How do we feel about turning 30?
At the end of last year we ran the survey “Your thoughts on turning 30”. Thanks to all of you who took part. We can now reveal the results, so… drum roll please…
When will we grow up?
Only 38% of us consider ourselves to be grown-ups! The majority of people (52%) felt that we are some way towards being grown-up, and one tenth didn’t consider ourselves to be grown-ups at all.
Apparently, the qualifications for this grown-up status are responsibilities and attitude (28% and 27%). Interestingly, most people thought that getting a mortgage (11%) was a more grown-up thing to do than getting married (6%) or having children (9%).
Where are we now?
It seems that many of us are more traditional at heart than we may realise. When asked “When you were 20, how did you picture your life at 30?” the most common answers included: settled, married, kids, stable, own home, successful career, serious and sorted.
And yet, two thirds of us said that our current reality is different or very different than we pictured it would be. Here’s how some of us described our current circumstances:
“Single, no children, no settled home, changing job.”
“I seem to enjoy the bits that I thought would be boring”.
“Still not clear what I want out of life.”
“Life circumstances and priorities change, like Oasis said, you just gotta roll with it.”
The good news is that on average, people feel more comfortable in their skin as they get older. Aside from worries about putting on weight, etc., most of us feel happier about who we are, more confident and less worried about what other people think of us than we did in our early twenties.
Priorities
The top priority for most people at 30 is a partner (45%), followed by children (16%) and career (14%). However for many others, having children is one of the lowest priorities, with over a third naming it as the lowest concern, just behind travel (38%).
At age 20, most of us said that our top priority was social life (39%) followed by a partner (19%). The lowest priority by some margin was having children (68%).
Looking ahead
More good news: the vast majority of us are satisfied with our lives at the moment – two thirds, in fact. One tenth are not satisfied, and a quarter are just not sure.
We still expect life to change quite a bit over the next 10 years – 68% of us said that we expect our lives to change either drastically or a bit over the next 10 years, and 31% expect it to change as much as it has in the last 10 years. Only 1% believe that it won’t change much at all.
Our big ambitions for the next ten years are not dissimilar to the ones we hoped to achieve by 30. Most of us still want to get married, have children, and be financially secure. And although it’s not a priority, a lot of us added that we would like to travel more in the next 10 years. One person said that their main ambition at this point is to “Settle down and try to attain the original goals I set out at 20.”
For more insights into how we feel about turning 30, check out these articles in response to the survey: Not so Great Expectations and More Comfortable at 30 than at 20
Who took part in the survey?
32% of respondents are male, and 68% are female. 23% of people already have children while 77% do not. 42% are married, 41% are single, 16% are in a relationship or have a partner and 1% is divorced.
Written by Lindsey Sisk.
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