The twenties for a woman can be very rough. Look at me; I’m still in my twenties and it has definitely taken the grace of God to be who I am right now as I write this post. I have a story to tell, but today is not that day.
The struggles in my twenties
However, I will tell you that it has taken a lot of strength and prayers to face all the challenges my late twenties are shoving in my face and my early twenties threw in my way. There have been moments where I had given up, lost confidence, prayed less, felt incompetent, and put everything going on in my life to a halt.
I couldn’t keep going any longer but life kept going on. I resorted to watching movies a lot, burying all my worries in movies just to kill time. Procrastination took over the strength in my bones, and I couldn’t do anything productive anymore.
I had plans for the future but they were just staring in my face, waiting patiently to be pursued like a naïve young girl who would do anything to catch the attention of her crush.
Hopefully, I got over it. It just happened! There was no way I wanted to go on living like that. My potential needed to bloom in its glory. The future was clear; I knew who I wanted to be, but even more so, I needed to put in the hard work to be who I wanted to be.
I wouldn’t say the newfound spirit of mine didn’t meet any obstructions. On the contrary, I encountered many things that should have dispirited me. But with earnest prayers and perseverance, I pulled through. I’m still pulling through.
If there is anything I learned from my situation, I would say that giving up takes a lot of effort (just that you don’t see it as you should) as much as persevering does.
The most crucial stage in a person’s life
Now, let me just say- the twenties are the most crucial stage in a person’s life because that’s the stage you have to make major decisions in your life that will drive the rest of your years on earth.
You will have to make decisions like ‘Which career path is best for me? Is this relationship the right one for me? How can I make money for myself? How do I stay healthy?
It’s important to remember that every woman on this earth will definitely be faced with a decision to make but it might not be exactly like yours. For example, a 25-year-old married woman will be faced with deciding whether to end her two-month-old marriage or not. One lady will be anxious to marry, whilst another will be deciding to quit her job for a better one.
Someone will be graduating, and another lady will be thinking of entering into the university. A neighbor next door will be battling a life-threatening disease, a university graduate will be looking for a job and finally, a 22-year-old girl will have enough money and be thinking of buying a house.
The decisions may not be the same but it doesn’t mean there aren’t other women facing similar decisions every day. Regardless of the situation, there are four things every woman in her twenties must do.
4 things every woman in her twenties must do
- Don’t be afraid to buck society’s norms for young people. Society has its expectations from young women in their twenties to have a certain lifestyle, make certain choices, and achieve certain things, but it doesn’t mean you must be in that category.
If you decide to let the pressure of society get to you, you will end up making unwise decisions that can end up having lifelong consequences. Such as engaging in meaningless sex, clubbing hard (drinking plenty of alcohol, smoking shisha), doing drugs, not going to church, not believing in God, giving up on your dreams, etc.
Instead, sit down and plan how you want your life to be in the next few years, ponder on who you want to be and how you can become that person then, in your own pace- at your own time and in your own capacity- work towards becoming that person.
Ignore what people have to say about what you are doing or the state you are in. Focus on God and reflect on what he alone has to say about who you are and what you can do.
- Seek wise counsel as much as you can get. Don’t just seek any counsel but seek wise counsel from people you trust. People who fear the lord. Seek council from the women who are ahead of you, and who are living the life you aspire to be. How did they get there?
What are the efforts and sacrifices they made? Make sure these women’s lives exhibit the fear of the lord. Whether you’re single or married, you have to seek the counsel of godly older women the bible talks about in Titus 2:3-5.
- Seek God’s advice through his word. It’s important to understand that the journey of life gets tougher and tougher as you move ahead. And the only way you can find comfort or motivation to strive forward is to open the bible and allow God’s word to guide you.
When you’re faced with difficult decisions, look into God’s word and find out what his word says about your situation. Nothing is new under the sun, and it might be surprising to find out that all solutions come from God and his word. Sometimes it’s not as vivid in the bible.
It’s not just a bible verse- it could be in an entire story in the bible. Other times you need to meditate on his word and pray and everything will come to you.
- Exercise patience but be zealous. Trust me! I have fought with myself a lot to be as patient as I am today. I won’t lie, my patience now still is a work in progress but I do remind myself of the benefit in being patient and zealous about the outcome of my patience.
Be patient that whatever storm that has carried you above level ground will whirl you into your safe haven. What I mean to say is that whatever problems you’re facing right now will end very soon. In fact, that problem is shaping you and preparing to push you into your desired final destination.
You just have to learn the art of being patient. Train yourself to trust in God’s word, trust the process, put in the ‘hard work,’ and wait for everything to work out as God has promised you. Don’t let the progress and success of others push you to make hasty choices or follow a wrong path. Just be in your own race.
If there’s anything you should focus on right now, it’s doing these four things in your twenties and seeing the great success that awaits you. While you’re working on these tasks, share some of the challenges or interesting experiences you have faced in your twenties, and how you are overcoming them.
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