Growing Up

[The Gracer]

Lately, ive been noticing how mature ive become over the last few years.

Lessons that were hard-learned, amazing experiences and most importantly the fun times have all helped me to grow into what i feel i am today - a young, polite (cough cough :P ) adult, who has learned his lessons, had some amazing experiences and definitely had his fair share of fun! :D

As i was saying, i feel my maturity has suddenly increased - as i court ( ;) awwwright!! ) i feel like a different person than what i was earlier in life - i feel more intelligent, far more articulate, and as a result i feel it is easier to convey my emotion, how i am feeling or what i think.

I feel older, for the first time in my life, i feel like im actually aging, becoming a someone rather than just a kid..

In another sentimental thread from The Gracer, id love to hear your thoughts on how you feel as you age.

[Mad-Ice]

I am happy for you that it feels good getting older! As long as you don't forget your innerchild!! I think I got stuck around the age of well let's say 20 years. I still have the urge to shock people in a funny way, especially colleagues and people of high standard. I enjoy it to be naughty! Vive la resistance!

[Asayyeah]

Lmao Matthijs :D
we are both on the same boat : i'd like to be for the rest of my life like i am now : enthusiastic, passionnated, happy and cool.
i am 38 but in my mind i am a lil' bit less aged ;)

[The Gracer]

I strive constantly to achieve a greater level of understanding. I take something from everything i do or encounter and use what ive learned to better understand how everything works - i think this is the ultimate goal, total understanding - however impossible it seems, there has to be a point where there is nothing left to learn...but we are yet to learn whether that is true...

In saying that, its not as if i am constantly noting and remembering these things. Its natural, subconsious, so its not as if i walk around looking for these opportunities to learn. I am a very impulsive person, so i tend to put myself into these learning situations without trying :P

Ive always liked to picture myself older than i am truthfully - i seem to get along with those of a higher age group better than those from my own.

As a 15 year old i couldnt wait to be 20 - i wanted the world at my fingertips.

No - my inner child is alive and kicking ;) i have to tell him to calm down sometimes!

[Flashback Jack]

i think this is the ultimate goal, total understanding - however impossible it seems, there has to be a point where there is nothing left to learn...but we are yet to learn whether that is true...

The ultimate human goal is unlearning. Everything. What's left after having done that is something most folks in the know call truth, but then again, most folks aren't interested in that because the prerequisites are first, foremost and finally a complete loss of individuality. And virtually nobody is interested in that, chiefly for the reason it's loss of individuality that drives all man's petty fears that he attempts to patch over with foolishness -- foolishness that floats in the ether in and between everyone. With the right eyes, it's easy to pick out.

- F

[eLhabib]

riiight...
I'll be slightly less philosophic and second what Matthijs said: be sure not to lose your inner youth and freshness. And perhaps most importantly: don't let anything in your life become a routine!

[Keenan]

Considering I'm 20, I don't think I've ever went through the whole 'Growing Up' process, as I generally had to be more mature than alot of my friends growing up due to the way I was brought up and having to take responsibility for alot from a young age.

My family ain't the richest to say the least and I've had to pay digs since I turned 16 (now upto £300 after my own bills once my dad left) and I've worked Full Time since I left college at 18, so my circumstances have always really dictated that I had act like an adult anyway. This by no means is saying that I wouldn't want it this way, it has given me a better perspective of life, the people who inhabit this Earth and the fact that life really ain't fair at all.

[Lance]

I could write an essay on this, but right now I don't have the time. Indeed time and sensory capacity and the limitations of the size and complexity of the nervous system are the limits of how much growing up can be done. And know this: that as long as you are a human in the way we are now, Truth with a capital 'T' is an illusion created by our thoughts and desire. We all still have many lessons to learn and will never have the time as humans to learn them all.

[Keenan]

In the words of Cypher, Ignorance is Bliss. Ironically (see cliche) none more so than in the real world.

[mdhay]

Well, you're only as young as you feel.:) So that makes me 2097.;)

[Lance]

I've sometimes thought that stupidity would be a kind of bliss, perhaps in the Zen Buddhist sense. I would say to myself: "If I were stupider, I'd be happier." As it is, though, even a human of modest IQ test scores [whose validity is very questionable] has enough imagination to think of things and situations that do not exist and to desire them. And to be unhappy without them.

[Flashback Jack]

riiight...

No, seriously, what I said is about as plainly as I could put it -- Truth (rather the great big nothing) isn't for everyone. Based on discussions around here, the one person I'm certain understands what I said would be Lance (and maybe the dude at SL that wrote the blurb by the founder of Piranha in the Fusion manual). :)

- F

[Hellfire_WZ]

It's weird looking back at how much I've grown up since I joined this board. I was 16 at the time, still doing my AS levels. Since then, I've passed my A-levels, spent three years getting my degree, and two years working as a teaching assistant in a school. Now here I am, a 23 year old trainee physics teacher.

