Feeling Lost in Your 20s? You Need to Hear This

Hey, it's your friend Mel, and welcome to the Mel Robbins Podcast. Let me guess. You were told that your 20s were going to be the best decade of your life. Like you'd have the dream body, your dream job, live in a dream apartment. You'd be going out every night with your friends. You'd have this amazing love life. You'd find your person, get married in your dream wedding. That would be your 20s. Eh, curiosity. Your job feels pointless if you even have one. You're getting ghosted again. Your friends are gone. That new city doesn't feel like home and you're lying in bed wondering if you're the only one in your 20s crying on a Tuesday night. Well, your friend Mel is here to tell you, you're not. I get it. In your 20s, you don't know what you want to do with your life. Neither did I. And if you're like me, you're just trying to figure out how to pay rent and not hate yourself in the process. See, here's the problem. The problem is that social media makes it seem like everyone else is thriving. They're hitting these milestones, launching influencer accounts, falling in love, buying houses, chasing their dreams, traveling 24-7, eating at all the best restaurants. That's a fantasy. Today, you and I are gonna talk reality. The reality is the 20s are the hardest decade of your life. And so if you're confused, lonely, uncertain, it doesn't mean that you're doing anything wrong. In fact, it just means you're in your 20s. Everyone feels lost, regardless of what they're posting online or what they're communicating in the group chat. Let me prove it to you. I have 10 million people who follow me on Instagram and I ask them, hey, if you're in your 20s, are you struggling? And if so, what are you struggling with the most? Holy cow. It was the same themes and questions over and over and over again in every single response. You said, how do I end the relationship, move to a new city and start all over on my own? How do I know what to prioritize in my life, my job, dating, my friends, having fun? Will I ever find my person? How do I know when to change paths versus when to stick it out? Am I just lazy? I've hated my job for as long as I've had it, but I'm scared to look for another one. Does it ever get better? Is it our generation? Or were the 20s like this for you too, Mel? I heard this over and over and over as I poured over every single one of your responses. You're terrified of falling behind. You're obsessed with making the right decision, which is why you can't make any decisions. You're scared you're never gonna figure out what you're meant to do or who you're meant to be. And most of all, you feel like you're the only person in your 20s who feels this way. You're not. And this episode is dedicated to you and everyone in your life who is in their 20s. Today, I'm gonna give you the three truths about your 20s that are gonna set you free and give you the tools and mindset that you need to make your 20s better than you could have ever imagined. You can and you will make this decade a whole lot easier. And after today's conversation, you'll know exactly what you need to do. Hey, it's your friend Mel, And welcome to the Mel Robbins Podcast. First of all, I am so excited you're here. I've been wanting to have a conversation with you for a while about navigating the decade that is your 20s, and today we're doing it. It is always such an honor to spend time together. And if you're new to the podcast, I just wanted to take a moment and personally welcome you to the Mel Robbins Podcast family. I am glad that you are here and you have picked a winner of a conversation to listen to or watch. because you made the time to listen to this particular episode, here's what I know about you. I know you're somebody who values your time. And I also know that you're looking for ways to make the most out of your life. And you're also looking for ways to support people in your life in doing the same. And if you're here right now because somebody shared this with you, I wanna point out something really cool. First of all, you got people in your life that care about you. That is not something to take for granted. And so thank you for hitting play. And secondly, if you're here right now because they shared it with you, it probably means one of two things. You're either in your 20s right now, so you're definitely in the right place. There is nothing more important that you could spend your time listening to or watching right now, or you're here because you have somebody in your life who is in their 20s. Again, you're in the right place. And what you're going to hear today is really going to help you understand what the 20-year-olds in your life are facing, because it is way different from what you and I were facing when we were in our 20s. And maybe your 20-something is the person who sent this to you, because there's a lot of us parents and aunts and uncles and grandparents and older siblings who need a wake-up call about how different life is right now for anyone who is in their 20s. And we need to show up differently to support the people that we care about in navigating this extremely challenging decade. So thank you for being here. Thank you for sharing this with people that you care about, and thank you for hitting play, because this is a really important conversation for you and I to be having. I have so much I want to share with you that's really going to help you. And so let me start with a fact that I need to say loud and clear. Feeling lost in your 20s is normal. I must say it again, feeling lost in your 20s is normal. And you might be lost in your career or financially, or you feel lost because you haven't found your person, or maybe you feel lost because your friend group has just disappeared, or maybe you feel lost because you don't even know what to do next or what to focus on, or it doesn't feel like you thought it was going to feel, or you thought you would have moved out of your parents' house by now. Or maybe you feel lost because you feel every single one of those things that I'm describing. So let me share some good news. By the time you're done listening or watching today, you're going to feel better. You're going to understand the very unique challenges that happen in your 20s at this exact moment in history, and that's going to help you navigate this decade better. And I'm also going to teach you how to take the pressure off yourself. You're going to learn how to be more decisive and how to start making the decisions that you need to make to move your life in a new direction. And if you're listening because you have somebody in your 20s, you're also going to hear some advice about how to show up differently and be more effective in trying to support people. The goal today is to teach you how to improve your life starting today in a way that's not going to cost you any money. I'm so excited to share all this with you. And don't worry, we are going to cover specific advice on career and dating and friendship