Jump to content

An open invitation to rant about adulthood


cognitivedissonance

Recommended Posts

cognitivedissonance

I think our modern symbols of adulthood/maturity in a lot of cases is really shallow, and way too few. The ones I can think of are;

 

  • Driving
  • Drinking
  • Having sex

 

Maybe it´s just me, But I, as a person who don´t live up to these standards, have often been read as prude or insecure. Therefore, I am wondering if there are anyone who has any suggestions on other social/psychological symbols, because this list needs to be longer. /cog

Link to post
Share on other sites

Having a job above minimum wage (maybe)

Having a college degree or more (according to some people)

Children (which ties into sex)

 

but some people never grow up and some "children" are very mature

Link to post
Share on other sites

I don't think driving, drinking, or having sex are seen as signs of maturity for very long. They're rites of passage among young people who want to be seen as mature, but they're not regarded that way as much when actual boring adulthood creeps up on you.

 

These are things I see as signs of adulthood (which I either have or am working on personally):

Having a mortgage or owning a home

Financial things, like investing or saving up for retirement

Caring for a pet, especially a high demand one like a dog

Taking care of yourself (responsible lifestyle choices, health)

Being organized in life (appointments, cleanliness, life plans)

 

If people think you're immature for not being into drinking and sex, they might be in for a harsh reality check if they don't build up these other life skills. Sexual things are called "adult" or "mature" as a euphemism. Real adulthood is paying your bills on time and choosing to stay in on a Saturday night because you don't want to walk your dog at 6:30 in the morning with a hangover.

Link to post
Share on other sites
firewallflower

First and foremost, I associate adulthood/maturity with responsibility. Honestly, I feel like holding up drinking/driving/sex as the definition of maturity is itself (even though, of course, many older adults do do these things) a sign of immaturity, if anything, on the part of the people making that judgement. There's so much more to it. (As a recently-turned adult, adulthood has been on my mind of late, but the only one of the three you listed which I have any intention of doing is learning to drive.)

Link to post
Share on other sites
what the face

As we move away from a discredited paternalistic society, people don't bother to grow up and adults regress toward adolescence, these ideas brought forward 

by many.    There is a leveling of people and their interactions, as Bly writes in  "The Sibling Society".

 

The symbols for adulthood have become really shallow as you wrote.   Leveling = a loss of depth.

 

I would add to any adult list:

   - ability to put together events and emotions from one's life into meaning or a story

   - understanding the impermanence of life along with permanence of ideals and legacy.

   - preservation of the intensities of creativity and being,  while renunciation of the demands for continual comfort, pleasure and excitement.

   - acceptance of mentorship or leadership

 

 

Link to post
Share on other sites

Having sex and children terrifies me the most about adulthood. I prefer my body to remain the way it is, unscathed, without having someone else's organ or an entire someone inside it. Gives me the shivers.

But time is ticking and the bullying and shaming is going to start soon. 

 

Also on the list :

my parents getting old

my friends moving on, not having time for me

 

Link to post
Share on other sites
abandoned-account

As I won't deny that being an adult does have complications, I like having more of a say in and control in my life and being more knowledgable about the world around me. If some won't call me an "adult" just for not intoxicating my body and killing my brain cells, or not copulating and reproducing like any other dumb animal can, well, they can call me what they like. I don't need them to determine what or who I am. Tyvm.

 

Personally, I think that childhood is way over-romanticized. 

Why does everyone say there is no responsibility? Did you people never have schoolwork or chores to do? Is that not responsibility in its own way? And the whole "innocence" thing... Not knowing about danger doesn't make it go away. It only makes you more vulnerable since you don't know it's there and thus, don't know how you can avoid it. I want to know the reality of the world around me so I can be as prepared as I can be.

And lastly, children are still people. They can feel things like stress and depression. Just because your situation may have happened to be sunshine and daisies when you were their age doesn't mean theirs is. So telling them things like "You're too young to be depressed!!!" or "you'll miss these days when you're older!!!" is a load of steamy hot ignorant BS.

Everyone's life experience and POV is different.

Rant finished.

Link to post
Share on other sites

Buying a property 

Getting a pension 

Link to post
Share on other sites
1 hour ago, Vee. said:

I think that childhood is way over-romanticized. 

