There is a specific kind of advice that hits differently in your 20s.

It’s usually not the huge, life-changing revelation you expect. It’s a sentence you hear at exactly the right time. Something somebody says in a podcast. A line in a book. A quote you scroll past on Instagram that, for whatever reason, makes you stop.

Maybe you’ve heard it before. Maybe six months ago it would have meant absolutely nothing to you. But today, because of the job you just started or the person you’re dating or the thing you’re trying to build or the fact that you have absolutely no idea what you’re doing next, it lands.

That’s what I love about life advice. The advice doesn’t necessarily change. You do.

So after the first Life Advice From the Internet, I kept collecting more. Some of it is practical. Some of it is the kind of thing you want to write in your Notes app and remember when everything feels much bigger than it probably is. And some of it is so simple that you almost feel stupid for needing to hear it.

But maybe that’s the point.

Because when you’re somewhere between 20 and 30, life can feel like a strange combination of having more freedom than you’ve ever had and simultaneously wondering whether you’re using any of it correctly.

You’re building a career. Dating. Losing friends and making new ones. Watching people get engaged. Watching other people break up. Moving apartments. Trying to save money. Trying to enjoy your money. Wondering whether you should be doing more. Wondering whether you should slow down.

There is no syllabus anymore.

So maybe a little good advice helps.

Put Your Phone Down and Actually Be Where You Are

The first piece of advice is painfully obvious: put your phone down every once in a while and enjoy your life.

I need this advice as much as anyone.

Our phones have somehow become the thing we wake up with, go to sleep with, bring to dinner, take to the bathroom, carry into meetings and instinctively reach for whenever we have seven unoccupied seconds.

And the problem isn’t just screen time. It’s how rarely we allow ourselves to be completely where we are.

You can be at dinner with your best friends and half-follow another conversation happening in your group chat. You can watch a movie while scrolling TikTok. You can walk into a party and immediately look at your phone because standing there without anything to do for ten seconds feels uncomfortable.

I think one of the easiest places to start is the beginning of your day.

“And it's it sets your brain from proactive to reactive.”

That’s what happens when the first thing you do every morning is open your phone. Before you’ve had a thought of your own, you’re responding to everyone else’s. An email. A text. A Slack message. A notification. Something somebody posted.

You haven't even gotten out of bed and your attention already belongs to everyone except you.

You don’t need to throw your phone into the ocean and disappear from society. Just find moments where it doesn’t need to be there. Leave it in your pocket when you walk into a room. Put it away on a date. Give your friends your full attention. Give where you are your full time.

The point isn’t to become anti-phone. It’s to make sure you’re not accidentally scrolling through the life you’re supposed to be living.

And if your phone has a way of immediately making you question where you are compared with everybody else, How To Stop Comparing Yourself to Everyone Else gets into that cycle more deeply.

The Thing That Feels Huge Today Probably Won’t Feel This Huge Forever

Another piece of advice I found was: what’s paramount today is a footnote tomorrow.

I love that.

There are obviously things that don’t magically become insignificant overnight. Breakups hurt. Losing someone hurts. Getting fired hurts. Real problems remain real problems.

But intensity changes.

Think about something that completely consumed you two years ago. There’s a decent chance you can barely remember the details now.

That text you spent three hours analyzing. That mistake at work you were positive everyone would remember forever. That person you couldn't imagine getting over. That decision you thought would determine the entire trajectory of your life.

Time has a way of changing the size of things.

That doesn’t mean what you’re feeling right now isn’t real. It means you shouldn’t assume you will always feel it this intensely.

Sometimes you need to give tomorrow the opportunity to make today feel smaller.

When Everything Feels Terrible, Do Something Extremely Basic

Here’s another one: if you’re feeling down, drink a glass of water, take a shower, go for a walk, and then see how you feel.

No, going for a walk is not going to solve your career crisis.

Water is not going to fix your relationship.

A shower is probably not going to reveal your purpose in life.

But sometimes the goal isn’t to solve everything. It’s to make everything feel 10 percent less intense.

Harvard researchers have pointed to walking as an accessible form of physical activity that can support mood and cognitive health. There’s something about physically getting out of the place where you’ve been sitting and thinking about a problem that can help change your relationship to it.

Get outside. Walk around the block. Drink some water. Call somebody. Take a shower.

Then reassess.

Your problem may still be waiting for you when you get back, but maybe it won’t feel like the only thing happening in the entire world anymore.

Some Things Are Worth Spending More Money On

Not all life advice needs to be existential.

One of the pieces I found was: if you’re going to wear cologne, go a little more expensive and don’t wear too much.

Completely agree.

A bottle of cologne can last forever because you should not be bathing in it. Find something you actually like, try it on your skin before buying it, and use enough that someone close to you thinks you smell good, not enough that everyone in the restaurant knows you arrived.

Your 20s are also when you start figuring out the random things that are worth paying more for.

A good suit. Shoes you’ll wear constantly. A mattress. A coat. A cologne you actually like.

You don't need the expensive version of everything. You just start realizing that sometimes buying one thing you genuinely love is better than buying the cheaper version three times.

It’s Not Hard. It’s Just New.

This might be my favorite piece of advice in the entire episode.

It’s not hard. It’s just new.

Think about how many things in your 20s you’re doing for the first time.

Your first real job. Your first serious relationship. Your first breakup from a serious relationship. Your first apartment. Your first time negotiating a salary. Your first time getting fired. Your first time managing people. Your first time realizing a friendship might not fit your life anymore.

Of course some of it feels impossible.

You’ve never done it before.

“It feels really hard. It feels like the most intense thing. It feels like it's weighing you down. It feels like it's impossible. It feels like you're never gonna be able to figure it out.”

