Too Young to Be Washed Up

August 7, 2007 6:36 PM

How do you keep from feeling guilty that you didn't "live up to your potential"?

30 is too young to feel like you're past your peak. (Long background explanation begins here) Before I was 18, I'd been heavily involved in professional performance art and modeling (so got used to seeing my picture in the paper frequently, etc), was in the top 2% academically (took college classes for high school credit), lettered in 2 different sports, dabbled with a couple instruments, volunteered, and taught children's theater classes in the summer. and so on and so forth. Sometime in university, I crashed and burned, hard. I dropped out of uni and bummed around for a few years before eventually getting my degree. I am now staring down the barrel of my thirties, having accomplished nothing at my early days had hinted. I'm employed in an un-inspiring, not-great-paying job, doing nothing spectacular...generally, I'm disappointed in how I turned out. Someone else out there must be going through this.

How do I quit feeling like I should have done more? How to logic away the guilt I feel for "wasting my potential"? Did I even HAVE potential?

posted by anonymous to religion & philosophy (33 comments total)

I think the "guilt" might not be a bad thing. Not to say you're wasting your potential, per se, but being employed in an un-inspiring, not-great-paying job, doing nothing spectacular seems like a recipe for dissatisfaction. It's never to late to do something else.
posted by someone else at 6:48 PM on August 7, 2007

At 30, you are not old. There's nothing to feel guilty about. Just use your time well now.
posted by DarkForest at 6:54 PM on August 7, 2007

How do I quit feeling like I should have done more?

Learn to be happy with what you have done. I haven't done most of what you've done and I'm older than you, but probably happier. You don't h ave to "do" a damn thing in life, other than what you want, the things that make you happy. Everything else is just baggage.

How to logic away the guilt I feel for "wasting my potential"?

You can't logic away feelings. You have to face them and accept or discard them and then move on. Life is short and the clock is ticking

Did I even HAVE potential?

Everyone has potential, be it for good or bad.

Here's the thing: you crashed and burned. You know why? 'cause you were doing shit to do shit as opposed to doing it because you wanted to and eventually your mind and body rebelled and said "Fuck this, I'm outta here." Listen to that voice, it's very smart and probably saved you some major headaches.

Ask yourself "What do I want to do?" Whatever the answer is, start working towards doing that all the time. It won't be hard, you're already been tops at shit you didn't want to do, so you know you have the discipline to achieve goals

and this train of thought: I am now staring down the barrel of my thirties, derail that fucker. There is nothing horrible about being in your thirties. It's not some litmus test or defining goal. In fact, once you are in your thirties you realize all that stupid shit you used to worry about was stupid and a waste of time.

Good luck.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 6:55 PM on August 7, 2007 [8 favorites has favorites]

1. Be happy you have potential.

2. Get to work now to accomplish whatever it is you feel guilty about not having already accomplished.

3. 30 is nothing. You have 10 years before you are 40 and feeling guilty. Get moving.
posted by The World Famous at 6:58 PM on August 7, 2007 [1 favorite has favorites]

Well, it greatly helps that you finished the degree. I know someone who's in his mid-30s who never went back to finish and is currently feeling a lot like you are—but who's unfortunately going to have to find a way to finish the degree some 13 years later.

Anyway, it sounds like you still have a lot of potential, and as someone else said, it's certainly never too late to do something else. I've seen numerous threads and comments on here from people who were even in their 40s facing situations like yours. You can only go up from here.

Just don't quit your job before getting something else lined up. ;)
posted by limeonaire at 7:02 PM on August 7, 2007

You completely achieved being a child prodigy, and you completed that part of your life when you finished your degree. Unfortunately, child prodigy *does* have an expiration date, and yours is met.

Fortunately, you're grown now, and you get to pick what your next goal is. You STILL have potential, you just don't know what you want to do yet. Your best years aren't done, just your prodigy years. What spectacular, grown thing do you want to try first?
posted by headspace at 7:07 PM on August 7, 2007 [1 favorite has favorites]

I recognize that feeling.

