The Up Series: Life at 27

As I near the end of my life as a 27 year old, I wanted to capture my thoughts & feelings of this time. I honestly feel as though the last 6 years have flown by and I don’t know what’s going on. I’m aware time is an illusion, but it’s also something so essential to our lives. I love having markers of time that allow us to separate different seasons of our lives.

1. What is your greatest ambition?

To fall in love and have 3 beautiful children who love life, are brave, courageous, smart, creative, kind and who love God. I don’t want them to live in fear or be too cautious like I am.

2. What is your greatest accomplishment?

Raising myself and continuing to grow as an individual without a lot of help from others, while also trying to let people in and help me. My greatest accomplishment this year has been the deepening of my relationship with God and my knowledge of Him.

3. What is the greatest struggle in your life right now?

My life is pretty easy compared to most, and I am pretty happy most days but I struggled with finding time for myself this year as I was very social.

4. What is your current goal?

This time last year my goal was to find a partner to share my life with, but now it is to be healthier and fitter, buy a house and get a dog! I’ve built all of my 2020 goals around this main dream. I think it’ll come true in about 3 years so I need to work hard to save money for it. I was blessed to get an inheritance this year but I still need to work hard to make up the rest of the money needed.

5. What do you fear?

A lot less than I used to. I still fear snakes, needles, spiders like I used to, but I fear embarrassment and speaking to new people for the first time less than I used to. My biggest fear is still not being able to have children.

6. What do you eat regularly?

My diet has changed in the past few weeks as I am trying to eat healthier. This year I ate a lot of McDonalds and other takeaways, soft drink, and a lot of chicken based meals and a lot of sugar-heavy items. I have cut back on those recently and started drinking more water, eating more fruit + vegetables, soup and nuts.

7. What do you believe in spiritually?

I believe in the Holy Trinity – God, Jesus, and The Holy Spirit. Jesus died on the cross to pay the price for our past, present and future sin, to set us free from our ego and to show us a better way forward.

I also believe in reincarnation and past lives, karma, energy, auras, psychics, mediums.

You have to have discernment, wisdom and use good judgement as not everyone is authentic or has your best & highest good in mind.

The Devil (or concept of The Devil) is everywhere and is very deceptive so you need to be alert and make sure you don’t get led astray.

8. What do you do with your time?

I am quite busy these days. I go to work Mon-Fri, go to church, life group, see friends, create. I watch a lot of YouTube and spend a lot of time on social media like a lot of people but am trying to get better with that.

With Phoebe & Kara at Sugar Republic Pop Up

9. Which people in your life are the closest to you?

In past years I have felt very close to certain friends or family members, but I feel distance from them now. The people that I spend the most time with are the church community, however I am still not sure I feel the closest to them. I think I have learned that a healthy distance is imperative when it comes to relationships and there is such a thing as “too close”.

To answer the question I think everyone is at the same level of closeness now.

10. How do you feel about the opposite sex?

Oh gosh…….

Well, for the first time in a long time, I had a crush this year, and it drove me crazy! I know they say love is supposed to drive you nuts, but after stepping back from it recently, I realised that it’s not healthy to be consumed or overtaken with someone else. You need to keep a sense of independence and individuality and continue to pursue your passions and hobbies even when someone else has a lot of your time and attention. Desperation isn’t attractive and neither are unrequited feelings.

Men are also more sensitive, intelligent, helpful, kind and caring than I have been giving them credit for the last few years. They struggle with the exact same things we do, they just don’t usually have the support system to express their thoughts and feelings. I was able to spend time with more males than I have since high school this year and getting to know them has been a blessing.

11. What has been the biggest challenge this year?

My health. I have always been very blessed health-wise but this year as Virgo was all over my astrological chart, I decided to tackle a few health things that I’d been ignoring for awhile. I got my first ever blood test and the results came back that I was very deficient in the B-12 vitamin and needed 3 shots (1 per week for 3 weeks) to get it to a normal level. In between the 2nd and 3rd shot I started breaking out in really bad acne on my face, which spread to my chest and lower back. My face felt like crocodile skin for 3 weeks but finally went down, as my chest got worse and spread to my lower back. I’ve been very lucky with acne over the years and have only had a few pimples every now and then, but usually my skin is very clear so it made me quite self conscious considering the ones on my chest were unable to be covered up by most clothing. They are still there but have gone down a lot.

I also got my period back early this year after almost a decade of not having a regular period. As I started to have romantic feelings for someone my cycle came back and thankfully hasn’t left since those feelings went away. I think being so closed off to men and relationships emotionally affected my cycle and once I opened that door again my hormones kind of fell back into how they should be.

Overall my mental health was good but I decided to start seeing a psychologist again to deal with some of my anxiety issues and to grow in areas that I have no experience in. It has been such a help and I’m so grateful to my psychologist who understands me. She recommended I do the Gallup StrengthsFinder test and my top five were Empathy, Connectedness, Futuristic, Relator & Discipline which described me perfectly.

In the last few weeks of being 27 I got a lot of back pain and tried seeing a chiropractor and an acupuncturist for the first time. I wasn’t a fan of the chiropractor but the acupuncturist was a very positive experience.

12. What is success to you?

Success is living life, thriving; not just surviving. Making changes, seeking God, building a community of friends, family, and believers who will support you and keep you on your path. Self-growth. Improving health and habits and building generosity and wealth. Accepting where you are and finding joy in whichever season of life you are in. Cultivating a life you love. If that is how I define it, then I am successful.

13. What were your highlights this year?

Going to Sugar Republic
Trip to Sydney & Melbourne and seeing LANY and The Lumineers while there
Getting a new car
My cousin moved in with me
Weddings!! This was the first year any friends of mine got married
Kids Church Christmas Party
My Mum’s Birthday – my brother flew up from Melbourne and we surprised her at dinner which was pretty epic
Work Christmas Party
Church Christmas Production
Photoshoot with my friends