Celebrity Column: Girlfriend’s guide to navigating your 20s, writes Shweta Bachchan Nanda

I am stretched out on a sunbed warming my old cold bones and watching 20-somethings — taut bodies, tummies you can bounce a penny off of, jumping in and out of the hotel pool in an attempt to capture the perfect ‘gram worthy picture. The rest of the day would probably be spent finding the right filter then caption, so on and so forth. Precious minutes wasted, and some poor girl who probably isn’t feeling her best today, on seeing said post and the likes it’s chalked up, will withdraw further into herself because she doesn’t have the same thigh gap/dewy make up/bikini/life.

Being in your 20s today is such hard work, it’s heartbreaking. My brief was to write a letter to my 20-year-old self, but since I don’t ever self-medicate, I won’t self-help either. What I will write is a piece of advice from my 40-year-old self to those 20-somethings out there who are probably going to need it.

I know it feels like time is infinite, it’s the hubris of youth. Your 40s seem a lifetime away but really they aren’t, ask me; I’ve been down that slippery slope. Lissome and taut one day; wearing Spanks on a regular basis …read more