Why "The Wrong Side of 30" Is The Wrong Idiom To Internalise
It's thrown out light-heartedly, but offers a glimpse into a society that struggles to accept the ageing process
Everywhere you look, society sweeps the ageing process under the carpet.
In the decades-long war against Father Time, being an arms dealer has never been more lucrative:
The $60bn global anti-ageing industry is set to double by 2030, covering everything from my daily moisturiser to Botox for 13-year-old girls.
It’s eyebrow-raising stuff (or not, if Botox has removed that function from your facial toolbox).
And, like the skin of the cosmetic surgery addict who yearns to become more Snapchat filter than human being, the issue has several layers.
“The Wrong Side of 30”
I’ve rarely thought about the idiom “on the wrong side of 30”.
It’s thrown away as a self-deprecating jokette, but as I approach another arbitrary age milestone it’s hard not to see it as another aspect of the war against ageing, sprinkled with some reluctance to accept reality.
Beyond the obvious reference to the discomfort of getting older, it hints there’s a pinnacle of existence. And for some reason, despite the chaos we face in becoming adults, it’s supposed to be located in some mystery part of our 20s.
But today, let’s briefly explore why this idea puts us on the back foot:
Why People Say It
First, the obvious:
Getting older sucks
“No one wants to get old. No one wants to die, but we do! So we bullshit ourselves. I started bullshitting myself when I got to my forties. As soon as I got into my forties I'd look in the mirror and I'd say, "well, I...I guess I'm getting...older." Older sounds a little better than old doesn't it? Sounds like it might even last a little longer. Bullshit, I'm getting old! And it's okay, because thanks to our fear of death in this country, I won't have to die...I'll pass away. Or I'll expire like a magazine subscription.” - George Carlin
Technically, every second you’re alive brings you closer to death. Despite its neutrality, you probably won’t thank me for writing it.
Good news, though! You can flip the script:
Every passing second brings you more of the gift of life.
As the old adage goes, “Youth is wasted on the young”, and part of its wisdom lies in our mental ability to accept our finitude.
From the age of between 5 and 7, we gradually develop an awareness of our own mortality, but it’s rarely framed as a way of building deeper appreciation for life today. In part, it’s what makes Stoicism such an attractive philosophy:
It’s said (perhaps apocryphally) that in Ancient Rome, a victorious general would be accompanied by a slave during his parade through the streets. As the general lapped up the praise from the crowds, the slave’s job was to keep his ego from ballooning.
The slave would supposedly whisper into his ear:
“Memento mori.”
Remember you will die.
It’s easier to pack your 20s with fun and adventure
Unless you abandon society altogether, living in a cardboard box in the woods like a reincarnation of Diogenes, it’s hard to avoid the escalating responsibility of life.
For most people in my societal echo chamber (Western, educated, middle-class), one’s 30s bring accelerated responsibilities across the board:
Marriage, job responsibility, children, ageing parents, personal health concerns (my neck is about 95% muscle knot, for example…)
The list goes on and you can feel totally underprepared for what life will throw at you next. And we have to accept some degree of unpredictability.
All of it can hit you like a whirlwind of stress and bad luck in one year, or gradually. Time erodes and it steals your capacity for personal investment.
So, by comparison, when we look ahead it can seem as though we’re permanently closing chapters of endless enjoyment and easy living in our 20s. But, when you look back on all the nights out, ramen restaurants, or one-night stands, how many of them occupy spots in your pantheon of prized memories?
So it’s more worthwhile to ask yourself what fun, adventure, and happiness really mean.
Is short-term enjoyment the same as finding meaning? Is hedonism the path to deeper fulfilment?
But as every generation is told and discovers for itself, long-term relationships and caring for children expand life’s horizons beyond yourself. And that’s where deeper fulfilment tends to be hiding in plain sight.
(Interestingly, a recent survey showed that South Korea was rare in valuing material well-being as the most important factor for living a fulfilling life. For 14 of the remaining 16 advanced economies, family was #1 and occupation was commonly #2)
Taking parenting as an example, a 2020 study involving 16,000 people showed parents reported significantly more happiness and meaning, but also more stress and fatigue.
