I think the most notable thing about growing up is all the changes you experience because they all happen faster than you can anticipate them. Adults always tell kids not to be so eager to grow up, kids never listen. I would know. As someone who has both heard and given the speech, I don’t know if it has ever accomplished its aim but I still believe it’s a really important advice to give so to all the adults out there, don’t stop giving it.
When people say life is complicated, they aren’t saying it to sound all mysterious and suave but they say it as a matter of fact and it is only when you begin to grow up that you realize this. But the amazing thing is that life is complicated in the most glorious of ways. You have all these choices to make and each one will take you on different paths and because you understand this, you take your time to make your decisions and consider various factors, you consider people because you know it will affect them too. Life makes you care and sometimes it can hurt but most times it enables you to have the greatest adventures and that is what living life is truly about.
Another thing people say is that experience is the best teacher, this is also true. My older brother told me not to grow up so fast and at the time I thought I understood what he meant but as it turns out, I really didn’t. I believe that growing up is such a unique experience that you can’t really teach someone how to do it, they have to grow on their own and get shaped by their own experience before they can truly understand what it means. It is only now that I have known what it means to be out all day and come back to meet a sink full of dirty dishes that I can truly understand why my mum used to be angry when she would come back home and meet the house all messy.
When you’re growing up it always feels like you know everything and that you are so sure of the things you believe but what I have found out is that with age comes a new perspective and new sides to you that you never knew were capable of existing. This is why friends reunite after years apart and cannot understand how someone playful and carefree has gotten so focused and sober but truly that is life for you. It changes you in ways that you’ve not yet imagined. I have come to understand this now and sometimes I tell myself “you don’t know who you’ll be by December.”
The changes you experience are numerous. This does not refer to just the physical changes but every single thing. I realise that making friends at a young age is so much easier than when you start to grow up. As a child, you are so young and innocent and you look at every child as your potential playmate but growing up makes you self-conscious, you begin to worry about fitting in and avoiding anything that can label you as “uncool”.
Change at first is uncomfortable and annoying like when you buy something new and you can’t seem to figure it out and there comes the temptation to just return to the old one. In life however, you must resist this urge to return to the former ways of doing things, the comfortable way, or the status quo, there can be no growth without change. Another thing you discover is how “change changes”, this simply means you begin to see change in a different light as something good and not something to be feared because most times you get to change for the better and sometimes you begin to even expect it.
I’m sure in the time it has taken you to read this article, some semblance of the speech above has taken place and as expected, that kid will not listen to that adult but it’s worth the try anyways. This to me is just how life works because there are some lessons that we can only truly learn by ourselves.
Keep living life without fear and don’t be afraid to take risks and soon enough you will find that place, known elusively as “being a grown-up”.