The Best is yet to come
Is there anything such as ‘age perfect’ when it comes to maturity? Now what do I mean by that? Does age and experience contribute to the maturity of a person? Well indeed it does. But that's only if we have picked up life lessons all along and grown wiser. I remember being picked on for how thin and scrawny I looked as a young child. At one point in time I had to tell myself not to give in to people’s negative comments. And there started my journey at a very young age trying not to retort but to plainly ignore those comments because I understood that they were detrimental to the well being of a 13 year old. It was life’s circumstances that taught me to keep my cool and respond with a smile without being offended. And today at 75 years old , I can clearly look back and say that I have come a long way. Because of which I know how to take a joke on myself even today. I have learnt how to laugh at myself and not take things too seriously. That was a sign of maturity at a very early age. Maturity brings with it an ability to assess and evaluate the situation, fuse it with our past experiences and belief systems and then to reason out the right response to the circumstances faced.
I want to take you back in time to the year 1990. This was a torrid year for my family and I, as we had to flee the country we were residing in then (Kuwait) owing to the Gulf war. But as they say, ‘desperate times call for desperate measures’. We had to leave our homes and most of our belongings behind. Being a mother with three young girls in a refugee camp with my three girls huddled beside me, I could barely close my eyes during the nights because I was so concerned for their safety and security. The sudden switch from eating 3 balanced meals with the family to eating tomatoes and canned tuna thrice a day, seven times a week is not something that I want to relive ( (though it sounds like a healthy mediterranean meal). The journey from Kuwait to home back in India that typically takes us 8 hrs (transit times included) took us almost 14 days. You can imagine what my plight would have been because my husband and I had exhausted the cash we were carrying, had no access to our bank accounts and had no assurance of future income to get us through. Nonetheless those were seasons where I matured a lot beyond my years because of the experiences that I went through.
I struggled with the change , but knew that if I didn't fully embrace the changes that life threw my way, then it would knock me off-balance and pin me to the ground. I liken these experiences to metamorphidzo (that's greek for transformation, and is the root of the english word ‘metamorphosis’). You would remember this from your school days as the process through which a caterpillar evolves into a butterfly. It's not until a certain maturity is acquired, that the caterpillar can transform itself into a butterfly. The process might be painful and a long drawn one, yes I agree, but is extremely crucial to maturity.
I would like to draw an analogy between experience and teachers. An experience is like” Ms Teacher “ or “Sir Mentor “ who takes us along life’s journeys to teach us through the pain, the toils, the joys, the failures, the victories , the tears and the laughter. These experiences encourage us and push us on to maturity. In addition to experiences themselves, the people that surround us during these experiences have the capacity to shape us during these times. It is therefore extremely crucial that we surround ourselves with the right people that will sail with us in this voyage called life.
So what are some precious life lessons that you and I can inculcate as a lifestyle to cultivate maturity? Here are some that I think are important:
Respond to situations, don't react.
Look to the future and quit brooding on the past
Choose wise people and learn from them
So the next time that you tell yourself, ‘I am growing old’, remind yourself that you have come far in this voyage of life, have learnt much from your teacher - Mr.Time and have metamorphosed into the butterfly you were destined to be. With advancement in age, has come experience, and with experience an increase in maturity. So I say, the time to crawl is behind you, it's time now to fly.
Author: Team 60plus India
Keywords: Age perfect, life lessons, experience, maturity
