As part of my New Year’s resolution, I finally decided it was time to get my driver’s license. I’ve said I would do it for five consecutive years now, yet I never actually make time to start learning. In fact, the longer I delayed it, the less I wanted to do it. Driving had always felt like a teenage rite of passage, not something you begin in your twenties, and I convinced myself that I had somehow missed my window.
When I sat in the driver’s seat for the first time last week, my instructor asked if I had ever driven a car before. Abashedly, I admitted that this was my very first time. I can’t fully explain why, but saying it out loud felt strangely embarrassing, like admitting you don’t know how to ride a bike or swim. In my mind, I imagined people judging me, wondering why I hadn’t already done this or learned sooner.
I began comparing myself to my peers and even younger ones who had already gotten their driver’s licenses. That single moment spiralled into a feeling that I was somehow behind in life.
What started as anxiety about not being able to drive expanded into anxiety about everything else, like not having moved out of my parents’ house yet, never having been in a relationship, and not having travelled to countless countries or hiked obscure mountains. Suddenly, all my quiet insecurities resurfaced.
There were, of course, practical reasons that delayed my learning. Living in a city with convenient public transport, the cost of lessons, and the expense of owning a car all required careful planning before I could even book my first lesson. Still, there was always that nagging voice reminding me that I “should” have already done it.
As I continue learning to drive and improving with each lesson, I have come to realise that driving, like many achievements, doesn’t come with a rigid timeline.
There are no expiration dates on dreams or new skills, even though it often feels that way. We place an incredible amount of pressure on ourselves to complete things by a certain age, when in reality, doing them later may simply make the most sense. Driving isn’t “too late”; it is just a milestone reached when it is most convenient.
And of course, it isn’t just about driving. I know many people my age who feel this same sense of lagging. Comparisons between peers ignite feelings of inadequacy when you haven’t done something society has deemed necessary by a certain point in life.
Life is complicated and takes us in different directions; it’s hardly set in stone, so we shouldn’t be either. So, book the music lesson. Sign up for the gymnastics class. Learning something new should never be framed as being too late.
Featured image via Diana on Pexels
Loved this piece – it’s a great reminder that there’s no one timeline for life milestones like getting your driver’s license, and that learning isn’t something that expires with age. Reading this, I was thinking about how having dependable support – whether that’s patient instructors or reliable services like Coastal Auto Body to take care of your car after those early adventures – makes the whole journey feel less stressful and more empowering https://www.coastalautobody.com/
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