and how to make the right decisions in your 20s because I have thousands of questions from listeners just like you. So let me give you some context first, okay? Before we jump into the advice, I always love to have the context for why something might be a problem. Why exactly are your 20s so challenging? There is a framework that I'm going to show you that has three parts to it. that you experience in your 20s. And this framework is operating in the background. And once you see these three things, you're gonna realize why you feel lost. And you're gonna also realize that it's a reflection of what you're dealing with. It's not a reflection on you personally. Because your 20s are not just about cool outfits and going out and having a dream job and finding the love of your life and documenting it all on social media. Your 20s are, in fact, a really challenging decade. I wanna hit you with some research. There is this research from the Harvard Study of Adult Development. This is the longest running study on human happiness. It's been going on for over 80 years. And it has shown conclusively that your 20s are one of the most uncertain and anxious decades of your entire life. Okay, so if you're feeling those things, the research bears out that that is basically a normal thing to feel in your 20s and a lot of people feel it. And the reason why your 20s are one of the most uncertain and anxious decades of your life comes down to these three major changes that happen in your 20s that no one sees coming, no one is talking about it. And if you don't know about these three things, these three major changes that are happening, you're always gonna feel lost and you will always blame yourself. And it's not your fault that your 20s are bumpy. The reason that your 20s are so challenging and bumpy and turbulent is because of these three changes and we're gonna talk about them one by one right now, okay? So change number one, the great scattering. This is the first reason why everyone feels lost in their 20s. It's something that I call the great scattering. Now, this is a term that I've created to describe a phenomenon that happens to every human being in their 20s. And I first wrote about this phenomenon in the Let Them Theory book that I co-authored with my 26-year-old daughter, Sawyer. And I want to read to you from page 158 of the Let Them Theory book, where I first wrote about this theory I have called the great scattering. Here we go. When you were little, you and your friends and your classmates felt like a team. You were moving through life at the exact same pace and in the exact same place from kindergarten to high school. You and your friends had the same daily routine. You rode the same buses, you read the same books, and you learned the same subjects in school. You saw everyone your age all the time, in class, in halls, on the sports fields in your neighborhood. You had the same milestones from birthdays to graduations. You had the same vacation schedule. You participated in the same clubs, activities, sports, and classes, which made you subconsciously feel like you were moving through life with a big group of people and you were a part of it, right? So for the first 20 years of your life, the school system, Sports teams, college dormitories, fraternities, sororities, the school calendar, extracurricular activities, birthdays, made it so easy for you to be around people your age going through very similar experiences at the exact same time. And then, boom, you enter your 20s and into a phase of life that I call the great scattering. Here's what the great scattering looks like. High school or college ends and all of your friends scatter in different directions Suddenly everyone is living in different places and very soon all your friends are on different timelines working different jobs Hanging out with different people achieving milestones at different paces and the structure That was the foundation of your life and how you measured where you stood disappears This is why in your 20s, you feel a tremendous loss of control about every aspect of your life because there's no longer a track, a template, a timeline, or milestones for what to do next or when you're supposed to achieve it. It's all up to you. In other words, in your 20s, your adult life begins. and for the first time in your life, you're officially on your own. There is no timeline. There is no group activity. There is no measuring yourself to other people. It is entirely up to you to choose how you want to spend your time, where you want to work, what city you want to live in, and who you're going to hang out with and when you're going to do it. And that's when the loneliness hits. That's when adult life gets hard and nobody sees it coming. See, the great scattering, this fact that after college and high school, everybody scatters and the timelines that you used to measure yourself by, how you knew if you were keeping up or not, how you knew if you were on track, it's gone. Your friends are no longer there. The group chats get quieter and quieter. You suddenly find yourself alone on a Friday and Saturday night with no idea what to do and no one to do things with. It's harder to meet people to date because you don't have friends to introduce you and you don't have classes or parties or clubs to go to. And for the first time in your life, when you hit your 20s, you might feel totally and completely alone. And now let me hit you with some other research. 60% of 20-year-olds here in the United States are back living in their hometown. So it might've felt like you went away, but now you're back and you never left. And on top of that, here's what's different. about being in your 20s today than it was for me. Hybrid work. Hybrid work has made it so confusing because it's challenging to create close work relationships with people that you don't see in person. And so what does that mean? It means the social life that somebody my age had in their 20s because I would go into work. I was also going out after work with my colleagues. Well, that doesn't exist for you. And all of this can create so much confusion because for the first time, you may be feeling completely lost and wondering, where are my friends? Am I on the right path? Am I in the right place? Am I on the right timeline? Am I falling behind? Should I have found my person by now? Should I know what I should be doing for a living now? Should I quit my job? Should I be doing that thing that that person's doing? And you wrote in again and again and again talking about this. I feel like all my friends are doing amazing things and I feel like I'm alone in my childhood bedroom. Here's another one. I thought I'd have my life figured out by now. I feel like I'm still 23, but I'm turning 27 in two months. Or this one, I'm 29 and recently single. I feel like I'm so behind in life and not where I thought I would be at 28. SOS. Let me explain why you feel lost. That gauge that you used to measure yourself by disappeared with the great scattering