Too young to burn
“Where's the fire?
What's the hurry about?
You better cool it off before you burn it out.”
02:14 am. “Too Young To Burn” - Sonny & The Sunsets.
You don’t notice it at first. You think you are just tired, that it will pass with a good night’s sleep or a quiet weekend. But it lingers. You wake up feeling the same weight pressing on your chest. You tell yourself to push through. “This is just life,” you think. “Everyone is tired.”
But this isn’t just tiredness. It’s more like a slow burning—quiet, almost invisible. You’ve been running at full speed for so long that you’ve convinced yourself it’s normal. School, friends, family expectations, future plans—it all piles up, and you’re somehow expected to juggle it all, perfectly. You think you’re managing, but really, you are burning from the inside out.
Your mother tells you a twenty-year-old shouldn't be this tired. That now is the time you should have the most energy of your life. And she's right by the unspoken rule that youth equals boundless energy. But life, as you quickly discover, doesn’t always follow the script. When you were younger, you thought burnout was something that came with age, with jobs and kids. But here you are, too young to burn out, yet it’s happening anyway. No one told you it could happen this early, that you could feel so overwhelmed while still figuring out who you even are.
It starts small. You stop enjoying the things you once loved—reading, writing, drawing, baking. The spark that once made those things light up your world dims. And instead of listening to that, you keep going, keep pushing. Because if you stop, what happens? Who will you be if you’re not achieving, not doing?
But that’s just it, isn’t it? You’ve wrapped your identity so tightly around what you can accomplish that you’ve forgotten who you are without all the doing. You think rest is something you have to earn, not something you deserve simply because you exist. You believe that slowing down is a weakness, a sign that you’re falling behind while everyone else keeps moving.
Eventually, though, you hit a wall. Not with a loud crash, but more like a slow, steady bump. You wake up one day and realize you are not just tired—you are empty. The things you are doing don’t bring you joy anymore. They don’t bring anything at all. You are not even sure why you’re still doing them.
That’s when you realize: you’ve been burning for too long. You’ve been moving so fast that you forgot to breathe, to take a moment and actually live instead of just exist. And it hits you—you’re too young for this. Too young to be this worn out, this disconnected from yourself. But you don’t know how to stop. And that’s the tricky part. When you are in that cycle, you don’t always realize it’s happening until you are in too deep.
So, you start small. You allow yourself a break, a real one. You let go of the idea that you have to earn your rest, that you are only worthy when you are busy. You start to say no to things that drain you and yes to the things that fill you back up, even if they are small or seem unimportant. You remind yourself that your worth isn’t tied to your productivity.
It is not easy. You’ll still feel the pull to keep going, to keep doing. You’ll still compare yourself to others, wondering if they’ve got it all figured out while you’re still struggling. But slowly, you will learn to trust the process. You’ll realize that life isn’t about moving fast, but about balance. About knowing when to push and when to pause.
So, what if you allowed yourself space to take it easy? What if you gave yourself permission to be young, not in the sense of having endless energy, but in being gentle with yourself? It’s okay to feel overwhelmed, lost, tired. It’s okay not to have it all figured out. It’s okay to admit that, sometimes, you don’t have the answers, and you don’t know how to keep up with everything being thrown at you. It’s okay to need time to rest.
The world may tell you that you need to constantly be achieving, but the truth is, you need space to just be. To let your fire burn slowly. You are not too young to feel tired, to feel burnt out. But you are also not too young to take care of yourself, to protect your peace, to learn when to say no and when to slow down.
So, take care of your flame. It is meant to last a lifetime, and not flicker out before its time. Feed it with rest, with joy, with moments of stillness. Let the fire in you simmer down. Let it warm you gently instead of scorching you. You don’t have to blaze for anyone but yourself. Take your time. You are young, and there is no rush.
3:23 am.
Saturday, October 19th.
