25 Secrets of Life from a 25-year-old Mermaid

It’s no secret, I’m a girl who loves a celebration, especially when the celebration is of my own awesome life. Birthdays are a unique day that allow you to celebrate the past, while savoring your future.

While some people cope with aging by eating their feelings in funfetti cake, personally, I enjoy growing another year older. Why you ask? Because growth is what gives life zest and meaning.

I approach each new year with my heart open to the improved knowledge and confidence it brings. Through my first quarter of life I’ve learned a great deal of lessons that have helped me become the badass mermaid I am today.

1. Make healthy a habit

Incorporate healthy habits throughout your daily routine and turn your health into a lifestyle. Eat as clean as possible, be sure to get enough sleep, drink water and sweat everyday. When you feel strong in your body, you will feel strong in life.

2. View yourself as a brand

You are the C.E.O of your life so make it work for you! Find your story and what you want to represent as a brand, then live it, breathe it and become it. As you begin to build your brand take the time to better yourself, become more knowledgeable in your product and sell it to the world!

3. Make friends with strangers

Opening up to complete strangers could help you see a spark in yourself you’ve never noticed before.

4. Begin each day with a grateful heart

Before I begin the day I take a minute to appreciate all the awesomeness in my life. My beautiful home, my exceptional health, and coffee.

5. Then start your day with a dance party

After I give thanks to my kick ass life, I celebrate it all with a morning dance party. It’s a fun way to get those good vibes flowing for the day. Put on your favorite jam-a-lam and let it all go...clothing is optional (however, I don’t recommend it).

6. Pay it forward

We have the power to change people's attitudes about the world through our own acts of kindness. Next time you are out at lunch, pick up a random tables tab or buy the person behind you in line at the coffee shop a cup of joe.

7. Serving is the best job a 20-something-year-old can have

Waiting tables has taught me a valuable set of skills like multi-tasking, communication and patience (a lot of patience). Not every shift is smooth sailing, but at the end of the day you walk with cash so who cares.

8. Traveling is a way of life

I adventure, roam, and interact with different cultures every. single. day. Even though my passport has one stamp from an all-inclusive Cancun vaycay doesn’t mean I haven’t traveled. I have opened my eyes to the world around me and live life in a way where I’m able to explore the world without ever having to buy a plane ticket (I consider that savvy traveling at it’s finest).

9. The best cure for a hang over is sweat

I have trained my body to endure the wrath of a binge drinking rager. It doesn’t matter how white girl wasted I get the night before, I make it a point to sweat it out first thing in the morning because honestly, who wants to waste an entire day feeling like shit rotting away on the couch? Not me.

10. Control your emotions

People always preach “happiness is a choice” but what people forget to mention is the fact in order to choose happiness we first must learn how to control our fear, anxiety, sadness, jealousy, exhaustion and every other feeling we are capable of experiencing. Once you learn how to keep all your emotions in check, only then are you able to hold the power of complete bliss.

11. Surround yourself with positivity

Are the people around you helping you toward success - or are they holding you back? You are a product of your environment and you hold the power to create an environment that will motivate you toward your goals.

12 . Money comes and money goes

Money always has a way of working itself out so there is never a reason to stress about it. Spend everyday rejoicing in the little pleasures you already have and eventually the numbers in the bank won’t even matter.

13. Meditate on the reg.

I am learning how to incorporate this life-skill into by daily shit, shower and shave routine. Meditation helps me slow down, breathe, reenergize and connect with my on-point intuition. Start your meditation journey with breathing in affirmations for 5-10 minutes everyday.

14. Create your own life mantra

Mantras help us live our day-to-day life in a more fulfilled way. When I first moved to Hawaii, my mantra quickly became “Treat Yo Self.” It helped me focus on living life exactly how I wanted to, while teaching me how to fall in love with myself.

15. Love someone for who they are

Love is a beautiful thing when you can experience it with someone who you admire as an individual, not for how they make you feel or how they can provide for you. This will help you to grow within the relationship, allowing you each become your best self rather than having the pressure to live up to each others expectations.

16. Find the good in each new day

Slow life down and challenge yourself to rejoice in the small gifts hidden throughout the day. Finding significance in each new day helps create a life full of meaning while providing reassurance that you are on the right path.

17. Practice makes perfect

People are paid to do the things they love because they have turned it into a way of life, allowing them to practice and become better at it everyday. Make more time to do what you love, eventually you will master your craft and the world will begin to recognize your true talents.

18. Believe in the unknown

Not knowing what the future hold is a thrilling way to live life. Let go of everything (family, friends, relationships, school, fear, doubt etc.) hold onto nothing but the confidence in yourself. Be courageous enough to believe that whatever happens is supposed to happen and you will end up exactly where you are meant to be.

19. Disconnect from technology

When we're not constantly distracted by the technology’s black hole of information, we become better listeners. We really begin to establish and strengthen existing connections and let go of useless information.

20. Weed is good

I’m not the stereotypical stoner who gets sucked into Netflix land rotting away on the couch. I go for a run, play in the water or write my little heart out. The devil’s lettuce helps my imagination run wild, gets my creative juices going and makes me totally stoked on life. Honestly, I think weed gets a bad wrap. Get over the taboo people and welcome to the 21st century.

21. Pizza is an acceptable meal any time of the day

hot or cold.

22. Patience is a virtue

Our millennial generation has become adapted to instant gratification making patience nearly impossible. Being patient is such a beautiful quality to have, it says you love yourself enough to have faith in the unknown. Master the art of patience by perfecting life secrets #13 and #16 first.

23. Keep a journal

Challenging myself to write in a journal everyday inspires me to live life in a way that’s worth writing about. Journaling is a remarkable way to believe in yourself, and when you believe in yourself anything is possible.

24. Love yourself

By taking the time to create a loving relationship with yourself, you are enabling positive energy and allowing wonderful situations to occur in your life.You are all you have and you are all you need, love yourself enough to believe you deserve it all and are capable of achieving anything your heart desires.

25. It’s only the beginning

Life is an endless creation of who you are and who you want to become.

I’m a 25-year-old single college drop out. To society, my social status has quarter-life-crisis written all over it, but to me, I’ve reached my own personal success and couldn’t be happier with the remarkable woman I am today.

I have finally discovered how to create my frivolous childhood mermaid dreams into a full-blown reality and I'm just getting started.