What Would You Tell Your Teen Self If You Could Go Back?

What would you tell your younger self if you could go back in time?

This episode is a letter to my younger self, what I would tell her if I could go back in time with the life experience I have now. And if it applies to me, it may very well have applied to you too.  

This episode also serves as a reminder that wherever you are in your journey right now is exactly where you need to be. You should celebrate your progress rather than criticise it!

And that 18-year-old version of you? They'd be amazed at how far you've come. 

Enjoy!

Chapters

• 0:34 Welcome and Episode Introduction
• 3:03 You Don't Need It All Figured Out
• 4:46 Your Worth Isn't Validation-Dependent
• 7:02 Outgrowing People Is Normal
• 9:06 Stop Shrinking, Start Speaking Up
• 10:56 Emotional Exhaustion vs. Laziness
• 12:59 Changing Your Mind Isn't Failure
• 14:40 Romantic Love Isn't Everything
• 16:41 Trust Your Gut Feelings
• 21:34 Celebrating How Far You've Come

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:17

Hey guys, and welcome back to another episode of the 20 survival guide. This is your host, emily Askey. Today is kind of a heartfelt episode, but it's also going to be something that's really valuable to you, because we were all 18 once and now we're in our 20s. And if I could go back to my 18 year old self and tell her what she was in for in the next five years, oh my god, she'd have absolutely no idea. Firstly, she'd have no idea that we'd come this far, but also she'd have no idea how difficult it would be to get here. And I know I'm making it kind of sound like I've had so much struggle in my life and whatever. And I don't necessarily mean that. I don't mean to be really satire. I just mean to say that, yeah, everyone's journey is valid and everyone's journey is difficult in their own way, and there's a long way to come for myself and, I'm sure, a lot of you, but we are making headway and we're doing a great job. So if I could look back at my 18 year old self, I would tell her many things. If she was definitely not the best version of herself, she was making mistakes left, right and center, with friendships, with her own self-respect, with boys, with school oh my god. The list like is basically anything you could do, like I was just one fuck up after the next. It genuinely felt like that, but I think it's really important that we go and look back and remind ourselves when we were younger that it's gonna be okay, because a lot of the time when I'm feeling really down or I'm feeling really self-critical or really sad and picking myself apart, the one thing that really helps shift my mindset is younger me would be so, so sad that you're being so mean to yourself right now, like baby Emily or baby whatever baby. You would feel so sad seeing you being so mean to yourself and I feel like that really then stops me, because you kind of have a special place in your heart for your younger self and I think that, going back to our teen years and looking back at when we were 18 and when we were in our mid-teens and how we were acting and how we thought life would be when we're in our mid-20s, we had no idea. So we're going to jump into a list of things that I would tell my 18 year old self and I'm pretty sure they'll apply to you too. So listen up, guys, because this is going to be a really useful episode. Without further ado, let's get into the episode. So we're going to go into 10 things that I would tell my younger self, that I would tell my 18 year old self, things that applied to me, and if they applied to me, I'm pretty sure they must have applied to you too. So, number one I would obviously tell myself you don't need to have it all figured out, and we hear this all the time.

Speaker 1: 3:12

But when I was 18, I genuinely thought that I had to have my life figured out by the time I left university. We're a year and a half deep now, like actually what the hell? But I thought that I would have a career already like flown off like the charts, like I'd be flying right now. I'd already have had my second promotion. I'd already know exactly what I want to do for the rest of my life. I'd already probably have moved out. Like I genuinely thought I would have moved out by now, and I know a lot of you might have moved out and that's amazing, but I haven't. I'm not moving out anytime soon, so it just doesn't look the same. But also, I still don't really know what the end goal is for me. I still don't really know what I'm gonna do with my career, with my life. Like I've got a job, that I'm about to start my second job and I'm really looking forward to it, but I don't know what's end goal. You know, when I was 18 and I saw loads of people looking like they knew what they wanted to do with their life. Reality is, they probably didn't. They just made it look like they did, and it really just depends on who's better at pretending at the time. So I think I'd tell myself to give myself permission to just evolve and see how things went over time and take each day by day and you can figure out your path later. That is something I would definitely tell myself. Number two oh my god, this is like. This is literally what consumed my whole teen years.