I am talking about myself here, because I feel like I can't generalize it to anyone else, but see if it sounds familiar.

I did a lot of overachieving because at some level I believed that overachieving would give me what I didn't have: approval? happiness? So part of me burned out because obviously I wasn't getting happiness and approval with my overachievement. And the other part of me said: if you're not happy, obviously you need to work harder, slacker! If only you lived up to your potential you wouldn't have this problem!

So I needed to locate my happiness somewhere else than my own achievements. I needed to realize over and over again that I wouldn't become any happier by getting a PhD or publishing. When I heard the voice that says "But you could have become ambassador to Finland!" I needed to say "Yeah? So...what's so great about that?" Just because you can do something doesn't mean you must, or should; potential is a lousy way to measure one's achievements.

And may I also recommend the young adult novel "An Abundance of Katherines" by John Green. Here's Colin's story: he used to be a child prodigy, and he's sort of faded or drifted back into the realm of Very Bright Mortal--he knows he's never going to be a genius, and he's beginning to come to terms with the possibility that he may never accomplish anything big and significant. But he sort of needs that big and significant thing, for complete strangers to like him, because not many people do like him very much at all.
Fantastic book.
posted by Jeanne at 7:16 PM on August 7, 2007 [5 favorites has favorites]

Welcome to your late twenties. You were an aweesome superstar and then you frittered it all away, and now you have to make a real life. I know it hurts, especially when you felt immanent value (for what you WERE) and need to find value in what you DO. See a shrink; go on a vision quest: decide what to do next. Lots of people choose this time to make a project of getting married and making babies, which gives you lots to do if you are into that. Otherwise, projects ahoy. Number one might be getting a job you like better, something else that is both hard and worth it. I'm at this point too, and I've been working to improve and I promise you it gets better.
posted by dame at 7:16 PM on August 7, 2007 [6 favorites has favorites]

I went through this for several years. I grew up constantly being told I was a genius, I was going to be the youngest writer to ever win a Pulitzer, etc. I know my parents and grandparents had the best intentions for praising me this way, but it had the unfortunate effect of inadvertantly teaching me that my essential worth was based on my accomplishments, and more particularly on accomplishments that were widely recognized.

It also had the net effect of making me too scared to really challenge myself at times; after all, if I was a genius, I had to keep up appearances, right? So I didn't even try to publish any of my stories for years, because the first time I had something rejected by my fucking college lit mag, I was so spooked that I lost my nerve. And, you know, it's hard to get that Pulitzer at 25 if you're not even sending out stories in the first place.

I won't lie: it took a shitload of therapy in my 30s to get over the pervasive belief of being a failure for not becoming a rich and famous writer and to understand that I am lovable and worthy not because of anything I've accomplished (or haven't accomplished) or how I look (or don't look) or what I earn (or don't earn), but simply because I'm alive. The most brilliant writer, the most beautiful supermodel, and the most extraordinary Harvard grad are no more or less lovable than I am, even if our resumes look quite different.

I eventually got that it's not about the external (jobs, appearance, public recognition, etc.) at all, but rather about internal qualities. The qualities I seek and admire in others -- creativity, compassion, humor, generosity, loyalty, etc. -- are the qualities I seek in my own life, in my job, activities, and relationships. It doesn't matter that my life looks quite different from what I expected (and what was expected of me). The question of whether I "lived up to my potential" isn't even relevant now; the terms I live my life on are not the ones that were set 20 or 30 years ago by someone else, but rather the ones I've set for myself in the here and now.
posted by scody at 7:16 PM on August 7, 2007 [34 favorites has favorites]

You crashed and burned, and then you picked yourself up. You didn't become a drug addict, you didn't commit suicide, you didn't land in jail. You just became normal. It's no sin. It could have been a lot worse.
posted by desjardins at 7:29 PM on August 7, 2007 [1 favorite has favorites]

I am now staring down the barrel of my thirties, having accomplished nothing at my early days had hinted.

