I’ve spent the last 28 or so days celebrating my entry into my 5th decade (thanks, Aunt Jen for the correction!). I’ve had dinners, brunches, parties, nights out, spa treatments, and more (I took this turning-40-thing very seriously, as did my friends!). I jokingly (and maybe hopefully) used #40isthenew25 as a hashtag for some of the events.
Obviously that’s a huge exaggeration. But this milestone has prompted a lot of reflection, as milestones often do.
The morning after my birthday, I realized that the dreaded day had passed and the world didn’t seem to notice, or more importantly, mind.
Then recently, I was reminded of the story of the Israelites being set free from slavery in Egypt, along with the adage about people wanting to “return to Egypt” as the Israelites did. I mean, yeah, their circumstances at the time weren’t ideal, but they wanted to go back to being slaves. Crazy, right?
For many of us, I think age can be like this.
We talk about wishing we were 25 (or 35) but we don’t think about the ramifications of going back to the proverbial Egypt: a time when most of us lived paycheck to paycheck, if we were lucky enough to have a paycheck; a season where we were still discovering who we were and who we wanted to be; an era where we were still unlearning the pride of our teenage years and realizing how truly little we knew about the world.
For me, there is always going to be a nostalgia about my pre-four-knee-surgeries-days when my body was fit and I played sports 4 days a week. But that’s the only part of Egypt I’ll ever miss. Because since then, the self-discovery and relative emotional intelligence (ok, I said relative!) I’ve gained can’t be underestimated. The learning, travel and experiences aren’t things I would trade for that younger body. And I don’t even know how to put a value on the friendships that have been forged and/or strengthened in the past two decades.
As part of my recent reflecting, I have been asking myself this simple question: do I want to be younger but without the wisdom and people I have now?
For me, the answer is a resounding, “No!”
So, maybe 40 isn’t the new 25. But maybe that’s actually a good thing.