43 Lessons from 43 Years
May is my birthday month, so I'm sharing key life lessons I've learned over the past 43 years. I hope they help you, too!
They say life begins at 40. I think that's true in many ways. I turned 43 last week, and while life is still, well, life, it’s easier and better in ways I didn’t know it could be when I was younger.
Here are 43 lessons I’ve learned over the past 43 years. These insights have changed the way I feel about myself and how I engage in the world. I’ve learned to create healthy relationships and to navigate life’s challenges in positive ways. Hopefully, some of these will help you, too!
Always trust your gut; any time you don’t is a time you’ll regret later.
I spent a long time ignoring my gut feelings (especially regarding dating and relationships), which means I spent a long time ignoring myself. I dismissed the part of me that was trying to guide me, protect me, and keep me safe. After getting hurt over and over again, I vowed never to ignore myself again. Now, whenever I have a feeling or hear a tiny voice deep within telling me something is off, I listen and trust it. My gut instinct is my guide. I don’t need proof beyond that feeling or voice. I trust myself without question. Each time I choose to trust my gut is an act of self-love.I always have a choice.
I used to make choices from a place of guilt. I used to feel bad about putting myself first. Later I’d feel resentful or blame others for pushing me into something I didn’t want to do. That doesn’t lead to healthy relationships. It doesn't lead to high self-esteem, either. Now, I know that I am in charge of my life. I may not like my choices, but I know I always have them. I know that no one else is responsible for the choices I make. As a result, I created a healthier relationship with myself and others.There’s a lot we don’t know we don’t know.
Never stop looking for more knowledge. Never stop looking for help. Never stop being curious.Nature is medicine.
Spending lots of time in nature is healing and replenishing. It teaches us how to be curious and supports our ability to reconnect with our inner child.Boundaries lead to freedom and closeness, not limits and distance.
Self-soothing is a life changing skill to develop.
Having healthy relationships is hard when you’re constantly reacting and reactive. It’s important to soothe your nervous system and take time to think about things before you react. That way you can gain clarity and choose how you want to handle things.Familial relationships are the hardest and most complex relationships.
We’re told they should be the easiest and best. When that’s not true, we feel like we’re the only ones who missed out on an idyllic family unit. The truth is that every family has dysfunction. No family is idyllic, and most familial relationships are challenging. Remember, you don’t choose your family. They’re the people you got stuck with and tasked to relate to and get along with. Over the course of a lifetime, that is challenging for everyone.Your mistakes don’t define you.
You get to choose what defines you. Don’t define yourself by your mistakes. There are way more important things about you besides your mistakes.Failure is a stop on the journey, not the end of it.
No one gets to their goal without failure on the way. Let failures help you figure out your next steps.Boundaries are about what I need and what I will do. They’re not about controlling others.
Boundaries are what I need to feel good about myself and the relationship, and what I will do to take care of myself if those needs aren’t respected. I can’t control whether others respect my boundaries. I can only control what I do when they don’t. We treat people how to treat us, and our boundaries are the instrument with which to do this. Your boundaries keep you safe and well and are always in your control.Red flags mean danger–run the other way.
Red flags aren’t signs of potential danger. They’re signs of actual danger. I used to see red flags and dismiss them. Once I started to take red flags seriously, I stopped ending up in painful relationships (or situationships). I stopped wasting time with the wrong people. The right person for you won’t have red flags, and won’t be painful to date. Dating and love should feel good. It took me a long time to learn that, too.At the heart of almost all relationship issues is the struggle to manage differences.
In relationships, people judge and look down on each other for doing things differently, seeing things differently, and having different perspectives. They take things personally that aren’t personal. Your partner (or friend, parent, etc.) is an entirely different human being than you. They have a different brain, history, parents, etc. They will be different from you in ways you dislike. But you can’t be in a healthy relationship if you try to have too much sameness. Learn to see your partner’s differences as information about them rather than information about you.Everyone is doing the best they can with what they’ve got, or they’d do better.
People generally don’t want to hurt others, especially those they’re close to. Don’t assume someone is intentionally being hurtful to you. More often than not, they don’t know they’re doing anything wrong, or they don’t know other ways to do it. This is another way to stop taking things personally.Disappointment is part of intimacy.
People let each other down all the time. That doesn’t mean a relationship is bad. Disappointment is part of healthy relationships. Learning to feel disappointed without making it into something larger is important. When you attach meaning to the disappointment, it becomes a bigger issue.Everything is a story unless it’s confirmed.
There’s a lot I don’t know and can’t know about others unless I ask. Ultimately, making up stories doesn’t serve me. It’s easier just to ask people what’s true for them.There’s magic in slowness.
Learn to slow down and be present. Stop rushing through life. There’s so much joy in the present, but most of us rush to get to the next thing. When you learn to slow down, you have richer experiences. You can connect with yourself more deeply. You can connect with others on another level. Since I began slowing down and practicing mindfulness, life feels more nourishing.Get off social media.
This is a hard one, but it is so worth it! I recently stopped posting as much on social media, and in turn, I stopped going on as much. I notice that I feel less drained and distracted. My mind is calmer as my attention isn’t pulled in many different directions. I’m more creative
. I’m more present. And best of all, I feel happier.There is more than one valid truth.
