21 things i know now because i’m 21

this is ur big sister speaking

i reread Alexa Chung’s piece with Vogue the other day, where she shared 40 key things she’d learned throughout her life to celebrate her 40th birthday, from fashion advice to things about love and relationships, and whilst i am not Alexa Chung, nor am i someone who is getting everything right (by ANY means), i am also very aware that a lot of you are younger than me so i thought i’d share all the stupid silly or somewhat meaningful discoveries i have made in the years leading up to now. i am definitely still fucking up and finding out to this day, but from my previous lapses in judgement or past wins, these are all the things i believe are important for you guys to know.

1. opposites always make for a great outfit

trainers with dresses or long flowy skirts, ballet flats with joggers or baggy jeans, baseball hats with a blouse and bloomers etc. etc. there’s just something really cool and effortless about mismatching and not giving a fuck

2. it’s okay to not have found ur forever friends yet but when u do u will absolutely know

i have found so much fulfilment recently from my friendships. growing up i was always super competitive and independent (which is perfectly fine too! lone wolves get it done!) and so didn’t invest as much into my friendships which made me feel sort of aloof and separate from my peers a lot of the time - but i was also quite different in my hometown, and often made to feel as though i had to shrink parts of myself to fit in. i am now living in london with an incredible, lovely, supportive, genuine group of people around me who are just as outrageous and loud as i am, and for the first time literally ever i feel as though i’ve found MY people.

3. sometimes less is more

i had suuuuuuuuuuuper bad acne throughout my early teens and after trying copious amounts of pricey skincare products, i found that literally washing my face with just water and moisturising, and replacing makeup brushes when they’re a bit gross worked better than all the remedies that were pushed to me online and by ‘experts’. however my current beauty blender literally smells like mould so can someone bully me into sorting that.

4. accepting your body is way less exhausting than hating it

this is a tricky one to articulate, but i have spent so many years of my life hating my body, comparing it to others, and then loving it again, and then seeing someone on tiktok come up with a new insecurity for women and then hating it again. tiktok has a habit for circulating trends in clothes and in foods and in makeup, but also strangely for women’s bodies. i didn’t know what a love handle was before social media, i didn’t know what a thigh gap was before i had instagram, and now i’m seeing girls make self-deprecating videos calling themselves “skinny soft”, or “skinny fat” when in actual fact, they’re just skinny. in the real world, these perceptions do not exist, and whilst i too roll my eyes at the seemingly false and forced mainstream self-love regime whereby objectively gorgeous women tell you to love yourself and that all bodies are beautiful, i would just say that from personal experience, my body is the least interesting thing about me, and i’ve looked back at photos of myself from when i was 17/18 where i thought i looked terrible, when i actually looked perfectly fine, and thought to myself now ‘what on EARTH was wrong with you?’. but i do love music, and this body allows me to make that music, so i am working on shifting my focus to that instead.

5. sometimes it just is that simple

that boy who isn’t texting you back just doesn’t want to. going through his instagram following isn’t helping anyone. and him following lots of girls that don’t follow him back IS embarrassing. stand up. i promise you your soulmate is not making you feel like this and you will know when it is right.

6. slogan tees are always going to be in. the more crude and outlandish the better. it’s always going to make someone laugh.

7. i am a strong believer that the love of your life is not on hinge

i know we all have it but most of the time you will end up meeting someone when you’re not actively looking for it. that’s just the way the universe works. so when it’s all feeling dire know that it’ll happen when it’s meant to.

8. never waste a friday night on a first date (thank you chappell)

weekends are sacred and nothing ever compares to a few drinks and giggles with the girls, so if you’re ever in doubt for what to do on a weekend, i promise you that good company in a random pub is going to bring you much more joy than small talk with someone you likely will never speak to again. save those for midweek.

9. coats and shoes

i am of the belief that if i ever come into a significant amount of money and want to treat myself to something nice, i either buy a coat, or a pair of shoes. coats and shoes significantly shift the whole essence of someone’s outfit and so i love that i can dress soemthing up massively merely by chucking on a big faux fur jacket or a pair of ballet flats.

