As I’ve mentioned before, my c0-worker and friend is turning 30 in two weeks and we’ve been talking a lot about that particular birthday and what it all means. There seems to be so much psychological pressure placed on us to have accomplished certain things and hit specific milestones. Sometimes we don’t even realize these pressures exist, they are buried deep in our sub-conscious.

One of our other co-workers and friends, who’s in her 40s, was giving us her own perspective on turning 30. She said that her real adult life didn’t begin until she was 30, and that everything prior to that was preparation for her journey. Hearing that was comforting; that she saw 30 as a starting point, as opposed to a kind of day of reckoning “What have you accomplished by now?!!?!”

As she’s a Christian, she also mentioned something fascinating that I did not know. Apparently, 30 holds a ton of significance in both the Bible itself and in Jesus’s life. Since I’m not religious, maybe this is obvious to those of you who are Christian, but apparently, Jesus started his ministry at age 30. Prior to that he worked as a carpenter and “grew in stature, wisdom, and favor with God and man.” Also, back in the day Priests trained until they reached their 30th birthday to join the Priesthood.

I love this idea that we can view turning 30 as a a kind of re-emergence of self, like we are coming out of our cocoons to become butterflies.