It seems like this is a common problem among people who had a lot of opportunities when young. All those wonderful activities that parents plunge their children into have the effect of convincing children that they are brilliant Renaissance people destined for lifelong glory ... but upon entering adulthood and having to support themselves, they realize that they are not as brilliant and fascinating as they had believed.

I don't know if this is any consolation, but this seems to be a realization that is quite typical among people entering their thirties. At least you're still young enough to do pretty much anything you want to do.
posted by jayder at 7:31 PM on August 7, 2007 [1 favorite has favorites]

Huh. I went through this, and still do (I'm 24 now). Basically, I realized that I was going to have to make my own yardstick to measure success, and possibly retreat-and-regroup [to quote another MeFite] and assess things. I dropped out of a highly-ranked PhD program, dumped a prestigious but low paying job, bummed around underemployed for a few months, etc after being the high school valedictorian, varsity lettering, double majoring in science sort. Don't worry - you're young yet. Just make sure you're doing everything you do for your own happiness, and no one else's and you should be fine. We all end up in the ground sooner or later anyway, so I figure that the trip getting there is really what's important.
posted by universal_qlc at 7:59 PM on August 7, 2007 [1 favorite has favorites]

For me, the (on-going) trick is listen for the "shoulds" in my thoughts and try to ignore them and focus on what is real for me. The whole concept of "living up to your potential" almost always means accomplishing what "they" think you be doing. The best book I know of for sorting this out is Who cares what you are supposed do? The book targets women in their 20's and 30's (although others can find useful insights) providing guidelines and examples for how to put all the social and personal expectations in perspective so you can figure out for yourself which ones work for you and which ones you don't want to buy into.
posted by metahawk at 8:39 PM on August 7, 2007

Read about the Effort Effect by Carol Dweck. Read as much of Carol Dweck as you can. I'm 43 and wished I'd read it in my teens and again in my twenties and thirties. It's never too late, and certainly not at 30.
posted by alms at 8:41 PM on August 7, 2007 [1 favorite has favorites]

I didn't get my shit together and even figure out what I wanted to do with my life until I was 30! It's best, I think, to see your 20's as a time of exploration, soul searching and having fun.
posted by pluckysparrow at 8:58 PM on August 7, 2007

To back up the beginning part of scody's great comment: The Power (and Peril) of Praising Your Kids from New York Magazine.
posted by spec80 at 9:10 PM on August 7, 2007

I've also been a high achiever at times in my life, and not at other times. I've found it goes in cycles. In high school, all I wanted was to go to Harvard or Oxford. Having accomplished that I found myself lost once I got there; it took some time to find new interests and direction. After college, again, it took a couple years to figure out what I wanted to do and where. Now I find myself again having accomplished something and starting one of those flitterty cycles where I under achieve. That's okay - by now I know its the compost for something better.
posted by zia at 9:20 PM on August 7, 2007 [2 favorites has favorites]

Yeah, I'm 26 and right in the middle of this. What I tell myself is that I can live my life according to either others' expectations or my own, but only one way will make me happy. My previous accomplishments were cheered on by others, but really, I was a miserable smart, talented kid. So I'm working in the field I want, traveling a lot, indulging myself, loafing around, finding happiness in fulfilling myself instead of using accomplishments to prop up my self-esteem.

I think you should decide how you're going to live your 30s; it doesn't sound like you're particularly happy with where you are right now. So do some self-exploration, find out what truly makes you happy, and set some goals. Or, if you don't want to change your current life path, realize that you already accomplished a lot as your younger self, and mellow out.
posted by lychee at 9:24 PM on August 7, 2007

This is pretty common among your generation that grew up in the 90s when you were preteen-teenager. We are used to seeing success happen over night. the 90s produced more millionaires than any economic booms in the history of this country. Your past is a good stepping stone to realize what you are good at and where your interests lie, but that's it. You still have to work to obtain what it is that you want.

Another problem is that you need to know what it is that you want to do for living. Many times, you'll do what you wanna do and that is enough regardless of how much money you make but you need to consider various criteria to determine what you want to do.

