Lani's Truths

Lani's Truth #6 (The Truth About Growing Up)

The Truth About Growing Up

It's difficult to pinpoint the specific moment in which we grow up, because, truly, growing up isn't measurable by time. There is no moment in which a person moves fluently from being a child to being an adult. Growing up is a state of mind, an emotional experience wherein the mannerisms of your thinking gradually morph into a subversive background voice that challenges all the behaviours and emotions that were previously triggered by everyday motions.

Things just stop feeling the same, I suppose.

And it isn't because nothing's exciting anymore. It isn't because you have hardened, or become insensitive or you've lost the ability to appreciate the small things. It's just that life has thrown all of these facts at you, all of these realities, which, maybe you didn't want to know. The things that make sense damage the mystery of the things that you didn't want to understand, and the things that you can't understand are the wrong things--the painful things.

But growing up isn't just characterised by a variation of thought.

If only it were that easy.

It's also about the way that people treat you, and the way you treat yourself. For a few years there, you'll be caught in that stage where you're learning everything at once and you're young and you're thinking about things that you didn't want to have to be thinking about. You're thinking about school, and boys, and that stretch mark on your leg. You're thinking about how the hell you're meant to manage your hair, or cover that pimple. You're wondering how to ask your Mum if you're allowed to go to that party that you know she isn't going to want you to go to and you're wondering how many drinks you can down before it becomes obvious.

But, my friend, that is a hell of a lot more exciting than when you get to make your own mind up. Without the thrill of having some kind of boundaries or rules or something, it seems vastly easier to just stay at home in bed. It seems a whole lot simpler lounging in your PJ's than balancing in heels and trying to keep the strap of your bra tucked in.

But it's the little things that you miss. It's arguing with your mum over what's for dinner and then losing the battle and getting stuck with stir-fry when you wanted pizza. That's a whole lot better than the packet-mix pasta you're eating (which kind of tastes like carpet).

There is no avoiding the disappointment you feel when a show you used to love comes on and you can't remember why you loved it so much, or when you smell something that you haven't smelled in so long and it brings back a feeling that is so nostalgic and different to what you're currently feeling the you get a little week. Sometimes your tummy turns, just a little bit.

Sometimes you hear a song and you're struck with that heart-wrenching twisted knife in your chest. That song was your creed three years ago and now...now is so different.

Because when you're growing up, somebody's always holding your hand. Every moment is guided and planned and sometimes you get in trouble but you can rest easy knowing that someone else is telling you what's right and wrong. There is someone else enforcing authority and dishing out the consequences of your mistakes.

But what about when you're all grown up and you're making your own decisions? You're the one that has to draw the line. You're the one that has to be tough on yourself. If you make a mistake, that's on you; Mummy can't apologise on your behalf.

People always want what they can't have and people always expect things to be better than they are. Don't be in a rush to grow up. Don't be in a rush to be allowed to do whatever you want.

Enjoy having someone watching out for you while it lasts.

The world is a hard place, so don't become too much like the world.

Make sure that you grow up in the heart and that you don't grown down in the soul.