And see I put a name to this phenomenon by calling it the great scattering And I think it important to label what is happening Because when you can say to yourself hold on a second, I'm not behind. I'm just in the great scattering. It allows you to just go, oh, it's not just me. And it's so important for you to label this and to call it by name, because here's the other thing. You experience the great scattering in your 20s for the first time. And there's a really important purpose that you lean into the reality of the great scattering. See, you're learning a new skill that you're gonna need for the rest of your life, which is this. How do you make new friends when your friends scatter? How do you figure out what's important to you when everybody's doing all kinds of different things that are important to them? How do you personally measure success and fulfillment for yourself, not based on what everyone else is doing, but based on what's important to you when you're doing it. I wanna read one more section from the Let Them Theory book about the great scattering to you, this is on page 161. The great scattering happens to all of us and it can be incredibly confusing and disorienting. Hear this, now and forever onward, it's up to you to change the way you think about life and how you measure success as an adult. Because the great scattering happens in your 20s, but versions of this will continue to happen over and over as you age. When your single friends get married, they scatter. When your friends start having kids, they scatter. When people move out of the city and into the suburbs, they scatter. When people become empty nesters or get divorced, they scatter. When you change jobs or go to graduate school, people scatter. When you get older like me and you become an empty nester or you get divorced, guess what? People are gonna scatter again. When people get older or downsize or retire or go through a loss, they scatter again. This great scattering, this shuffling of timelines and people coming in and out of your life, it's gonna happen again and again and again. This is normal. And this is why you need to understand that from this point forward, you're gonna measure happiness and success, not based on when other people are achieving things, but based on what you're doing now and on the timeline that you're on. So it's easy for me to read from the let them theory, but you're the one that's gonna have to interrupt this and teach yourself to look at your life differently. Because when your friend gets engaged, if you're still single, you're gonna say to yourself, uh-oh, I'm behind. If your friend gets a promotion and you're not sure what to do with your life, you're gonna say I'm behind. And a great thing that I want you to say to yourself instead that will help you get out of this default way of constantly comparing yourself to this timeline that no longer exists is to say, all right, my friend's engaged, my friend got a promotion, my friend just moved to my dream city. Here's what I'm gonna say to myself. It's not that I'm behind. I'm on my own timeline and it hasn't happened yet because it's not supposed to happen yet. Got it? I'm on my own timeline. I'm not behind and it hasn't happened yet because it's not meant to happen yet. Doesn't that make you just kind of, okay, got it. Great scattering. There's no timeline. I'm on my own timeline. And the things that I want that my friends are getting, that's great for them. And if it hasn't happened yet for me, that doesn't mean it's not going to. It just means it hasn't happened yet. Doesn't it just feel better saying it that way? Of course it does. And you know what else is going to feel better when you share this episode with 20-somethings in your life, or if you're listening and you're in your 20s, share it with your parents so your friend Mel Robbins can help your parents be better at supporting you and understanding where you're at. And don't go anywhere because there are two other big changes that happen in your 20s that I want to reveal to you. And we're going to do that after this short break. So stay with me. We'll be right back. Welcome back. It's your buddy Mel Robbins. Today, we're talking about what to do if you're feeling lost in your 20s. And we've already covered the first of three big changes that happen in your 20s that nobody sees, people are not talking about. That's why we're talking about them here on the Mel Robbins podcast. Now let's talk about the second thing that happens in your 20s that nobody is talking about and you need to be aware of, and that is there's so much possibility you're paralyzed by it. The fact is you have so many choices of what you could do with your life and more importantly, they're all thrown in your face all day long on social media. This is something that came up over and over and over again in all of the responses that you sent in. Questions like, what is it that I want to do with my life? I feel like I want to do so much, but I don't know how to pick. How should I know what I really want to do with my life when there are so many options? It costs a lot of money to do all the things you dream of achieving in your 20s. How do I prioritize? I don't know what to prioritize. I really struggle with the balance of wanting to have fun, but also trying to build a career. What's interesting is that my 20s were not like that. And for those of you that are not in your 20s now, but you're a little bit older, your 20s weren't like this either. I mean, I didn't have a clue what anyone else was doing. I didn't know what people's jobs were. There was no LinkedIn or Instagram or TikTok or Facebook or YouTube. All I knew when I was in my 20s, I was broke. I was in a new city and I needed money. So what did I do? I wasn't watching what my friends were doing because I had no way to watch what they were doing. I signed up for a temp agency. My first job, my first job was so bad. You know what I did for my first job in my 20s? You want to talk about lost? I would go every day into this law firm and I sat in a windowless conference room with a bunch of other 20-somethings that were working a temp job. And for a year, I would hand stamp with these other 20-somethings who also hated their job as much as I did, who also felt lost. This is what it sounded like all day. As we would hand stamp one paper after another, we would sit in there for 12 hours a day stamping papers that were part of some big class action lawsuit. We would talk about how much we hated our lives, how stuck we felt until about 7 p.m. Because if we stayed that late, the law firm would buy us dinner and none of us were making money. So we needed, you know, the dinner and it was one less thing that we had to pay for. And here's the thing. I was miserable, but I didn't know anyone who was doing anything different. I didn't have thousands of people broadcasting their amazing lives in my face. I didn't know that there were people traveling. I didn't know the expensive clothes they were buying. I didn't