Guy Shares 27 Things He Wished He’d Known Before Hitting 30

As smart as we think we are, we all have gaps in our knowledge. We might spend our whole lives believing we know how to properly operate the microwave or the right way to wear our running shoes. Then, when someone points out that the complete opposite of what we thought is true, we can’t help but scratch our heads in confusion.

Sidneyraz is on a mission to show us we're not the only ones by sharing super simple and obvious know-how life tips. The creator told Bored Panda in a previous interview that he decided to start this series after people positively reacted to his video "Here's something you should know about being in your 30s. It's better than your 20s."

"My most popular videos are ones that have to do with the most common items that people use. Travel pillows, English muffins, trash bags, plungers, and so on," Sidneyraz explained. "We all use the same things every day and [without questioning them] because that's how we were taught, but we have no idea why or if it's even right. So when I post a video showing a different way, it blows minds."

The TikToker also revealed there's more to this life phase than just figuring out simple life hacks. "We tend to experience both heartbreak and true joy before our 30s too. There are large ups and downs but, hopefully, they help us to be more empathetic people. They’re hard lessons but needed."

"I’m learning all these things too and I don’t want anyone to feel as alone as I have in the past when I didn’t know something [older folks understood quite well]," Sidneyraz added.

We previously spoke with Joshua Klapow, Ph.D., a clinical psychologist and creator of MentalDrive, about why so many of us realize obvious things only later in life. He explained people often take everyday things for granted "only to pay more attention to those actions and interactions that grab our attention. The obvious goes in the background, so we reserve brain bandwidth to notice the novel, standout occurrences in our life."

As we grow older, there are fewer things that look different to us. "We call that maturity and growth and development," the clinical psychologist said. Then, we can look at the seemingly common in a more careful, more detailed way. "And when we do, we often discover that that obvious has so much more to it that we missed earlier on."

When certain things are visible to us in plain sight and we somehow fail to notice them, it’s easy to feel ashamed. Klapow explained we feel this way because the obvious is often simple and clear to everyone else.

He mentioned we feel embarrassed for several reasons. The first would be that we simply missed what others saw. Then, "we may have made mistakes, hurt others, missed out on opportunities because we didn't see the obvious. Lastly, we have to acknowledge to others and ourselves that despite how we think of ourselves or how we are seen by others, we have missed something."

The clinical psychologist said we should turn the internal dialog around and tell ourselves: "I now see things differently, more clearly, and that is going to help me from this day moving forward." Then, embarrassment "can transition into gratitude and excitement for arriving at the discovery of the obvious."

"We are growing, learning, adapting organisms. What is foreign at one point in time can become obvious later as we learn and develop. At any point in our life, we have a chance to look at what we see every day and look at it differently. We never know what we may discover if we are courageous enough to consider the obvious when the world around us is telling us it is sitting right in front of us," Klapow concluded.