Speaker 1: 4:33

I would say your worth is not dependent on being liked, being validated or feeling like you've been chosen, let's be honest especially not by boys, because I was definitely feeling when I was in my teen years that if I wasn't chosen by boys like I was not worth it. This other girl was better than me and there was something wrong with me, and I would genuinely chase validation by men absolutely, and you know what? It's not a shameful thing to admit it, because it's very common and in your teens it's so common. But I definitely chased validation by boys and if I didn't get it I didn't feel worthy, and that is a big mistake. And also, especially not by social media. I definitely felt like every like I would get on Instagram and however many likes I got determined whether I was worthy or genuinely just chosen or validated as a person or not, and that is so sad and toxic and I definitely don't really think like that anymore. But I think it's so normal that a lot of people probably did, because social media was like huge and and everyone was judging way more, especially in our teens, people would judge you from just what you wore and judge you and criticize you and absolutely rip you apart behind your backs. And I'm not saying people don't do that now, but when you're in your teens, all you had to do is say something weird and everyone would genuinely come for you. So no wonder why how many likes you got on Instagram made so much more of a big deal to you. But I would go back and I would say your worth is not dependent on what boy likes you, how many likes you got on Instagram, how many friends you have, and your worth is genuinely from what you do and who you are and how you feel on the day-to-day and your confidence and your self-respect. But oh my god, did I take time to learn that one? So, yeah, she really needed some help. But I would definitely go back and tell my 18 year old self that and you know, 18 I was only 18 four years ago and the period of time in between now and then, the life trajectory and the turn that I've taken, is huge. So I am definitely speaking to my younger self at this point.

Speaker 1: 6:42

Number three it's okay to outgrow people. So this one hurts, like the amount of times I remember and I have them ingrained in my mind on specific friendship breakups, relationship breakups, but mainly friendship breakups because those hurt so badly. You know, like I would think that if I had a friendship breakup it was because, like I wasn't a good person or it was the end of the world and if I made a mistake it might have been on me, but I genuinely thought that I just wasn't worthy as a person and it hurt so much. But a lot of the time I felt like those friendship breakups were due to just outgrowing another person. And I was not really used to that because I never really had friendship breakups until like my mid to late teens and I just thought that it meant that I wasn't really a good friend and that's just not it, because you can't overcompensate when a friendship is already ending. You are both on different paths.

Speaker 1: 7:40

A lot of the time I think I tried to hold on to friendships for too long when they had run their course. But I think now I would look back and tell my 18 year old self that letting go of that friendship or those friendships doesn't mean that they failed. You just outgrew those people and I would definitely say that not everyone is meant to grow with you. Some people you're supposed to leave behind, some people are supposed to continue on your journey with you, but you can't bring everyone with you and getting to be in a place where you're comfortable with losing friends, but not in a way that's sad, in a way that's just. This happens because you can't keep everyone. And also at uni and at school I feel like you had so many more friends, those party friends, the true friends, the ones who you can have a good night out with. And when you move on with your life, you realize that you can't just keep these acquaintances and these people and keep in touch with everyone, and in the beginning it definitely made me feel quite insecure and sad that I didn't keep in touch with everyone. I didn't, I didn't have the time for everyone. But then you sort of realize that it's it's not quantity over quality, it is quality all the time.

Speaker 1: 8:46

Number four being low maintenance isn't a personality trait. So speak up, ask for what you need, don't be afraid to raise your hand, don't be afraid to say what you think, don't be afraid to actually have an opinion, because you shouldn't be scared of what other people are going to think in your friendship group, what they're going to say behind your back. The amount of times I would just say what other people said and copy people, because I didn't really know myself and I didn't want to be judged, or I was scared that people were going to think that what I actually felt was weird or odd or they wouldn't like me and I used to get told so much because of my ADHD that I was like just off the walls crazy, too much, too dramatic. And it then stuck with me for a little while and I actually thought to myself am I too much? And that is something I would love to go back and tell my 18 year old self that you are never too much, you are never too dramatic. You can be however you want, and other people's opinions don't actually matter, because you're the one who has to live with yourself every day. And if you like that version of yourself, if it makes you feel like your actual, true self, then that is how you should be behaving.

