When I was younger, I had this idea of what adulthood should look like. I think that’s only natural, especially for kids that lived through the 90s. We we grew up hearing how to get a good job you need to put your nose to the grindstone, work overtime, get a degree. From there, the next step was to get married, buy a house, and have kids – all by the time you’re 35 years old!
Back then, if you were an adult who lived with your parents, you were generally considered a failure. People would assume that something has gone very wrong with your life. Being child-free was almost an alien concept, and the choice of such would give you a label of being gay or a so-called ‘spinster’. You didn’t change careers; you went to uni, did your degree, and worked til the day you retired, or the day you died. Whatever came first.
Some may say that that’s an exaggeration, but we would often grow up hearing those sort of stories from parents or grandparents. “You’re twenty-one years old and still live at home?! I put a down deposit on my house by your age!” I could go on about previous generations attitudes towards how millennials and gen Z are fighting for better pay and a healthier work/life balance but this post isn’t about that.
The point is, I grew up with this idea of what an adult should look like. And I didn’t look like an adult when I was eighteen. Some still say that I don’t look like an adult (apparently, I have a perpetual baby face), but I digress.
When I was about…oh, eighteen or nineteen or so, I found myself at a loose end. At that point, I’d yet to find a full time job, nor had I figured out any sort of direction in my life. As a result, I felt like I was failing at being an adult. And I decided that the reason for that was because I didn’t look or act the way an adult should.
Can you see where this is going?
Gone were the baggy cargo pants or board shorts. I had to look professional. Gone was using a backpack and wearing caps, because professional people didn’t wear them – much less women! At some point I even bought one of those flowy hippy skirts that were oh-so-popular at the time, because that’s what adults did. Or so I thought. That was something I wore all of once, like a lot of other things I bought around that time.
And then there was the way I’d act; the things I’d do. I used to be very into art and craft as a child. Those hobbies were pushed to the side. I still loved reading, and I still do, but even the genre changed and I ended up throwing out many books that I loved – something I regret very deeply.
In short, I became what I thought an adult should be, based on asinine comments made by people I probably should never have listened to in the first place. And guess what happened?
Within five years, I was an anxious mess. Within 10 years I’d lost all sense of self and was so burned out I honestly didn’t care what happened to myself anymore. I was working full time by that stage, by the time I was 30, but I was just…dead inside. I did nothing but get up, watch TV until my shift started at midday, work, come home and sleep. That was it.
I did nothing else. I didn’t go out with friends and have fun. Oh, I’d still go out with friends, the few I had, but going to the park and acting like silly fools was a thing of the past. I survived on coffee. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed the time I spent with friends; don’t for a second think that I didn’t. But fun activities were a thing of the past. Many of my friends had moved from where I lived anyway, so catch-ups were often meals and coffee, not things like going for a hike or acting like a silly fool in a park.
Those were dark times. I led a very lonely, solitary life. I would often think, “I need to get out and meet new people, find new people to have fun with.” But I never did. Partially because I was just exhausted, all the time. And partially because I just felt…dead inside. I wasn’t a human. I was a body masquerading as an adult. I had no personality, I had a set of ideas I tried to live by.
As you can imagine, I was burnt out. And I eventually crashed. Hard.
I won’t get into the details of that. But it’s been a long process healing from it. Not physically, though that is a whole other issue, but mentally. Because all that, all of what I just described, was wrong. And it destroyed me.
So, where does chaos come into the equation?
Well, recently, I reconnected with an old friend who has just moved back to my hometown. And honestly, it’s been a breath of fresh air. We’re in our 30s, now, but honestly, the first time we met up it was like we were back when we were in our mid-teens, and we fell right back into the insane chaotic fun patterns that we had way back then. It was fun and chaotic and messy – and it was honestly one of the best times I’d had in a long time.
It doesn’t matter how old you are. You want to have fun? Have fun!
Want to get messy with a bunch of paint or go to the park and swing on the swings? Do it!
Who cares what you do, or what you were? As long as you’re comfy, as long as you’re happy, what does it matter?! Act like a dork in public and have fun! Let loose! Act like the silly little fool you were when you were a 14 year old! What does it matter?
We’re humans. We need to feel, to live. We need to let off steam and get the jitters out to work through stress. We need to have fun, to have a healthy and balanced lifestyle. Chaotic fun is the best kind of fun, because it’s just so random. You don’t know what’s going to happen, and that’s why everyone should do it. I wish I had let myself have some chaotic fun all those years ago, because I likely wouldn’t be in the spot I’m in now, if I did. Because I would have been reminded that I’m a human. I’m alive.
We’re not just thoughts in a body. We don’t fit anyone’s mould. If I could give one piece of advice to anyone, it would be to never pretend to be someone you’re not.
Because you can – and will – lose yourself.
So let out your inner chaotic self, and have some fun! It’s worth it. Trust me.
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