My version of things is one valid version among many. My opinion is one valid opinion among many. My way is right for me, but it isn’t right for everyone. Other people’s truths are valid even if they are different from mine. It’s better to be curious about other people’s ways rather than try to get them to match mine. This is important to be able to manage differences and have healthy relationships.Sometimes, you like someone a lot, but you’re not compatible enough to be friends or more.
It’s okay if some people aren’t the right fit for you. It doesn’t mean they’re bad people or that you are. You don’t have to be friends with someone out of guilt. You don’t have to maintain relationships that don’t work for you.Get angry.
Your anger will enable you to set boundaries and to start saying no. I spent a long time feeling depressed. I felt sadness. I felt numbness. I was stuck. Once I embraced my anger, I stopped being, well, a doormat. I stepped up for myself. Anger is motivating. Anger turned inward is depression.Take ownership of your judgments.
It’s not other people’s job to be how you think they should be. Judgments are a self-protective way of keeping people away; judgments create disconnection. If you want healthy relationships, you must learn to recognize how people are different from you without judging them as better or worse. No one is going to be just like you. If you judge the way people are when they do things in a way you wouldn’t, you’re going to struggle in your relationships. Judging people means saying, “What’s wrong with you?” It breeds disgust. That doesn’t feel good for you or the person you’re judging. On the other hand, it feels good to have space for differences. You create safety, trust, and closeness when you don’t judge people. Taking ownership of your judgments is a key way to manage differences and create healthy, nourishing relationships.You know yourself better than anyone else.
Stop looking for answers from everyone but yourself. No one else knows you or what you need better than you do. Start trusting yourself. Figure out what’s true for you. Otherwise, you’ll be at the mercy of a million opinions and never know anything.Not everyone’s opinion matters.
You get to choose whose opinions matter to you and whose do not. Figure out who matters to you. Who do you respect and whose opinion do you value? If you worry about what everyone thinks, you’ll be paralyzed.True worthiness comes from within, not from accomplishments and success.
Accomplishments feel good, but they’ll never be enough to make you feel worthy. That only comes from healing old wounds and elevating self-esteem.People show you who they are right away.
The sooner you believe them, the better.You can’t change people.
Trying to is a waste of time and energy.Nothing is personal.
Literally nothing. It took me a while to understand that people are the way they are for a million reasons, none of which include me. I can’t make someone nice, nor can I make them mean. How people treat me reflects their values, capabilities, and history, not my worth or how they feel about me. A lot changed when I began to see people for who they were, separate from me. I stopped blaming myself or thinking they’d do better if I were more worthy. When you think people are the way they are because of you, you don’t hold them accountable for their actions or inactions. You blame yourself, and you stay in relationships with toxic people, thinking if you’re better, they’ll be better. That’s not how that works. People are showing you who they are; your job is to take in that data and decide if they’re good for you. You can’t do that until you see them for who they are, separate from you.Accepting others and being accepted is a gift.
We misunderstand each other way more than we realize.
If you’re hurt, make sure you’ve understood the other person accurately. A lot of times, you’ll find you haven’t.If someone doesn’t like you, it’s about them, not you.
You will trigger people, and that isn’t your fault, nor is it in your control to fix. Focus on the people who like you, and grieve the loss of those who don’t. Don’t let the opinions of those who don’t like you matter more than the opinions of those who do.You don’t know what people need unless you ask.
Being relational means honoring where you end, and the other person begins. That means accepting that you only know what you need—what you’d need if you were in the same situation. You don't know what others need unless you ask. It’s not your job to know or figure it out; it’s theirs to tell you.You teach people how to treat you.
What you allow will continue.Everything is an experiment, and it’s helpful to approach life with that mindset.
Everything is an opportunity to learn more about ourselves. Don’t approach everything like it’s a test of your worth or capability. Your worth isn’t in question.Take care of yourself like you’re a million-dollar pair of earrings.
If you’d never put them in danger (or even potential danger), don’t do that to yourself either. When you treat yourself like you’re valuable and special, others will, too. Those who don’t won’t have space in your world.There’s a lot of information in endings.
Don’t rush through them.Your environment is everything.
You could be the best at what you do, but if you’re in the wrong one, you’ll struggle. If you’re in the right environment, you’ll flourish.You may feel sad when you think and talk about sad things, but this doesn’t mean you’re not healed.
Defensiveness is a relationship killer.
I didn’t know I was defensive until a friend of mine said, “Caitlin, you never admit you’re wrong.” I’d never heard that before. I valued this friend’s opinion, so I started learning about defensiveness. I started paying attention to my reactions. I didn’t want to be defensive, so I learned to lessen that reaction. I learned how to hear people’s feedback without making it bigger than it was. I started to use feedback as an opportunity to learn about myself and improve. I learned to respond to people with curiosity to understand their experiences, and I began to take ownership of my part. I found that my relationships grew stronger and conflicts lessened.Forgiveness is instantaneous when we feel the other has understood our injury.
Learning to apologize and receive an apology is a skill and a practice.Your feelings aren’t always valid.
If your story is incorrect, so are your feelings.Surrender, pivot, and grief are constants.
The more we practice and allow for these, the easier life is.Sometimes, we’re wrong about things we’re sure we’re right about.
Don’t assume no one can understand what you’ve been through.
That belief keeps you feeling isolated. Even if someone hasn’t been through what you’ve been through, they can still offer enough understanding for you to feel understood. Give people a chance to support you imperfectly.
I hope some of these will be helpful to you! Which do you most resonate with?
I love number 27