, 4 min read
Seven Things That Happen When You Turn 21
I wanted to share some things that have happened to me since turning 21, and I think these things are pretty universal, so I think fellow young people might get something out of it.
1. Slow-down
Twenty-one, for me, was the year when I finally decided I wanted time to slow down. It's a funny switch because when you're a kid, you want time to speed up. Usually, you want to be a grown-up because being a grown-up seems super cool, and so you just can't wait until all of those exciting ages. For me, being 21, that's when I was finally like,
"Okay, that's it. No more aging. I'm good to be this age for a while."
2. Death
You know, I wanted time to slow down. Of course, that's not how time works. It may seem a little strange; maybe it doesn't happen to everyone when they are my age, but when I turned 21, I started thinking a lot more about death, and how imminent it is, and how real it is. This past year, I have, for the first time, started worrying about my parents dying. They both reached their 60th birthdays, so for the first time ever in my short little life, I finally realized that death is real, and that at some point, my parents are going to die, and that it could happen relatively soon. It seems like it's just this recent past year that I've been thinking that.
3. Health
Along the same line of thinking, another thing that has really struck a chord with me this past year is diseases that happen when you age. Generally, I never had to worry about things like diabetes and cancer and heart disease — anything like that — because I was young. And now, suddenly being 21 years old, that's when reality strikes me that I actually do have to worry about those diseases. No, I know I'm still young for a lot of them, but just somehow the reality of those diseases has really sunk in. When I was younger, it was very easy for me to dismiss them.
4. No clue
You know, something else that I've learned, but it's on more of a positive scale, is realizing more and more that adults, almost no matter how old they are, they generally don't know what they're doing, just like me. I always thought that adults have it all together, and they have their life plan and their life all figured out. That's not the case at all. Most of the people I've talked to, they don't really know what they're doing from one year to the next, and they don't really have plans, and, like, things happen. Sometimes it seems like they're just as lost as we feel. So that's really encouraging.
5. Pressure
Maybe it's a pressure I put on myself, but this past year, I feel like as I get older, I feel more and more pressure to get things figured out, like, figure if I'm going to college and hunt, make a career, or pick some huge goal to go after. But more and more, I just feel like I have to really decide what I'm doing with my life. Slowly, as they progressed in age, you feel like you have less and less time to figure things out.
6. Respect older people
Well, I always talk about something that I call ageism, which I think is a real term. I've always believed that ageism exists, as in older people treating younger people a certain way, and I think younger people know what that way is, but just kind of a looking down on you, not giving you any respect, considering you as immature. But the past year or two years, slowly, it's very strange to see a cool shift in the way that I've been treated by fellow adults. I find that I've gotten a lot more respect from adults, and it's something that I'm not even used to, but it feels really, really nice. So that's a positive of getting older. You finally feel like you're finally treated kind of like an equal, as opposed to someone below.
7. Appreciate your parents and family
There's the last thing that I've noticed as I get older, in being 21, is that I've found that I have appreciated my parents more and my family more recently because I feel like when you're 18, if you've moved out, you just feel kind of a thrill to be on your own and free from your parents' control. After you're on your own for a while, and suffer for a while, like just with the daily responsibilities of adult living, you slowly start to appreciate things about your family that you wouldn't think of.
That's all I have for today. Hopefully, I'll make another video.