Here's to Being Black, Bold, and Broke

If you haven’t binged the Netflix show One Day then consider yourself lucky as you’ve saved yourself a fit of tears. When I say I sobbed at the ending of the series for the entire duration of the final episode, I mean it. Now I will try not to spoil anything for my readers who haven’t watched the show and you can read this post having not seen the show. But I strongly encourage you to watch as it is genuinely a good series. 

In watching though I had some revelations…

For a lot of my readers who are in their 20s like myself, the show made me realize that we have SO MUCH time, as it covered Emma’s and Dexter’s lives from graduating college up until their mid 30s. And with all that time especially as we navigate our 20s we will spend some of it alone, some of it with a significant other, some of it with friends, some of it with a new significant other and so on and so forth. 

Something I really liked about Emma’s character is the fact that during her 20s she was alone, she had a boyfriend, they broke up, then she was alone again, focusing on herself and her passions, trying to figure out her career. And at every point Emma was the focus of Emma’s life no matter how much she secretly wanted Dexter. 

Recently I’ve been trying to take a page out of that book by focusing on myself, asking myself what are my wants, desires, and values? Where do I want my career to go? Who the hell am I and what do I like and don’t like? I think in our 20s is the time to ask ourselves these questions and to take the time to find those answers in whatever healthy way we deem fit. And I emphasize “healthy” because it is very easy to find not so great ways to cope with the stress and fear that comes with navigating all of this. 

I think it’s important to stumble, trip, and completely fall on our faces and asses during these years because we’re really just adult teenagers trying to navigate the world with not a handbook in sight.

Another realization I had was that trying to find your forever person right now will be hard and complicated so it’s best to pour into yourself, friends and family while still remaining open to love. I think it’s really easy, particularly right now with dating culture – the dating apps to be specific, to feel dating fatigue as you’re talking to different people, going on dates, things fizzle out and you feel as though “When will my person come?”

Know that they will come. I tell myself this all the time, they will come. We will find each other because having a positive outlook on love, connection, and partnership is what will bring you and that person together. I mean you could very easily think “I’m undeserving of love” “I’ll never find it” “It just isn’t going to happen for me,” and in that thinking you risk putting up a tall brick wall against the possibilities of love. 

I personally believe that we should get back to meeting people in the wild (bars, cafes, hell on the street, even parks) like our parents and grandparents did and start connections like that.

I think it’s good also every now and then to at least go on a dating sabbatical (taken from my friend Amanda) where you take a break from swiping left and right on the apps, and focus on yourself, because too often (especially with men) we’re just trying to find a distraction from the feeling of loneliness. And it’s a feeling that at some point in our lives we have to grow comfortable with in order to thrive. 

Thirdly, do not wait in love or to love. This is for my emotionally unavailable readers, you may or may not know who you are but know that loving someone is yes, absolutely terrifying but equally if not more, thrilling. I truly believe it is a blessing to love in life and it is too precious to let yourself get in the way of that with negative self-talk, feelings of doubt or undeservingness, fear, or having walls so thick no one can get through. 

Take whatever steps are necessary in order to allow love in your life at some point, whether that be therapy, looking inwards at yourself, your wants in a partnership, whatever, but do it! By waiting or withholding on love, you might miss out on what could be the greatest love of your life (for you emotionally unavailable men I am yelling this at you). 

Lastly, right person, wrong time, I feel that was the overarching theme of One Day, and I for one do believe that it’s real – not for everyone meaning not every ex but when two people are connected, soulmates, there being an indescribable chemistry and amount of love, it can happen. It’s important to remember that we’re young, we grow, we change, we are all working on ourselves, and sometimes the timing for a connection like that conflicts with where we want to go and what we want to do. But if the universe, God, or whatever being you believe in wants you and someone else to be together, inevitably it will happen. 

I truly hope every person reading this (even myself), gets their One Day with their person and hopefully it doesn’t end like how the series did, but with a love so great that you realize all the waiting, the self-growth, the times spent feeling lonely, were all worth it if it means having your person in your life.