My bestfriend's parents came to this country in their mid 40s and started from scratch. They had some savings to support themselves for awhile but they worked really hard to raise children and send them to college and buy a house, etc. You're ONLY 30. You will not have been 'turned out' anything til you're in your 60s. People go to law school in their 50s! to do what they want to do!

My advice is do something about the aspects of your life about which you don't like. You ARE old enough to know that YOU have to take control of your life and take responsibility of yourself. Remember, it's never too late.
posted by icollectpurses at 9:37 PM on August 7, 2007

The way you've written your question, it sounds like you're thinking of your life as if it's already over. The antidote for that is to do things that will make you feel alive again.

Easier said than done. Sure, eventually you might think about getting a job you'll enjoy more, but for now concentrate on doing tiny things that will shake your life up a little.

Plan a "field trip" to a new part of town (if you're in a large-ish city), and just wander around. Choose an author whose writing you enjoy, or a subject you're interested in (origami, photography, organic gardening, kite making, whatever), and read about it until you're bored. Cook a new kind of meal for yourself...one of those meals that takes hours to prepare - take a photo of it when you're done! Engage your senses and get yourself out of the rut you're in. If you start doing something and it's not fun, stop. Find something else that is fun. Dabble.

High school-era accomplishments are so overrated. Really. If I had a nickel for everyone I went to school with who was going to be a doctor (but isn't)... Put the past into perspective. I understand where you're coming from, but it's NOT all over!

Once you've taken some tiny steps that get you feeling alive again, take some bigger steps. What WOULD you be doing if you could do anything you want? Do you still want to model/be an athlete/play an instrument/teach theater? If so, start taking steps toward doing that. If not, figure out what you want to do now that you don't have anyone you feel you need to impress.

What would help you feel more fulfilled than you are now? Do you want to help other people? Help animals? Be the best at something? Earn name recognition in your city? Raise money for a cause? Really think about what is meaningful and fulfilling for YOU...not what you think SHOULD be meaningful and fulfilling.

For the record, I think that "crashing and burning" while you're in college and then "bumming around" takes guts. Seriously.
posted by splendid animal at 11:36 PM on August 7, 2007 [1 favorite has favorites]

By the age of 18 you had already accomplished the things that a lot of other people were just starting to strive towards.
I've heard it said that success is 10% inspiration and 90% perspiration (I hate that). I'm thinking that you're experience was the opposite, 90% inspiration and 10% perspiration.
When things come easy for you and the accolades just roll on in, it's hard to make the transition into the middle of the pack. It's like you've been a sprinter and now the long distance runners have caught up and passed you.
Of course you had potential, you still do. The question is: do you want to work that hard?
You've already done the flashy stuff. As far as "living up to your potential" you've been there, done that. Now, what do you really want to do?
posted by BoscosMom at 1:15 AM on August 8, 2007

Read Status anxiety by Alain de Botton. Not specifically about potential, but about society's standards for status and how to distance one self from them with the help of philosophy, litterature, art, etc. Not the usual style of self help book, more (light) philosophical.
posted by pica at 1:56 AM on August 8, 2007

Yes, I'm in the same boat. I've lost (and am still losing) friends who saw me the way I was, and don't entirely know what to do with me anymore. But you know what? None of them saw just how much strain and effort it took to maintain all those different strands of single-mindedness, and in the end I realized I wasn't living--and I lost control of it all. Were you happy and fulfilled doing all your activities? Be honest with yourself.

I can't say I'm happy with where I am right now, but I can tell you that splendid animal is right to say that "crashing and burning" took guts, though an unconventional kind, and probably not what you (or most of us, for that matter) would have chosen. If that hadn't happened, where would you be now? Probably with the commendation and approval of everyone you've ever met, but maybe you wouldn't have understood quite as much of life as you do now--the life of those who never had such achievements, or those who actually had to struggle through life. I know there are many things I've learned about people, about life, in general, that I wouldn't have understood if the School of Hard Knocks hadn't decided to set me a few extra tough exams. And maybe the only way I could have learned that stuff was to give up my old existence--entirely. Maybe. (I may eventually go back to pursuing what I did before, but it will be at the right time, at my own pace, with (hopefully) added wisdom and experience, and screw whoever starts jumping to sales and dollar signs and awards and accolades--that's not what I want to be in it for).

