Adulting Is Hard

And what does being an adult even mean anyway?

Dear friends,

The rain drips gently from the gutters as I gaze out at the misty mountains. Some farmers are tending to the hill beyond the fence, and all I can really make out are their figures, backdropped against the white block of clouds. Here, nestled in the serene corners of San Ramon, our casita provides a new challenge: what does it mean to be an adult?

The mountains that surround us perch above the small city. The high elevation breeds a unique natural world of palm trees and pine forests. The house we are living in is situated on 111 acres of diverse ecosystems. Rolling hills of passionfruit vines are strung through a blanket of wires that stretch across fifty acres, while grassy cow pastures overlook deep mountain valleys. A creek snakes through the land providing a natural spring for drinking water before cascading into waterfalls at the mountains’ base.

The dogs enjoy the walks to the waterfalls the most, their noses pulling them to all corners of the jungle.

When I return from my walks in the morning I slip on my yellow rubber gloves and get to work on fulfilling my domestic duties, because even though I'm a feminist, I still desire a clean kitchen. I put away the dishes Alex has washed and scrub down the sink, the stove, the counters. I’m the type of person who needs a clean environment in order to think, so daily cleaning–though often tedious– has become a necessary ritual to maintain my sanity. As I wipe down the massive kitchen counter, it feels as though the white block of clouds, that also shrouded my own mind, clears.

Then, I begin to write.

A few hours later, hunger strikes, and I return to the kitchen for a snack. I hastily assemble something, devour it, and then gasp. The stove is splattered, and my dirty plate sits smugly in the clean sink.

Wait, when I clean it doesn’t stay that way forever? I have to do this over and over again, everyday for the rest of my life?

Adulting is hard.

There's the laundry, and the groceries, the meal planning and the prepping. The management of scorpions, wasps, termites and rats. The tending to and maintaining of fruit trees and seedlings. Keeping things clean, paying bills and tending to that pesky sourdough starter. The daily sweeping that doesn’t really do anything because you live with three fur babies.

And although it is monotonous, and sometimes it feels like it might in fact kill you, the routines that adulting demand can teach us a lot.

Routines for me are stabilizing. They help provide direction to the movement of my day, and allow my brain to not have to work so unnecessarily hard all the time. I know that when I get home from my walk, the next task is to clean, and that will lead the way to the beginning of my day; blurring the lines of doing that causes friction and an excuse to get out of doing the thing I'm overwhelmed to start.

A steady dose of self-discipline has been useful in those moments where you really don’t want to do the thing, but you do it anyway because you know it will feel better once you’ve done it.

And you know it will benefit you, and even in the moment after you have started the hard thing, because the hardest part is always starting, but in that moment that you are inside of the task, like being half way through your walk at the top of that mountain, you know that it was in fact worth it to do the hard thing.

When I get to the top of that mountain I take a deep breath as I drink in my surroundings. The sweet piny air washes over my lungs and the murmuring creeks drift past my ears. My mind is buzzing as I let it wander and ponder– I do my best thinking on these walks.

Nature hums with life, while the distant cars fade into a soft buzz. The endorphins are flowing and I’ve found the sweet spot between exertion and rejuvenation. The quiet of the outer world soothes the noise within and it’s in these moments that nature becomes my refuge.

It is both the reward for the mountain climbed, and the challenge overcome.

Adulting, I am learning, is about meeting yourself with the compassion reflective of how hard you push yourself– blurring the lines between self-discipline and self-care. It’s about taking breaks, resting when you're tired, eating good food, and celebrating each accomplishment no matter how small. It’s about asking, what are my needs? –and meeting them shamelessly.

Being an adult isn’t just about maintaining a household. It’s about building a life powered by sustainability, not efficiency.

As we spend the next six months in these mountains, our exploration of the outer world will pause. But my journey inward—the hardest one yet—has only just begun.

Stay tuned.