Emotional Changes In Your 30's: What To Expect

What is it like to be in your thirties? Well, we have the wisdom we’ve gleaned from our twenties but now we face the added pressure to be successful in our careers, love lives, and everything else in between.

Today we will talk about how to shake off these expectations because, at the end of the day, it’s up to you if you want to let the pressure dictate your life. You must be thinking, people in their thirties are excelling at raising a family, working their way up the career latter, and have ten-year plans.

Wrong, most of us are still trying to figure it all out and make it look like we’ve got it all figured out.

A Head Start

First, let’s breathe a sigh of relief because this change is not a time when you are going through massive hormonal changes like puberty so you will sense some stability setting in. You’ll be able to make choices with a more level head since you’ve had the last decade to work on ‘adulting’ and you don’t have to spend as much time discovering ‘who you are’ as you did in your 20s.

Also, let’s get real, you have a stronger sex drive in your thirties from a new self-assuredness and understanding of the world (for some, this is also from a need to procreate).

Despite this, there is much more going on that is rarely talked about. It’s a mixture of physical and mental health that can cause stress in the way we think, this is because we have become accustomed to a certain way of life that is slowly fading from us which can create confusing emotions in our thirties.

We’ve all felt the brunt of sitting at work, slouching in our chairs, seeking a way to counteract the feeling of flatlining. Some may suggest stretching but this ignores the mental aspect of this feeling. Despite the head start that we discussed earlier, our thirties leave us vulnerable to our past, which can catch up with us and drain us emotionally.

So, let’s discuss the soul, our deeper emotions, and our true sense of being at peace in life. That way we can look at to understand the archetypes at play in our minds during this decade of life and prep ourselves with the proper tools and ideas of how to move through it.

Read this next: Never Grow Up: Why & How You Need to Heal Your Inner Child

Sources of Stress in Your 30's

In our thirties, we get into routines because we have newfound clarity on our bigger goals. That means in the moments of downtime, we have more time to reflect on the past and get resentful about everything anyone did to us, ever.

This can make us bitter and jaded, leading us to believe that much of this stress comes exclusively from what happens outside of our own control. The fears we store in our subconscious will play out in our life if we don’t address this stress and reliance on the outside forces. This subconscious stress can cause us to seek comfort in food, partnerships, substances, or push us to work so hard we don’t have to stop and deal with those deeper parts of ourselves. And this goes without saying, this is bad for our health, energy levels, and overall vitality.

We begin feeling like we need to be doing better or have a better plan because of societal conditioning and fear of struggling in our older age. We may even experience imposter syndrome, the feeling that everyone is doing well except us and therefore we do not belong. This will end with us feeling that life is out to get us and luck just didn’t land on us this time around. We may push ourselves to burnout trying to find a sense of accomplishment.

How To Manage Stress in Your 30’s

Wait, how did we get to this point? Unfortunately, we didn’t get the emotional training we needed as kids in order to overcome some of these anxieties and that is the number one reason stress can creep up and get the best of us in our thirties.

What do we do to heal our traumas and learn to control our minds? Well, it’s time to get training! We start by practicing and expanding our mental capacities. We read books; we look at our behaviors; we mature ourselves emotionally, and eventually, come to the understanding that blaming people will not make our lives magically get better.

It’s time to research, learn about our hormones and how our diet affects our emotions. We must start acting on these changes before they get the better of us. We start to realize we need regular sleep, water, and rest. We get wise but we also get our butt kicked if we don’t look in the mirror and direct our thoughts to be more positive.

Have you ever seen someone who is attracting negativity? Chances are they aren’t doing emotional work and developed neurosis because of it. To manage the stress of the subconscious, it is important to look at how external pressure to ‘fit the mold’ is affecting our own identity and choices.

Tips to Get in Touch With Your Soul

• Make a list of your goals and ask if they are yours or someone else’s.
• Ask yourself if you are doing too much or trying to make things happen so fast you don’t enjoy your life.
• Ask yourself if you’re in a job or relationship because of fear; whether it’s fear of change, fear of judgment, or fear of trying something new.
• Ask yourself if you are taking time to get in touch with your emotions or just pushing through them putting up with them.
• Ask yourself if you have some way to connect to your own inner desires and sense of greater purpose.
• Ask yourself if you are repeating family behaviors of self defeatism, victim mentality, or focusing on what could go wrong.
• Ask yourself if your eating habits dictated by your environment or childhood and if they are they helping or hindering your overall health.

Focus on a Healthy Lifestyle For Emotional Stability

To take control of our emotional well being, we can look to time tested solutions such as eating more whole foods and plants. We can look at simplifying our day to lower stress by slowing down and relaxing each day to let your nervous system recover. This can be by taking a walk in nature, reading a good book, or relaxing in your own way. Finding healthy habits to replace the college party lifestyle can help your body cope with stress too. Getting a healthy dose of endorphins from exercise helps keep our hormones balanced and increases our sense of well being. Drinking lots of water is actually much more important than we may think too. Staying hydrated eases the pressure on the kidneys which can cause emotional upset as well as help us maintain our energy.

Overall, our thirties seem to be about addressing if our goals are sustainable, getting real with what we want, establishing some independence from family patterns that aren’t serving our well being, finding ways to lower stress and relax, adopting a healthy lifestyle and accepting that you don’t need to be perfect to be happy. But more than anything, the deeper work of training the brain to think positive using affirmations and meditation will be the biggest and most helpful way to thrive in your thirties.

Instead of living a life of quiet desperation, use your thirties to do exactly what your soul is calling you to do and face your fears by redirecting the mind each day. You can decide that your thirties are about becoming more self-aware, mindful of your thoughts, words, and lifestyle choices. If we choose, our thirties can empower us and make us feel more in control because we start to experience how to keep our energy, our own vibration, up and how to attract good things to us! We can start to dig deeper into feeling good about ourselves because of the kindness we show others and not because we are trying to live up to some image we may have picked up from TV or the people we grew up with.

Related Article: The Negative Attitude Detox - Change Your Perspective in 10 Days