Op-Ed: I Refuse To Spend What's Left of My 20s Proving Myself
By Jessica Wise
“The work in your 20s is that self-mining work…It’s hard to do now because you’re so busy striving, right? You’re so busy just trying to prove that you’re not an imposter…Practice that work. Practice understanding your story, your history, your voice. That’s what’s happening in your stage in life, and if you’re really good at it, you’ll be doing it the rest of your life. You will constantly be evolving. You will constantly be becoming something more.”
As I come to the last two years of my 20s, the year of 27 has been some of the most significant inner work I have done in this decade of my life. 30 looms closer with every day, minute, and milestone, and I remember what my 20s were supposed to be all about – adventure, late nights, falling in and out of love, and finding my way. It’s also been a decade of having to work through life hardships, the things no one told us about our 20s – struggle, learning, failing, death, and losing more than just friends.
The year of 27 was a time for me to self-reflect, to figure out where I as an adult have contributed to my own suffering.
Well, after 30 hours (and counting) of therapy, three failed almost-relationships, and a return to performing onstage after the height of pandemic, I’ve come to this conclusion:
I’m done trying to prove myself, to anyone.
Like Mrs. Obama said, we spend so much of our twenties trying to prove we’re not imposters. And to be honest, I’m OVER it.
I’ve been working since I was 18, from waiting tables to selling Brazilian waxes to climbing corporate, picking up the balls my seemingly-knowledgeable bosses dropped and took no accountability for. I was abused in multiple workplaces for my enthusiasm, creativity, and just plain naivete by managers and bosses who convinced me I wasn’t getting further because I just wasn’t good enough. I didn’t show enough “effort” or “interest” in making another white man rich, even though the numbers showed I was a top performer. I lived in the world of online dating and even fooled myself into thinking I would get a better outcome by dating male “friends,” trying to show men through my actions and persona how good of a catch I was. This only got me used for my emotional labor, time, and loyalty until they were done with me and left me wondering what else I could have done, much like past workplaces that refused to promote me or even pay me a market average wage.
How was I missing the mark? Hadn’t I proven how valuable I was? Didn’t I deserve to have the same passion and advocacy reciprocated to me that I poured into everyone else?
It’s taken until 28 has come knocking for me to realize these jobs, bosses, dates, and even this magazine I’m still building were never the magic I placed on the pedestal in my mind.
The magic was and always has been ME.
I don’t have to stay an extra unpaid hour at my day job to prove I’m worthy of being treated well or paid better. At my current job, they don’t care about that. They care about teaching healthy work habits and balance. I’m worthy because I’m a human being, and while they consistently give me constructive feedback to make me better, they don’t hang my value solely on the work I produce. And they encourage me to do the same.
In career, family, romance, friendship, and even religion (God says, “Come as you are, right?”), the year of 27 taught me there is nothing else I need to do to “prove” who I am, what I can do, and what I deserve. My life and now over a decade of credentials can speak for themselves, from my public and private work for human rights to my education, from my love of animals to my 75+ publishing credits. If that doesn’t make them a believer, nothing will. My only obligation now is to keep being my authentic self. Why prove who I am when I just be who I am? I am the proof.
I have two years left in this decade of my life. I won’t waste any more time trying to prove to others what’s been inside of me all along. This is what I believe to be the self-mining work, the constant becoming Mrs. Obama was talking about. I thought I had a voice all along, but as I see 28 on the horizon, I realize I am just discovering it for the first time. I’m reclaiming what’s left of my 20s. You only live them once.
