Parenting: Here's what your children need to know about growing up

Not knowing if you fit the mantle of a child or an adult and to be in a stage where you have stopped being water, yet you have not solidified into ice

By Asha Iyer Kumar

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Published: Fri 29 Sep 2023, 12:01 AM

Last updated: Tue 14 Nov 2023, 7:57 AM

Dear Children,

I know this for a truth — one of the most niggling issues of being a teenager is being told that you are not a child anymore and to behave like an adult, and when you try to take the cue and impress upon people that you are not a munchkin anymore, they put you right back in the girdle with a sharp reminder of how little of the world and life you have seen. This can be utterly annoying — not knowing if you fit the mantle of a child or an adult and to be in a stage where you have stopped being water, yet you have not solidified into ice. Where precisely are you positioned in this transition period when you are neither a fledgling nor a ripe being?

Let me share a little secret about this thing called ‘growing up’ — it never stops. It is not a passing phase that people of your age alone go through with all its attendant challenges, it is a coefficient of life itself. There is no definite moment or rite of passage that takes us to a realm of total maturity because none of us come of age completely. We are all in different stages of ‘growing up’ and just as you are flummoxed by the new things that get thrown at you in this phase of ‘maturing’, the rest of the world is wrestling with its own doubts and fears about getting future ready. Although we perceive the teenage years as the essential period of transformation when the pupa becomes the butterfly, the butterfly too is in a constant state of flux in terms of mental and emotional growth.

Mankind is designed by nature to evolve with time, and there is only one way we can make this plan come to total fruition — by letting ourselves be moulded by our life experiences and learning from them. The idea of growing up is all about becoming a better person than you previously were.

We have all fallen into a trap of leading a life of wanting and fetching. More marks, more money, more fame, more intelligence; an extra share of everything that we think makes for a successful life. While all these elements are important to lead a life of comfort, growing up is not essentially about that. It is about evaluating at every step where you are headed, what the objective of your pursuits is, and in what way it will make you better than you are presently.

Every action should have a meaning and a purpose — that of making you more contented with yourself. Learning a skill? Ask if it would amplify your happiness. Striving hard to pass an exam? Ask if that would take you one step further to your goals. Assess the reason for you to indulge in any activity and if the answer doesn’t inspire a negative emotion, know that it will eventually do you good. Conversely, it is not only about implementing plans to a tee that will augment growth. Sometimes, dropping an existing idea that seems too hard to consummate and taking a new recourse can also save you from getting stunted and encourage growth.

The pangs of growing up are not limited to you alone. Anyone who has aspirations in life is in the throes of maturing into something new, and that includes adults who might have crossed the Rubicon of juvenile concerns. As you negotiate your adolescent years, remember this — every little action should be directed at enhancing your status as a human being. That, in short, is growing up.

Keep growing. Keep glowing.

wknd@khaleejtimes.com