True, however the most pleasant and happy memories are the ones often brought up and with no bad ones the view that childhood was wonderful is biased. 

One thing I get a lot of is an intense feeling of natsukashi. (Look it up)

Link to post
Share on other sites
Kelthepurplequeen

I’m 23 and still live with my parents because I have the personality of a 12-year-old.

Link to post
Share on other sites
abandoned-account
21 minutes ago, DuskFire said:

True, however the most pleasant and happy memories are the ones often brought up and with no bad ones the view that childhood was wonderful is biased. 

One thing I get a lot of is an intense feeling of natsukashi. (Look it up)

For some reason I just have a tendency to remember bad things more easily than good. I'm not saying there was absolutely nothing good in my life when I was little, but when I think back all the bad comes up first. I seem to be the only person I know who is like this. hm.

Link to post
Share on other sites
1 hour ago, Vee. said:

For some reason I just have a tendency to remember bad things more easily than good. I'm not saying there was absolutely nothing good in my life when I was little, but when I think back all the bad comes up first. I seem to be the only person I know who is like this. hm.

Ditto. :( 

 

I do have good memories from my childhood, but I've noticed that the bad ones seem to be easier to remember than the good ones. I think it has to do with how deep of an imprint they make on your psyche. When I used to think back on my childhood, all of the bad memories would just jump out at me without me wanting them to. Things have gotten better over the years, tho, especially with all of the work that I've done. 

 

Having CPTSD and memory loss doesn't help matters either... 

Link to post
Share on other sites
2 hours ago, Vee. said:

For some reason I just have a tendency to remember bad things more easily than good. I'm not saying there was absolutely nothing good in my life when I was little, but when I think back all the bad comes up first. I seem to be the only person I know who is like this. hm.

I understand too. I had a relatively happy childhood, but the little things still affect me. Like the only memory I have of my grandfather now is the last time I saw him alive and his funeral (over a decade ago)

Link to post
Share on other sites

I've met and befriended many people from little kids to the elderly. Age is really just a number. 

 

I especially like to hear the opinions of kids. They can shock you

Link to post
Share on other sites
3 hours ago, Vee. said:

For some reason I just have a tendency to remember bad things more easily than good. I'm not saying there was absolutely nothing good in my life when I was little, but when I think back all the bad comes up first. I seem to be the only person I know who is like this. hm.

I used to be like that because I actually had a lonely childhood until 6th grade.

Then the amount of bad stuff in my current life over took the amount or at least severity of my childhood. Now I tend to remember the good memories of the past and I over romanticize it a lot. So in a way I'm like you.

Link to post
Share on other sites

Because I look really young I find it doubly difficult to be an adult. I sound young and I'm short too. People think I'm the younger sister, I get asked for ID all the time, I got asked for ID for a cert 15 DVD when I was like 20. I find it really hard to grow up because I can't get a job and people think because I look and sound young that I'm immature. I rarely go out with friends, I don't drink, I don't drive and everyone judges you for not having these milestones. I'm seen as less mature because of these things. On top of that I don't want to get married, have kids or have sex so I look even more immature. It's frustrating that everyone is measured on the basis of what they've done. I'm no less an adult because I hate beer. Because of all this it makes me unconfident which makes getting a job harder and it loops in a cycle. It feels like I'm waiting for life to begin and I can't do anything and it sucks.

Link to post
Share on other sites

It sucks that most people around me and/or my immediate family all lift up working yourself to death and being proud of it, and they inevitably somehow look down on those who don't/can't work as much and/or seek jobs not considered 'real'. My dad has more than once been like 'you're such a hard worker, I don't know why you don't have another job yet... I've had to work for and had work for me a lot of people who did not work so hard.' Completely ignoring/not acknowledging and brushing aside everything that he knows about me now(although he probably thinks its not real and doesn't have the mental struggles and other things, so good for him) and... just. gods. Everything.
To me, good for those people who are able to find other things and enjoy more free time. I don't think that's lazy at all. And everything else. Can, can't, we're all doing our best and I don't think its bad if we don't subscribe to the work yourself to the friggin bone if we can help it, or if we want something different.

