3 Things That Will Change Your Life When Entering the Workforce

Entering your 20's is exciting. You start to go to college, you might even travel and you are at that age where high school, wasn't that long ago.

Now I'm almost 24 and I will not accept that I graduated high school back in 2017. All of a sudden it's not 2 or 3 years ago. It's almost 7!? What happened during these years, besides Covid?

I'm currently working full time and a lot has changed in my life. Especially my relationship with time and setting priorities, which I want to share with you so that you know what's coming for you.

You will need to prioritize

I'm not talking out of the student stage anymore. This is about entering the real world, where you actually have to work. Now, most of your day is not going to be you doing non sense with your friends and hanging out in the park at 2 pm.

It's you, working... until 6/7/8 pm.

So there will be only a couple of hours left in the evening and on the weekends.

Work drastically limits your free time and you need to make sure that you spend time on the right things, with the right people.

Is it worth it to go visit that one friend that you were always cool with but never really had that real connection with?
If yes, keep in mind that this takes away a big chunk of the small amount of time you have besides work.

When I go home for the weekend, I need to make sure that I spend enough time with my family and manage to see my relevant friends. You decide who is important enough to take that time.
It's like a game, having 48 hours available (or less) and optimizing your time so that your loved ones feel appreciated but you don't neglect your desires and goals.

So much of this thought process wasn't needed when you were younger, but it comes suddenly and you'll realize how fast life gets.

That's when you start to understand how stressful adult life actually is. And I know, there is so much more to come.

Weeks fly by

Once you find your routine and the tasks at work completely absorb you, it's amazing how quickly time flies by in your day-to-day life.

At 7 you're standing in the gym, then at 9, you're at work, and all of a sudden it's lunchtime. Then you work for a couple of more hours and boom, you're standing at home left with a few hours to do whatever (if you're lucky).

Do that for a while and you don't even realize how the year went from February to May. I still can't wrap my head around that.

Socializing is a must

Hey introverts, this is a tough one.

This is not like university where you go to class with your pajamas on and casually leave without having talked to anyone for the past few days.

In most jobs, you will need to work as a team. That means engaging in conversations.

For people that are not much into small talk, me included, that can be a real challenge. Having a coffee with your colleagues, going to eat with your colleagues, chit chat during work ... all of that is fun, but it can be overwhelming at times, especially if you're not a talkative person or engage in group conversations as much.

You will need to learn that, but, usually, the people around you will make it easy for you, and it's interesting getting to know your colleagues since you spend the most time with them.

Conclusion

Looking back at my student life, when the time felt infinite, I remember so many moments that seem like they lasted forever, just because there was so much happening.

Alive Time, spent in good places with even better people.

That's a good reminder right there. You will mostly remember the special moments. And this excludes Dead Time, meaning Tiktok, Netflix, or scrolling through Instagram.

There are many more lessons to come, but I think it's an interesting experience since you can always look back and separate your life into segments.

Every segment is unique, and realizing that you're in the midst of a major change in your life is so exciting because there is A LOT to discover.