Welcome To Modern Adulting!

So you want to learn about Modern Adulting? Great! Welcome to the first day of the rest of your life.

Source: Tenor

Here’s the simple facts of life in less than a tweet: You don’t know what you don’t know, and that’s okay. IT’S NOT YOUR FAULT! However, if you want to live YOUR best life, then it is your responsibility to define what that means and learn how to do it well.

As a recovering fault-aholic turned personal growth junky, I know how difficult it can be to balance the expectations the world bestows upon us with the experiential truths of our own individual realities. But what I’ve come to learn, and further appreciate with time, is that perfectly imperfect balance is the definition of being human.

We are all products of our environment and being raised in the Information Age is no easy feat. Who isn’t overwhelmed with all the things we’re “supposed to” know but don’t, and all the things we’re “supposed to” be but aren’t?

Source: Tenor

The struggle is real, but it doesn’t have to be so hard.

When I was in my twenties, I started reading Rich Dad Poor Dad by Robert T. Kiyosaki, a well known book about financial literacy. My biggest takeaway however had little to do with finances. Instead, I became fixated on an assumption made about human behavior.

The first chapter keyed me into a pretty obvious, but undervalued truth about growing up. Parents can’t teach what they don’t know. More specifically, Kiyosaki makes the argument the reason so many people struggle financially is because money is taught at home, not in school.

This prompted me to consider what other knowledge and skills are exclusively taught at home? And how that source of education influences how we interact with the world throughout our lives?

For me, an obvious example was organizational skills.

Growing up I was regularly yelled at and ridiculed for being messy. My family used to call me “drop and run JoAnna” and lines about my messy bed found their way into divisional sing songs at summer camp. While packing up my room for my freshman year at college a friend even asked my mom “did you know there is carpeting in there?”

As early as I can remember, my parents used to threaten me with consequences like not being allowed to play with friends until my room was clean.

So what did I do? I shoved all my belongings into drawers, closets, and under the bed, then vacuumed the floor so my room looked presentable enough to go about my business.

Source: Tenor

Over time this unhealthy habit became part of the operating system I used to navigate the world. Despite often being overprepared, the disorganization of my thoughts, feelings, and emotions weighed on me like a dense fog that crushed my confidence.

That lack of clarity made me feel both insecure and overwhelmed. Like a kid who doesn’t know they need glasses, how was I supposed to know it was possible to view the world differently? Clearly I could feel something was off, but I didn’t know how to communicate it; because that too is a learned skill.

You see, growing up my parents expected me to know how to clean my room, but they never dedicated the time to teach me how to do it well. At least not in a way that made sense to a child.

Oh how I wish I could give my childhood self a hug. And my parents’ childhood selves a hug too.

People would say I was too hard on myself or made the fix seem easy, like I “should just…”. After all, based on my impressive professional and academic accolades, to the outside world it appeared like I always accomplished my perceived goals.

But knowing the truth about what was hiding behind closed doors and drawers made me feel like a fraud. None of my belongings had a dedicated home which translated to not feeling at home with who I was.

Source: Tenor

I’ve since come to understand that the physical state of my room was both a projection of how I felt inside and a reflection of my environment.

Messy JoAnna jokes served to amplify and reinforce my negative feelings about myself: ashamed, embarrassed, stupid, and less than for not knowing how to just figure things out myself. Then, as I got older and my world got bigger, whenever I didn't understand how to connect the dots between others’ expectations and my own reality, I’d question my ability to do anything right.

I felt like I was always at fault.

So how did I change the narrative from being a fault-aholic to a personal growth junky? I learned to have compassion for myself, and then my parents, by recognizing it’s not my fault; and it’s not theirs either. After all, parents can’t teach what they don’t know.

Yet, my poor organizational skills had already seeped into every crucial area of my life including my confidence at work and in school, the quality of my relationships, the way I cared for my body, and my overall self esteem.

After a series of events including a cancer diagnosis at the age of 25, instead of accepting blame, I learned how to accept responsibility.

Source: Twitter

If you look at the rise of the self-help industry, the number of lifestyle bloggers, and the popularity of influencers, and of course the slow but steady de-stigmatization of therapy, it’s clear I’m not the only one who needed support, structured guidance, or wisdom about how to be a better version of myself.

And that’s okay! What I learned is that this process is called adulting; and the overachiever in me wanted to do it well.

As a result, I dedicated the last four years of my life observing and organizing the chaos of what it means to be an adult in a modern world. I’ve studied everything from the social expectations of what we’re “supposed” to know to the mental health implications of not knowing what we don’t.

Sorting through all the information and revisiting my own experiences, I viscerally understand that the struggle is real. There was so much I needed to learn, relearn, and reevaluate regarding what I had learned about myself growing up; and I’m still learning and probably always will be.

But again, just because the struggle is definitely real, doesn’t mean it needs to be so hard.

Although my access to educational information is very different from what my parents had growing up, there’s still no one textbook or manual on adulting that outlines all the things you’re supposed to know or how to do them well. And quite honestly, I don’t think there should be.

Growing up should be fun! So instead of a textbook or a manual, I’ve created a playbook.

Source: Tenor

JoJo’s Playbook for Modern Adulting features eighteen home and community-based living skills that will be in demand for as long as humanity exists. Think: predictable life cycle needs taught using creative structured play.

The goal of my playbook is to provide tools, resources, and experiential learning opportunities to help you master the craft of adulting with confidence.

But when I say the craft, I mean your craft because the beauty of Modern Adulting is that you get to define your own expectations about what YOUR life looks like. I’m just going to help you learn the skills to do it well, in a way that is authentic to the learning style of your inner child.

If you’re here, I’m excited to welcome you to Modern Adulting. I look forward to getting to know each other on this deeply personal journey together.

With tremendous gratitude and appreciation,

JoJo