Believe me, I still live with a lot of guilt and regrets for what-may-have-been or who-I-may-have-been. One book that helps me is "The Way of Transition" by William Bridges, which I highly recommend for helping you to move on. And that's all it is, really--getting over who you were, learning how to step into whoever you will (and want to) become--which will probably bring you a different kind of satisfaction. Where you are now is probably not it.
posted by elisynn at 2:10 AM on August 8, 2007 [1 favorite has favorites]

I don't know if this makes YOU feel any less guilty, but your situation sure makes ME feel a lot less guilty for being a total bum when I was in high school.
posted by GooseOnTheLoose at 3:44 AM on August 8, 2007 [1 favorite has favorites]

Same story here in many aspects. I just crashed and burned when I was 19, main reason being that my family had run out of money to support me, and I did not know how to work.

I felt very guilty and depressed for many years, and made a bunch of stupid decisions. Dropped majors, did lots of drugs and other dangerous stuff. Got involved in bad relationships, and wasted a lot time.

I think that if I ever had 'potential', it was there while I was doing all that stupid stuff, and it allowed me to experience them and learn from them in a different way. It may be arrogant, but I believe that someone in the top 5% academically experiences getting stoned a bit different than someone in the bottom 5%.

I will turn 30 soon, and I finally start to feel like I am getting somewhere. I have a job I like, I make enough money, my marriage is getting better all the time, and I think I will never be famous or rich or a genius. The somewhere I am getting to is having a quiet comfortable life.

What really helped me was hanging out with my dad and his friends for a summer. His friends range in age from the 20s to the 90s. Rich, poor, artists, businesspeople. There were 30 year old burned out ex rockstars, and a 70 year old trumpet player STARTING to live up to his potential.

Why the fuck worry? If you have food and drink, friends and some good loving, the rest is details.
posted by Dataphage at 5:57 AM on August 8, 2007

I went through this. Yeah, I was a child prodigy, taught myself to read before starting school, carried the weight of all those adult expectations...I let those go.

Then I married, had kids, turned out exceedingly ordinary.

Now, the kids are grown, and the third act is beginning. I feel that only NOW, after living life and gaining experiences, is my potential starting to bloom. I've already accomplished some of my goals, and others are starting to be reachable.

You might take some comfort from the biblical story of David. Or Joseph. Or Moses.

You ain't dead yet.
posted by konolia at 6:17 AM on August 8, 2007 [1 favorite has favorites]

How I dealt with this: I'm still an overachiever, but now my sense of achievement and accomplishment is geared towards outcomes entirely different than those set for me by others during my childhood. That was political activism for me, but it can be anything - being a good member of your church, a good volunteer, or a good partner, for instance.
I also gain a sense of satisfaction from following my sense of personal honour. A strong and/or rigid code of honour works best here.
posted by By The Grace of God at 6:26 AM on August 8, 2007

Do something. Do anything. Challenge yourself, even if you think you'll fail. No matter what, don't wait. No one is going to come waltzing in the door with something wonderful for you do to.

You can never eliminate the gap between what you are and what you could become. That's a good thing. You have potential. You have skills you don't realize you have because you've not had the chance to use them yet.

But it's all for naught if you assume you're washed up and stop trying. That you've taken the time to write this says you're not ready to stop. So ignore the internal voice that's telling you it's over. It's not.
posted by tommasz at 6:26 AM on August 8, 2007 [1 favorite has favorites]

I learned something in my late 30s. I'm not sure if it will help you, because in my latw 20s/early 30s, I would have said, "yeah yeah yeah..." if someone had told it to me. But...

It's never too late.

As-long-as you're alive and kicking, you can achieve greatness.* For instance, I would like to write a novel. I'm 41, and I haven't written it yet. But I first wanted to write it when I was in my teens. Maybe I won't write it until I'm 50. Or even 60. But whenever I write it, it will be an accomplishment.

