pearls of wisdom
on things I wish I had listened to when I was in my twenties
To my dear Musers
I’m writing this with a stuffy head and a sense of exhaustion. I think I’ve caught whatever the latest thing is that’s going around or maybe it’s all part of a whirlwind of busyness and travel over the last two weeks. I hope this issue finds you well and safe, especially those who may have struggled with the winds that have blown through southern Australia over the last week.
Monday night was Dunley Dinner and we had the usual crowd plus a couple of extras, including all my sons! It was a lovely moment to have my three for dinner for the first time in a really long time. The eldest is on holidays and after his trip away with his girlfriend, has stopped by for a week before returning to work back in Bendigo. The youngest is home from a few months away in Europe with his motorsport team.
I was at one end of the table and M at the other at our Dunley Dinner. Unplanned, the table was split fairly evenly with males up one end and the women at the other. At my end of the table, we were talking about a bunch of things and I got nostalgic. Maybe it was talk of travel that the boys had been on, or going to Brisbane on the weekend to celebrate my uncle’s 80th and seeing photos from when he and my mother were young, or the long and late night chat with my sister on the weekend holed up in a Brisbane hotel, or the what’s-next talk with the girls finish uni next year. Whatever it was, I got nostalgic.
So, I began talking about the things that I would tell my twentish-old self, if I’d had the chance. My early twenties were hard in some ways (married to someone with severe mental health and sex and drug addictions) and brilliant in others (brilliant work opportunities with promotion opportunities aplenty). They are the years that I do look back on at times and wonder what life would have been like if I’d made some different choices. I’m not one to regret anything in life as I know all my experiences have shaped me as who I am and I wouldn’t change that in a heart beat, but I figure with all that I know now, I do have some wisdom to pass on.
On Monday night, as we talked, phones came out and notes were taken, so I thought I’d drop my eleven pearls here (even though I’m not really a pearl kind of gal).
Meg’s Pearls of Wisdom
Don’t spray perfume on neck or décolletage, only where the sun don’t see
This pearl was handed to me from a sales rep at Telstra Mobiles in the early nineties when I was a wide-eyed 23-year-old. She was probably in her late thirties or, in my eyes then, old. She pointed to her red neck and décolletage and said: ‘Never spray your perfume here. You can do a lot to hide your age, but your neck and décolletage will always betray you, especially if you spray perfume here.’
Enough said.
Don’t smoke, even if it looks cool
This is a boring old one and I’m sure my words fell on their ears in the way the same words fell on mine all those years ago. There’s a rise in the ‘cool’ factor of smoking again, much like in my youth. So, I gave them my story, how I was only a social smoker, how I’d taken it up when I was fourteen (Hell! So bloody young) and my best mate and I would smoke Alpines stolen from her father’s pack. We’d go to the oval and hide in the bushes there and smoke then go via the chemist on the way home to spray ourselves with perfume to disguise the smell.
I kept smoking over the following years. It progressed to smoking in cars, rentals, bars, out bedroom windows. I had rules of only smoking when drinking, with certain mates. I told myself for about ten years that I wasn’t actually a smoker, then for the next five that I was giving up. Finally, on a balcony in Singapore, I lit a cigarette and took a drag and was repulsed by it. A few times I’ve been tempted, and I have here and there, but I know I can’t. I understand enough that its addictive powers are too much. At 35, I had an awful pain in my oesophagus and put off going to the doctor as I was positive my smoking years were coming back to kill me. When I finally went, I was relieved it wasn’t, but it was enough to scare the pants off me.
Spend time alone, often
It’s hard to be alone, but when we are, that’s when we discover so much about ourselves. It’s kind of like sitting in discomfort until it becomes okay and maybe even good. I wish I had learnt how important this was earlier and I am glad I am now learning how to be alone. I think this is even trickier with so many distractions at how our fingertips.
Go on dates, by yourself
It’s taken me decades to learn to do this, but when I do, I love how I can immerse myself in whatever I am doing without having to consider what other people want to see or do. Go on a hike, visit a gallery. Go out for a coffee, or dinner. Do the thing that you love doing that isn’t necessarily what the other person/people want to do.
Get an exercise routine established, early
Any peri- or menopausal woman will tell you, if you are willing to listen, that it’s bloody hard to shake the extra weight off when you’re on the other side of the ‘pause. All women who had established their exercise in their early years were in good hands once they hit this stage. Getting exercise in as a regular thing as an older woman is harder and I wish I’d stuck at it from when I’d signed up at the gym back in my early twenties. It’s never too late, but it’s much harder. Sign up to the gym, or whatever regular exercise you like, and make it routine.
