Frankly Put: To Growing Pains and Beyond…
The points where it feels like growing up is happening to others and not to me continue to increase in number as I get older. There are more days than not that I genuinely forget my actual age.
Like a pendulum, I find myself swinging between thinking I am younger than I am or that I am older than I am. It is a weird place of dissociation to be in and I sometimes laugh to myself at how it occurs. At the same time, there comes a lot of self-doubt about where I am vis a vis where I am supposed to be in life.
I mean, they say, “You are in your twenties, you shouldn’t have everything figured out” and I would really like to agree. At the same time as it is supposed to elicit some comfort in where one is in life, to look within and find discomfort in the same sentiment is just a different race altogether and I think I am losing. The pressure… is getting wersa!
They’ll tell you, “Don’t compare yourself to others, compare yourself to the you of yesterday” but what do you do when the you of yesterday is the one that is lining up the expectations for you like comically huge hurdles that are meant to take you out? Ambition is not such a bad thing but one can be overambitious and therein lies the bad. Being afraid is fine but it is detrimental to live continually in the state.
As someone who grew up around people who would often say to me, “You have so much potential” I think a part of me grew into the mentality of always seeing what could be more than what was. So much so that it became a state of being and transcended factions of life. This is strange but I think it is also kinda cool from the point of an observation of the quirks of a human mind.
In many circles, I find myself being the “big brother”, the “responsible one”, the “one to take charge” and I don’t think I really have a say in it anymore. I often wonder when that space for putting away the responsibility to the side will come and I can let loose and act my age. This leads me to ask what I mean by that. What does my age look like?
Probably, the better question would be “What do I want my age to look like?” Granted, I come from the generation where we don’t like to live by rules, standards or be put in any boxes that are not our own choice (#GenZ) Anyway, banter aside, it is a balance I am still striking between the hustle and bustle of life, internal wants and life choices. I suppose that is where the growing pains come from.
Every time the earth runs around the sun, I am reminded that time is passing and I along with it, bit by bit every day. Excuse the sense of urgency but I do actually want to make something of this short rollercoaster ride before I get off. I want to run, jump, walk, sprint and jog to every which-where dream and vision I cast into the vastness of the universe but growing pains must come with it.
Perhaps there is something to braving the pain in the morning after if it means carrying with me the satisfaction of getting out there every time. Sometimes, the pains may take longer to go away — like losing friends — sometimes, they may be just a bump on the road — like a mistake in a drawing — but I think the point is to get up each day with a new-found desire to keep growing.
I think that although that is the mentality, there are still days I crave a shoulder to lean on. A helping hand to massage the muscles and ease the pains if only for a little bit because my hands may shake when I think of doing the same. I think of the number of times my legs have failed and I have stumbled in this growth. Of the days getting up hurt a lot more than just laying there and letting it be if only for a little while longer.
The realization that adulting has this way of stealing the little joys you hold so dear is just another pain to live through. Every so often I read something on the “inner child” and how that is the best way to find peace. How the things that bring that inner child joy are what essentially makes you happiest. What do you do though, when you just have an “inner geezer”?
So cheers to growing pains and beyond… to put it Frankly.
