I'm 39, and this but entirely unironically. Think about your teens and twenties, and all the incredible shit that was happening. The parties, the music, the friends and new experiences that you look back on now wistfully. The world felt so big and new. But then take a second to think about how you actually felt. You were really unhappy a lot of the time, weren't you? I certainly was. I spent what were supposed to be the "best" years of my life pissy, moody, convinced that the whole world was full of things that I was missing out on and obsessed with finding "authenticity" in myself and, and this is the shitty part, disproving authenticity in others.

Now I'm nearly but not entirely sober, I have a steady group of friends and an incredible partner, and I spend my life mostly doing whatever I want to whenever I want. It's just that what I want has changed. I'm thrilled on an average Sunday to wake up, put on an audiobook and immediately start cooking dinner. I like mowing my lawn and tending to my garden in the evenings. Going to the grocery store with my partner is just the best, we pal around and make each other laugh and get hype about little specials. Who I am has changed, what I want has changed, and I'm realizing that it was never anything external to me. I've just become the kind of person who is capable of being happy. My world has gotten smaller, more familiar and so much brighter.