Then you do.

And the second time usually feels different.

This is something I wish more people understood about their 20s. We interpret discomfort as evidence that we’re bad at something when sometimes it’s just evidence that we haven't done it yet.

That’s why I think Is It Normal to Feel Behind in Your 20s? is so connected to this. Once school ends, everyone starts moving at different speeds and experiencing their own firsts at completely different times.

You’re not necessarily behind because something still feels difficult.

You might just be new at it.

Do the Work. There Really Aren’t Any Shortcuts.

There is an entire industry built around making things sound easier than they are.

How to get in shape quickly. How to become successful overnight. How to grow your business immediately. How to transform your dating life. How to become confident.

And I understand why we want those answers.

We want the result without spending years becoming the person capable of producing it.

But another piece of advice from the episode gets right to it: do the work that it takes to be good at something. There are no shortcuts.

That’s true of your career. It’s true of relationships. It’s true of confidence. It’s true of building something. It’s true of almost anything you care about becoming genuinely good at.

There are tricks that make things easier. There are people who can teach you. There are smarter ways to do things.

But eventually, you still have to do the reps.

If you want to become a better writer, you have to write. If you want to get better socially, you have to talk to people. If you want to become better at your job, you have to spend enough time doing it badly, learning, asking questions, making mistakes, and eventually getting better.

How to Build Confidence When You Feel Behind in Life gets at the same idea: confidence is built through evidence and action, not by waiting around until you magically feel ready.

You don’t think your way into being good at something.

You do your way there.

Also, Wear Sunscreen

Seriously.

This is one of those things a lot of guys somehow make it well into adulthood without taking seriously.

The American Academy of Dermatology recommends broad-spectrum, water-resistant sunscreen with SPF 30 or higher to protect your skin from harmful UV rays and reduce skin-cancer risk.

Wear sunscreen.

That’s the section.

You Have More Time to Figure Yourself Out Than You Think

There is a weird pressure in your 20s to arrive at a final version of yourself.

By 25, you should know what you want to do.

By 27, maybe you should be in the relationship.

By 30, surely you should have figured out where you’re going.

Except there is no final version.

The job you desperately want right now might bore you five years from now. The city you can't imagine leaving might eventually feel too small. Something you currently think is central to your identity might become something you barely think about.

That’s not failure.

That’s what growing up actually looks like.

One of the pieces of advice I found was that it’s okay to spend more time figuring yourself out. I’d take it even further.

I don't think you ever completely figure yourself out.

You figure out what makes sense for this version of you. Then you live a little more, learn a little more, change a little more, and figure it out again.

That can feel exhausting if you think life is supposed to eventually become certain.

It can feel exciting if you realize you're allowed to keep changing.

Stop Living So Far Into the Future That You Miss Right Now

The final piece of advice is the one I keep coming back to:

Try not to waste life worrying about the future. We’re here now. That’s about the only thing we know.

This is much easier to write than it is to actually do.

We spend so much time mentally living in futures that don’t exist yet. What happens if this job doesn't work out? What happens if this relationship ends? Where am I going to be in five years? What if I don't accomplish the thing I want to accomplish? What if everybody else gets there first?

Planning matters. Ambition matters. Thinking about what you want matters.

But there’s a point where preparing for your future becomes missing your present.

“Knowing that today is the only time that matters.”

That doesn’t mean today is the only day that will ever matter. It means today is the only one you can actually do anything with.

You can’t go to the gym next Thursday today. You can’t ask somebody out next month today. You can’t do the work tomorrow today.

You only get to decide what you do with the day you're currently in.

And maybe that’s the thread connecting almost all of this advice.

Put your phone down because you’re here now.

Remember that what feels enormous today may get lighter because time keeps moving.

Go for the walk because sometimes you need to get out of your head and back into your life.

Do the work because the future you want gets built through what you repeatedly do today.

Give yourself time to figure yourself out because there isn't a deadline coming where you have to submit the final version.

Your 20s can feel incredibly urgent. There is always something else to accomplish, decide, fix, start, find, earn, become or figure out.

Maybe not everything needs to happen right now.

And Here’s The Thing

I think the best advice rarely gives you an answer to your entire life.

It gives you something useful for the part you're in right now.

Maybe today you need to hear that the thing crushing you will eventually feel lighter. Maybe you need permission to take longer figuring yourself out. Maybe you need to stop waiting for a shortcut and actually do the work. Maybe you need to stop thinking about where you’re supposed to be at 30 and pay attention to where you are at 24, 26 or 29.

Or maybe you just need to put your phone down and go outside for a while.

The advice that changes something for you today might do nothing for somebody else. And something you dismiss today might become exactly what you need six months from now.

That's why I keep collecting it.

You never really know which sentence is going to find you at exactly the right time.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the best life advice for your 20s?

Give yourself more time than you think you need. Be present, do the work, stop assuming everyone else has figured out something you haven't, and remember that you are still experiencing a lot of life for the first time.

Is it normal to not have your life figured out in your 20s?

Yes. Careers, relationships, friendships, priorities and even your idea of who you are can change dramatically throughout your 20s. There isn't one age when everything is supposed to become clear.

How do I stop worrying about my future?

You probably won't stop completely. Try bringing your attention back to what you can actually affect today. Planning for the future is useful. Constantly mentally living there isn't.

Why does everything feel so hard in your 20s?

A lot of it is new. You're navigating situations without the structure you had earlier in life, and being inexperienced at something can easily feel like being incapable of it. Those aren't the same thing.

How can I be more present in my life?

Start small. Put your phone away when you're with people, spend some time outside, stop filling every quiet second with scrolling, and consciously pay attention to the part of your life you're actually living right now.