Adulting: “Acting like an adult or engaging in activities usually associated with adulthood—often responsible or boring tasks.” -Definition via Mignon Fogarty (Grammar Girl).

"Adulting" is a word that most of us age range 18-30 have become quite familiar with. There are hilarious memes circling the internet and tweets that are retweeted about how hard adulting is.

There's this one:

and this one:

and my personal favorite:

While these memes are funny and offer some comic relief to the stressful life of someone entering the grown up world, I'm starting to wonder if they're really hurting our generation more than they are helping.

I'm a college student. I am smack dab in the part of life when I have to start making my own decisions and figuring out the "adult" thing (in fact, just today I went to a new doctor alone and got a prescription at a new pharmacy all by myself--granted I used mom and dad's insurance-- but, anyway I was proud of myself!) I understand how stressful it is to go from living under someone else's roof and rules to all of the sudden making your own rules. I understand what it is like to have to start forking over money for things instead of just calling mom or dad. I understand what it is like to have to make yourself do hard things even when you want to just curl up and watch Netflix. But what i'm finding is that everyone seems to want a pat on the back for doing so. That's a problem.

We do something that is considered a "grown-up" task and then we post about it or we tell our friends that we adulted and everyone congratulates us on how we are doing it right and then usually this is followed by comments like: "Wow! You are doing it right!" or "Way to adult!" or "Man! I wish I was keeping up with you."

Another problem I have noticed is that when things get stressful, I will see posts about how an individual doesn't want to "adult" because adulting is too hard.

This used to make me laugh because I could relate my own apprehensions and stresses about growing up to what others were feeling, but then I started to notice a pattern. Using words like adulting to describe our current state of life is preventing our generation from fully embracing adulthood. Adult-ING implies that someone is only half an adult, or they are only an adult sometimes. But the truth is, we are adults and not half-adults, but full adults. My age group seems to expect a round of applause for doing something that they should be doing anyway. It's an expectation. It's like my mom used to say when I would clean my room after I let it get horrendously messy, she would tell me that she was glad it was clean but it really should have just stayed clean in the first place. It shouldn't have been dirty. Although, sometimes I thought I deserved an award after cleaning up the mess that I made. It's the same with getting older. Sometimes, some of these words leave us feeling like we deserve some sort of award for doing what we should be doing anyway. It's like wiping after using the bathroom--you should do it anyway.

I also think it leaves us in fear. Like I said, I am in college. I am surrounded by college students all the time, or as I see them-- emerging adults, not adulty people. We should give ourselves more credit and recognize how capable we are. But instead, I see these students and most of them are running around loaded with stress, afraid to do anything, not embracing adulthood like they were meant to and instead resorting to more childlike behaviors like watching tv all day or sleeping in for ridiculous amounts of time. Let me just say that those things are fine (in moderation) but not when they're being used to avoid the inevitable-- and that is growing up.

We all have to grow up. We cannot be a bunch of childish, "adulty" 20 somethings or 30 somethings or on. But we do have to be well-rounded ADULTS who contribute to making the world around us better. We do have to be ADULTS who take ownership of the decisions we make and to not flee from anything that causes us stress.

All i'm saying is be careful. Be careful of using these words to describe your current state. The truth is, you are not a child anymore. No, you may not have fully taken on financial responsibility like paying all your own bills and you may have to check in with mom and dad about certain things but you are not a child. You're a college student, you're a young adult in the work force, you're smart, you're making your own decisions, you are capable--you are an adult, with all the rights, responsibilities and privileges thereto.

Own it. Be proud. This is the moment your childhood prepared you for. Adulthood is an adventure that will bring many lessons, hardships, joys, laughter and tears. Why choose to live in fear about fully embracing all parts of it? Don't fake adult. Just be one. Being an adult is fantastic and scary all at the same time, but it is all totally worth it.