26 and told I have “old lady vibes.” On here and in real life, endearingly. I’ll admit, these comments have made a nest and bother me. How to come across as more “youthful” without compromising my maturity?

perryplats · 2020-04-11T21:02:27+00:00

It’s you and you aren’t hurting anyone. Embrace it! People love you for it.

stevierose789 · 2020-04-11T21:39:13+00:00

Are you by any chance the oldest sibling? If so perhaps it is one of the reasons you come across as the sensible one because you have had others rely on you since you were a kid.

2020-04-11T21:27:52+00:00

You are fortunate to have the wisdom now that many of your friends will spend the next two decades painfully acquiring. Cherish this.

Fuckitandthrowitaway · 2020-04-12T01:25:41+00:00

Having your shit together is nothing to be ashamed of. It's important to make your man feel needed as well, though.

curious-girl-5 · 2020-04-12T01:16:36+00:00

How do you shake a vibe that you can’t quite pinpoint?

Own your shit and keep improving all areas of your life - daily.

ajaa123 · 2020-04-12T02:46:01+00:00

You could just be an old soul or super mature. Nothing wrong with that girl.

PeanutbutterDruidess · 2020-04-12T03:30:23+00:00

I’m 24, but the oldest of my sisters, some trauma under my belt and have been told the same since high school. It use to annoy me, but now I own the mom friend title, still haven’t fully figured out if I like being called an old lady yet. But I require a cane when out and about so that doesn’t help, I have a slight southern twang to my Canadian accent which oddly doesn’t help. The mix of Canadian and American relatives apparently mixes slang and terms of endearment oddly.

Adding more pink and purple to my wardrobe helped a tiny amount, but it’s one of those when the world has aged you beyond your years it’s hard to be your age. I think being as happy and joyful as you can, being bubbly when happy it helps and just enjoying the little things you do. Sometimes people wanna guess my age because I look one way, but come off as something older. It killed me a bit to be asked if I was in my 30’s because that’s how I spoke. But at the same time I’m okay with it, I’m a nurturer by nature I like caring for people so they can call me old all they want, I will not be less or pretend otherwise.

AKinglyAss · 2020-04-12T04:34:16+00:00

You probably "act" too much, as in, you built your entire personality based on responding to other people and their situations...

Spend a good amount of time genuinely imagining what you would do if you suddenly found yourself alone on Earth. And when I say "alone", I mean "everyone suddenly disappears and you're the only person on Earth" type of alone. What hedonism hides within you when there is nothing to fix, accomplish, prevent or even really create? That feeling is where your youthfulness is hiding.

bittersweet311 · 2020-04-12T00:10:59+00:00

Off topic but what anti-ageing product are you taking? Is it similar to retinol?

victorinevien · 2020-04-12T13:50:40+00:00

Did you grow to be this wise and responsible because you had to take care of your parents or someone in your family when you were young...either emotionally or physically? It seems that your psyche had developed an "old lady" identity within you to withstand whatever overbearing responsibilities you had to manage at that time. And your true self went to sleep, allowing "old lady" to take over because your true self saw that old lady was managing things well. To get rid of the "old lady" vibe, you need to do some inner child work to identify the moment you created "old lady" to cope with life. Identify where "old lady" lives in your body/mind. Ask the "old lady" what she is resisting knowing about life and herself. What emotions or thoughts is she resisting? Write down the answers and spend the week observing yourself taking on the "old lady" identity. Notice that your observer self is the one that created the "old lady" in order to cope with life at a specific moment in time. "Old lady" is not your true identity. It is an identity that your observer self made up in order to survive the challenges of your youth. Once you are aware that you are not "old lady", you can begin to discard this false identity. For more on this, you can check out Wolinsky's "Dark Side of the Inner Child". It's a fantastic read with many exercises to help you dispel inner children that don't support your life goals anymore.

ouelletouellet · 2020-04-12T14:54:42+00:00

Seriously stop paying attention to the stupid comments you get from people this is who you are and I don’t see why that has to be an issue maybe your just more mature then people your age and sometimes that’s caused by how we grew up your just more independent then others and maybe that means you don’t tend to give a shit about specific things people your age do

I know for me I only con recent years started smoking weed but I don’t drink or party and I tend to like my alone time and I used to get a lot of shit for it in high school and I was considered weird for it but you know what fuck that shit if that makes me a old lady then so be it at least I’m not at a party suffering from a stupid hang over that could be prevented

Overall people will have opinions of who you should be or what you should be doing and society likes to decitate what is norm and what isn’t but I don’t follow the trend it’s just stupid I’m not going to be brainwashed to their standards just because that’s how they’ve conditioned others

nocreativity729 · 2020-04-12T13:54:10+00:00

The key to youthfulness involves the enjoyment and desire to “play”. Most people stop playing when they are kids, but adults and especially women should continue to remain youthful and attractive. In terms of attracting great men, generally these men take things very seriously and it’s a breath of fresh air to spend time with his woman. It relaxes him.

