Even with a good career and all the “adult milestones” I don’t feel like an actual adult. I feel like I’m pretending to know what I’m doing. Anyone else experience this?
Even with a good career and all the “adult milestones” I don’t feel like an actual adult. I feel like I’m pretending to know what I’m doing. Anyone else experience this?
Early 20’s. I work with a lot of people nearly double my age who call me a kid (endearingly and lovingly if I may add). Make decent money and have a great partner.
I pay taxes and pay bills, I have a car and I go to work everyday of the work week. I tend to ask myself “is this it? This is what I wanted so much as a kid? This is being a grown up?”
I mean I can eat ice cream whenever I want I guess, but I dread when the actual adulting comes along. Seriously, does anyone else know when the adulting comes? Is it bad?
Apologies for the rambling, but the title question always hits with me as of late. Thanks.
I’d call ‘actual adulting’ having responsibility for another’s welfare. Whether a dog, cat or human, they are all varying levels of “if I fuck up, someone else suffers”.
I still don’t feel fully like an adult, but I do feel the responsibility of ensuring there is food on the table and a roof over our heads. My partner is also responsible for these things so it is a little less pressure.
All said I do not feel as adult as I saw my parents when they were my age. They seemed very grown up and very responsible compared to how I feel today. I was 11 when my dad was my age.
You’re perfectly fine. Really right now you’re a young adult and your older peers are just calling you a kid because they’re at a different stage of life development than you and so don’t relate to you anymore, hence they treat anyone outside of their little clique with derision to enforce their unwarranted sense of superiority. In short, if they’re being mean about it, they’re ageist bigots; remind them they will never have the youthful beauty, potential and opportunities you have when they do it and watch them fume.
As a 41 year old, when I call someone in their early-mid 20s a kid, there’s no derision intended. Think about how you relate to someone who’s 12 or 16 when you’re 20 or so - they might be quite capable, even fun to hang out with; but their life experiences also give them a clearly different outlook. And, like as not, you feel a little more interest in making sure they’re getting along all right (at least I do!)
As you age, that doesn’t really change - but the “target age” where that comes into play follows you up! So at 26, you feel that way about people just coming into high school; at 30-35, about people getting out of college and starting their careers. My oldest kid is 6; and I feel this way now about most of the parents of my kids’ classmates! Makes for a fun juxtaposition, when they have older kids and know more about what we’re in for than I do :p
It can turn into something condescending, depending on the person; but I think it’s usually more of a statement that “I remember being where you were!”