A look into The Defining Decade 20 by Meg Jay
Why your twenties matter and how to make the most of them now
This month's read was a non-fiction book that I'd seen a few people recommended on their Instagram stories, so I decided to give it a try and I'm glad I did.
The book is written by Meg Jay, a clinical psychologist who tells us that our twenties are the most defining decade of adulthood contrary to what contemporary culture tells us. She recounts various therapy sessions, detailing real-life stories of her clients all facing difficulties in various areas of their lives such as relationships, love, fertility, and identity.
As a fellow “twentysomething” (23) I found the book quite eye-opening and it made me reflect and think about areas in my life that I'm not paying as much attention as I should be. It also confirmed that I was generally headed in the right direction with some room for improvements of course.
The book has 3 sections titled: Work, Love, and The Brain and Body. The section that stood out to me the most was “Love”, she discusses topics such as dating down, picking your family, and being in like. Although I enjoyed all 3 sections, this one especially made me think about how I approach my love life and why it’s important to develop healthy dating habits now rather than later. In one of the chapters, she talks about the ‘cohabitation effect’ and tells the story of one of her clients who moved in with his girlfriend quite quickly but things are going as he expected. Typically most people believe that moving in with their partner before they get married is a good way to gauge how they will be once they are married but she breaks down this belief by revealing that couples who move in together before marriage are actually more likely to divorce. Surprising right!
Research showed that the reasons why couples want to live together are different for men and women. Women want better access to love whilst men want easier access to sex.
She further explains that people often believe that moving in will “test their relationships” but the areas that actually test a relationship after marriage aren’t ventured into. Areas such as a mortgage, trying to get pregnant, getting up in the night with kids, holidays with in-laws, saving for retirement. She states that “Living with someone may have benefits but approximating marriage is not necessarily one of them”.
I had always thought that moving in together is like a taster of marriage but after reading this chapter I changed my mind and realised marriage is a different ballpark because you’re not dealing with the same things that happen during a marriage.
The book is very well written and is a nice mixture of real-life accounts and research/studies. It’s not just a load of “I think” but most reasonings are backed up by scientific research. Notably, there’s only one real-life account where things “don’t work out” and I think it would have been nice to include more accounts where there isn’t really a “happy ending” because the reality of life is that things don’t actually always work out. There could have been a better balance of this in the book but it might just be that most of her clients actually did get better after working with her which is a testimony to her work.
My biggest takeaway from this book as a 23-year-old is to not only live for now but for the future. Although it is important to have fun in our twenties it is also important to build something for yourself whether that’s your career, love life, or body. Your twenties will fly by and you don’t want to be thirtysomething or fortysomething regretting all the time you wasted on things that seemed worthwhile. Be intentional about the things you do, make your own certainty, and don’t be defined by what you didn’t know or didn’t do.
A few of my favorite quotes from the book:
“To achieve great things, two things are needed: a plan, and not quite enough time”
- Leonard Bernstein, composer
“What counts in making a happy marriage is not so much how compatible you are, but how you deal with incompatibility”
- Leo Tolstoy, writer
“Life can only be understood backward, but it must be lived forward.”
- Soren Kierkegaard, philosopher
“The more you use your brain, the more you will have to use.”
- George A, Dorsey, anthropologist