know the dream careers they were building or the amazing relationships that they had or the products they were putting on their face, all I had was the life I was in. The choice was either this or that. Just keep doing the same thing or do something different. And so I really want to validate this. And I feel bad for you. I mean, social media is amazing in so many ways, but one of the ways that it's making your 20s miserable is that it is revealing this infinite number of choices. Should I focus on my career? or should I quit my job and go backpacking in another country? Oh, I don't have any money to do that, but I'm still thinking about it. Should I live it up while being single or should I settle down and look for my longtime partner? Should I go home more and see my parents or should I be present here with my friends in the city? Should I be going out every night and having fun with my friends or should I be staying up every night and focusing on my health or should I be getting up early and getting to the gym or should I be working on a business plan or a way to make money online? Should I start posting a day in the life videos or writing a book? I mean, the options feel endless because they are endless. And I want you to imagine something. Imagine if you were to walk into a grocery store and all you had to do was buy some milk and the entire grocery store is just all milk. There are 10,000 brands of milk and some are displayed this way and some are displayed that way and some are cool and some are shelf stable. What one do you choose? How do you know? I mean, it's all right there in front of your face, all these different options. And what ends up happening when you have 10,000 things to choose from? Oh, you just buy the one milk brand that you always buy. Because trying to make a decision when it seems like there's a million options is so overwhelming that your brain always defaults to what you know. And this isn't just sort of a common sense thing. There's really powerful research here that is gonna validate why you feel paralyzed and lost and overwhelmed in your 20s. See, there was this very famous study about making decisions and what happens when you're offered too many choices. And this study was done by researchers at Columbia and Stanford, and they discovered this concept called the paradox of choice. And here's how the experiment went. In a grocery store, you know how they give you samples and they want you to try to buy something? Well, imagine, here's what the researchers did. They were going to give customers samples of jam. and then they were going to measure based on how many different samples the researchers gave the customers, how many people ended up buying jam. In one table, they had six jams. And when shoppers were presented with six jams that you could taste, 30% of the people bought a jar of jam. Now check this out. They then put out a table with 24 jars of jams. And you would think if there were more things you could sample be more likely you would buy something, right? Wrong. 3% of people bought jam when they were offered 24 different types of jam. People were 10 times more likely to purchase jam when the number of jams was 6, not 24. Now I want you to zoom out and think about your life. This afternoon alone, based on what's going on on social media, there's literally more than 24 options of how you could spend your time, which based on the research means you're not going to do anything. See, the more choices you think you have, the harder it is for you to make a decision. This is what's called the paradox of choice. This is why it's so hard for your brain to make a decision because you're the very first generation that has had your brain programmed to believe there's always something better, that there's a bazillion different choices. I don't need one jam, there's 24 things. There's a better partner, a better job, a better place to live, a better body. And you see 10,000 examples every single day of people living this better life. I mean, look at the dating apps. There's 500 people you could match with in literally the next two minutes at your fingertips. Look at LinkedIn. There's 5,000 job options available to you. Look at your Instagram feed. There are 100 countries that you could be flying to today, and they're all in your feed. This is so important to normalize, this sense of paralysis and overwhelm that you feel. There's nothing wrong with you. Your brain is struggling with the paradox of choice. I want you to hear me loud and clear and start saying that the fact that you feel paralyzed and overwhelmed in your 20s by all of the options, it means you're mentally well. The research is clear. when there's too many options, you choose nothing. And I'm so glad we're talking about this because if you're listening and you're a parent or a grandparent or the sibling of a 20-something and they're really like paralyzed or overwhelmed or struggling and you've been sitting there judging them and thinking, oh, God, can't they just get it together? I mean, they have no willpower, they're lazy. Why are they not exercising? Why are they not updating their resume? I want you to recognize that there's something so much bigger going on in the world. It's a different world than the world that you and I were dealing with in our 20s. Stop saying that they aren't motivated. And let's be accurate. They're struggling with the paradox of choice, okay? They're overwhelmed. That's why it's hard to make a decision. That's why it's hard to move yourself forward. Everybody wants to thrive. Everybody wants their life to move forward. Everybody wants to have a great job and a great social life, and they want to take better care of themselves, including the 20-year-old that you're worried about that seems like, oh, they're so unmotivated. They just sit there. And I want you and I to recognize this, because if you're sitting there barking orders and to-dos at your 20-somethings, get a job, get a boyfriend, when are you going to get married? Why not just go back to school? Fill out the application. Get up earlier. You got to stick to a budget. You're actually making it worse. What every 20-year-old needs right now is someone to sit down with them and say, it's very overwhelming to be your age in a world where there's endless options. It's normal to feel paralyzed and overwhelmed by all of the things in front of you. How can I support you? Have you thought about what you'd like to be doing in the next year? What can we work on together to help you actually put the ball in play? So the takeaway here is really important. Your 20-something in your life is dealing with a different reality than you and I did. They're struggling with the paradox of choice. They're capable of doing what needs to get done. That's why you're frustrated with them. But you and I need to recognize that this is a human being that's overwhelmed by all the possibilities. And even though they're an adult, they still need your support and decisiveness to push through this