Mistakes you make in your 20s – Your 20s are a time of exploration, growth, and learning. And with that comes the expectation that you’ll make some mistakes along the way
People make mistakes, especially when they’re young. You’re expected to make mistakes in your 20s, it’s just part of the growth process. That’s how we become better people, by learning from our mistakes.
However, there is an easier and more efficient way to go through this growth process – By learning from others’ mistakes.
Winston Churchill famously said in his 1948 speech to the British House of Commons: “Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it”.
On this note, today we’re going to talk about the 15 mistakes people make in their 20s, so you can avoid falling into the same traps that those that came before you did.
Let’s dive right in, here are 15 mistakes people make in their 20s! Don’t worry if you don’t feel like reading, you can enjoy the video below or watch it on YouTube:
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Mistake #1 – Not investing in yourself
One of the biggest mistakes you can make in your 20s is not investing in yourself. This means you don’t take the time to develop your skills, pursue your passions, or invest in your own personal growth.
Your 20s are a time to try out new things. Compared to the real world, you have zero responsibilities.
Now is a great time to try as many things as you can and build your character. People start to have personal crises in their 30s because they didn’t take the time to figure out who they were in their 20s.
They don’t know what they can do, they have little skill, and they don’t know where they are going. You’re not supposed to figure that out in your 20s, but you are supposed to lay the groundwork for it.
You should have learned a lot by the time you’re 30. But if you just hang out and chill all the time, you’ll soon find yourself in a world of chaos.
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Mistake #2 – Neglecting Your Health
Another likely mistake in your 20s is not taking care of your health. In your 20s, you may feel invincible. You can stay up all night like it’s nothing, you don’t mind having a hangover, and your back doesn’t hurt.
You’re wrong to think that you’ll always be like this.
When you’re in the best shape of your life, it’s hard to imagine feeling old. It will happen, though. After one flight of stairs, you’ll start to feel tired.
A nap in the middle of the day will sound good. You won’t be able to afford to lose too much sleep. The list goes on and it will happen instantly.
One day you’re fine, and the next day, when you get off the couch, you start making dad sounds.
If you want to avoid that, you should start taking care of your health more. Get the minimum requirements done.
A little bit of exercise and a pretty good diet will make all the difference in the world.
Have you ever seen a 30-year-old who looks like they play Bingo on Friday nights? Start taking care of your health if you don’t want that to happen to you.
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Mistake #3 – Living in a fantasy land
When you’re in your 20s, you feel like the main protagonist. You live in your own little world and think you don’t care about anything outside of what’s right in front of you.
You create your own little fantasy world, where you are in charge. But you can’t always be a child.
One of the biggest mistakes in your 20s is believing you can always run away from your duties. They will come knocking on your door at some point.
“Growing up is a trap,” some people say, and we should all stay kids forever. This is what we mean by a fantasy world.
Even though it sounds good, it doesn’t work.
The good news is, you get to be a kid after you take care of your responsibilities.
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Mistake #4 – Not Taking Risks
Another mistake in your 20s you’re likely to make is not taking risks.
Your 20s are a time of exploration, and taking risks can help you discover new passions and opportunities.
Risks are necessary for growth.
If you don’t take risks, you’ll stay in your comfort zone and miss out on chances to grow as a person and in your career. And, as we said in the beginning, your 20s are the time when you have no real-world responsibilities.
It’s a great time to learn something you might never use or start a business that will probably fail. The older you get, the less time you have to take risks.
When you have a mortgage or a child, you won’t be able to take chances.
You don’t want to find yourself in your 30s saying, “Well, I guess this is my life now…”
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Mistake #5 – Not Networking
The “squad” won’t be there forever, despite what most people think.
You need to meet as many people as possible, and your 20s are the perfect time to do so. Those well past their 30s know how awkward it feels to meet someone new.
Believing you are able to make it on your own is a common mistake in your 20s.
At some point, you need qualified people around you. You need people to open doors for you and help you out, people to learn from, and to help you grow.
We know how tempting it is to be antisocial and think you don’t need anyone.
But you’re not fooling anyone but yourself. Don’t say no to social events, especially when you’re in your 20s unless something about them feels off.
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Mistake #6 – Not Saving Money
You are expected to be dumb with money in your 20s, especially if you have no one around you to teach you otherwise. Hence the importance of networking from the previous point.
The most impactful thing you can do with your money in your 20s is to save a portion of it and park it in safe investments.
And the reason it’s so impactful is that you have huge amounts of time and can leverage the hell out of compounding.
Besides that, saving money, even a small amount, will teach you financial discipline, which is something most people don’t have.
Do your best to avoid this mistake in your 20s, as it’s a source of regret for more people than you’d imagine. It’s tempting to spend all the money you make in a month because “you’re 20 and it doesn’t matter”.
