by Mrs. Xennial
Hey you,
It’s the year 2022, and we are almost 40 this year. I know; you’re probably thinking how old I am now, and you probably wonder how we are, well, you will be, doing 20 years from then. I’m doing great, and I’m living in the States like you’d wished. I’m really happily married with fur babies (1 K-9 and 3 felines now), and life is pretty good. I thought I’d write you a letter to talk about what I wish we could have known at your age as a way to step into the big 4-0.
I wish I was more bold at your age.
At your age, I was fearful…high school was rough, and this new transition to college, while it feels all fun and dandy to you right now, it actually scared the crap out of me. Many times, even with questions in my head, I was fearful to ask questions for many reasons: I worried that people may think I was stupid, or I worried that I’d be bothering people by asking questions. Had I known what I know now, I would be more bold in asking questions. And that may also include asking mom questions about personal finance… c’mon, we know she’s always been smart with her money, but she never told us how, or what to do… you probably only remember her saying “don’t spend it all” or “make sure you save money.” Well, that won’t change til much later, and I wish we had been bold much earlier.
College… well, wasn’t much better than high school, unfortunately, sweetie. The 4 years you are about to go through will have lots of dramas and ups and downs; but know that it’ll eventually be okay, and that we graduated just fine. You’ll also earn a handful (okay maybe a little less than that, oops) of lifelong friends, and that’s irreplaceable. You’ll learn to be a little bolder at the end and give less $hit to those people who don’t matter to you anymore, and trust me: it will be okay to do so, and you’ll love that freedom. You won’t choose to go straight into the workforce, but that brought you to a completely different journey later on. But then later on…
I wish I know how to better balance myself.
You know, in college, you’re so sheltered and privileged, you really didn’t know much about money and how it works. Sure, maybe if we had asked more questions we’d know better. But the thing is, once you go abroad, some parts of you will be “unleashed” without having to report to mom 24/7. Of course, she is going to stick to the “don’t spend it all” and “try to save some money” talk; but since the money isn’t even yours, you didn’t even think about preserving any bit, thinking more will flow in naturally (well, with some begging and explanations). Girl… you’re gonna learn the hard way one day later. I mean, few years later.
There will come a time when you’d follow the “go big or go home” bull$hit guideline, and party like there’s no tomorrow as if you’re making up for the years of being an obedient child. Sure, you would eventually have a part-time job (or two) to supplement your allowance, and guess what? The first lesson for personal finance actually begins around that time where you’re paying for your own car insurance and cellphone bills. But because you’ve made enough, and can always fall back on mom and dad… you won’t learn much during this time.
It is a mistake I’m not able to change now, but I wish we had figured out saving money and setting that aside somehow, or learn how to invest by then (or at least learned what Roth IRA is). I just recently saw the magic of compound interest (in an Excel format) and you have no idea how much I wish I had started at your age. Well, with what we know at your age, we probably won’t know what to do with it except for not spending it, but still. It could have had a better impact… But that’s okay; we don’t know what we don’t know.
I also wish that you’d go easy on yourself.
I also wish that we knew how to balance our well-being by treating ourselves better, and really taking better care of, well, US. There will be quite some time that you’d work so hard to get some sort of approval from others, and you’d be a major people pleaser, too. I guess you’ll sense that in grad school where you think by going out with friends and spending all the money you make in your part-time jobs, and slowly going into this paycheck-to-paycheck life style that everyone around you seems to have, and that by doing so, you get a sense of belonging.
But all the spent money aside, I wish we had been more careful with our mental health and seek help when we needed, instead of seeking solutions from a bottle (or 5). All the alcohol didn’t seem to be helping, and potentially made things worse when we got pretty darn sick at one point in our mid-20s. Don’t worry; it’s under control now, and I’m actually not dependent on alcohol for stress-relieving purpose for quite some time now, and it’s not a coping mechanism anymore, thankfully.
Aside from that, we also grew up being compared to almost everyone around us. It was never fun, and you’d develop a sense of “never good enough” as you are exploring the adulthood. It’s a confusing time, really, because you’re legally an adult, but still quite a child, and all you knew about how to value yourself was based on other people’s standards, or how others will view you. During this time, as you explore, there are so many things you thought you should be doing because everyone else is doing so; but in reality, deep down, you didn’t want to, or you’d never feel like doing a right thing (but did anyway). I want you to know that your value is determined by how you carry yourself, and how you view yourself; not based on the numbers on your transcript or on your scale, or based on “the trend.”
Well, interestingly, it comes back as a theme from time to time even at my age, almost 20 years later… except that I don’t generally use my weight or my dress sizes to compare anymore; but sometimes I’d see others farther down their FI journey and felt I didn’t do enough to save or invest. Sometimes I wonder if we started not to care about what others think of us, or not letting ourselves compare to others, we’d do better now… I guess we’ll never know. But know that it’s going to be a constant battle to be kind to ourselves, which isn’t something we knew how to do back at your time.
All in all, there’s much to learn during this decade. There will be a lot of fun, and also lots of things that would make me cringe later on, but it’s okay. That’s just part of the journey. Just try to be nice and kind to yourself during this time, and do what you can to keep your head held high. We’ll be okay. 🙂
Xennials on FI/RE 
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