A couple of weeks ago, I was talking to my mom about the differences between how we imagined adult life when we were children and how it really is when we are adults. Despite belonging to different generations, as kids, our problems were similar: money for candies and spending time with our friends, playing in the streets of our neighborhood. We knew that sunset was the alarm to go back home. Mathematics was the most challenging task of our life – at least to me. We used to think that becoming an adult was the best part of growing up because they can be out after sunset, they have money to buy whatever they want, and they do not have to deal with math every week. In a kid’s eyes, all adults are successful.
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| Barranco, Peru – On the street – Andres Urena |
During the conversation with my mom, she told me that the greatest disappointment of being an adult was related to her professional life. She wanted to be a nurse when she was a kid and when she grew up, with the support of her aunt, she studied to become what she always dreamed. She was one of the top students in her class, so she was sent to the neoplastic area of a hospital. She remembers being euphoric about wearing her white clothes and traditional nurse’s hat on her first day of professional training. The problems arrived when she had to help a doctor heal a terrible wound – she remembers it like that. She started crying because she could not stand seeing that kind of lesion. Ultimately, she rejected her dream and stopped being a nurse. Later, she started working in a transnational company for electrical appliances and became a quality assurance supervisor. She worked in that company until her retirement.
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| Lima, Peru – Crossing – Erik Gonzalez |
My mother was not disappointed by becoming a nurse. She was disappointed by what being a nurse meant, the actions involved in it. Like my mom, a lot of us become disillusioned or stop liking some thing or profession because we discover a side we do not like and did not know was included because our idea was completely different. The problem is we do not realize that bitter disappointment can mean a new beginning and new opportunities, like my mom’s case. She became a good employee in a field she never imagined. Unfortunately, when disillusion arrives, we would like to be kids again and avoid knowing the reality we do not like. It is the paradox of growing up: As adults, we would like to be children again.
Why do we miss our childhood? Because, we, adults, have already experienced that period of life and we know for real how it is and what it implies. We miss those days playing at the park, when school was our biggest responsibility, but we do not remember being scolded by our mothers.
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| Bellavista, Peru – At the market – Rostasedlacek |
Why is being an adult harder than we expected? Easy. When we were kids, we were not fully aware of what being an adult really means. We did not know about the tasks coming as part of that package: being responsible for ourselves, payments, loans, etc.. We thought our university days were going to include parties every week end and the courses were going to be super easy because we chose a career we liked. We also thought our life was going to be completely solved at the age of 25; I mean, we were going to have our dream job, own house, car, and, of course, a lot of seals in our passports. We did not know that being an adult was going to increase our pride to the point that losing friends could be as easy as breathing because we want to be right all the time.
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| Pisac, Peru – Walking home – Nick Albi |
If we want to stop desiring a return to our childhood, we need to understand that not being on the millionaires list after graduating is ok. We also need to learn that it is fine to be lost at the age of 29, that part of growing up is to doubt our decisions, to question ourselves if we are doing what we really enjoy because we are talking about our lives. It does not matter what everyone is expecting from us, we need to find our path, the thing that makes us happy. We also need to remember our dreams – professional or personal – and work so they come true because goals are not achieved just based on luck, we need to work for them and we need to be patient and strong to not forget why they are worth it. We need to learn that failure is part of success, but it also implies perseverance and patience.
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| Lima, Peru – Living – Pablo Padilla |
Now that we are adults, we should remember the joy from our childhood and use it to enjoy our jobs, our daily life because as we grow up, it looks like we forget how to enjoy daily activities and things, and we start acting like robots doing everything automatically. And why is that? I think it is because we are so focused on competing among ourselves that we forget that living means enjoying every moment. As our grandparents said, we must enjoy the road, not just the victory at the end.
Being an adult is not that difficult, ultimately, the secret is finding the right balance between our inner kid and the adult we want to be.
Credits
Snapshot 1: Peru – Nazca lines – Stanislav Beloglazov (Shutterstock)
Snapshot 2: Barranco, Peru – On the street – Andres Urena (Unsplash)
Snapshot 3: Lima, Peru – Crossing – Erik Gonzalez (Shutterstock)
Snapshot 4: Bellavista, Peru – At the market – Rostasedlacek (Shutterstock)
Snapshot 5: Pisac, Peru – Walking home – Nick Albi (Shutterstock)
Snapshot 6: Lima, Peru – Living – Pablo Padilla (Unsplash)
Locations
Home: www.perypatetik.net
Social: www.facebook.com/Perypatetik
Cinemblem: Perypatetik youtube channel
The Syncretion of Polarization and Extremes
Alencar, Joana. Lack of Social Trust – Brazil. January 2019.
Baccino, Alejandra. Polarization within Ourselves – South America. January 2019.
Cordido, Veronica. Hanging by Extremes – Venezuela. January 2019.
Hernandez, Jonay Quintero. Extremism Is Now the New Hype? – Spain. February 2019
Montano, Osvaldo. Progress in the Face of Polarization – Bolivia. February 2019.
Romano, Mavi. Censorship and Cultural Survival in a World without Gods – Spain. January 2019.
Sariñana, Alejandra Gonzalez. Student Movements – Mexico. March 2019.
Sepi, Andreea. A World of Victims and Perpetrators? – Germany and Romania. February 2019.
Sevunts, Nane. The Era To Close – Armenia. March 2019.
Sitorus, Rina. Polarization in Politics: All a Cebong or Kampret – Indonesia. March 2018.
Vuka. Extreme Immunity to Functional Tax and Judicial System – Serbia. March 2019
Wallis, Toni. Walls and Resettlement – South Africa and Angola. February 2019.
Forthcoming
CW 14 – Bosnia and Herzegovina – Aleksandar Skobic
CW 15 – Argentina – Julieta Spirito
CW 16 – Italy – Mary Ranaldo
CW 17 – Lebanon – Ghadir Younes
CW 18 – Cuba – Marilin Guerrero Casas
CW 19 – Ukraine – Evgeny Bondarenko
CW 20 – Uruguay – Andrea da Silva Escandell
CW 21 – Spain – Jazz Williams
CW 22 – Armenia – Mania Israyelyan
CW 23 – Poland – Pawel Awdejuk
CW 24 – Balkans – Aleksandar Protic
CW 25 – Italy – Daniela Cannarella
CW 26 – Serbia – Jelena Sekulic
CW 27 – Tajikistan – Nigina Kanunova
CW 28 – Portugal – Nuno Rosalino
CW 29 – Uruguay – Lillian Julber
CW 30 – Argentina – Javier Gomez
Source: The Codex of Uncertainty Transposed