Speaker 1: 9:54

Number five nothing good ever comes from shrinking. So when I say shrinking, I mean the more you try to play safe, the more you try and shrink yourself to be someone who's smaller, someone who's less yourself, the more you'll feel disconnected from yourself. So the more you try and copy other people, the more you try and blend in with the crowd, the less you you're going to feel, because you're going to feel like you're just a prototype of everyone else. You're just a copy and paste of someone else. And the only way to feel like you're just a prototype of everyone else you're just a copy and paste of someone else and the only way to feel like you're actually the best version of yourself is by knowing what you actually want, instead of copying someone else's identity. I feel like in sixth form, everyone gravitated towards the people that everyone used to think were weird, because they were actually really comfortable in themselves and it was really visible that they weren't that insecure so they could be standing out, and I think that's a really true sign to say that it's okay to not feel like you don't have to be everyone else in order to be cool. You can stand out and you shouldn't feel badly for taking up space.

Speaker 1: 10:58

Number six You're not lazy. You're probably just emotionally exhausted from trying to be someone who you're not, and I know this sounds like a trauma dump, but you know, if you look back and you weren't trying to be anyone and you are unapologetically yourself, genuinely, you want a life in your teens, because I think your 20s are really hard, but don't get me wrong, so are your teens, because the worst part of your teens was constantly trying to be someone else, constantly trying to fit in and constantly trying to look cool, and you ended up sort of being so emotionally exhausted and so physically exhausted from trying to be someone that you're not because you're trying to fit in that it's exhausting and you don't have any energy and then you feel lazy and then you feel stupid and, honestly, it's not that you're not lazy. So I would go back to myself and I would tell myself you're carrying this pressure and energy to feel like to be impressive and it's a lot of energy that you expend on trying to be that person. Instead, like I would tell myself to rest rather than feel guilty about not doing enough and I think that's also something that comes with time, because I still really feel like I'm never doing enough and I don't think that feeling is going to go away for a little while, but I'm working on it. But I definitely felt that way more when I was younger, so I'd go back and tell myself that you're not lazy. Felt that way more when I was younger, so I would go back and tell myself that you're not lazy. The reason why you're so exhausted is because you're so self-conscious. You're trying to be someone that you're, not you. You grew up in a girl's school and, like everyone, had eating disorders, so you constantly like constantly ashamed about your weight and that took up so much energy. So I would go back to myself and tell her not to be feeling so down and unhappy with yourself, but rather you're just really emotionally exhausted from trying to be someone that you're not.

Speaker 1: 12:46

Number seven. You'll change your mind so many times, over and over and over again, and that's not failure. Back in the day, I used to think that changing my mind on my career path, or whatever the hell it was, was genuinely meaning that, like I either couldn't stick to anything or I was just a failure. And now that I'm older and I realize that your 20s are genuinely for you know figuring it out and these are the times to do that, which is so okay. It's not a failure. You're learning. You learn through this because when you're in your teens, you've been alive for half a decade and a failure. You're learning. You learn through this because when you're in your teens, you've been alive for half a decade and a half. You don't know shit. So you're genuinely just figuring it out like.

Speaker 1: 13:25

Learning comes from changing your mind sometimes, and it doesn't mean that you're failing. You're becoming more honest with yourself, what you actually like, what you don't like, and you don't have to stick to one thing. You know, you can. You can do so many things. You can learn so many different things. You can try so many different hobbies and not be good at them and change your mind. So you know what? I would go back to myself and I would tell 18 year old me that changing your mind isn't a bad thing. And I think at school a lot of people saw changing. A lot of people saw, if you changed your mind, that you weren't confident in yourself and maybe that's just me, but I think that's really sad. But you know, a lot of it, I feel, was based on how other people perceived me and my decisions dictated that. So and that dictated my decisions. So I would go back and say it's okay to change your mind, don't worry about what other people think. You're learning.