paradox of choice. because even though you and I figured it out in our 20s, it's not the same thing as what 20-year-olds are experiencing today So can we agree to stop with the judgment and have some compassion and offer support Because this isn easy and we meant to be doing life together And in just a minute I'm gonna give you in your 20s some tools to help you be more decisive. But in the meantime, how about you ask for the support? How about you share this episode with the people in your life that are barking orders at you so that I can help them understand what's actually going on? And how about you ask somebody to sit down and help you or sit with you as you work on your resume or you apply for those jobs or you do the things that you know you need to do, but you just feel too paralyzed to do them. Because when you start to navigate the day-to-day decisions and you start to move yourself forward with a little support, it's gonna create a sense of momentum that's gonna make you feel a lot better. And that brings me to the third major change that's happened to you when you hit your 20s. And that's this pressure to do everything, right? It's playing in the background, this pressure that you got to cram everything into your 20s. And you wrote in about this over and over and over again. Mel, what are the things I have to do in my 20s that are just going to be too late to do once I hit 30? What's the one risk everyone should take in their 20s? How do I look forward in the future and not be scared about time, people, pressure, money? How do I live in the moment and stop worrying about the future? I feel so much unnecessary pressure to achieve big goals, educational and professional and personal, by the time I'm 30. See, the big thing that's happening if you're in your 20s is you feel that now is the time to chase your dream career, to have your fun party years, to master your morning routine, to get the perfect skincare, to be fashionable now because you're never going to look better. Take big risks because you can afford it now. Move to the ski town, move to the beach town, travel the world, make money online, become an influencer, get a dog. Why did I get a dog? See Beyonce while she's touring. Get that photo in front of the Ferris wheel at Coachella, run a marathon. Live with my college friends. No, live with my significant other. No, live alone because I'm never going to get to live alone again. And now I'm alone all the time and I'm lonely. So it begs the question, why do you feel so much pressure in your 20s? I mean, I didn't feel this pressure in my 20s. And part of the reason is because of what we just talked about. I actually didn't understand the options. The other reason why I didn't feel this pressure is because when I was in my 20s, and this is important for all of us to understand how things have shifted. When I was in my 20s, the social pressure that was aimed at us was to figure out your career and climb the ladder and save money to buy a house. That was the uniform social pressure of what you needed to figure out in your 20s. And if you were the kind of person like me who, you know, you started your career as a lawyer and then you realize, I hate this. And then you change jobs and then you change jobs and then you change jobs again. Or you're like my husband who got laid off one job after another job in tech. Everybody thinks you're a freak who's never going to be successful. That's not the reality you're living in if you're in your 20s today. It's actually the opposite social pressure. I mean, if you're in your 20s, it's sort of like, what kind of loser stays in the same job for an entire decade? The pressure of doing your 20s correctly means doing everything in this decade, lots of changes. You know, whereas for a lot of us, stability was glamorized. But for 20-year-olds today, it's adventure, constant change, up-leveling, Instagram-worthy moments, trying the best meals, taking photos of everything, performing your life is what's glamorized. And you know what stability feels like? Boredom, loneliness, feeling loss. If you're in your 20s today, you have this haunting sense that there must be something more than what you're currently have because the world has shoved in your face and told you that, oh my God, constant change is what you should crave. You should be moving. You should be displaying. You should be putting it all out online. It's just like the great scattering. Once you recognize that this kind of pressure is just something that's a social construct in the background, what's great about it is it empowers you to understand where the pressure is coming from. It's not coming from internal. It's coming from external. This pressure that hits in your 20s is a lot like the great scattering. It's something that's happening in the background that creates all this anxiety and this confusion, but we're not talking about it. And because social media in comparison, it's not going anywhere. I actually think it's going to get way worse, especially with AI. You got to learn how to see it and separate yourself from it so you don't drive yourself crazy. See, you're not going to be just looking at the fantasy life of what some human being is posting in terms of the perfect meal and the perfect vacation and how beautiful their life is. You're going to be looking at AI-driven accounts glamorizing what a human being isn't even doing. And look, I think you should do all those things that you want to do in your life. You should make a bucket list. Everything that you want to experience in your life, you should absolutely put that somewhere and have it on a list and make a plan to do it before you die. But here's the truth you need to hear. Forget the pressure. You don't need to do it all in your 20s. And look, I get it. Everyone who gives advice to people in their 20s is like, do it now. Do it before you have a partner and a mortgage and kids. Do it, do it, do it. Well, the reason why we say that is that number one, first of all, we were not aware of all the options you're aware of. So when we say, do it, do it before you can, we were talking like, change your job. I mean, that's what we were basically pushing other 20-year-olds to do when we were your age. So we weren't aware that there were all these options, okay? Number two, most of us grew up in households where your parents or your caregivers literally sacrifice everything to give you a better shot at life than they had. And that might've been what was modeled for you, that that's what it's got to look like when you have kids. But here's the thing. It doesn't have to be like that. It doesn't have to be like that at all. Like your life is not over when you turn 30. Your life is not over when you get married. It's not over when you have a mortgage. It's not over when you get a dog or a cat. It's not over when you have kids. One of the greatest things about social media is you can find examples of people who are doing life differently. You want to do van life with very little money