Friday open thread: advice to your younger self

[dolorosa_12]

I think I've finally managed to get on top of all the comments I've received on various posts (and I have to say, having so much activity on Dreamwidth that I'm on the verge of being overwhelmed by comments is a nice problem to have), just in time for this week's open thread.

Today's question comes from likeadeuce: give a piece of advice to your younger self.



It's a bit of a cliché, but I truly wish I'd been able to tell my younger self not to fixate so much on what people thought of her, or to at least have a sense of perspective about it. I wish I had been able to make myself understand that every single other teenager in my life at the time was as self-absorbed as I was, and that they were completely oblivious to all the things I felt they were noticing and judging me for. Sadly, I fear that teenage!me would not have believed this advice, and I'm sure I got it from the adults in my life at the time, and didn't believe them. It didn't help that as well as being very self-absorbed, I was a hyper vigilant and hyperaware teeanger who did observe the people around her (and definitely judged them), and just assumed everyone was the same.

So I wish I had been able to give myself that advice, but I'm dubious as to whether it would have been effective. Learning that for the most part people are too wrapped up in their own selves to notice all the things you're embarrassed and fearful about is just one of those lessons that you have to learn the hard way.

What are your answers?

Comments

[bruttimabuoni]

Oh... weirdly, my first thought was "You do, in fact, like men. Stop stressing."

Which is a very un-2020, un-ally thought to have. But I wasted so much of the late 80s/90s, homophobic/Section 28-ish years wondering why I didn't respond to boys the way my friends do. (The answer is: they were immature assholes, like I thought. I like grown ups.)

I guess the version of it I'd prefer to have thought is "You do in fact like men and women, and both those things are okay. But know that you're really picky, and stop stressing about wny you don't pinball between crushes like other people do. The spectrum of healthy, normal, positive and happy is so much broader than you know yet." Let's pretend it came out that way first time.

Oh, and: get a real summer job when you're 16. I know you have a handy in with your mum's firm for summer cash but that's not a real job. Do the boring hard customer service stuff when it doesn't matter; it will prepare you so much better for the rest of your life.

[dolorosa_12]

Those are definitely good pieces of advice, and regarding your first one, I would probably give teenage!me a version of that advice as well.

I had a weekend job since I was fifteen, and in fact the only time in my life that I haven't had a job since was the nine months when I was doing my MPhil and my visa prevented me from working. When I was growing up in Australia in the 1990s and early 2000s, the legal age when people could start working was fourteen and nine months, and in Canberra, where I grew up, it was considered kind of shameful — even in the upper middle class milieu that I came from — not to have a weekend job by the time you were fifteen or sixteen, like you were childishly relying on your parents for money. My first job was in an organic/health food shop, and after that I worked in a Swiss bakery/chocolate shop for the next two years. Most of my friends worked in cafes, restaurants, supermarkets, fast food outlets, or doing tutoring via agencies.

I definitely agree with you that doing this kind of work is a really good thing to do, especially at a young age. It increases your confidence and resilience (dealing with vindictive, ignorant, or just plain obnoxious customers isn't pleasant, but it is instructive), and I also feel that having a consistent employment history, and people who can provide references for you when you're attempting to get your first 'real' job is just really useful from a practical perspective. It wasn't really until I came to Cambridge that I met people who were in their mid-twenties who hadn't had any paid employment (and even in that context they weren't the norm), and I always felt a bit worried about them, especially since many were graduating into a recession.