Call your girlfriends for no reason
Calling friends for a chat with no other purpose was something that I did Who doesn’t love to have a chat with someone who you love and loves you back?! Nothing like a chat that is about nothing other than catching up with each other. When life things get in the way, it’s easy to let this slip but I think that it’s something that makes our lives richer. Don’t just call for the ‘business’ of life, call for a chat?
Get a list small acts of self care you can do every day
Self care is something that is easily put aside as it becomes something ‘big’ that needs to fit into the everything else. Years ago, not long after my mum died and a lot of other shit things were going on, my psychologist challenged me to come up with a list of tiny acts of self care that I could do every day.
I draw on this list often.
Put your sunscreen on every day
Imagine this: a bottle of baby oil, a banana lounge and a skimpy bikini. This was the dream in the 80s. It’s the same dream that ends with wrinkles, sunspots and potential cancer. What I would do for that beautiful skin now.
Get out in nature, often
I think this is even more important now as we are much more disconnected with nature in our busyness of life. Nature seemed like a slightly annoying thing in my twenties with so much else going on: shitty home life, hospitals and mental health clinics, work, booze, etc. When I did get out to nature it was always good, but I didn’t do it enough. The hikes I took were few and far between, then suddenly decades have passed and I’d forgotten how to do it. When I got back to it I remembered what an amazing meditation walking in nature is.
Feast your eyes on nature. Get to know names of flowers, plants and birds. Dig your hands in the dirt and try growing things. Go for a hike with some great (girl)friends.
Write letters to your friends
I love nothing more than getting a letter in the mail (you know who you are!). I have a box of old letters from mates back in those early years, but at some stage we stopped writing. Emails, messages…they all took over but they’re not the things that we look back on fondly. They’re more like work/business.
Pull out a pen and write to your friends.
Keep writing in your journal, or start
I look back through my journals and there’s a lot of angsty stuff in there. When life was good, I barely wrote. Instead, I used it as a place to purge and workshop my feelings. I still write in them, but there was a decade or so that I didn’t.
Think of journal writing as narrative therapy.
What wisdom would you give your younger self?
Other things
Reading
Mira Robertson’s second novel Grace & Marigold – a great historical fiction about Australian Grace who is trying to work out who she is against the backdrop of squatting in 1970s London. It is a wonderful witty and moving story.
Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones by James Clear – full of fantastic and practical tips on how to live a more purposeful life by creating good habits and losing bad habits
Talented Mrs Greenway by Tea Cooper – I was listening to this audiobook but am now reading the physical book. This book was recommended to me by Tracy Peacock because of similar themes in my book. Mrs Mary Greenway’s husband was Francis Greenway who became known as forefather of Australian architecture after he was sent out to New South Wales as a convict in 1814. Mary was described by Macquarie “…as 'pleasant and genteel', she was manifestly as self-effacing as a wife of the arrogant Francis Greenway would need to be...” (Australian Dictionary of Biography). This story shows her as the brains, temperament and drive behind Francis.
Next up are:
The Benevolent Society of Ill-Mannered Ladies by Alison Goodman
What’s on your bedside table? What are you reading and loving?
Watching
Nothing! I’ve been too busy. Please let me know of any short snappy good shows
Five things
Write around the Murray is coming up (11-15 September) and it looks like it has a great lineup if you live up that way.
I ran an event last week about how to find your creative freedom. It was ace (and free) and I know there’s a bunch of people who missed it but wished they’d been there. Unfortunately, I didn’t record, but luckily I’m going to run one again. Keep your eyes open for new dates dropping
My freesias are flowering and when I dare open the window (if that wind would stop blowing), I get the stunning aroma flooding in. Isn’t spring the best (if it would stop being windy)?
My new system of managing my emails is working! I deal with them quickly every day and now they are consistently under 50 in my inbox. How do you manage the never ending pile of emails?
If you’re not yet subscribing to
’s Raptorial, please do. Her newsletter is always full of story, critique, writing prompts and a short story book club.
Thank you dear Musers for reading and stay warm. Spring is nearly here!
Til next time
x M
I loved reading this. All sons at home at once. That’s very special. I loved your points 3 and 4. I’m going to have a think about my advice and leave a separate comment.
Love all of your recommendations Meg!