and take little kids with you? There are people who can show you how to do that. You want to travel the world while you have kids and raise kids? Great. I have a very close friend who lived in Chicago and then got involved with this organization in Tanzania. and they were over in Tanzania when their son was born. They lived there until he was six years old. So instead of putting all this pressure, like cram everything into your 20s when you don't have a lot of money and all this pressure, let's take the pressure off. Let's relieve the pressure. Let's like flip the valve. And I want you instead to imagine a world where you create this bucket list and it starts in your 20s And you trust in yourself that you're going to create a life and live a life where you're going to be checking those things off throughout your entire lifetime. That's the way I'm doing it. And that's what I want you to do too. Because you can have everything. You just can't have it all at once at the same time. And there's no reason to cram it into your 20s. So now you understand the three changes that happen in your 20s that cause you to feel lost and overwhelmed and confused. When we come back, we're getting into what to do about it. There are three truths I'm going to tell you. You absolutely want to hear this. So does everybody else that you know in their 20s. So take a moment and share this episode with everyone that you know. And don't go anywhere because we're talking about what to do after this short break. Stay with me. welcome back at your buddy mel robbins today you and i are talking about what to do if you feel lost in your 20s and that brings me to the three truths i want to tell you that are really going to help you in your 20s where you are right now and truth number one i've already hinted at you don't have to do it all in your 20s in fact i don't want you to do it all in your 20s Why would you do everything you've ever dreamt of just in that part of your life? Your 20s is just one eighth of your life. Why do you want to do absolutely everything amazing in just one small part of your life? Forget that. Let's like blow it out and start creating the list. Start dreaming out. Write down everything you want to do and don't hold back. Every time you're inspired, add it to the list. If you're a notes person, put it in the phone. If you love creating those little folders on social media where you save all those posts, that's the way that I do it. Just put them on social media. Put them in those little folders. Have a list for your life of all the things that you want to experience, places you want to travel to, meals you want to cook, things you want to wear. Heck, my daughters aren't even engaged and I already have a folder about weddings. They may never get married. Who cares? It's not about the timeline. It's not even about doing it. It's about creating space to dream without invalidating where you are. because there is no expiration date on these things. And you're killing the joy by putting so much pressure on yourself. I mean, I can give you so many examples of life beyond your 20s. I mean, when I was in my 30s, my husband and I, we took our six and eight-year-old on a week-long backpacking trip in the Wind River Range because they were so little. We rented llamas. That's a thing that you can do in Wyoming and Idaho. We rented llamas and they helped carry the packs. We didn't stop traveling. We did it on a budget. When I was in my late 30s, I had always wanted to own my own business. My husband and I figured out how to own this tiny little paint-your-own-pottery studio retail store that was open in the afternoons and the weekends. Didn't make any money. We checked the box. It was a dream. My husband started a restaurant business in his late 30s. He didn't have to do it in his 20s. Heck, I didn't even get serious about social media until I was in my late 40s. I didn't get paid for my first speech until I was around that age too. In fact, I have done some of the best traveling and the best trips of my life in my late 40s and my early 50s. And honestly, I like it a lot better because had I backpacked in my 20s, I probably wouldn't have enjoyed it as much as I can enjoy it now because I've saved a little money. I learned how to do a backflip at the age of 48. You're not dead when you turn 30. Like, stop acting like it. You know, you guys think your life is gonna end when you have kids? Mine actually began. because you think that when kids come into your life or a dog comes into your life or a mortgage comes into a life, that all of a sudden you gotta change your whole life. No, no, no, no. Stop and consider something. Give yourself a little bit more credit. When you have kids, they're coming into and are a part of the life you're creating. And if you already do have kids, you just keep living your life with them in it. So the takeaway here is start the list. Expand the dreams. Like allow yourself to really visualize what you want, but don't you dare give it a deadline. Don't you dare put pressure on it. That's the fastest way to kill a dream is to put a deadline to it and try to squeeze it into a moment in time when you're not meant to do it. And that way this list, it becomes not a to-do list or a bucket list or this thing that you feel pressure to achieve, but it becomes this lifeline that is pulling you through your whole life. It becomes this lifeline that expands this habit of dreaming and visualizing and sprinkling all these amazing things through your whole life. I mean, how cool is that? And that brings me to the second thing. There are no wrong decisions, okay? Like the single most questions that I got from 20-somethings online was all about decision-makings, like how to make the right decision, how to trust yourself in making the right decisions, how to know what decision to make, how to move through paralysis, how to stop feeling so overwhelmed. The biggest skill that you can learn is just making a decision, period. And what I've learned in my life is that there are no wrong decisions if you learn something from it. See, I think that you are so focused in your 20s on not screwing up, and we've already talked about this paradox of choice and being overwhelmed by everything, that you're thinking about decision-making the wrong way. You keep thinking that you have to make the right decision. In your 20s, I'm gonna tell you, you need to learn how to make a decision. One listener wrote in, And Mel, I obsess over making the right decisions versus letting it flow. In your 20s, you have to learn not how to make the right decision, but how to make a decision. Another listener said that the hardest part of their 20s is, quote, constantly stressing that you're always making the right decision when it comes to where you live, your job, your partner, the list goes on. Another listener wrote in, I'm always making the wrong decisions with my career, with my friendship, with my relationships. Well, first of all, no, you're not. No, you're not. You're not making the