Weird... :)

[ZenDJiNN]

-- foolishness that floats in the ether in and between everyone. With the right eyes, it's easy to pick out.
- F

Flash, that was great. Not sure i get all of it yet because there's a lot there to take in, but some things just "Feel right" when you read them, know what i mean? Nice one. :+

[Lance]

I thought it lacked sufficient clarity of expression to be an accurate communication of the idea, which would be why you didn't "get all of it yet". ;) It's very difficult to accurately convey exactly what one means without leaving open the possibility of misinterpretation. Some people are distressed by that difficulty, others use it in political campaigns to avoid saying anything that they could be made responsible for. Not naming any particular politicians. Probably only need to say "politicians" as a general case, and my premise about them would be mostly true. :D

[G'Kyl]

The ultimate human goal is unlearning.

As an important side note: Would you then please start unlearning track layouts and barrel roll opportunities? ;)

Seriously, though, what you are saying sounds like Buddhist or similar philosophy, and personally I doubt the ultimate goal is to unlearn or unbecome.

Then again, of course the biggest lesson I learned so far is I don't know ****. I couldn't even tell if that's true, because
1) if there is one absolute truth (and I assume there has to be one) then I sure don't know what it is, and
2) if everything were a matter to subjective thinking then truth was fluent and arbitrary to begin with.

As a matter of fact, when I was younger I thought I had found the one and only truth and tried to make everyone around me understand. Probably sounds worse than it is, but when I realized the way I would talk to people something, I hope, snapped and made what I hope I have become.

Sounds cheesy, I know, but I just feel in the mood. ;) Didn't want to get there by starting with philosophy. What it comes down to is: Have fun and enjoy the rest having their own fun, yay! :) Thumbs up for the "keep being a child" ideal! :-)

[Keenan]

Lucky you, I have to spend 4 days (4 on 4 off 4tw, See what I did there :p) with mostly bores with a headset on listening to the thick of Britain when cars break down.

Theres only one guy on my team I feel I can go for a proper pint with.

/violin

[Lance]

One should avoid customer service unless one is a bottomless well of empathy and has an endless forgiveness for the non-rational, the self-centered, and the greedy.

[Keenan]

Circumstances dictate I'm afraid.

4 days on, 4 off allows me to do my own thing and spend a lot more time with my girlfriend and pals unlike my last job,+ it has genuine opportunities to move upwards aswell.

I'm not the most sympathetic either which doesn't help :D

[The Gracer]

i think i see what you mean Flashback.

For me, 'unlearning' would be a giant step backward. Sure, the race as a whole has ravished the planet, but what have we achieved? We have technology. We have technology now that 20 years ago wouldn't have been thought possible. I think the technological achievement of the human race is astounding - no other found living organism has shown technological advancement, and thats something.

Surely forward movement and further learning of how our surroundings operate is a much better outlook than simply forgetting we even have these capabilites?

Debate, not argument. :)

[Lance]

~snip~Then again, of course the biggest lesson I learned so far is I don't know ****. I couldn't even tell if that's true, because
1) if there is one absolute truth (and I assume there has to be one) then I sure don't know what it is, ~snip~

You've arrived at Socrates' position on the possibilities of knowledge. Modern scientific instruments extend the range of our senses, but the finality of possible conclusions or 'facts' gathered from the investigations carried out with these instruments is still not absolute. The nature of reality is still entirely a speculation.

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Who knew this thread was going to mushroom like this? :D

[The Gracer]

It was my goal to create a thought provoking thread and a debate but i was looking more at how one feels as he ages, not the philosophical side of things! :D

[Lance]

I was very naive and innocent and trusting, not merely as a child, but on into my twenties. I gradually became more suspicious of people's motives as I continued to learn more about the world outside of my immediate interests, and eventually, by my 50s [!], became able to see through the fakers, the liars, the cheats, et cetera. I wish that I had been more perceptive about such things in my twenties, but I was a very protected child who lived in isolation to some degree because there were so few kids near my age where I lived, pretty much none. School was a world apart, that I hated, was very uncomfortable in, and I learned little from it either socially or academically. The being gay thing did not help either by the time I hit puberty and realised that I was different in yet one more way than I already was; this tended to isolate me even more, especially because of the very conformist nature of American society at the time. But as I matured, I came to accept me, and be damned to other people's opinions. How could they possibly know what was right or not? Most of them knew far less about everything than I did. It seemed that if anyone could know anything, I was more likely to be able to accurately assess it than they were. So I reached an independent maturity of mind. This probably happens a lot sooner for most people than it did for me.

[Keenan]

"So I reached an independent maturity of mind."

Quite possibly the best thing that ever happened to me.

People who live there life's in the shadow of others thoughts aren't really living their life at all.

Considering your age lance, I'm guessing it must have been pretty tough at the start when you came out?

[TheFrostE]

wel im only 21, and i really feel like im lacking in knowledge of other culture, ive never been away from the east coast US...and ive always wanted to go to europe and japan! i hope sometime soon i can before it becomes too late. unfortunately for now, my life is semi-routine everyday. and it sucks

[Lance]

@ Keenan: So difficult that I didn't "come out" till I was in my 30's. And that cost me a lifetime that I might have spent with someone I met in my teens and was in love with by my 20s. Haven't met anyone that compatible since then.

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@FrostE: Learn as much as you can as soon as you can so you can find out what you really want out of life and can have it as long as possible.