30 by 30

Today is precisely three months before the most daunting birthday of my lifetime so far.  While I am often happily mistaken for being 24-25 years old, and although I still seem to think I am and function thusly, I am not.  I am 29, and I am exactly three months from turning the dreaded, big THREE-OH. 

Oh, oh, no…

I absolutely cannot believe that I, Sarah Bauman, am merely months away from being an age that begins with a three. Other than somehow reverting to toddler-dom...  

But, y’know what? 

The only photo I can find of me DJing.  He  said, "It's cooler not to
smile," which made me smile. Not everyone's as cool as you, Graham...

I am starting to understand why so many people say your 30’s are so much better than your 20’s.  When I look back with my rosey-fuzzy-wuzzy-yay-I’m-young goggles on, I see how my early 20’s started off with a bang.  I was living in England, going to school, DJing, working with my awesome friends at a  great music venue, living life with a kind of starry-eyed zeal that, I suppose, should be expected of a young 20-something living out her dream abroad.  I often look back on it so fondly that I forget about the depression that set in during my 2^nd year there. 

There was a tragedy that took my roommate at the time back to the US for quite a while.  For some reason, being home alone so much seemed to fuel my downward mental spiral, despite my best efforts to stay insanely busy and happily distracted.  Parts of my life were outstanding, but others began crumbling.  In my dense haze of depression, I made some mistakes.  There were things out of my control that landed me back in the USA, and my mistakes made that possible.

And that's when things really got bad.

If I take off those rosey-fuzzy-wuzzy-yay-I'm-young goggles and look back at 24, I see a sad, miserable, stagnant person who was deeply discouraged about losing her dream and ending up back in a place she had no desire to be, doing things she had no desire to do, allowing herself to be consumed by her unhealthy, destructive mind.  My confidence had been annihilated.  I was defined by my failure and did not believe I would ever be capable of not-failing.   

And what of this Sarah who is drawing ever nearer the infamous three-oh? 

I battle daily with this little demon called “premature failure.”  I keep myself from doing things by rationalizing the impossibility of my success, so that I don’t have to deal with inevitable failure.  You can see the Catch 22 in this, I’m sure…  The exciting part is, I know this now, and I’m working on it.  This blog is evidence of me making conscious decisions to do something, despite my own self doubt. 

I really am a late bloomer who is coming into her own as a nearly-thirty-something.  So why not have a super sweet goal to make turning 30 even better?

Last Monday, I decided to set myself a goal of losing 30 pounds by the time I turn 30, which is exactly three months from today.  So, let's make it official.  It’s 10 pounds a month, which will be a challenge, but I know I’m up for it. 

Huzzah! 

I’m a little grossed out that this post reads a bit too much like a diary, but I’ve got to tell you – I find myself oozing joy from writing this.  It’s exciting when the future is more exciting than daunting.  It’s about 53% exciting and 47% daunting, but exciting’s still on the winning end.

Wish me luck, and I’ll keep you all updated on my progress.