wrong decisions with your career, your friendship, your relationship. Because here's the thing I'm going to keep saying. I want you to stop thinking about making the wrong decision or the right decision, and I want you to learn how to make a decision and learn from it. Because I personally have realized that the way that I figured out my life is by making decisions And oftentimes I figure out what I need to be doing or what I want to be doing by making the wrong decision. I learn more from the bad decisions because they feel a certain way, right? I mean, let's just take my career, for example. If you're sitting there obsessed because you're like, I got to make the right decision. I got to get the right job. No, you need a job. I have changed my career so many times, and it's how I figured out what I wanted to do. I mean, let's just start right out of law school. I was a public defender in New York City. Then when my husband and I moved to Boston for him to go to business school, I was a lawyer in a large law firm. Hated that job. Then I worked for two tech startups. The second one I was fired from. Then I jumped to a business development role at an advertising agency, which I was also terrible at. I didn't like that job either. Was that the wrong decision? No, it was the right decision because I had to pay my bills. and while I was in that job, which I didn't like, I started training with somebody at MIT to become a life and small business coach. When I was starting my coaching business, we did that little retail store and I became a radio host. I tried hosting a reality TV show that got canceled. Then I hosted another reality TV show. Then I tried out for another radio show. Then I got hired by CNN. Then I started speaking about the five second rule and then businesses started to hire me and then I became a motivational speaker and then I became an author and then I hosted a daytime talk show, which I got canceled, which is another version of getting fired. Then I started this podcast. Every single one of those jobs, were they the right decision or the wrong decision if I got fired? I'll tell you what, they were the right decision. Even the jobs I got fired from, even the jobs I hated. Let me tell you why, because I learned something from the experience. Making a decision with the information that you have in this moment, making the decision that moves you closer to the thing that you want. That's just how you make a decision. You make the best decision you can with the information that you have and the problem or the issue or the goal that you have right now that you need to deal with. And I need to tell you something else about decisions. No decision is a decision. Thinking about what you want to do but not doing anything is a decision. doing the same thing over and over and over again and expecting it to somehow feel different, that's also a decision. And let me tell you something. I wanna speak to you directly if you're afraid to make the wrong decision. I personally believe if you learn from the decision or if the decision helps you solve a problem, it's the right decision. so you know when i graduated from law school my first job was as a public defender in new york city i worked for legal aid i loved that job and then my husband got into business school up in boston and we moved up to boston and i was not licensed to practice law in the state of massachusetts so i could not work for the public defender's office because i couldn't be in a courtroom but i could work for a law firm now here's the thing i had a problem i had bills to pay. I didn't really want to work for a law firm, but when I got offered a job at the law firm, was it the wrong decision to take the job when it was going to help me pay the bills? Of course not. So I take the job. I show up for work. The second I walked into the office, I'm like, this is not the place for me. I hated that job. I hated commuting in. I hated the year I spent working there, I hated every single second of it. Was it the wrong decision and the wrong career move to take a job and work at a place that I hated? No. It helped me pay my bills. That's a good decision. And every day that I sat there miserable, it told me working a desk job where I read and write all day is not for me. And the more I sat there in a place that I hated, the more motivated I became to find something different. And ultimately, I did. And so even though I hated the job, even though it was not the career move for me, it was a great decision because it helped me solve a problem. I needed to pay my bills. And sitting someplace that you hate teaches you what you don't want to do. And that's going to motivate you to get out there and go find something else. And so if you're struggling with indecision, the problem isn't right or wrong decisions, it's that you're not making a decision. And there's only two things that have ever helped me. The first one is my five second rule. Very simple. You got a decision to make, count backwards, five, four, three, two, one, make the decision. Second thing you can do is you can use this six word phrase that is magical. I use it all the time. What if it all works out? What if it all works out? What if it all works out? Part of the paralysis that you're feeling right now is that you're so focused on whether decision is right or wrong that you then doubt what decision to make and you make no decision. When you ask yourself, what if it all works out? You're doubling down on your ability to figure it out regardless of what decision you make. So make the damn decision. And that brings me to the third truth about being lost in your 20s. If you feel lost right now, I want you to commit to a one-month project. And here's what you're gonna do. Pick the one thing that's making you feel the most stuck, the most sad, the most off course in your life right now? Is it what you do every day at work? Is it that you don't go to work? Is it that you don't see your friends or that you're super lonely and you've started to disengage? Is it that you spend too much time watching everybody else and you've lost touch with what you actually want in your life? Is it that you can't make the ends meet, but you can't force yourself to get a second job and instead you keep thrifting and fast fashion shopping. Pick it. The one thing about your life right now in your 20s that makes your stomach drop when you even think about it. Are you tired of living with your parents? Then maybe you need a second job. Now here's what's going to come next when you pick the one thing about your life that you hate the most. See, right now you keep telling yourself, oh, it's not that bad. You got to stop pretending it's going to magically fix itself. You got to stop numbing out, zoning out, checking out, and you need to pay attention. Because that one thing that's making you miserable, that makes you sad, it's the signal. It's the red flashing light. It's the part of your life that is begging for your attention. Not because you're failing, but