Being 30 rules.

By all accounts, the 30s look to be the greatest decade of one’s life. Yes, it can be the busiest and therefore more stressful – but it’s also the only one where you’re still young enough to feel up for anything, but finally old enough to be taken seriously.

It’s also the decade where most of the big things usually happen, both in your career and personal life.

Here are a bunch of awesome things I love about being 30.

You stop caring what other people think.

There’s a lot of shit that we care about in our 20s that just doesn’t matter. Something about turning 30 allows you to finally let go of what (and who) doesn’t matter and start focusing on what really does. Maybe it’s because your Saturn Return (the real thing people in their 20s should fear) shook the shit right out of you. Maybe it’s because all that caring about what other people think is tiring. Who knows? I only know I no longer worry about what that guy or those girls think of me, because life is too short to waste time on shitty people.

You feel more comfortable in your own skin.

By the time you’re 30, you understand your own sense of style and what looks good on your body. You know better than to try a trend just because it’s trendy, and you realize the absurdity of trying to look like someone on a heavily photoshopped magazine.

You finally feel like a grown-up.

For whatever reason, there’s something about being in your 20s that allows you to still feel weird about being considered a grown-up. That’s why terms like “adulting” exist. When we still rely on our parents to help us with the less-than-fun parts of life, we don’t feel worthy of such a title. At 30, I’m no longer adulting when I pay my bills on time or research the best insurance policies; I’m just being what I am – an adult.

People take you seriously.

Maybe it’s because you take yourself more seriously, but it does feel like something changes when you hit 30. The self-doubt starts to STFU a bit more, and that comes across in every interaction you have.

You are less sexualized.

Articles that shit on being 30 might use this as a negative. The reality is, for women – who are constantly in a damned-if-you-do/damned-if-you-don’t situation – it’s a huge blessing. Whether it’s a creepy boss, street harassers or catty coworkers, this discomfort is no longer as heavily a part of the daily grind in your 30s – because people know they can’t get away with it when they’re facing a grown-ass woman who will not hesitate to call them out on such disrespectful behaviour.

Bosses treat you with more respect.

When you’re in your 20s, it’s hard, especially if you’re a woman in a male-dominated work environment, to be treated with the respect you deserve at work. The condescension thrown at millennials by boomers is high. Women have a harder time making as much money, getting as many promotions, and asking for what they want and need at this stage. Once you have years of experience behind you, your boss can no longer get away with asking you to make the coffee run while the new guy gets to take the lead on the project you just put your heart and soul into.

You have more confidence in your work.

And this might be why your boss is suddenly giving you the promotion and that raise so you finally make the same salary he’s been paying Dave for the same job. Having worked on your career for 8 years since graduating, you know what skills you bring to the table, you understand your worth, and you are no longer willing to sacrifice the things that your male coworkers have not had to sacrifice.

You take your health seriously.

Your 20s allow you to get away with never going to the doctor while eating pizza every day, because you can always play that trump card of being in your 20s. The reality is, that lifestyle is bad for your health no matter what age you are, and just because your metabolism isn’t showing it yet, you’re still doing your body some serious damage. Once you’re 30, you’re more inclined to become a regular at the gym and make green smoothies a ritual – not because you’re worried about how you look in a bikini, but because you like life and want to be just as mobile at 80 as you are now.

Your apartment feels like home.

Just like your personal sense of style has developed into something uniquely you, so has your sense of home décor. You can now proudly host a dinner party and feel excited to show off your digs. You no longer need to live with roommates to afford the rent, and you place looks like something out of a Style At Home magazine (because you just paid someone to give it a deep clean).

You can afford to travel.

While we all talk about how you should use your 20s to travel and see the world, most of us spent our 20s paying down student loans. Now that we’re in our 30s, we finally have some money set aside for that backpacking trek across Europe or a spontaneous trip to Iceland.

Your relationships are a lot less dramatic.

The 20s are meant for all the Romeo and Juliet drama you didn’t get out of your system in high school, but – and thank the universe for this – no one in their 30s has time for that. Dates get right to the point. No one is interested in the cat and mouse games anymore, because we have careers to attend to and goals to focus on, and if you are not a person that is going to contribute positively to my life then, next please.

Sex is better.

Maybe because your libido is starting to reach its peak. Maybe because you’ve been with your partner long enough that he knows what you really like. Maybe because of that new-found confidence in your own skin. Or maybe because you’re comfortable enough to ask for whatever you want whenever you want it without feeling weird. But probably because of all those things.

The friends you still have are the ones that will always be there.

Friendship is one of the hardest things to maintain as you enter the adult world. We get so used to our friends being around growing up and throughout college, and then it all changes when we’re thrown into the insanity that is our 20s. People move, people get married, people have babies…and suddenly your friends are nowhere to be found. The friends you have when you are 30 are the ones who made it there with you. They’re the ones who stuck around through the good times and bad. They’re the ones who you can always count on to be there even if life has been so busy you haven’t been able to hang out in person for months.

Lisa Lagace is a freelance writer in Toronto. Her work has appeared in Notable, Dose, AUX, Lavalife, EverythingZoomer, and Shameless Magazine (among others). Follow her on Twitter.