I think, when you're young (even 30), ages like 40, 50, 60 and 70 seem so far away that they're unimaginable. So it seems imperative that you complete all your goals by the time you're 25 or 30, because the years after that seem like a big gray area. Like old age.

At 40, I can sense 50 and 60 -- the way I could sort of sense 30 when I was 25. And I can tell that when I AM 50 (or older), I'll feel just as much in-the-now as I do now. When I'm 50, I won't care about 20 or 30 or 40. I'll care about 50.

But what if, when I turn 50, I fall into a depression because I haven't written that novel. And my depression makes me feel like it's too lake. Now, say that it's in the cards for me to live to be 75. That's 35 years I'll waste, wallowing in depression, when I could be writing. 35 years -- from 50 to 75 -- is longer that you've been alive! And with the state of medicine today, there are good odds I'll live a decade or two past 75.

So I agree with everyone here that 30 is young. But so is 40. So is 50. So is 60. Those ages aren't young in the traditional sense, but they ARE young enough to accomplish stuff!

* about achieving greatness. If you're thinking about that, then you're thinking and not DOING. You won't care what you've accomplished if you're WORKING. If you're working HARD. You'll be too busy working to think about what you've accomplished. You'll be busy accomplishing.

I direct plays. I have a BIG list of plays I want to direct before I die. There's no way I'll make it through this list. It's too big and it keeps growing. If I sit around thinking about the fact that I might never get to direct "King Lear," I'll get depressed. But If I'm busy directing "Hamlet," I'm not going to be depressed because I'll be too busy.

My wife, an actress, gets depressed about the roles she can't play. She never got to play Juliet, and now she's too old for that part. So she'll go to her deathbed without getting to play that part. This DOES depress her when she's not working. But I didn't hear her complain about it once, last year, when she was playing Beatrice. She was too busy playing Beatrice to care about Juliet.

When you feel most depressed that you're not accomplishing, that's the time to get WORKING. And THAT'S why 50 and 60 and 70 are young. Because when you're 67, and you're knee-deep in chapter seven of your novel, you'll feel alive. You won't care than you wanted to write ten novels and this is only your first. You won't care that you never cured cancer. You're mind will be totally filled with the current paragraph on the current page. It's not about accomplishment; it's about accomplishing.
posted by grumblebee at 7:47 AM on August 8, 2007 [15 favorites has favorites]

High school-era accomplishments are so overrated. Really. If I had a nickel for everyone I went to school with who was going to be a doctor (but isn't)... Put the past into perspective.

I'd repeat this for emphasis. High school-era accomplishments are completely worthless. Every single one of the roughly thirty thousand high schools in the US produces a valedictorian, a 'top 2%' and a fresh new batch of inevitably wildly successful graduates every. single. year. The same applies to the 99th percentile and other statistics people eagerly trot out to validate themselves. But, as you're beginning to find out, all such numbers and scores and medals mean zilch in the long run. And frankly it's seriously pathetic for a 30 year old to still be harping about their twenty year old successes.

That stuff is ancient history. Long gone. Bury it. Let it die. Forget it. Move on. Stop letting it weigh you down and start focusing on the future. You're young, healthy, and I suspect there's very little you couldn't accomplish if you put your mind to it.

Did I even HAVE potential?

This is a pretty silly question. Everybody has 'potential.' It's difficult to imagine that there's anybody on the planet whose heart is still beating doesn't have some capacity for growth, improvement, and overcoming some obstacle to achieve success.

What you're really asking for is validation. If you're one of those poor souls who needs continual validation from others in order to esteem yourself and structure your life then, surprise, adulthood is going to be a bitch. Nobody is going to dote on you and encourage you at every turn like they did when you were a child. Everybody is far too consumed with their own problems and in all likelihood nobody seriously cares what you do with your life. The idea that people will be standing around in fifty years saying to themselves "What ever happened to anonymous? She had so much potential..." is ridiculous. Your feelings of guilt and fear that this will happen are similarly irrational. If you take a step back and ask yourself whether it really matters if everybody perceives you as a success and whether this is a healthy attitude you might begin to grasp the absurdity of such feelings and thus gain some measure of control over them.

