The Quarter-Life Crisis Diaries

I turned 25 with a fully developed prefrontal cortex 🧠

“A whimsical hand-drawn illustration of ‘Life as a 25-year-old’. Simple anime Japanese cartoon style, flat painting, playful lines. Use bright and vibrant colors to evoke playfulness, creativity, and absurdism.” —prompt on Midjourney :)

I’m officially 25.09 years old. I meant to write this at 25.00, but I’d been in a dazed slump slogging through my preordained quarter-life crisis from 24.91 to 25.00.

The symptoms were there: confusion, jadedness, nihilism, long stretches of alone time, occasional waves of despair, a briefly active but now hibernated desire to move to NYC, a stint of hedonism paired with wardrobe upgrades, and an obligatory read of “Designing Your Life” (classic.)

Normally, when an existential crisis like this creeps in, my instinct is to look outward for answers. Friends, family, books, and Redditors typically provide some solace (“hey, you’re not alone”) and clears away 20% of the confusion (“here’s what is happening to you). But no one can tell you how to resolve the remaining 80%: What’s next?

One perspective I found on Reddit on “here’s what is happening to you” that resonated (Reddit source)

In my consultations, I’ve reinforced that there are infinite ways to live a life. Choosing how is a deeply personal journey determined by three key variables:

• Your values (what matters most to you)

• Your past experiences (the lessons you’ve collected over time)

• The collective zeitgeist (what’s happening in the world around you)

No one can tell you what the right next thing to do is because the equation looks different for everyone. Really, only you are capable of getting yourself through the remaining 80% of confusion. Stumbling and floundering are inevitable of course, but that’s where the growth happens.

Where I’m at now at the end of the crisis tunnel is fully embracing a new guiding philosophy: absurdism. At its core, absurdism suggests that life is inherently absurd because humans have a craving for meaning—and yet the universe offers no inherent meaning.

From all of the memoirs I’ve read and life experiences that I’ve gathered thus far, my ultimate conclusion is neither groundbreaking nor novel (repeated ad nauseum in books, movies, and every family gathering at this point): Life is short and unpredictable.

Freak accidents, a global pandemic, a cancer diagnosis (so many books I’ve read this year seem to involve this), or even losing your job during a company-wide layoff (or let’s be real, to AI)—life can pivot in ways we never anticipate.

Instead of endlessly seeking certainty or meticulously planning for a future we can’t control, absurdism invites us to confront life on our own terms: embrace the present, savor the fleeting and absurd moments of existence, and live authentically and joyfully.

For the last month, I’ve invested more heavily in my personal passions, hobbies, and relationships that genuinely bring me joy. At work, I’ve embraced the chaos and shifted my focus to the journey itself—reminding myself that every challenge is a chance to build character and cultivate resilience. I’m following my curiosity, wherever that takes me.

How I see life now as a 25-year-old is drastically different from how I saw it at 18. Today, I believe that life’s value lies not in what it leads to but in how it’s lived. Seven years ago, as a bright-eyed and bushy-tailed high school graduate eager to leave a mark on the world, I believed in the opposite. After all, that’s what all commencement speeches will tell you.

How will my philosophy evolve as the years go on? That remains to be seen. For now, here’s how I’ve been living life recently:

• Learning to play Regent’s Park by Bruno Major on the piano 🎹

• Learned to play Come Together by The Beatles on the drums 🥁

• Recreated one of my favorite smoothies (the ‘OMG’) from Sidewalk Juice – I now make this at least once a week! 🍌

• Cooking recipes from Joshua Weissman’s “An Unapologetic Cookbook” – recently made Chicken Katsu & Cacio e Pepe 👩‍🍳

• Planned a Patagonia hiking trip in the spring with a stop at Ushuaia, also known as the “End of the World” 🌎

• Aprendiendo español para preparar de viaje 💬

• Interior decorating the sh*t out of my new apartment and making it cozy 🛋️

• Catching up with my close high school & college friends at home and over FaceTime 📞

• Putting myself out there to make new friends 💃

• Trying out SoulCycle classes 🚴‍♀️

• Reading a non-fiction and fiction book each month (This month: Nexus by Yuval Noah Harari and In Five Years by Rebecca Serle) 📚

• Re-building my personal website using AI UI tools like v0, bolt.new, and prompt-stack 💻

As an absurdist, I’m now embracing life's inherent weirdness and unpredictability. Instead of clinging to rigid plans, I’ve decided to let go and let the journey unfold as it will.

Here’s to another year of stumbling and growing—and to embracing the chaos that makes life worth living.