Forty, and the strange comfort of making sense

On lessons learned, versions lost, and becoming someone unexpected yet familiar

I turned forty recently, which feels strange because I spent a good chunk of my younger years assuming forty was an age for people who had their shit together.

I regret to report that this is not the case.

I’m not saying I expected enlightenment exactly. But I did assume there would be a little more certainty by now. A stronger sense of direction. Some quiet, hard-earned wisdom that comes from age and experience and surviving enough bullshit to finally know what you’re doing.

Instead, what I found is something stranger.

Not certainty. Not answers. Definitely not an escape from daily decisions about what to eat or the deeply offensive fact that laundry is, apparently, forever.

Just a growing realization that the person I became is not the one I expected and somehow, she still makes perfect sense.

Not because life turned out according to plan. It absolutely did not. But because somewhere between the heartbreak, the healing, the bad decisions, the grief, the laughter, the people I lost, the people I found, and all the versions of me that didn’t survive the journey, I became someone I recognize.

Not the woman I imagined at twenty. But unmistakably myself.

Not the most successful version, no. Not the happiest or the most ambitious or the most fearless. But the most honest. Also, the most gorgeous. The version that finally stopped trying to outrun her own shadows.

That’s the strange thing about getting older. Somewhere along the way, becoming yourself stops looking like self-improvement and starts looking like recognition.

I was never someone who struggled to be myself. If anything, I have been aggressively, consistently — sometimes alarmingly — myself for most of my life.

I have loved loudly. Chosen boldly. Said the thing. Taken the trip. Burned my hand on life more than once because curiosity, hope, stubbornness, or sheer audacity told me to go for it.

Questionable? Occasionally.

Chaotic? Frequently.

Loud in opinion, soft in unexpected places, prone to making decisions that begin with “might as well” and end with stories I still tell years later? Absolutely.

But never not myself.

What changed over the years wasn’t my essence. It was my understanding of her.

Because the woman I imagined I would become at forty is not the one who showed up. This one is stranger in some ways, softer in others, far more complicated than I planned for — and yet, somehow, entirely familiar.

Forty years in, here’s what I know now.

I know that healing is not a final form. You do not unlock enlightenment and suddenly become immune to spirals, grief, or bad decisions. Healing is maintenance. It’s repetition. It’s noticing when you are becoming cruel to yourself and deciding, again and again, to stop.

I know that grief changes shape but never fully leaves. It settles into the architecture of your life. You just learn to carry it differently. Some days it’s background noise. Some days it sits beside you at breakfast and drinks your coffee with you.

I know that love is much quieter than I thought it would be.

Not grand gestures. Not dramatic declarations. Just people remembering how you take your coffee. Friends answering the phone at ungodly hours. Someone sending you food because you casually mentioned you’re mentally exhausted and they thought to take that tiny decision off your plate. Love, increasingly, looks like understanding. Like gentleness. Like taking time.

I know that some friendships are forever, and some are simply sacred for the period they existed in. Both matter. Both count.

I know that anger can keep you alive, but tenderness is what makes staying worthwhile.

I know that there are versions of myself I had to lose in order to survive. The woman who thought rest had to be earned. The woman who doesn’t bother taking up space. The woman who used silence as a shield. I miss some of her qualities. I do not miss being her.

I know now that there is a particular freedom in disappointing people who only loved you in the good times.

I know that my body remembers everything. Stress. Fear. Joy. Exhaustion. The way music can transport me to another year entirely. The way certain cities still live inside me.

I know that routine is underrated. That stability is sexy. That peace is not boring. That younger me would be horrified to learn how much happiness I derive from cancelling plans, tending my plants, and owning a reliable electric screwdriver.

I know that surviving something does not automatically make it meaningful. Sometimes terrible things happen and the lesson is simply that they hurt. But sometimes meaning arrives later, quietly, while you’re folding laundry or walking home or sitting in comfortable silence.

I know that sometimes you will hurt people you love. Good people. And oftentimes, forgiveness does not come in the way you need it. Learn to live with it anyway. It’s the only thing you can do.

I know that there are many kinds of courage.

Starting over is courage. Staying is courage. Leaving is courage. Letting yourself be loved after disappointment is courage. So is softness. So is hope. So is allowing yourself to imagine a future after spending years merely trying to survive the present.

I still know, that life is both long and short. But that space between birth and death is a lot of room to play in.

And maybe that’s the biggest surprise of forty.

Not wisdom. Absolutely not certainty.

Expression.

After years of living loudly, feeling deeply, and collecting enough stories to fill several cautionary tales, I find myself wanting something slightly different now.

Not reinvention. Not a cleaner, wiser, more polished version of myself.

Expression.

To say things out loud. To make art out of confusion. To admit when I’m angry or grieving or joyful or afraid. To stop waiting for life to make sense before I write about it.

This year, I want to write more recklessly. Love more intentionally. Rest without guilt. Wear the ridiculous outfit. Take the trip. Say “I miss you” first. Stop overthinking moments that were meant to be lived instead of analyzed.

Because forty, unexpectedly, feels like standing in front of a version of myself I never saw coming and realizing she makes perfect sense.

She’s a little chaotic. Slightly overcaffeinated. Emotionally complex. Still learning. Still occasionally held together by memes, medication, and pure spite.

But I like her very much.

still In transit, I’d like to think intentionally,