Grown Up

I decided a long time ago that I wasn't really interested in posturing stereotypical "maturity". I play video games, I read comics, and I watch cartoons. The subject matter of all three of those things has changed over the years but to suggest that I draw more enjoyment from something like Saint's Row 4 or Watchmen than I do from Battle at Procyon or Calvin and Hobbes would be patently false. Heck, I've been re-watching the Fox dub of the original Digimon with my kids recently, and quite frankly I'm enjoying it more than the final season of Attack on Titan.

My point is that "maturity" isn't about what we do with our free time. Hobbies, interests, or careers don't define whether you're a fully matured adult of the human species, and neither does some made-up standard of financial success, familial success, or stoicism. There are a million different yard sticks for what defines "maturity", but for my money it all boils down to understanding.

Someone who is mature understands themselves and how they interact with the world around them. Maturity isn't repressing emotions, it's understanding emotions; what causes specific emotional responses, how they affect your perception, how to express them accurately and productively, and if necessary, how to control them to avoid negative impacts. Maturity also isn't looking down on other people, it's understanding other people. Understanding how their motivations drive their behavior, how their behavior will affect you, and when you need to put some distance between yourself and their behavior to prevent injury.

Maturity is about living life enough and developing enough empathy that you have a full picture of what drives you and the ability to come to understand what drives the people around you. Maturity is about understanding.

I like to think I'm pretty mature. I do understand myself pretty well, and I think I do pretty well at empathizing with the people around me. Yes, I watch cartoons, play games, and read comics. But I know why I like those things with a great amount of detail. Can you say the same about the things you enjoy?

All of that was just preface to the decidedly random announcement that with my birthday and the upcoming birth of my third child I'm increasing and fully rounding-out the structure of my personal Nerf arsenal via the addition of the extremely good-value blaster pictured below. To any other mature Nerf herders out there that are interested in a good-natured battle sometime this summer, let's set something up. I need an excuse to stretch this thing's legs.