Speaker 1: 14:18

Number eight romantic love is not the destination. I used to think that being in a relationship was like the be all or end all. If you were in a relationship, you were successful, you were happy, everyone wanted to be you. And was I wrong? Absolutely, I'm single and I'm living my best life, but genuinely, genuinely, genuinely. The goal isn't to just find a boy or a girl or whatever. Whoever you want to find, like that's not the end goal, and I think that my life used to be so boy orientated and I don't have any shame admitting that, because I think that it was super common when you're a teenage girl. And that doesn't mean if you're not in a relationship, that you're not, you're not, that you're not successful, you're not happy. I would go and tell my younger self that your life can still be extremely meaningful, extremely happy, extremely rich, with great friends and laughter and success, without being in a relationship. No one has to say I love you or hold your hand or be able to post you on Instagram in order to make you feel like you've completed your life or you're doing really well. You can be single and you can be thriving and you don't need to constantly be texting someone in order to be happy.

Speaker 1: 15:31

Because a lot of the time when I wasn't in a relationship, I think I had this feeling, when it links back to male validation that, like I always had to be texting at least one person I don't mean like a friend, I mean a guy like texting one person and if I was overdone texting with them, I'd have another person on the back burner and it wasn't even like to do anything with them or to be in a romantic relationship with them, it was just so. I had someone there, someone who I knew was interested, and they would just always be there giving me that validation. And I think that I look now and I'm like I really never needed that. I didn't need that at all. It was just because that's where I saw validation, whereas now validation is not seen by that. But again, it's a process and I didn't know that then. So we can't criticize and destroy our younger selves because they didn't have as much knowledge as we do now.

Speaker 1: 16:21

Number nine you don't have to prove that you're okay. So if you're down, if you're sad, it's okay to be not okay, like it really is, and you don't have to cope with humor. You don't have to stay busy. You don't have to avoid being with yourself alone. Those kind of things won't actually protect you from what really needs to be felt and like this could be heartbreak. This could be heartbreak. This could be a mental health issue or disorder or whatever it could be. You need to actually sit with your feelings and and recognize them and let them be there before you can move on and distracting yourself with going out, going crazy, other boys, whatever. That is genuinely not going to solve the problem, and I did that more times than I can actually count, like genuinely more times than I could ever count. I I have no idea, no idea how many times I did that.

Speaker 1: 17:16

I think it was just what I lived and breathed was distracting myself from what I actually felt, and I really hated to be alone. I remember this so much Whenever it was a Saturday night or a weekend night, I would rush to make plans with someone because I genuinely didn't want to be alone, like I couldn't be able to be sitting with myself and my own thoughts and I wouldn't feel okay because I'd be stressed to where my mind would go. And I think now I love being alone, going to uni and having nights by myself in my room, like the best thing ever. So it's so interesting how things change and how you learn to be comfortable with yourself, and I think learning to be alone and not avoiding your own thoughts is such a huge sign that you're actually comfortable within yourself. So so just remember that Number 10, this is the final one Trust yourself. I would tell my 18 year old self to trust herself.

Speaker 1: 18:06

You know more than you think, because the amount of times I'd second guess myself even an example as silly as this, where, at school, if you're working in a group project and you were doing a maths problem's, say, and someone came up with an answer that was different to yours, and let's say it was a competition with the rest of the class and you had to show one answer if I got a different answer to everyone else, I would be like, yeah, well, obviously you're right, because why would I be right? And then so many times they'd actually be wrong and I was right and I was like, wait, wait, why did I second guess myself? Why do I do that all the time? You know more than you think. Stop trying to second guess yourself.

