I used to think my twenties would look like a perfectly curated Pinterest board; clean, aesthetic, lightly edited with soft lighting and a productivity playlist in the background.

But honestly? It’s more like a camera roll full of blurry screenshots, deep chats at 2AM, outfit photos I never posted and notes app rants I will probably turn into something… someday…

Some days I’m reflective like I could write a book called “What I learned after deleting everyone’s number.” Other days I’m petty with screenshots and dramatic punctuation. Most days I’m both…

I’ve learned that being pretty does not mean being put together, that healing is most definitely not linear and that sometimes you backslide into old habits just to remember why you had to outgrow them.

I have worn the wrong shoes to the right places. I have made pros and cons lists about people I already knew the answer to. I have fallen in love with potential and learned to love the present version of myself even more.

My twenties so far? A little chaotic, a little poetic, and very much still under construction. But they’re mine; pretty, petty and profound.

If you ask me, twenties are a strange cocktail; one part glitter, two parts confusion -shaken- not stirred and just with a tad splash of existential crisis. They are mostly served in chipped martini glasses you thrifted because you saw something similar on Pinterest and swore you’d host dinner parties (You never did.).

I spent the first year of mine trying to be this cool upgraded version of myself. Cool like the girl who orders oat milk flat whites and never checks her phone twice after texting a man. Spoiler: I am NOT that girl.

I am the girl who re-listens to her voice notes to make sure they don’t sound too eager, too boring, too… me. I am too me, and it took me a long time to love that.

There were phases. Oh, there were phases. Pink hair that said “don’t talk to me unless you have a vinyl collection,” red hair that screamed “main character with questionable taste in men,” and, yes; the bangs era. A time of chaos, emotional spirals, and scissors at 1 a.m.

Bangs: the punctuation mark of every almost-breakdown. I’ve grown out more identities than I’ve grown out fringes, but each one taught me something; mostly about the power of conditioner and starting over.

Then came the “I can fix him” era, where I tried to shrink myself into someone else's idea of love. I changed my laugh, my lipstick, my playlists. I learned the hard way that if you have to morph into a more palatable version of yourself to keep someone, you’ll eventually disappear entirely.

And yet... it wasn’t all melodrama and mascara-streaked epiphanies.

There were moments of profound beauty.... Like realizing your friends are your soulmates. Like dancing in your bedroom in an outfit too good for the outside world. Like choosing to take yourself out for brunch because you deserve the flowers, the pancakes, and the good table by the window.

I wore a lot of hats in my twenties. Literally and metaphorically. A bucket hat phase. A baseball cap phase. A “tiny beanie that makes my head look like an acorn” phase.

I also wore the hat of the overthinker, the people-pleaser, the girl who stayed up until 3am editing texts for tone.

These days, I don’t wear it to pretend I’m someone else. I wear it as a nod to the parts of me still in progress. I don’t think about “arriving” so much anymore. Arrival suggests a final version; something static.

I’m more interested in edits, drafts and the beauty of evolving in real time. Keeping what fits. Letting go of what doesn’t.

I’m not saying I have it all figured out.

But I am saying this: I don’t need to. Because maybe your twenties aren’t about arriving at some grand, glossy, final version of yourself. Maybe they’re about learning to enjoy the costume changes, the plot twists, and the overly dramatic internal monologues.

So no, I don’t have a five-year plan or a signature scent that says “she’s got it all together.” But I have a Notes app full of half-written thoughts, a closet full of characters, and a growing ability to laugh at myself in real time.

And if I keep showing up, maybe that’s enough.

At least for now.