Recently, I've become more aware of my growth as a person. I've acknowledged which parts of me and changed and how those changes have happened. It's an incredibly strange thing, I think, to perceive the differences between yourself and your peers when it comes to these sorts of things. You can be in a room of twenty different people, all the same age, yet all be different levels of maturity when it comes to emotions-- and being self-aware. This might not be the typical thing I'd write about but my brain is whirring and it feels like something I should just get out (who knows, it could be a wake-up call for people).
Emotional maturity. What does that phrase even mean? How can you be emotionally immature? Really, it's quite simple. Emotional maturity is having the ability to manage your emotions regardless of the circumstances, regardless of how extreme or bad things may seem. To be downright honest, I wasn't even close to being emotionally mature 12 months ago. I was reactive, I had to shut everything else off completely when I was emotional, and I could barely deal with the things I was feeling. Everything was in the moment and entirely reactionary, and I never gave myself time to process the situations. In the aftermath of what I see as my October 2020 'Unhinged Period', I started to address this issue.
The real crux is I didn't realise it was an issue before this point. I didn't realise that-- sometimes-- my reactionary nature was simply me not taking the time to address how I felt correctly. It definitely wasn't the case every single time, because I suffered a lot of disrespect and downright horrible treatment at times, but there were situations in which I reacted because I didn't know what else to do. Impulsivity, insecurity, placing blame on others. I recognize a few things as how I acted and how I was when I was less mature in my emotions. I often look back now at how I reacted to things and honestly cringe; times where I immediately turned to tears or being defensive just because I didn't want to process or deal with how I felt. At all. Here's the thing: being able to handle, understand and react to situations correctly isn't just beneficial for you. It's good for everyone in your life. That's something I want to discuss.
I wouldn't say I've ever been an outright bad friend. For as long as I can remember, I've always put my friends' interests ahead of my own and wanted nothing more than to look out for them. Those things are good traits to have in a friendship (as long as you keep looking out for yourself too, which is something I've learned recently) but when you're still learning how to deal with yourself, maintaining friendships isn't the easiest thing. When I was younger- and I mean that even as recently as me being 19- I struggled in friendships because I was trying to balance understanding my own emotions, helping my friends get through their own issues, learning not to take the tiniest things in an all-too-serious way and huge life changes. The result of such an imbalance in my life was one of two things; I would withdraw completely or become hypersensitive and cause arguments. Yikes. By stepping back and assessing myself, I've been able to (for the most part) prevent this point from ever being reached. I'm happy to say, and hopeful my friends would agree, that the past year of being around me has been better than others because of this. Self-work is not just about improving your own situation!
Emotional maturity, then, flows so neatly into becoming self-aware. Depending on who you ask (trust me, the self-aware research path is a deep deep hole) it's typically considered that there are two types of self-awareness. There's internal self-awareness (how we see our own values, passions, aspirations, fit with our environment, reactions, and impact on others) and external self-awareness (understanding how other people view us). Some people will value one of these over the other, but the truth is a balance of both is what makes you truly self-aware. To be able to acknowledge exactly who you are- strengths and flaws alike- and assess exactly how that impacts others at the same time is an incredible ability to have. I for one am not quite there yet; there are moments where I lack one of the two, but I believe that working towards it is a form of self-awareness in itself. For me, the focus is entirely on my impact on others. I look at who I am and the things I stand for and what I do and wonder how other people view me because of this. What does my empathetic nature look like to others? How do people view my outlook on relationships? Would someone agree with my aspirations or find them stupid? There are so many tiny things that we sometimes forget impact the view others have of us. Think about that.
It's practically impossible to always have a grip on these things, which is why I try not to hold myself to a perfect standard with it. I might have a lapse in my emotional maturity sometimes, I might not always understand myself and I might not always understand the way others view me, but those things are okay. The real value comes in admitting that. You can't really be self-aware without admitting that you aren't entirely there just yet (a confusing concept) and there's something admirable to me about an individual that can admit they haven't got everything down yet. I try to surround myself with those people. The people that are working on themselves in whatever way they can, understand their own values and actions can affect others and don't shy away from the realities of who they are. There's a certain draw for me to people that show a willingness to grow. My words, really, can't be gospel; I am just a 20-year-old woman sitting at a laptop and emptying my thoughts onto a screen. What I think and how I perceive people is entirely individual to me, but my writing of this blog is just to encourage other people to maybe take a step back and look at themselves in a deeper way. Who know's what you'll learn.
This truly was a brain splurge on my part. It's an idea I've had floating around in my head for a few weeks and thought I'd take some spare time today to get it out there. Admittedly, I've been busy (and will surely be busy) settling into life post-pandemic and seeing my friends for the first time in a while, which is why I've been absent from writing. I've also genuinely become more comfortable in myself, and a lot of writing for this blog came from a lack of that. It won't end anytime soon, I'm certain of that, but the infrequency of posts will be down to me wanting my ideas and writing to be as fully fleshed out as possible. If you've made it this far, I truly hope you're enjoying lockdown slowly coming to an end and are ready to make the most of a nice summer!! Be kind to yourselves <3[