I’ve been meaning to write this since January, when I turned 25, but life has felt full and heavy in a way I didn’t quite expect. Now, a few months into turning 25, having graduated in that time and experienced a fair few other things too, I’d like to think I understand this season of life a little more than I did back then.
There was no big celebration. I went to church, my partner and I baked a cake. We spent time together, at home, easing back into familiar routines after being away. It was quiet, ordinary, and unexpectedly grounding.
What stayed with me most wasn’t the day itself, but the feeling that came with it.
Turning 25 and Becoming
Turning 25 doesn’t feel like an arrival. It feels like standing in a doorway.
I came across a painting recently of a series of open doorways leading into one another, and it felt like a visual way of describing this moment. The painting itself is somewhat distorted, almost like the mirrors at the funfair, but the rooms are quiet, almost empty, and there’s no clear sense of which way you’re meant to go. It isn’t unsettling exactly, but it does feel uncertain, it makes you pause.
Standing in the doorway, you become aware that there are many possible directions, but no obvious path. In some ways, that’s exactly how this next chapter feels.
There’s a sense of looking back and forward at the same time. Behind me are years that have shaped me more than I probably realised while I was living them. Experiences that felt uncertain at the time but now feel formative. Relationships that have deepened. Choices that once felt fragile and now feel quietly settled. In front of me are paths that are still unfolding, questions without clear answers, and a future that feels open rather than fixed.
I don’t feel behind, sometimes. But I definitely don’t feel finished either.
When I look back at my younger self, I’m aware of how much uncertainty shaped those early years. Stability wasn’t something I could rely on, and I learned quite quickly how to adapt, how to observe, how to keep going even when things felt unclear. At the time, it just felt like survival. Now, I can see that it also gave me something else, a kind of quiet resilience. Not because it was easy, but because it asked me to grow in ways I didn’t fully understand then.
Graduating this year has felt significant in a way I don’t think I’ve fully put into words yet. There was a time when this kind of milestone didn’t feel guaranteed, or even possible. And yet, there I was. Not at the end of something, but in the middle of something that’s still unfolding.
Learning from the classroom
Teaching has reinforced that understanding. Spending my days with children keeps me close to the reality of becoming. They don’t pretend to have everything figured out. Children ask honest questions and they change their minds, often. They live in the space between knowing and not knowing. Being around that every day has reminded me that growth is rarely neat, and that uncertainty isn’t something to be embarrassed by, but something to be worked with.
My faith has shaped this season too, though not in loud or tidy ways. More quietly, it has taught me to sit with complexity rather than rush past it. Noticing before explaining. To trust that meaning unfolds over time, and that not having all the answers can be a faithful posture in itself. Turning 25 has meant that I feel more settled in who I am, and more open about who I’m becoming. I’m less interested in certainty, and more interested in attention. Less focused on proving something, and more committed to learning how to live thoughtfully within the life I already have.
Standing in a doorway means you don’t fully belong to either room. You’re in between, you’re pausing. You’re noticing what you’re carrying with you, and what you’re ready to leave behind.
That’s where I find myself right now. I don’t have a list of lessons or a manifesto for the next five years. What I have is curiosity, gratitude, and a growing sense that life isn’t about arriving at a fixed point, but about learning how to move gently and honestly from one season to the next.
If you’d like to keep following along as this space grows, I’ll be sharing more reflections like this over time.
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