Adulting “is an informal term to describe behaviour that is seen as responsible and grown-up. This behaviour often involves meeting the mundane demands of independent and professional living, such as paying bills and running errands.”
As bland as this google search may sound, it does reflect how adulting is projected onto young minds or the whole society in general. As an “almost adult”, who has been on the lookout for adulthood that is all about only growing up, carrying out responsibilities and trying to get enough sleep, it has come to my notice that adulthood is anything but that!
For starters, you are a legal citizen of whichever nation you belong to, when you officially hit 20/21 years of age (the usual adulthood age, lesser if you have experienced childhood trauma), which is a pretty big deal to be celebrated if you ask me. It’s a celebration of life, to have made it this far into the journey. Adulting, the way I see it, is a massive but intricately designed beautiful balance between life and mundane chores.
The catch is, you cannot avoid either of the two ingredients. Life, well, life is just there on its own orbit while you are the moon sometimes, sometimes the Sun, really depends on what stage of life you are at, it always hits different. And you have to fulfil whatever mundane chores you have chosen to actually stay alive in the game of life.
But there is one thing that nobody prepares you for. The balance. Our parents prepare us for the hardships, the long hours we need to work for a couple of paper notes that determines our worth- how rich or otherwise, the impending doom of after working hours; everything, except teaching us the balance. And the rest of the people you had/have surrounded yourself with, only prepare you for the fun part. But where’s the middle ground to all of that? The balance?
Unfortunately, from what I gathered; the balance remains a lesson for us to learn in our own ways. In some ways, it is kind of nice to figure out and form my own version of balance; but a heads up about it would have been nice.