I used to use other people as markers of what it means to experience life. Until I had also gone through XYZ, I believed I hadn’t grown much in that field. We’re used to using different forms as templates for how we should go about our lives. We use several films as tutorials on how certain experiences should be. We get lost in the drunken daze of books and believe that people will mimic the characters we love. We hear stories of family members and past generations, and somehow think we must inherit those same experiences, personalities, and achievements to fully “live” a life. I read somewhere online that to be truly happy, you have to be ready to disappoint the people around you because your experiences, values and choices will inevitably disappoint them because you’re a different person from your friends and ancestors.
I’ve had a lot of debates and arguments with myself because, on the one hand, I have my own skills, interests, and background that are unique to me—on the other hand, I think of all the things and people I did not experience and wonder—am I truly living? Older people often tell the younger generation to listen to their advice because they have more life experience but sometimes, I wonder, can we really use their experience when the world has changed so much? Will we learn using their experiences or going through our own? I feel the only way we really learn and understand life is through personal experiences. We can’t impose our beliefs, values, emotions, and experiences on other people—even if we could, would other people genuinely feel anything?
This also applies to celebrities and the exhausting culture surrounding public figures. As someone who doesn’t understand the hype around celebrity culture, I do feel pity for those who feel the need to follow their favourite celebrities’ lifestyles and believe that they need to do things exactly as their faves have done to “achieve” certain things. Nowadays, people don’t watch films, listen to songs, or read books to drink in it fully and make their own judgements. I’ve met people who exclusively read Dostoyevsky and Didion, not because they enjoy their works but because they think it makes them “look smart.” I’ve heard people who listen to certain artists to achieve a certain aesthetic in their music tastes or even to make their Spotify Wrapped look “cool.” People online admit that they only watch certain films because their favourite influencers watch them, and they want to become like them, so they watch them. Doesn’t anyone think this is a very sad way of living? You become a shell of who you could be, following other people’s experiences and choices, not understanding that it is their experiences, not yours. And by the time people realise this, it is too late.
It’s why high schoolers graduate feeling dejected that their teenage years did not look anything like High School Musical. It’s why people are left heartbroken when their relationships and friendships do not turn out the way they usually do in a Disney film. It’s why top-paying doctors and lawyers feel unsatisfied with themselves as they realise that listening to their parents blindly instead of doing what they want does not make them happy. You cannot inherit your favourite book character’s relationships. You cannot follow your favourite celebrity’s lifestyle thinking it will lead you to fame. You cannot “stick with tradition” when it comes to your life choices vs your family. The experiences and journeys that made you become the person you are today, even if they’ve been experienced similarly by others, are still uniquely yours.
We need to live life beyond these templates because personal experience matters most. The only way to develop maturity is from firsthand living. In a culture where films, books, and celebrity lives act as blueprints for what it means to “live,” we risk losing touch with the beauty and importance of our unique experiences. We should accept and welcome the messy, irreplaceable growth from personal experience. We’re surrounded by roadmaps for life—films that show us how love should feel, books that depict what heartbreak and friendship look like, social media posts and family stories that teach us how success is meant to unfold. When we measure our lives against someone else’s, we rob ourselves of something crucial—the chance to experience life on our own terms. Whatever you do will disappoint others. However, that is the cost of carving out your own path. Besides, life is a personal journey, not a checklist.
“We must live our own experience, we cannot inherit it.” — Andrei Tarkovsky
You carved these words directly from your heart and touched my heart with them. Thank you. ❤️
i loved this post just like i did all of your others that i have read. the way that you experience life and analyse it with your own wiseness is so meaningful to me. the way you talked about fomo, and the performative act we all perform in our generation is so, true. i have been disappointed by my own life experiences many times by comparing it to others. i refused my own taste and forced music down my ears i disliked just because others thought it was cooler. i asked so many people which career path i should take and never enough times to my own heart because i never thought my own life experience was valid enough. thank you so much for your wise words, your pieces always have a way of changing me for the better, tunmise :)