I Thought I Wanted to Be Special. Turns Out I Just Want to Feel Good.

Somewhere between reaching my mid-30s and booking in more routine skin checks, something in me 🪄 shifted 💫. I used to chase things that looked impressive: the title, the chaos, the story-worthy version of my life. Now I crave low-stimulation workdays, quiet moments with my own thoughts (or a podcast), and a skincare routine that doesn’t involve the internet watching me get ready. I used to want to be known. Now I just want to feel regulated.

In my 20s, stress felt like proof of ambition. Now it just feels like inflammation. Back then, it felt like the harder the challenge, the bigger the payoff would be. Professionally, emotionally, maybe even spiritually. If only that had been true. It took me longer than I’d like to admit to realise a lot of my counterparts were working less, caring less, and sleeping more, while still getting the same promotions and pay rises. And they weren't making work their entire identity.

✨ Which brings me here, to a new ideology… ✨

Give me a job where I can log off at an appropriate time, still make tangible impact, feel energised by what I do, and afford a Sydney studio apartment with a bathroom that isn’t falling apart from years of other bodies living in it. (Honestly, I don’t need a mansion but I cannot for the life of me deal with a grungy bathroom).

This shift in mindset made me realise I don’t have to stay stuck. Even if I’ve followed a particular job path or industry, I can redirect the skills I’ve picked up and use them somewhere else. We all can. There’s always another version of work, another version of us, somewhere out there.

And it’s not just work…

When it comes to love; I don’t need fireworks or butterflies. I need someone I can talk to about my personal and professional anxieties, appear deeply unsexy in front of, and somehow still be incredibly sexy with an hour later. Ideally over wine and pasta followed by some bedroom fun.

When it comes to exercise; I don’t want to be shredded. I want to be fit and functioning. I exercise now not to punish myself, but so I don’t experience a near black-out every time I bend over to pick something up.

In a world that still worships burnout and virality, choosing softness, in work, love or routine, feels like the most radical thing I’ve done thus far in my short-lived (yes, mid-30s is still short-lived) life.

Here’s to being a little less impressive, and a lot more at peace.

Until next Dispatch,
LGM