because something real in you is ready to change. And you don't need a five-step plan. You just need to stop looking away and start showing up and change that one thing. For one month, that's all I'm asking you to do. Take on a one-month project to make the worst thing about your life a little better and see what happens. Stop trying to focus on 15,000 things. Stop thinking you got to make these massive changes. Pick one part of your life and go all in for one month. Make it a one-month project to improve this area of your life. If it's your job, for one month, show up like it matters. Just put everything you have into it. Be the best employee you can or admit it's time to go. And for one month, start working on your resume and finding another job. If it's loneliness, text someone first, invite them, make the plans, plan the trip, be the one to reach out. I mean, when was the last time you planned a night out or texted someone first? If it's money, well, stop buying a latte every day. Stop buying stuff at the thrift store that you don't need. Sell something, in fact, on Depop that you don't need. Or open up a spreadsheet. Download one of the free budgeting apps. Get serious and take it on as a project. Listen to podcasts about it. If it's your love life, stop complaining about it and start going out on two dates a week. Or talk to everybody as you're standing in a line. You reach out first. You ask for the date. If it's your mental health, start going to therapy. Put your phone down. Get outside in nature. Meditate. Do what every expert tells you you should do. but make your mental health and feeling better your project. If you are sick of how much time you waste on social media, delete it for a month. I mean, it's only a month. You're not gonna die. In fact, you're gonna feel better. You're gonna feel like you're living again because momentum doesn't come from a new haircut or moving across the world. It comes from facing one thing you've been avoiding and doing something different. That's it. And if you still don't know what you should focus on, Your friend Mel Robbins is going to tell you what your one-month project should be, your health. Because your body is the foundation for every other part of your life. For one month, get up early for that workout class you're going to stream on YouTube. For one month, meal prep all of your meals. For one month, keep a food journal. For one month, stop drinking, stop vaping. For one month, show yourself that yes, you, even if you're lost in your 20s, you can still be consistent and truly dedicate 30 lousy minutes a day to being your best physical self, to making yourself healthier. You want more confidence? You want to feel less lost? Find yourself. Move your body. You want clarity? Clean up what you're eating and how you're sleeping. You want energy in order to change jobs, change relationships, change your entire path in life, then take care of your body because your body is what has to carry you through those changes. See, you don't need to become an athlete. You don't need to, quote, get it perfect. You don't need to find the perfect workout routine or have any money. You just need to start showing up for yourself. I'm talking 30 lousy minutes a day. Turn yourself and being healthier and taking better care of yourself into a project. Go for a walk. Drink water. Go to bed earlier. Just imagine that for a month. You're in bed by nine o'clock reading a book. Hello, new you. Break a sweat. Eat something green every day. Do it every day for a month. You'll not only feel different, you'll be different. And when you feel different, by the way, you think different. And when you think differently, you act differently. So if everything feels like too much right now, you're living at your parents' house, you can't figure out what to do with the living, you don't have any money, if you're still staring at your life like, where do I even begin? Begin with your body. Let your health be the proof that you still matter and that you care about yourself because you're not going to fix everything in life overnight. You're not going to find your purpose tomorrow, but you can make yourself stronger every day. So why did I just ask you to commit for one thing for one month? Why just one thing? Because this is where you come back to yourself. See, you've been scattered, pulled in a thousand directions, paralyzed by all the options, convincing yourself that you're behind or that you're too late or that you're doing it all wrong or that you'll never figure it all out. You're not. You're just disconnected from your own power. And that changes right now. This next month is about remembering who you are and what you're capable of, not by fixing everything, but by following through on one thing every day. You need to prove something to yourself right now. Not to the world, not to your parents, not to your friends who are scrolling past your posts online. You need to prove something to you. You need to remember that no matter how lost you feel, you can still follow through. You can show up for yourself. You can find a little bit of time every day to make yourself proud. And I want you to consider, when is the last time you felt proud of yourself? like truly proud of yourself. That's what this one month project is about. It's about becoming the kind of person who does what they say they're going to do. So let this be the moment where it all turns around. Let this be the moment where you make a decision to follow through on the promise you're making to yourself. Let this be the decade you stop dreading and you start living. And with this framework, these three truths, I promise you, you will make your 20s better than you ever imagined. I promise. And in case no one else told you today, I wanted to be sure to tell you that I love you and I believe in you. And I believe in your ability to create the life you want for yourself, especially if you're in your 20s. And I want you to know your friend Mel is going to be there every step of the way cheering you on. And I'm also going to be there to welcome you in to the very next episode, the moment you hit play. Oh, great. Awesome. Okay, here we go. Is that okay? Okay, go back real quick. And let me act out the thing. And the last thing that you're going to do is you're going to get a, and this thing, this last thing. Hold on. Oh my God. I think I just overcooked myself. Okay. And that, oh, sorry, David. Oh, wait, that's when I was supposed to read it right. Okay, wait a minute. Okay, great. I got it. Okay, great. Oh, and one more thing. And no, this is not a blooper. This is the legal language. You know, what the lawyers write and what I need to read to you. This podcast is presented solely for educational and entertainment purposes. I'm just your friend. I am not a licensed therapist. And this podcast is not intended as a substitute for the advice of a physician, professional coach, psychotherapist, or other qualified professional. Got it? Good. I'll see you in the next episode.