Why Does Adulthood Hit You All At Once?
As a kid, you always loved the holidays, and you loved waking up knowing school was at least 3 weeks away. As an adult, that idea seems to flip on its head. Who knew that an unstructured and indefinite period of time could tear you down so much?
Adulthood seems to have a new definition these days. With such a shift in technology and the cultural conscience, over a very short period of about 20 years, those just emerging into adulthood these days have no idea who or what they are. We remember those days when we’d run around outside, and spend time on the playground and in the forests with our friends. But we also remember dial-up internet, and the ‘computer room,’ and the invention of console after console.
When you look back on it, there’s such a disconnect between these two memories, despite the fact they exist uncomfortably concurrently. The complexity of adulthood hits all at once.
It’s said that adults these days are delaying milestones. In the US, 1 in 4 adults aged between 25 and 34 still live with their parents, without any job to their name. Compared to 2005, 12 years before this census was taken, the ‘majority’ of young people were living independently.
To me, this says that things have gotten a lot more expensive, and jobs have gotten a lot harder to get. It makes a lot more sense to stay at home, with your parents, than to waste everything you have trying to move out and make a point of independence. Of course, some people would love to leave home, for various reasons, but there’s still an impassable gateway there. Even when you try to move out, you get hit by so many obstacles, mainly in the form of fees, you start to believe you’re never going to make a go of standing on your own two feet.
You try to be an adult, and reach one of those adulthood milestones the generations love to go on about, and get pushed back all at once. The complexity of adulthood hits all at once.
Things seem similar in the UK, where I live. Comparing 1998 to 2018, there are less young people in work, mainly between the ages of 18 and 24. The older you are, the more likely you seem to be to have a job, and starting to find success there.
But when you study a little more closely, there’s not much of a difference between the two values, and there are also more people staying on in higher education these days. But maybe staying on at university, for as long as possible, is one of the best ways to get by in the modern world. I know some people hate the idea of shifting out of academia, and moving into ‘the real world’, despite the fact that we’ve always been living in one. Preparing for one. And then getting let down by one.
Which gets you to think a little — if it takes round about 5 to 10 years to find a good job, that you love to do and pays well, why is there so much focus on achieving at a young age?
After all, adulthood is all up to you. You have to deal with things mostly on your own, with a bit of advice here and there, that you may or may not agree with. Reaching out can seem like a 50/50 — you might get a talk that’s worth the time and energy, you might just get a rehearsed rebuttal you’ve heard a million times before.
You can only take so many ‘just ignore it’ in response to something that’s grinding you down before you snap.
You set your own alarms, and have to keep to them. No one else will wake you up, or make you breakfast, and half the time all you have the time or energy for is a bowl of cereal. The whole time you think about what you can make tomorrow, to make sure you eat healthy at least one day this week.
You don’t see you the people you love as your friends for months on end, despite repeatedly assuring each other, ‘We should catch up soon!’ 8 or 9 months go by before you even see each other again, and half the time, it’s not even due to a plan you made together.
You have to go into arguments all on your own, and deal with the fallout on your own. You stop yourself from ‘bitching’ to your friends, or complaining to your mum, because you’re an adult now. You can handle this.
You’ve got responsibilities, and the guilt that weighs on you when you don’t keep to them is almost unbearable. You miss a day of work, because you’re sick or you’re hit with an emergency, and you can’t bear to think about the money you’ve lost, or the boss who might give you a disappointed look when you go in tomorrow.
You see other people who seem to manage just fine. Other adults, just like you, who seem to have it all together. They get their nails done, they hit the gym on a regular basis, they’re walking to work, rather than sitting tiredly on a bus that takes you down the same street.
You realise you’re in your 20s, and you’re only going to get older, and you’ve got things to do. You muddle along, hoping you’ve got this. The complexity of adulthood hits you all at once.
Which is why I thought it would be important to think about adulthood right now, just for a second. It’s a rough ride for most of us, and nothing is ever as simple as it claims to be. And maybe, you’re looking for a sign that you’re doing just fine. Well, this could be just that for you.
Because adulthood is up to you. You have to take things at your own pace, because some of us just aren’t in a position (or aren’t ready) to get on with those milestones we hear about all the time. You know your life, even if you don’t know where you’re taking it.
The complexity of adulthood is that we never share the same experiences. But most of all, it’s that you’re not alone in how you’re struggling.