Is it a worthy trade-off?
You’ll have to ask someone who’s been there.
“The struggle itself towards the heights is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy.”
― Albert Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus and Other Essays
There’s societal pressure to “settle down”
Particularly in the UK, I’ve found people’s desire to “get on the property ladder” as quickly as possible can be inflated to the point of religious doctrine.
Of course, deciding whether to rent or buy is complicated. But it’s open to the same flavour of cultural dogma that drives some people to rush into marriage to keep pace with their friends.
Is it really a great trade to move an hour’s drive away from your friends and a buzzing neighbourhood, just to say you own a percentage of a house and can spend time in its garden?
When I trade stories with my almost-50-year-old dad and his friends, their core envy is I’m still in the stage of living in a popular area with one of my closest friends.
That I’m still renting because I can’t afford to buy in my postcode isn’t seen as a dampener.
If you’ll likely spend your late 30s and beyond living with family, the rush to tick off the marriage / baby / house triumvirate before turning 30 can seem less like personal goalsetting and more like social contagion.
Each to their own, but how many of us would be willing to consider (let alone openly discuss) their honest answer to two questions:
How much am I being swayed by what other couples around me are doing, and then rationalising my decisions as independent choice?
How much of my decision to settle down (taking into account my current knowledge of my biological clock and fertility rate) is driven by unacknowledged anxiety around ageing?
Why It’s Unhelpful
Above all else, our 20s tend to be spiritually chaotic.
We’re all figuring out:
Our ever-shifting personal identity
How we’d like to spend our time
How to successfully transition from child to adult
Entering the world of work isn’t easy, especially if, like me, you have a short fuse for being patronised.
It’s easy to forget the chaos and existential angst once we’ve emerged from the other side, especially if our minds are tinged with nostalgia at the time of asking.
Second, 30 is an arbitrary milestone. There’s no magical 30s demon who twists your nipples and forces you to give up everything you found enjoyable and meaningful a few years ago.
Aside from some easy examples (my days of attending fresher’s weeks are a long distance in the past, logically and emotionally), you have plenty of opportunities for freedom and exploration.
You likely have greater resources at your disposal, depending on how financially stable you’ve been up to this point.
It might take more planning, and you may have to decline more invites than you accept, but that’s always been the case.
You probably just weren’t as intentional with your time when you were 21.
Third, this kind of rejection of ageing undervalues experience:
More life experience means you’re more equipped to identify negative people and less likely to spend unnecessary time with them.
As long as you’ve taken the time to develop sound judgement:
You’re more able to screen for poor character traits. When you’ve considered your personal values for a while, you’ll notice more obviously when other people haven’t done that work.
You’re more forthright with your opinions. Being polarising helps you filter out people you have little in common with. This also helps filter out boring ideologues who can’t handle healthy disagreement.
You're in a much stronger position to confidently cut to the chase. To have the challenging conversations on date 2 instead of some vague, emotionally driven boiling point when you can't take the ambiguity of the situationship any more.
You understand there are always new friends, hobbies, partners, or jobs out there. You’re able to see the bigger picture and differentiate between short-term pleasure and long-term fulfilment. This helps you repeatedly say no to the kinda-good, freeing up valuable time for the potentially excellent.
Moving Forward
So what might life look like if we spent less time indulging defeatist mindsets against the neutrality of ageing?
To peer into the past with fragmented memories and nostalgic yearning takes up mental space that could help you live with presence, or consider what you’d like to do going forward.
You’re not set in stone.
So whether you’re about to turn 30, 40, 52, or 67, the truth remains:
By progressing through life you’re more able to be you.
Your 20s have been a series of stepping stones. Some firm, some wobbly.
But they’ve led you precisely to where you are now. Borrowing from one of my favourite writers, Tim Urban, we spend too much time thinking about what might have been, rather than what could be.
So instead of looking back over your shoulder, asking if times will ever be the same, ask yourself:
What will I do now?
Love this Alex. Getting older is a fantastic journey that not as scary as most make it out to be. A lot of preparation goes into it, especially with finances and health, but we should also be getting our suitcase packed with wisdom.