“I knew nothing as a teenager” or “Trust me, when you grow up, you’ll realize how stupid you were as a teenager”. Who else has heard one of these sentences? Have you ever said something like this yourself? Well, if you have, allow me to say that I strongly disagree with you.
Now I’m not saying that teenagers are always right. All I’m saying is that we shouldn’t bash our past selves that way. Sure, as a teenager, you may have done some pretty embarrassing things, maybe even horrible things you regret, but that doesn’t change the fact that you did it, does it? Let’s be real here, if you hadn’t done it as a teenager, you would’ve have never learned your lesson, and eventually you would have done it anyway – as an adult.
The achievements, the wrongdoings, the friendships, the promises – everything we once committed as children are what shape us as grown-ups. We aren’t documents or 2D characters. We’re complex beings built on, not only a few characteristics, but an entire lifetime of experiences. No matter how silly or “childish”, every action we performed in our lives is a part of us.
Did you carry around a stuffed bear? A hippo? A shark?
Did you have an invisible friend no one could see but you?
Did you try to escape from school? Try to steal your parents’ car?
Worse? Even so, own it!
Disowning all those years of youth isn’t a smart move, it’s just repeating the same mistake all over again: convincing yourself that you know everything, you understand life by now, you “get” how the world works. You may have done that as a teenager, and now, by belittling your teen self, you may be subconsciously replicating the same arrogant thoughts.
The truth is, we’ll never fully understand life, because it’s just as complicated as we are. You, as a person, will never stop growing, will never stop learning. Sure, you may not have been as smart, as a teenager, but if it weren’t for what you were back then, you would never be what you are today. Your current self is a flower that stems out from your former self.
Those years of youth are not something you can idly cross out with a flick of your pen. That naïve child is not a kid you can disown. That reckless teenager is not a prosthetic limb you can detach from yourself at will. That adolescent is a living, breathing human with dreams and not “just a phase”. That child, that teenager, that adolescent…That person was you.
That person is you.
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