Speaker 1: 18:44

When I was 18, I could not make a decision for the life of me. I could not make my own decision. I feel like I would always ask my friends like genuinely, questions as silly as what should I eat for lunch today? Like I have no idea, what shirt should I buy at the store? I have no idea and you need to remember. And I would go back and tell myself to remember that you should trust your own decisions, you don't need to be waiting for someone to approve your decisions, and like that is what I was clearly doing. When I was asking my friends what I should do, I was waiting for someone to approve me.

Speaker 1: 19:26

So I just want to say a little story about one time when I broke up with one of my exes and I had a couple, but I broke up with one of my exes because one of the reasons was there was so many reasons, but one of the reasons was that I felt I just knew it wasn't working out. But also there was this other girl that was causing problems and I think I felt in my gut that I was going to be cheated on if I didn't break up. So I did, and the next month he was with the other girl and you know what. That is why you should listen to your gut, guys. But the point is there is a point to this story and that is that I genuinely felt so I think the word is lesser than I felt so small and I felt so not worthy, not validated, not liked, all because I wasn't really the one who was chosen, like this other girl was where technically I was, because we were in the relationship. But you get the point, I felt like the second choice, like the second option and not the person who anyone really liked and it was tough and I was like super sad for a little while. It didn't really make me feel great about myself.

Speaker 1: 20:34

And I look back at that 18 year old self and I think, oh my gosh, just because someone liked another person more doesn't mean you're any less of a human being. It's more than okay for someone to like another person more than you, but that shouldn't determine how you view yourself and it doesn't make you any less of a person. It just doesn't mean that they're right for you. And you know what? I look back and I wish I could tell my 18 year old self that you are more than enough and stop wasting your time and energy on people who genuinely aren't worth it. So I hope you guys can look back at your younger self right now and think how did you get here? How much have you changed in the past, however many years since you were 18, and I hope that you can sit here and congratulate yourself. I know you've come a long, long way and, just like I have, and you have with me, look back on this journey from when I was 18. I feel like it might be similar to your journey and you can look back and think journey from when I was 18. I feel like it might be similar to your journey and you can look back and think, oh my gosh, I might have a lot of shit to work through right now, but boy did I have a lot more. I know so much more than I used to and I'm so much more mature than I was. And it's crazy when you reflect, because it actually makes you feel really good about yourself and where you've come, but also like really heartfelt and sort of sad for your younger self and what you had to go through at that time because you didn't know any better. So I think it's really important for us to reflect on these things because we need to be kind to ourselves.

Speaker 1: 22:02

Guys, the main point of this episode is I want you to remember that you've survived so many things, from breakups, from trauma, from mental health, from potential bullying, whatever it is that you survived and suffered with. You've survived it and look how far you've come and that deserves celebration. So you know what, guys? I hope this episode felt like a hug. I wanted this episode to feel like a warm hug, you know, like the hug you didn't know you needed and the hug that you can give your younger self and I also this episode to feel like a warm hug, you know, like the hug you didn't know you needed and the hug that you can give your younger self.

Speaker 1: 22:34

And I also want you to know that if you're listening to this and you feel lost or you feel late and behind in life, or you don't feel like you're enough, genuinely I'm absolutely telling you, guys, you are 100% is the truth, you are enough. And also, if you went through tough times when you were 18, in your teen years, and even now, just know that you're not alone. You've got me, you've got this whole little community. Everyone is here and everyone's around you and you're not alone and everyone loves you. You're loved by so many and you're doing great.

Speaker 1: 23:06

And remember, if we've come so far from when we were in our teen years to now, just think about how far we're gonna come in the next four years, like, look how much progress we've already made. We can make so much more. So you're not at the end of your journey. You're genuinely just evolving quicker than you even realize. You're growing, you're learning and, of course, you're exactly where you need to be right now. You are exactly where you need to be right now. So I hope you guys enjoyed this episode, because I kind of felt like a massive therapy session for me and a massive dump onto getting to know the teenage Emily. So I hope you guys enjoyed that and if you're ever feeling lonely or sad or down, genuinely come back, revisit this episode or use it as a reminder to think about your younger self and how far you've come, because you're doing great. So I shall see you guys next wednesday. Bye, bye.