“Maturity is healing and unlearning your own toxic patterns to turn your pain into power, your wounds into wisdom, the mistreatment of others into boundaries, and your generational curses into blessings,” Mind Tendencies 2. This ties into our discussion about future faking.  When we are honest with ourselves about the obstacles we put in our own way, we can then learn how to dissolve them.  That includes allowing people to misunderstand us, or delaying action in the moment thus delaying our lives hoping it will happen for us.  So many of us look at maturity as a certain level of seriousness or making sure we portray ourselves a certain way (image).  I used to look at maturity as respect for attaining a certain age, the ability to take charge and constantly making decisions, leading with authority. These things are part of maturity, but this isn’t what makes people mature. The truth is there are plenty of “adults” who don’t have a clue, making terrible decisions, and we think they are mature because they are a certain age.  Or there are people who seem completely flighty who are remarkably astute.  The difference is an inner knowing and how closely we follow it.  We grow when we let go of the things that hold us back, when we realize that we don’t need to seek comfort, we need to allow things to develop as they are meant to.  Basically, we do better when we understand our role in where we are—including the ways we have created our own problems.

There is also this misconception about maturity and responsibility.  The idea of responsibility is complex.  We can’t let ourselves be so bogged down with responsibility and obligation that we forget to live our purpose, but we need to take enough responsibility for our lives that we are accountable for the results.  None of these things make us mature.  People can set some pretty low bars for their goals and believe they have it together.  When we take responsibility for our own lives, we acknowledge where we lowered that bar, where we decided to kick the can like we talked about yesterday.  We see where we can do better.  We stop letting the outside influence us and we deal with what we feel in the moment.  We heal those issues in the moment and we make peace with who we are.  We learn to love who we are.  Most importantly, we accept who we are and allow that version of ourselves to break free.  Maturity has nothing to do with our image, it has to do with possessing and practicing grace for ourselves and others and knowing it has nothing to do with us.  It has to do with taking ownership, authority, and responsibility for ourselves. 

As we are healed, we create space because the junk falls away and is removed from our souls.  Maturity is letting go of the desire to put it back because we are familiar with it.  It’s knowing it’s bad for us and leaving it where it is.  It’s making the right choices for who we are, not for who we want to be seen as.  It’s accepting that not everyone can or will understand us, that others can go about their path as they see fit, and knowing we have the wisdom and fortitude in ourselves to get us where we are meant to go.  It’s listening to what feels right in us and trusting good guidance.  It’s keeping the humor because we know the outside has little influence on the inside.  When we are healed, we understand that we won’t have to focus on any of this, we will simply be it.  We will stop repeating patterns and do what is right for ourselves. The goal of maturity isn’t to appear a certain way or to be a certain way.  Maturity is about loving and honoring and accepting who we are without apology or fear or the need to go back wo what is familiar.  Maturity is the loving embrace of allowing the entirety of our being to flow and to allow the same for others, to encourage the same in others.  We don’t need more responsibility, we need more maturity.