Hot take: dissatisfaction will always find its level. Also? My dude, check in with "Felix" when you're both 45 and 55. Where is the source of value in a life?

Hot take: dissatisfaction will always find its level. Also? My dude, check in with "Felix" when you're both 45 and 55. Where is the source of value in a life? There is no right answer but I can tell you from observation that whatever combinations work for people, they are almost always not premised on stasis. Popular culture, night life, preoccupation with the finest examples (or most trendy) of things like croissants, most especially, drinking drugs and the drive of libido—all of these are ephemeral pleasures. Here in the Bay Area it's very easy to see the whole spectrum of life-choices and make a survey of the outcomes that results from different investment in career, pleasure, parenting, community, etc. There's a subtext in writing like this: that what the author really wants, is to be frozen in a moment they regret is behind them; to forever be full of potential and on the cusp: well, it don't work that way I'm afraid, and neither your potential nor your youth nor the twinkle that come from being Young and Bright and Attractive last. What I can say having made my own survey of outcomes is this: to the extent that your anchor sense of self worth and satisfaction in life on those ephemeral things (or worse, their pale social-media social-politics echos), you're gonna have a Real Bad Time getting older. That does not mean you need to learn to love the bomb that is your kids. It does mean that you need to have insight and perspective on your own and other's psychology and manage to it. Lots of traditions and cultures have evolved pretty solid ways for managing this shit. Insight meditation and investing in your community through volunteering and even hobbies are rightly popular. But family and friends (i.e your actual not online social network) are almost irreplaceable. Stop chasing what was, no matter how eloquently you lament, you're not getting back to it or holding on. The river of aging and accumulating memory and the cummulative consquences of your behavior and decisions are inexorable, as they are for all. Even the rich. The young who are actually 24 just generally don't realize that yet. That's why they are who they are, as they should be.