the hard way. I was never the ‘chosen’ friend. If you know, you know. Right now I have made peace with it and I am happy but at the time it was all I wanted. This meant that I would go out of my way to be an exceptional friend. I would buy my friends gifts, visit them multiple times to ‘check in’ on them, I would be their therapist, send money… I know, I know. In my eyes, I was doing more or better than their other friends and I thought that they would recognize that and choose me but lo and behold friends, that made me get used. I set myself up to be used and you know what the worst part is? I could feel that they were only my friend to secure more from me. Pardon me for ranting but that was honestly one of the harshest realizations I have had to come to. It really hurt me because, after all that, I still never used to get invited and watch them go out online, I only used to get contacted when they needed something from me and more. My main point is, to go where you feel welcome and liked. You always feel the vibe and you can tell. Stop lying to yourself, start loving yourself, and realize that you can be truly valued elsewhere.
Avoid judging people: Everyone has a story, background, and struggle. Everyone is going through something and your judgment is not always needed. People’s actions stem from something and we just need to let people live. Maybe except for criminals because some crimes can never be excused. Most importantly, never judge someone based on how they look physically. I can promise you, they know. It is quite literally their body. The only thing I feel you can point out to someone is if they can fix that in five minutes or less. For example: there is something on your shirt, your shoelaces are untied, your lipstick is smudged, etc. You guys know what I mean. Refrain from judgment at all and I always say, you may be judging without knowing what you’re getting judged for. Uplifting others never fails and it costs free.99!
Those are some of the things I have learned as a new adult. Let us know what some of the things you have learned in adulthood or some of the changes you noticed. Be sure to follow my Instagram page for updates and Pinterest for a personal photo collection!
-Tori