Summer has finally arrived in the Pacific Northwest. We are going to have sunny skies this entire week and I can’t wait.
I’ve been talking about realizing who you are this month in my emails, blog posts and on Facebook. I am going to continue to talk about identity today and about the concept of emotional adulthood.
Emotional adulthood is when we accept 100% responsibility for how we think, feel and the results we see in our lives. When something happens that we don’t like, we don’t look around for someone or something else to blame it on.
Oddly enough, emotional adulthood is not something we are taught as children.
In fact, we are taught the exact opposite. We are taught that other people or events can and do cause us to feel happy or sad. We learned that others “are responsible” for the feelings and emotions we experience.
I’ve spent a few years learning to accept responsibility for my own thoughts, feelings, actions, and the results that I see in my life. I have learned that it is a LOT easier to say we want to be an emotional adult than it is to actually be an emotional adult.
Let me give you an example. Yesterday was my birthday. I planned a quiet, relaxing day. The morning went great, I had friends and family call and sing happy birthday to me, we had a great lunch. Then in the afternoon it got quiet and I wanted to know where my family was, I wanted more people pay attention to me. I thought some of my girls should be doing something more to make me feel special on my birthday. I felt sorry for myself because everyone else’s family celebrates their birthdays in (what I imagined to be) some special way.
Thinking that others are to blame for our feelings stops us from recognizing and living with our own emotions. Being comfortable with feeling ALL of our emotions lets us enjoy our life in a real way rather than an imaginary world where we think that everyone else has things better than we do.
Now that I am another year older and wiser, I can see how being an emotional adult makes me more in control of my own life. That seems like a much better way to live, what do you think?