 

I hate that now I'm an adult, I'm just expected to just get over everything and power through it and never mind all this shite that happened in my formative years, 'that means absolutely nothing'-except that it means everything, and its been scientifically proven, and much isn't easy to 'get over' or 'move past' or 'deal with'. We can work at it, sure, but that doesn't mean it just stops and I can suddenly buck up. I'm not a friggin god, and I'm not weak-willed because I'm still dealing with the... with my dad being an arsehole when I was younger and all the crappy church things and crappy upbringing and other things and... things. I'm not a robot, I can't turn it off.

Adding to or connected to the immediate above, the whole shite view that just because 'you're an adult now' all your mental struggles and all the illnesses or disabilities or whathaveyou you had when you were younger(or still have) just magically go away/are supposed to magically go away, or 'become less' and you must be a functioning member of society as defined and dictated by... most of society. And that if you aren't, well. You're not a good human being and are lazy and a waste of space. It's so... not ironic, but maybe? Some word, that so many of us deal with so many things, and yet what runs and is considered the norm is totally opposite of that. No wonder its so damn soul-killing.
There've been a couple either ads, or articles or something that friends have reposted on fb that I see sometimes, about how autistic children grow to be autistic adults. And how we don't seem to have as much support, or something; just, bringing a little light to the fact that just because we grow up doesn't mean its gone. We still deal with the same stuff, although maybe, depending on when diagnosed and whatnot, might have learned some coping mechanisms or whathaveyou. But it doesn't make it better, and in many ways its just worse. Because adult now, and have all this friggin... /stuff/... to deal with, and so many just 'well, you're an adult now, suck it up, it's the way the world works.'

My car hasn't been used in like three years. I quit my job years ago because I was getting suicidal from a lot of stuff, and then let one of my bros borrow it because I stopped using it really, but then he went to school and got his own car. I never really  need to go anywhere, the applications I put in at first to places never went anywhere and I didn't want to work there anyway anywhere in our small area because there was nothing and everything reminded me of that shite place I'd left recently. Never really went anywhere before anyway except for work, and now it just sits there.
And everyone insists you can do so much with a car, but if you're not a confident driver-I'm not at all-and have some spacial and brain things, you don't want to go places anywhere, especially if they're more than half an hour away. Also the farking weather, that just makes things like 30x worse if it's bad weather, so I just wouldn't go out.

Got into a job help for disabled peoples program a couple years back. They couldn't help. I'm too picky. I know I am. I knew it. But I still wanted help, still hoped for... something. There wasn't anything. And throughout different times, through it all, they would mention how this person or that person was soooooo picky and they never found anything; that I shouldn't be like that, that I should look at the things and really *think* if I could do them and picture myself at the place or whatever...

it didn't work.
They were able to send me back to school for maybe three months, but not even for anything because I could only be in the last some classes and pick a few of those(so basically random classes, and then I had to try and find /something/ in the list of those that would be useful somehow). Those went nowhere, and I for all my good grades and okay times(yay masking) I was constantly having breakdowns and my brain wanted to rip itself apart and it wasn't very pleasant. And at the end, I got meaningless credits and meaningless good grades that... didn't mean anything. And of course once it was over, I've already forgotten most of what I learned. Because my brain is so damn beautiful like that... (bitter crying)

so I just feel guilty that I wasted my time and wasted their time and I haven't even been in contact with the organization anymore, it all just kinda... faded, like everything does.


I'd really much rather just be a cat. I hate being an adult.  I'm useless at it, I'm miserable, it's all bullshite, there's very little enjoyable about it except I can go to bed when I want and have a computer that my parents no longer hover over, I'm slower than everyone I know at everything except reading novels, my mum is worried to death because I've hit none of the hallmarks of my brothers, and just

pissed off that a god I'm not even sure I believe in plopped me here, as I am.

dunno.

 

 

so there's like... some of my rant. I used to have over 300pages of it, but I deleted them because shouldn't dwell on it, but not like it's not there or it goes away.

 

Link to post
Share on other sites

So... I guess I'd just add

 

-magically having gotten over everything that happened in our younger years

-magically being able to handle everything life throws at us once we're 'adults'

-magically becoming more mature, I suppose. Which often is portrayed as more sexy and desirable and Super Independent(*laughs until cries*)(there is so much I don't know how to do or I forget as soon as after I've learned it)


**still not entirely sure I understand. I thought I did, then I read it again and made another post, and now I'm still confused. So I'm sorry if I totally derailed this.

Link to post
Share on other sites
Kelthepurplequeen

Just because I’m female doesn’t mean I want a baby.