Play can include dancing in the mirror, singing in the shower, baking fun treats and decorating them, picking a pretty flower and putting it in your hair. Etc. etc. these things will keep you joyful and young without compromising you maturity. I love to play, despite growing up quickly due to my ill single mother, having attended a top university, and working a corporate job with 6 figure salary. I too ponder life’s greatest questions—I studied philosophy. If there’s one thing I learned, it’s to not take life so seriously. Enjoy it!

Leg_Mcmuffin · 2020-04-12T16:28:20+00:00

No matter who you are or how you act, you will always find people who will attack you for it. If you were the opposite, people would call you “immature,” etc.

vintagegirlgame · 2020-04-13T03:26:09+00:00

Are you a Karen? If so just gotta own it!

kat13579 · 2020-04-14T00:55:50+00:00

People often don't know the reality of "old lady vibes" is having a beautiful old soul. It's untraditional in modern days, but what the world needs, "back to the roots" women. Much love to the "old lady vibes" as I too get this and have come to love it.

Zakdoekjeleggen · 2020-04-11T21:30:45+00:00

Polite argument? I was at my worst there. What kind of people do you usually argue with??? ;-)

Your advice was way too stern and conservative IMO, so that's probably how you treat yourself as well. Youthfulness is mostly about having fun, you can be self-indulgent in wholesome ways as well. You don't have to ruin your life to enjoy it.

Re: the argument, you should definitely NOT dress down out of female solidarity. Instead, inspire others to look their best also and lighten the room with your prettiness. Only hags will resent you for it.

Enjoying male attention, even from married men... Totally fine. Enjoy it, delight in it, sparkle without crossing the line into starting relationships with unavailable types. Flirt for fun. Lots of married men flirt just a little to give themselves a boost without having malicious intentions, and then take that happy mood home to their wives. Flirting does not equal hitting on someone. Don't be that sour faced type who can't laugh it off or play along just a little bit. Only shut these interactions down when they have malicious intent or are hurtful or insulting. Better than shutting down is redirecting. If a married man flirts with me, I flirt back not with him, but with his wife. That avoids confrontations and keeps the mood light.

Another thing about youth is that it's trusting in and leaning on others. You may have more answers than some, but don't fool yourself that you have all the answers. Dare to lean on another for support when you feel down. It's not burdening them (unless you whine incessantly always), because everyone who is nice likes to feel like a good friend and likes to help their friends.

You can be mature and get on with things, but after all is taken care of, allow yourself your emotions.

Also sorry if I hurt you.

JLPEACOCK · 2020-04-12T16:05:40+00:00

I’m a grandmother type too at 29. I’m always trying to feed people and I get the same as you with the advice thing. I just embrace it now. I’m a comfort, what a blessing!

Wolfssenger · 2020-04-12T16:56:25+00:00

Wisdom, perceived or legitimate, is nothing to be ashamed of.

wispo-wills · 2020-04-12T18:32:35+00:00

Normally, people just call you "old soul", never heard of "old person vibes", lol.

There's nothing wrong with being considered mature, wise and older than your age. Personally, I find it to be a badge of honor when people call me old soul, mature and wise beyond my years. I even put it upon myself to call myself grandma and an old lady to my friends and I'm 25.

I mean, you're 26. That's not 62. You have a baby-face. Clearly you're young. It's not like the way people treat you is actually going to progress your age by 50 years. As long as you feel young, that's all that matters. Personally, I feel I garner more respect from my older peers when they recognize my maturity... So like someone else said: embrace it. :) Don't fret about how other people think of you.

Nekkanan · 2020-04-13T16:12:54+00:00

I'm like that since I was 12, and what people notice is clothes and reactions in funny situations, be mature as you like but if you bothered you can change your clothing/makeup/hair style, take it easy in fun situations and take part in them as long as you are not close to feel silly.

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