10. good great really well not okay

maybe an obvious one but if i ever encounter someone from my past; a ex, an old friend, an old enemy etc. and they ask how i am, i am always good, great or really well i am never just okay. okay is defeat.

11. apologising when you’re wrong is actually quite empowering

apologising when i was wrong was something i discovered in my late teens but i realised that the more you do it, the less you feel as though it’s a really shameful and embarrassing thing to do. there are also a lot of people who don’t know how to accept an apology and would just rather continue the disagreement further, and those people probably aren’t people you need around.

12. having a signature clothing item that feels the most you is really fun

i’d say mine is ballet flats/mary janes and now people show me when they’ve seen ones that they think i’ll like, and it’s so fun finding new ways to wear them. i personally have been loving mary janes with a full double denim outfit OR ballet flats with like track pants/joggers.

13. not everyone in your life needs to be super empathetic and understanding

whilst it’s great to have those friends you can get deep with and feel understood by, it’s also great to have someone who’s gonna tell you to stand up when you’re being walked over and to get a grip when you’re being crazy. i normally am this friend for other people, but i would say i have found my match recently and it has made a world of difference having someone be totally objectively honest to me because they want the best for me, and that doesn’t always need to be said in a roundabout way.

14. wear the jeans

jean trends change all the time, but i know that for me, low rise baggy is all i ever have any interest in wearing. if all you ever wanna wear is high rise joni topshop jeans, WEAR them, because i think the most flattering style differs for each person, and i also don’t think any particular style of jean is DEEPLY uncool or unflattering. wear em.

15. ur not wasting ur youth by not clubbing

i am a very extroverted person but BOY do i hate clubs, clubbing, club culture, everything involved. this caused much stress for existential little me, who has many a time thought that i am effectively pissing away my twenties by not going out and getting drunk all the time. again - once you find your people this is much easier to realise, but you do not need to do what it feels like everyone else is doing. life’s too short to waste it on things you’re only doing because you feel like you have to.

16. that being said, those random nights where you end up out all night going to places you never thought you’d actually step foot in will end up being stories you’re telling for years

last weekend i had a crazy silly stupid night out with some of my best friends and had the worst hangover of my life (i put my hair up for the first time ever!) and whilst i had definitely wanted to bow out at midnight, i stuck it out and it ended up being one of the most funny, outrageous, silly nights ever. it made the nausea and the sleeping in my makeup worth it.

17. DO NOT SLEEP IN YOUR MAKEUP

remove, wash, moisturise, sleep

18. phone your friends

a forgotten gesture, i love to phone my friends. in the same way that my grandma will call my mum for a chat, i love to call my friends when i miss them. and i love to tell my friends that i miss them. all the time.

19. telling someone you admire them is never cringe

luckily in what i do now, i’ve had the chance to meet a few people whose music i love and have loved, and i have never once shied away from telling those people that i admire them and love what they do. i don’t understand anyone who says that it’s uncool to do so, because you clearly want to tell this person the positive effect they’ve had on you, and the person receiving this information is only going to feel great that they can see and speak to a tangible person who they’ve had a positive effect on. i’d rather be perceived as cringe than miss an opportunity to make someone feel good, because if someone came put o me and told me they liked what i’d been doing, im only EVER going to be over the moon at that.

20. invest in a good perfume

having people tell you you smell nice is a fabulous compliment but also the idea of having a signature scent is soooooooooooooooooo fun. exes can’t even walk down the street without somebody smelling like you :’(

my favourite atm is malin & goetz ‘bergamot’

21. everyone should probably be in therapy

there shouldn’t be a taboo surrounding speaking to someone, regardless of how in-need of it you believe you are. as someone who has been through many many many bouts of different therapies, i don’t regret any of them, and think there’s no way anyone can understand all of the different emotions co-existing in their brain, it’s only fair we bring in someone else to try and figure it out. i am a therapy supporter.