Link to post
Share on other sites
Chocolatastic AroAce
On 2/18/2019 at 8:20 AM, Carmine88 said:

Because I look really young I find it doubly difficult to be an adult. I sound young and I'm short too. People think I'm the younger sister, I get asked for ID all the time, I got asked for ID for a cert 15 DVD when I was like 20. I find it really hard to grow up because I can't get a job and people think because I look and sound young that I'm immature. I rarely go out with friends, I don't drink, I don't drive and everyone judges you for not having these milestones. I'm seen as less mature because of these things. On top of that I don't want to get married, have kids or have sex so I look even more immature. It's frustrating that everyone is measured on the basis of what they've done. I'm no less an adult because I hate beer. Because of all this it makes me unconfident which makes getting a job harder and it loops in a cycle. It feels like I'm waiting for life to begin and I can't do anything and it sucks.

I actually have  slimier experiences. For a long time I had a minimum wage job and people who didn't know me thought I was a teenager. I live in an apartment, don't drive or drink, so it is hard for people to realize i'm a grown up. I often try to sound older by using bigger words because that seems to be at least one way to convince people.

 

I think these things are seen as adult mile stones because western society is materialistic...so people tend to associate attributes based on what other people have or don't have. So things like having a home, a car, and kids has become almost a short hand way for people to tell that someone is a functional grown up. Where as someone who doesn't have these things are seen as immature losers or some how not as 'adult' as someone else.

 

I'd be lying if I said I didn't get sucked into this thinking. I still sometimes find myself doing things because of how i'm worried people will perceive me. Though I do think an important part of becoming a grown up is when you realize that a lot of the things we worried about don't matter and the acceptance that as scary as it is....we will die. So we really need to be mindful of how we spend our time, do we want to spend time living up to someone else notion of adulthood?

Link to post
Share on other sites

The only “adulthood” thing I really have a problem with is driving. I can and do drive, but I get anxiety from it, especially if I have to drive on the highway. Sure I have to work at some office job 8 hours a day, but I spend the other 16 hours pretty much doing what I want when I want. I don’t have to do homework. Nobody bitches at me for leaving a pile of dirty dishes in the sink. I can go to bed when I want (though of course I usually choose to go to bed at a decent time since I like being well-rested). I spend a lot more time in peaceful solitude since I no longer require supervision and nobody bitches at me to do some “extracurricular activity”.

 

If someone told me I wasn’t an adult just because I don’t have sex or some other arbitrary reason I’d just say “Well I’m 27 and the age of legal adulthood is 18 so yeah I’m still an adult”.

Link to post
Share on other sites

Yeah I dunno if I have any milestones for adulthood. Like, I cannot drive so thats off the list. I think its just changes that have occurred naturally. I appreciate my friends more than strangers and a nice night in with sleep over hanging out in bars until 1am. 

That being said, I still love cartoons and acting "immature" and I never want to stop. Its strange, I still wanna connect with the 10 year old who loved cartoons, but not the 22 year old who loved bars. 

Link to post
Share on other sites
cognitivedissonance

Kind of into the idea of being an adult means that you´ve realised that there are no superheroes? Like, your maturity is defined by the moment (or series of moments) you realise that there are no one, or Extremely few people that at all levels feel like they have got their shit together? And maybe that is why we need these shallow symbols, to seek shelter from that realization 

Link to post
Share on other sites

Adulthood is finding out that the adults around you growing up were all winging it, and nobody really knows what they're doing. 

Link to post
Share on other sites
23 minutes ago, ben8884 said:

I am opening up a tax free savings account for pension planing...does that count?

That depends. Explain why you're going with a TFSA instead of an RRSP.

Link to post
Share on other sites
5 minutes ago, Snao Cone said:

That depends. Explain why you're going with a TFSA instead of an RRSP.

long story and funnily enough I was going to go with an RRSP and still plan  to down the line. The reason I am not doing it now and going with a a TSFA is because the main benefit of an RRSP doesn't really apply to me as I do not earn enough to pay a lot of tax therefor lowering my taxable income is not really an issue. I researched this with a realtor friend and 2 people who are financial planners although that being said I will talk to the bank rep and make a final decision. I am looking for a job with more money mind, and when I do I will open an RRSP. 

Link to post
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...