My Tussle With Adulthood

In my first post on the delay of adulthood, I’m worried that I came across as suggesting young people ought to grow up . . . in order to be more like me. I’m afraid I gave the impression that I have my act together — seeing as I have completed school, I’m (sort of) employed, I’m married, and we’re looking to have kids — and that others should therefore emulate me.

In a lot of ways, my first post was kind of stupid. I feel terrible about the self-righteous tone.

The truth is, the reason I’m so interested in the topic of adulthood is because it’s something that I’m constantly struggling with.  I’m trying to understand what it means to be grown up, and trying to figure out how I can become more mature. There are so many ways in which I fail as a grown-up. I’m also interested in whether this is a generational thing or if it’s just me. Articles like the one in New York Times suggest that maybe it’s a problem that affects all of us.

In the comments of my last post, you guys helped me to narrow down what I think are the key elements of adulthood. It’s not about accomplishments but attitudes, especially in the following areas:

• Commitment
• Responsibility
• Self-Discipline/Acceptance of Hardship
• Production vs. Consumption

Here are some of the ways I struggle with all of the above.

Commitment

I think the ability to commit is a huge marker of adulthood. And yet I struggle immensely with commitment. Sure, I got married. But committing myself to my husband was kind of a no-brainer, because it was so obvious from the start that my life would be far better with my husband than without him.

But in many other areas, I have an intense fear of commitment. I can’t stick with positions in church, for example – I’ve never lasted in a role for longer than a year. My gut response to any request to take on a role is always no. I just don’t have the gumption to commit long-term. The same goes for jobs. I’m always flirting with the idea of quitting, no matter what job I’m currently holding. I’m always thinking about what else I could be doing.

And I suspect that this is a common problem for my peers as well. Others folks my age are constantly breaking up, quitting, complaining, moving, shifting, experimenting, and trying something new.  And I think this inability to commit often manifests itself in an unwillingness to get married. We want to keep our options open. We don’t want to close any doors or jeopardize our “freedom.”

I think we twenty-somethings over-value freedom and choice, to the detriment of our character and even our happiness. We’ve been so indoctrinated with the notion that we have to test everything first, to be absolutely certain, and avoid mistakes at all costs, that we have become rather feeble when it comes to commitment, and we lose out on some of the greatest things in life (including marriage). I am as bad as the next twenty-something in this respect.

Self-Discipline, Responsibility and Accepting Hardship

A huge part of being an adult, I think, is becoming responsible for oneself and others. Not independent, but responsible — accepting both the positive and negative consequences of our actions, and occasionally choosing the more difficult road.

Lately I have been wrestling with how much self-discipline I ought to foster. I’m trying to understand how much hardship I should accept before trying to make things easier for myself. I know this is an area of weakness for me. And boy, do I complain. My grandparents would never have dreamed about whining the way I do about having to get up in the morning and go to work at a job that I find boring.

Again, I think that since many twenty-somethings in North America have been so coddled all of our lives, we haven’t developed a very strong work ethic or sense of responsibility. We feel as though the world owes us something. We are told that our purpose in life is to achieve happiness, and when hard work and responsibility don’t seem to make us happy, we resent them.

 Consumption vs. Production

I am also working to understand how adults ought to strike a balance between consumption and production. I believe that growing up is a process whereby we go from infants, who only take, to adults, who are able to give as well as take.

I think this is another area where 20-somethings like me are falling short, and why I think the delay of adulthood is a problem.

In my first post on the delay of adulthood, I observed that 20-somethings are delaying adulthood in part by traveling and going to school instead of settling down. A few commenters had a problem with this: “But education and traveling are good things!” they protested. While this may be true, I still feel that these are both primarily activities of consumption, and in that way they fall more into the realm of adolescence than adulthood. Even though only older people can afford these forms of consumption.

Many 20-somethngs today are striving to consume fewer material goods, which is amazing. But we can’t seem to totally shake our consumerist tendencies. We consume education, entertainment, and experiences, but without equivalent output. We travel, we read books, we go to school, we go to concerts and museums and poetry readings. These are all great things, but I wonder if we are failing to give back as much as we consume.

I don’t want to focus too much on productivity, but I wonder if I should, as an adult, strive to create and contribute more and consume less.

 A Little Bit of Grown-Up Wisdom

There are a couple of areas in life, however, where I feel like I could provide some insight to my fellow twenty-somethings. There are a few things that I’ve accomplished which makes me think I have some authority on growing up. I may not be all the way there, but I think I have at least figured out one or two things about adulthood.

And here’s the main thing:

I’m bothered by the idea that we can’t “find out who we are” within the context of marriage and responsibilities, and so we need time to roam around untethered to family or employment to indulge in self-discovery. In my experience, being married and responsible for your own finances can be the perfect place to discover who you are and what you’re capable of.

Roaming around untethered to family or unemployed to indulge in self-discovery is not a bad thing; I just don’t think it’s a necessary step in understanding who we really are. It’s a bourgeois luxury that most human beings will never be able to afford. I don’t frown upon it, but I don’t endorse it, either. There are other – perhaps better – ways of discovering who you are, which involve giving rather than consuming.

What do you think?