As for disappointment in yourself, such disappointment can be a good thing and a powerful motivator. But only if you commit yourself to resisting such disappointment. If you surrender to your self-contempt then in thirty more years you will be crushed by your regret and disappointment. That is, you need not dismiss or ignore your feelings -- no matter how irrational -- but instead consider them as a signal, a red flag telling you to act. For all the people telling you thirty is young, you should take this advice with a grain of salt. Thirty isn't young. You don't have all the time in the world and yes, life really is over before you know it. So when you start receiving these sorts of warning signs it's important to act on them and start making every day, week, month, and year count. It is indeed a race but in the end the race is only with yourself.
posted by nixerman at 7:54 AM on August 8, 2007 [7 favorites has favorites]

First of all, thank you so much for asking this.

Secondly: Thirty isn't young. You don't have all the time in the world and yes, life really is over before you know it. So when you start receiving these sorts of warning signs it's important to act on them and start making every day, week, month, and year count.

In case you're like me and this kind of bootstraps talk encourages you to turn on the TV, crank up the AC, and settle down under the duvet with a two-pound bag of M&Ms, it may help to remember that all these years when the lack of measurable indicators of progress toward your highschool goal indicates you have been doing nothing, you have not in fact been doing nothing. Your focus shifted, and it was probably good that it did. What were you doing while your co-valedictorians were all out making names for themselves? Think about the non-career aspects of your life. People you love? Your physical/mental/fiscal health? Any measurable changes in these or other such realms? There you go: that's you growing to a healthy adult 30, as opposed to a freakish, crystallized adolescent 30, which is what you might be now if you'd kept your nose to the grindstone. Assume the diversion was essential to your well-being and that of your friends and family. Your worrying over your age is a sign not that you've done everything wrong and are too old and doomed to mediocrity but that you're ready for another change: your focus is shifting again.
posted by Don Pepino at 9:37 AM on August 8, 2007

The first thing you have to decide is what success means to you.

Do you want to be in some "top 2%" of something again? That would entail getting some high paying job somewhere or choosing a grad program or maybe mating & having a kid with the kind of grades you had... But if you go for that kind of success, you have to realize that that is a never ending maintenance problem. Just as having been in the top 2% of your high school class means nothing now, having been in the top 2% of something else now won't mean much in 5 years if you don't keep it up. That is a completely relative sort of success, and is only useful in keeping you in the game.

Or do you actually have specific personal goals of some kind? If you want to write a novel, or learn to play an instrument, or make a lot of money so you can retire to an island, or have a family so you can spend time with people you love, or become a kung-fu master, or whatever, then you have an actual goal to work toward where achievement is measurable and success might actually bring some level of happiness. I'm not saying you'll complete the one goal and never have another, but if you can redirect your understanding of success into a series of personal dreams and ambitions rather than external validations, you're far more likely to get somewhere satisfying.

Sit down and think about what you really want out of life, and then work out ways to get those things accomplished. Don't worry about what "could have been". We all get stuck in that loop but it is honestly the stupidest and most pointless time-waster ever. For some reason it's the loop most likely to hypnotize you in your late twenties, I found - I don't know why I was so mesmerized looking back when I was even younger than I am now. I'm in my early-mid 30s now and still see a lot of late 20s people stuck on it, and of course I understand, sure, couldashouldawoulda, but now I feel like, yeah fine, but anyway, let's move on, what's next? So if you can jump-start that attitude I really recommend it. Skip the self-indulgent "what went wrong" part 'cause it is a dumb waste of time.
posted by mdn at 10:43 AM on August 8, 2007 [3 favorites has favorites]

Stop spending time on AskMefi, and start thinking (independently) about what you can do to reach your potential. It's definitely not going to happen by having internet strangers heal your inner doubts.
posted by yevge at 9:40 PM on August 8, 2007