“From birth to death, people have many experiences, but the experiences that truly determine your future are mainly concentrated in your twenties. About 80% of your life’s decisive moments happen before age 35.”

The various uncertainties about the future force young people in their twenties to frequently make choices while feeling lost, growing through continuous trial and error. In the book “The Defining Decade: Why Your 20s Matter and How to Make the Most of Them Now”, Dr. Meg Jay reveals the importance of these crucial ten years from twenties to thirties for future life development, and how to navigate this critical period of growth more rationally and efficiently.

In the first part of the book, the author introduces an important concept in career development - identity capital.

“’Identity capital’ is the foundation of our personal capital. It reflects who we are and how we’ve lived our lives. It includes our investments in ourselves, and the things that have become part of who we are, through our expertise or long-term engagement.”

The decade between twenty and thirty is the best time to accumulate identity capital by doing things that increase our personal value, continuously investing in the person we want to become. As someone who’s “been there,” now in my thirties, I often reflect on my twenties, asking “What was I doing then? What was I thinking?” At different life stages, I’ve engaged in such memory retrieval, questioning “What did I do then that led to my current situation?” while also setting reasonable directions and goals for the future, making preliminary plans for next steps. This helps maintain rationality when faced with complex choices, enables graceful handling of fleeting opportunities, and ensures each step in accumulating identity capital is taken with certainty and clarity.

The uncertainty of the future fills life with various opportunities and risks. However, the consistency in our growth process, how our choices and outcomes at each age are linked together, serves as the ballast that keeps us steady regardless of life’s stormy seas.