When I Grow Up

Let me speak my mind on a little something called growing up.

What does it really mean by growing up? Making your own decisions? Living on your own? Being at the legal age to drink?

The thing is, growing up is not everything we thought it was when we are younger. But when we do grow up, we realise this. And there is no other way to realise it than by... well... growing up.

The first aspect: making our own decisions. Growing up is not about making your own decisions. In fact, growing up is when you understand the decisions you have to make and then let the best person make the decision for you. In any case, if you believe the best person to make the decision is yourself, then by all means, make the decision. If not, you ask for opinions. You take advices. You let other people talk you into or out of something. So in the end, growing up is actually having the bravery to leave your life in someone else's hands, knowing that you don't always make the best decisions yourself.

It's not about being perfect and not making mistakes either, for we all know adults make a lot of mistakes. (Take the recent recession as example). Here, you know you've grown up when you learn from the mistakes you make. And also other people's mistakes. When you've gone so far as to learn from other people's mistakes, then you know you've grown way way up, as some more influential people has never learned to pick up this little trick in life.

So it's learning, in a way. Adapting.

So then, being a grown up doesn't mean you're done with learning. Far from it, actually. The point that you grow up is evident when you realise you don't know anything. Knowing that learning is a process that takes a lifetime. That even if you're the oldest person in the world, you'd still be able to learn from someone much younger. When we grow up, we accept learning as a breath of fresh air. We strive to know more. Because as long as you learn, life doesn't stop. As long as you learn, you keep yourself alive. No matter where or how you learn.

One thing being a grown up definitely doesn't give you is freedom. If you're chasing to grow up just for the freedom it seems to promise, you'd be so far from it in years to come. For no one is farther removed from freedom than the person who actively seeks it. I learned that from Kahlil Gibran. And it is wise to take it. He knows, the person who wants freedom so much is the person who is the most trapped. For freedom is not what freedom seems. And when you achieve this freedom in your had, it won't be freedom any longer.

What being a grown up is, is independence and responsibility. It is when you are given independence, that you have the responsibility to use it as well as you can.

I still have friends who are living with their parents, and they like to ask me, every night, "What's stopping you from going out and having fun?"

I never have the answer. I never knew what to say. They look at me and see me to have all the freedom in the world, living in a different country from my parents.

The thing is, responsibility is my answer now. I know if I go out tonight I won't be able to finish my resume. Or do my tutorial work for Wednesday. Or even finish my work for the societies I'm involved in. And I know I would spend my money in better places. And then I know the dangers of going out at night on my own. And I also know it's not very nice to leave your boyfriend behind and go to a bar without him.

Maybe it would be nice to go out and party tonight. But it would be a hell of a lot nicer to stay home, knowing the trouble you'd be out of, and the problems you won't get yourself in.

So part of growing up, I realise, is finding a partner, someone to love, as well. This is because most of us (in my culture, anyway) is used to being surrounded by our close-knit famillies. So much so that surviving alone doesn't seem to be a very attractive option. Admit it: we love to have someone to keep us in check. We do need someone to tell us what not to do sometimes. And we need this constant witnes to our lives. For when someone is there to care about all the littlest things you do, it would remind us everyday that our existence really matters in this world.

So grow up, guys. And love every minute of it. For there's nothing like growing up to remind us of the kid in us everyday.

And saying all that, I'm still getting there.


LoVe~
MzP<3>