I remember turning 18, and I remember thinking that I would have everything figured out. I thought turning 18 meant the world would finally see me as an adult. I realized that there’s a big difference between being treated like an adult and being respected as an adult. You have to earn adulthood. I realized very abruptly that doctors, credit card companies, and collection agencies were quick to call you an adult because they want something from you. It’s an entirely different ball game when it comes to co-workers, employers, mentors, teacher, professors, peers, and strangers. It isn’t a look, the way you dress, the kind of car you drive, the shoes you wear, the way you style your hair, or the piece of paper you may or may not earn that make you an adult. It all boils down to integrity and character.

Many people have referred to me as “wise for my age”, and maybe I am, but it has all been a learning process. I have failed, what feels like more than majority of my peers, made countless mistakes, bad judgment calls, and unbeknownst to me, life altering choices that will change the direction of my journey forever.

I realized later on that I am going to continue to make mistakes, bad judgment calls, and life altering choices until the day I die. When you graduate high school, undergraduate school, or graduate school, education doesn’t end. We, as human beings, will continue to learn for the remainder of our lives. We may not learn every lesson we take with us through our own experiences either. I know many of the lessons I’ve learned throughout my short amount of life so far have been from observing the lives of those around me. In all reality, observing the way people around me live and function has shaped a lot of who I am today. Not all of me of course, but I’d be lying if I said it hasn’t had a significant impact.

When I came home from college life hit me hard. I joined the work force, started to figure out what having credit meant, understanding taxes, politics, responsibility, and accountability. I took classes such as Economics, Government, Statistics, and Home Ec. In high school, but the reality is that it doesn’t truly all make sense until you’re living it. You can test me all day on Economics and Government, but putting all of that acquired knowledge to use in the adult world is entirely different. When you’re sitting in a class of 30 students learning about car insurance and liability, it doesn’t really mean anything because it’s not until you’re sitting in front of your computer trying to work through all the different coverage plans, for the beater you’ve been saving up for, that you realize you’re completely in over your head! Just like when you’re sitting in Math class looking at your homework and thinking to yourself, “when in the Hell am I ever going to use any of this ever again?” Then, in just a few short years you find out what a budget is and how to manage it, you’re trying to make sure you didn’t get gypped on your paycheck for the week, you’re questioning the validity of your checking account, trying to understand what percentage of your paycheck should go into your 401K and how much risk you should be taking. It’s exhausting. It’s exhausting and you’re still living at home with Mom and Dad!

Then you have the young adults that are working full time and taking classes part time or vice versa! So add all of that on top of school and work, going to the gym (Yeah right, I wish! What’s a sit-up, again? My P.E. teachers would be so disappointed), trying to fit in four to five hours of sleep somewhere in between learning how to cook something other than Mac N’ Cheese out of a box and figuring out how to file your taxes. Wait, did you say you wanted to have a life? Oh, you want to go out and have a night with your friends? Relationship? Ha! Good luck. It’s a miracle you remembered to put on clean socks at this point! Okay, maybe that’s a little dramatic. I usually have clean socks.

My point is that “adulting”, as it has been referred to throughout various social networking sites, isn’t easy. The scariest part is that I only mentioned a few of the obstacles we begin to face as we emerge into the adult world. Life is full of challenges, some we conquer more easily than others, some we goof up on more than one occasion, and some we just barely get through. The point isn’t necessarily to just conquer the world and gain the title of adult. When I was turning 18 I was so excited for that title. Now I wish I could turn back time and enjoy being a teenager just a little while longer. I’ll be 23 in a few months, and I’m thinking about things like a house (let’s be honest; house actually means apartment), insurance, marriage, children, school districts, the safety of the area in which I choose to live, and whether or not I support Trump or Clinton…Okay, that’s an easy one.

I am okay with the stress of still having no idea what I want to do with my life, and I’m okay with figuring things out one day at a time with the knowledge that I’m probably going to make more mistakes than I can count along the way because I have a beautiful lady whom I love more than anything, and because I have earned my title as an adult. I have made mistakes, but I have yet to quit and I know I never will. That’s what has earned me my title; I refuse to give up because I can’t.

“Just keep swimming!” (Pixar’s (2003) Finding Nemo)