The day broke out in elegance, the birds chirped joyfully heralding the dawn of a new age. No doubt, today is special, the 23rd of its kind for me and words are not enough to say how grateful I am to God for the gift of life! 😀 A big thank you to my family, friends and the amazing blogging community! God bless you! ❤ ❤

I’m gonna share lessons learnt so far, enjoy!

1. Being a grown up has its perks, but I feel the whole excitement about adulthood is a tad overrated.

2. You have fewer friends as you grow older. Face it, life gets busy. And if you’re living in a bustling city like Lagos, you may only see your friends once in a long time based on scheduled visits. No more bursting into the next room in your hostel just to give your friend some new gist 😦

3. Life isn’t as rosy as the fairy-tale books said. Well, I should have learnt this a long time ago but I’ve always been a dreamer. Dreaming of better days and perfect scenarios but life continues to show me how imperfect everything is! :

4. When you start paying your bills, you learn how to manage your resources a lot better. I think I did most of my shopping while I was in school, receiving regular allowances. But now that I have to earn the money, I’d rather not spend a huge chunk on some trendy bag. Sure there would be shopping days but now with extra calculation. 😉

5. Oh yeah the outside world is scary! The culture shock is outta this world! Ok, that’s a little exaggerated. But being on the outside takes a whole lot of adjusting which I’m still learning.

6. Apparently dates don’t just jump on you when you become an adult. Well for me, Mr.Right eludes me but still not a good enough reason to compromise. Being dateless could be sad though, but it’s still better than being in erroneous relationships.

7. Forgive the past. There are tons of things I would like to change. Tons of things I would like to forget. But yet they hunt me every now and then. Hence the need to forgive the past. Just let it go because there’s really nothing you can do about the past, except learn from it.

8. Although life can get really busy, you’re never too busy for those who matter. I’ve made the mistake of pushing away friends because I don’t get the time to reach out, but many lonely movie nights have reminded me of the importance of keeping them close.

10. Dressing up as a grown up, so worth it! Yes I love the ‘tees, jeans and sneakers’ outfit but being a grown up also means wearing some heels, pencil skirts and mature colors.Of course I still revert to my comfy jeans and sneakers when I get the chance but I think the grown up dressing is super chic. 😉

11. You know how your dad and his friends read the news and deliberate on how the economy is bad or how some policy isn’t favourable? Well, soon enough that becomes you, grasping for news to analyze with your friends and colleagues. Everything now relates to you, including the stuffs that were considered boring as a teen.

12. Don’t push personal development and acquisition of skills to when you’re grown up. Read as much as you can while in school. I wish I did a little more reading of books that were not my school books. I wish I acquired new skills while I still had the ‘spare’ time. Now I have to fight to get that time to spend developing myself.

13. When are you getting married? Yes I love romance and marriage and everything in between! But no, don’t ask me this because I’m now a ‘grown up’. It only freaks me out the more! I wish people could get that.

14. Serve the Lord in your youth. Going by my new cycle of life I wonder what will happen when I become old. Serve God while you still have the strength and lesser things to concern yourself with. Because soon enough the pressures and pleasures of this life will overwhelm you.

15. Don’t get depressed if you don’t get the hourglass shape, but don’t relent on staying healthy. Eat good food, fruits and a lot of water. Exercise as often as possible. And yes exercise needs a lot of commitment! Stay true to the goal.

16. Don’t compare yourself with others. If there’s anything I learnt while growing up, it’s contentment. Worse was when I read in the Bible that covetousness is akin to idolatry. That scared the hell outta me. So yeah I admire stuffs but I don’t have to get them for myself especially if I don’t have the means to. Stay contented and avoid comparisons.

17. Still on comparisons, don’t envy others who may have been your mates but are on a different stage of their lives. Be diligent in your endeavours and you’ll get there. No, you don’t have to be pilot because your friend who is a pilot bought a house. You don’t have to get married just because all your mates are doing it. Stay true to who you are.

18. Live a little. No, live a lot. Live everyday. Not just on Fridays. Let your life go beyond you and let the blessings you have spread graciously to others around you. Therein lies the fulfillment of truly living.

19. Attend weddings and birthdays. Be there for your friends. I’m not a pro here but I’ve learnt how necessary this is. I look forward to weddings this year and the dress shopping that comes with it 😉

20. You are never grown up in the eyes of your parents. I kinda find this comforting, because I don’t want to be all ‘adult’. I want to still talk like a child over the phone with my dad or watch my mom  lovingly make my favourite meal. I want to be able to cry as a child when I’m upset and know that my parents would have the right things to say because they’ve passed through it. So don’t fight it when they treat you as a kid. Enjoy it because the world won’t see you as kid anymore.

21. Growing up comes with responsibilities. You can never run from the ‘R’ word. You have to be responsible for your decisions and the consequences that come with them. Scary as this is, trust God to help you make the right decisions. You’ll also have to be responsible for others. If you can’t manage yourself well, how will you manage others?

22. Don’t leave the big birthday celebrations for the big years like 18, 21, 25, 30 etc. See every year as a big one. Celebrate accomplishments, embrace failures and use them as corrections. I definitely didn’t want to celebrate this because I felt ‘it’s not a big deal’ but it is! I could stop breathing at any point but the fact that I’ve breathed long enough to see a new year is worth celebrating!

23. I’ll leave this to those who have passed through this age before. What have you learnt? Just drop one or two lessons that would help me in the comment section. This will be a much appreciated birthday gift! 🙂 

Oopsy! I forgot to warn you it was gonna be a long read! If you made it to the end, well done! I’ll send a chunk of my birthday cake! 😀

If you like to see pictures, please follow @dainty_m on Instagram to view pictures from this amazing day!

Lots of love  ❤

©Mfon Etuk, 2016