However, if you can build good money habits early on, your life will be 10 times easier later on.
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#7 – Not Travelling
Your 20s are a time to find out more about the world, and traveling can help you do that. Traveling helps you see more of the world and learn more about other cultures.
Traveling is the best way to learn about yourself and the world.
And despite what most people think, you don’t have to spend six months backpacking through Southeast Asia to do it.
City breaks, camping, and going to concerts in other countries are all examples of traveling. Basically, anything that gets you out of your normal environment counts as traveling.
Not traveling is a big mistake in your 20s. However, it’s a mistake that can be easily avoided.
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#8 – Not Being Assertive
Another common mistake in your 20s you’re likely to make is not being assertive.
It’s easy to feel intimidated by people in power or colleagues with more experience, but speaking up for yourself is important for your personal and professional growth.
Being assertive can help you tell people what you want and need. By being assertive, you can set limits, win negotiations, and earn the respect of your peers.
In other words, be your own voice. Don’t back down. Make yourself strong.
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#9 – Not Embracing Failure
When you are young, you are expected to fail. You don’t have the training, the skills, or the experience.
You are not supposed to have it all figured out. That’s why they’re called the exploration years. It’s a nicer way of saying “messing around for years”.
You don’t need the perfect job, the perfect internship, or the perfect whatever.
You can’t possibly know what you want to do in life unless someone engraves it in your mind from a very young age.
Don’t make this mistake. Failure is expected. Embrace it and learn from it.
If you’re having difficulties embracing failure, we covered failure and the lessons it teaches us, in greater detail, in a previous post. It’s helped many before you and we’re certain it’s going to help you too. You can read it here.
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#10 – Not Prioritising Self-Care
Self-care is the last thing that comes to young people’s minds. You think that when you’re older, you’ll have more time to care about that nonsense.
You force yourself to deal with your traumas by using blunt force instead of trying to understand them.
Every day, you let it grow and eat you up from the inside. This is a big mistake to make in your 20s.
But people seem to be more open-minded about self-care now than they were a few years ago, which brings a smile to our faces. Prioritize your self-care and stick to it!
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#11 – Not Seeking Help
Speaking of self-care, not seeking help when needed is one of the most impactful mistakes you can make in your 20s.
People in their 20s feel like they have something to prove and tend to do everything on their own. And when things don’t work out as they hoped to, they start to blame the system.
What they fail to realize is that everyone had help along the way and you are supposed to seek support.
Asking for help takes nothing away from you as an individual.
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#12 – Living only on social media
This is something that only this new generation has to deal with, and because it’s new, it’s all a mystery.
We haven’t seen a grown-up who grew up with a smartphone from a young age yet, so we don’t know what effects it can have.
But if you can’t tell the difference between reality and illusion, you definitely have a problem.
Deep fakes and virtual identity theft will be new problems for the generation coming up. And what happens next will be interesting to watch.
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#13 – Not trading with the future
Even though your 20s are a time for exploring and making mistakes without risk, there’s no point in doing that if there’s no end in sight.
In the end, all of it must add up to something bigger. Do something now that “future you” will thank you for.
Whether that’s getting to know yourself or building a strong financial base, or anything else that makes you a better person, you should do it.
Avoid the mistake of doing things aimlessly. This will help you find your way. Ask yourself, “Will this make me a more whole person in the future?”.
If you ask this question often, your 20s will stop being so chaotic and aimless.
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#14 – Not Setting Good Habits
Your everyday actions are what define you as a person.
Your 20s are a great time to start strong habits that, if left alone, will stick with you for life. So why not make the most of this?
Now is the perfect time to start working on the small things you do every day and slowly build a base.
Research shows it takes around 66 days for an activity to become a habit. However, breaking a habit can take much longer than forming it.
As it stands, avoid making this mistake in your 20s by not indulging in any counter-productive activities for too long.
Remember, breaking a habit is significantly harder than building it.
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#15 – Not Enjoying the Journey
The final mistake you’re expected to make in your 20s is not enjoying the journey.
Your 20s are a time of exploration, growth, and learning. But if you can’t bring yourself to enjoy the journey, you won’t be able to achieve much of anything.
Life is a journey, not a destination. Sounds corny but it’s true. Even if you’ve made some of these mistakes in your 20s, don’t despair. Help is just one click away.
We’ve designed the Alux App specifically to act as the mentor in your pocket; a guiding light in this maze of mistakes and opportunities that we call Life.
Even if you made every mistake we discussed in this post, with the aid of the Alux App, you’ll have all the resources you need to recover and then prosper, right at your fingertips.
Now, it’s just a matter of ambition on your side. We know it works, but you need to do it for at least 10 minutes per day.
Do you want it bad enough?
This concludes our trip through the 15 mistakes you make in your 20s. We hope today’s food for thought has been insightful. See you next time!
