maturing, slowly

This post has been a long time in the making. I don’t have an exhaustive definition of maturity. A friend I know has a whole blog about how he’s maturing and growing in the Lord. But I’ll start with what I do know. I know some of what maturity is and some of what it is not. I’ll share some posts from other people who have written wonderful things about specific areas of maturity too.

Once in college I thought I was mature. My measure of it was that I didn’t struggle with the same things that others did. Someone else stays up late and misses class? That’s not me – I sleep early and wake up early. I committed and stuck to reading the one year bible during my sophomore year. I purposely scheduled 8am classes. Someone else built up credit card debt? That’s not me – I had a job I worked at each weekend in college. I always paid my bills in full. I watched every penny.

But to think that measuring my maturity this way was a lie of course – though God gave me discipline to rise early and gave me some wisdom about finances, I still had many areas to grow in. Maturity is not a matter of comparing yourself to others. It’s about growing from where you are. I consider my 3 year old daughter mature, for her age because she knows things like how to share toys and she folds laundry with me and puts away her plate and cup at the end of each meal. Those are things that older people shouldn’t have issues with.

Less than a year ago, a friend called us and invited us to lunch. It was a Sunday around 1pm. He wanted us to have lunch with him that very day. Um, sorry. We already ate lunch. And it would have been nice if you asked us earlier. But we didn’t say that second part, only the first. Because D and I know that this friend doesn’t plan well. Was he being thoughtful? Hard to say. It was nice to think of us and invite us, but it wasn’t taking into consideration that we have young kids and that we tend to plan things ahead of time. I’m not saying that he’s immature, but part of maturity is more than just being nice and thinking of spending time with others. It’s thinking about their situation too and not just your own.

Sometime in my early twenties, I made plans to have lunch with some friends. I was going to meet them at a Korean restaurant at a certain time. I told them that they had to be on time because after lunch I had to go to work. I drove separately so that I could go straight to work. I waited in the parking lot and they eventually showed up about 30 min after they said they would. I was upset and told them I couldn’t have lunch with them because they weren’t on time. I had to leave to get to work and have just enough time to grab a quick meal elsewhere, not at a sit-down place, because they were late. Being late is one of my biggest pet peeves. It’s so inconsiderate and rude. It’s selfish. There’s an article written about it that I think sums it up well – http://www.huffingtonpost.com/greg-savage/lateness_b_4169441.html

Part of maturity means handling your time well. Part of maturity means you’re considerate to others and their time. D and I always strive to be on time or early if possible. And if we’re late, we call or text ahead of time – not at the time we’re supposed to be there. We try to rsvp to weddings and things as soon as we can because we know what it means to plan a wedding and throw parties and how inconvenient it is to not have replies. At our own wedding, it was really not nice that people did not tell us they needed to change their rsvps. We paid anyway for their meals and saved them spots at tables. They never showed up. And we lost out on a few hundred dollars.

There’s a college friend of mine who recently was diagnosed with cancer. Praise God that he’s rooted in Christ and he’s firm in his faith. He started writing a blog so that he could document the things he’s going through and how the Lord is still at work all around him.

One of the (many) great posts he had mentioned how there is such a temptation for him to search online about his specific condition. He spent hours scouring different health websites and such and came to a point where he had to stop. After all, not all of the things were going to be specifically applicable to his situation. Not all of the treatments were going to work for him. Not all of the things he came across were worth reading. Another brother told him something to the extent of “Wouldn’t you rather spend your time in prayer or reading or being with your wife?” And it was so encouraging for me to read that it set him free. He knew that he could spend hours reading about his condition. Or he could trust in the Lord and not let the temptation of the internet be a time-killer.

While I don’t scour the internet for hours on end, I know I have wasted time on it before. Who hasn’t? But part of maturity is knowing your limits. D and I are so glad that this is something our daughter does herself (specifically with food) without our encouragement. She knows when she’s full. She can say no to chocolate or even to her favorite fruit strawberries and doesn’t eat more just because.

There’s a famous blog called Zen Habits and I’ve looked through a handful of posts. One of his is about the “dangers of reading” http://mnmlist.com/reading/

I don’t think he’s a Christian (which means specifically for me that I don’t want to subscribe to everything he says and want to be more wary than I otherwise would with an author who is a believer) but I see his point. Part of maturity includes being focused and mindful about what you’re doing and not getting distracted. And also not distracting others from their goals.

There’s so many other things I could go on about maturity, but I’ll mention one last one – communication. Part of maturity is knowing how to communicate well and making things specific and clear with the person you’re communicating with. Speaking to my daughter is obviously different than speaking to adults. I speak to my grandma differently than others. Etc. Because I’ve worked in customer service, I have such a different take on how I make my complaints/concerns known with whatever company I have an issue with. I understand what it’s like to be in their shoes. They just work for the company and some have absolutely no power to do what you need them to do. It makes me sad to see a customer yell at an employee who’s just trying to do their job.

One of my college friends wrote about a specific area of communication – forgiveness. And it went viral because it’s that good. http://www.cuppacocoa.com/a-better-way-to-say-sorry/ And while it’s mostly about children, I know a few adults who could learn more about forgiveness too.

It’s a long long process, but I’m grateful for the life lessons on maturity that God has shown me through others. And through his refining fire, I know there’s more to come. I have so much more to learn.