The Power Of Growing Up

Let me start  with something I wish I could take back:

The one thing that I most regret saying when I was younger is  “I want to grow up.” All I wanted to do is to grow up or to be older. Now looking at myself, what was I thinking? When we were little we had all of this free time. We played games, ran around with friends doing whatever fun things we could do… and less responsibilities. Life was simple. Life was easy. We would get asked by adults “What do you want to become in the future?” Most of our responses would proudly probably be “ a doctor, a  teacher, a police officer, or a firefighter.”  Those questions would get us excited for our future and I thought that growing up and becoming an adult would be a fun adventure. Let’s be honest, yes, it is an adventure, but not the adventure we thought it would be. Now that I am 18 and soon to be on my own… I kind of want a refund.

Growing up, in elementary and middle school we watched the graduating seniors walk the halls in their caps and gowns for their last time, as we saw them walking down, we saw our future. We thought “ Oh, that’s gonna be us someday!”. And somehow that someday is today, it is our turn, as we walked down those halls for our last time, seeing the kids, we did not just see the kids, we saw our past. 

And now look at us here, sitting in our caps and gowns, about to hit a milestone. A milestone that we used to dream about. A milestone that we thought would take forever to get when we were little, but it somehow came in a blink of an eye. 

But, what is growing up, really? As we grow up we gain our own freedom and learn what independence truly means. From watching our parents handle responsibilities for us kids like scheduling our doctors and dentist appointments, paying the bills, and bringing us to places where we need to be. Now we are slowly taking on those things ourselves,  putting less stress on our parents. It may be difficult and not always fun, but most of all, it teaches us a lot. This teaches us responsibility. As we gain more responsibility, we gain more independence and freedom. We start to go on our own, making our own decisions, finding our own interest, exploring the world, going past our comfort zones, and most importantly we find who we really are as a person. Growing up is learning the consequences of your own actions. It’s about understanding how things and people change.

Now we are at that age where the question shifts from “ What do you want to become in the future?”  to, “ Where are you going to go to college?” or  “ What are you going to major in?” Most of us know the next part of our future of where we are gonna go and what we wanna do, either going to college, to the trades, or straight to work, but some of us are stuck and don’t know what is to come next. That’s ok if you don’t know.  You don’t have to rush things and figure your life out right away. You are still young and have the time to explore, time to change your mind, time to find who you are, and time to grow.

To my younger self, growing up is not as simple and fun as I thought it would be. Overall,  It’s complicated, but most of all it’s powerful. It’s powerful because you gain responsibility. Powerful because you gain independence. Powerful because you gain freedom. Powerful because you gain wisdom. Powerful because of the understanding of the world around you. And most of all powerful because growing up means that you become you and most importantly, you should be proud of that.

Congratulations class of  2025 we did it! Thank you!

Image-“The Graduates” by Game of EPL5 & LUMIX G20/F1.7 is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0.