When I got into my late 20s, I panicked. I wasn't where I was supposed to be, I didn't have a wife, or even a girlfriend, I wasn't anywhere near having kids- I didn't even have a job I liked! None of my boxes were ticked, and I was freaking out about it. It sent me into a depression spiral, and the oldest bad thoughts came tumbling out. I'm nothing, I'll never be anything, I'll never succeed, etc. It took me almost a decade to figure out that none of that mattered. As a person, you never stop changing, and holding onto the goals you had when you were fifteen like the last custard-filled donut in the box is not going to lead to happiness (unlike the donut), unbalanced mental health or not. I had to learn to let go of goals that didn't fit me anymore, and figure out what real me, current me, wanted. Along the way I learned that since I hadn't started working on myself until my late 20s, it would take more time to get there than if I had started working on it in college, or the years that followed. And that's okay.
Because I hadn't lit a fire under my own ass until later in life, it would take a few years longer than most people to get there. That didn't make me lesser, or dumb, or doomed to fail. It just meant that I would have to work a little harder, and be a little behind most people in terms of where I'm at in life, for a while. I read this amazing article and it really helped me understand what was going on with my life. When I finally figured out what I wanted, it wasn't at all what I expected. All this time I'd been beating myself up for not reaching a goal I didn't even want. I don't want to work a 9 to 5 in an office building and go home to my apartment. I mean, I do want that for a while, a year or two maybe, but then once I've saved up, I want to buy a tiny house and travel around the country. Did I mention I can't drive? Working on it. The key is that it doesn't matter whether I'm 29 or 21, I'm going for my goals. One isn't worse than the other. I had a late start. That's not embarassing, it's not something to be ashamed of. Other people might not get it, but (another revelation that came to me later in life) that doesn't matter. People all have their own things to deal with, and anyway you'll show them when you roll up to Saturday dinner in your tiny house. *ahem* I mean, um...
Figure out what you really want, and do your best to go after it. If it takes you a little longer than most people, so what? You'll get there in the end, and a lot of the people who you're afraid of judgments from still probably don't live their goals.
You can't be ashamed of yourself for being a certain age and still working on your goals. You're working on it, do you have any idea how many people settle for whatever they can get? Who give up? You're not one of those people, you're trying, you're going for it. And people will see that. If they don't, it doesn't matter, because you're going to get there, and you'll be the kind of happy you never thought you could be. I have faith in you.
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