There are so many people on the Internet who talk about adulthood, how to navigate practical life and find the emotional maturity it requires...
LIFE LESSONS
There are so many people on the Internet who talk about adulthood, how to navigate practical life and find the emotional maturity it requires. Life coaches give hours and hours of TED talks about finding balance in adult life and making this journey exciting. You can find a lot of content on self-care, financial stability and finding purpose in your life in adulthood. But the thing no one talks about is how adulthood is in some way or another a synonym for loss. No one teaches you to expect those losses and deal with anguish and grief in adulthood when it eventually comes your way.
Loss has so many complicated feelings intertwined with it and comes in so many forms. That one childhood friend whom you thought would always be at your side is now a stranger whom you see coincidentally sometimes. One of your favourite books that morphed your youth into adulthood is no longer interesting to you. One hobby that always gave you peace of mind now seems tedious and rudimentary. A loss of something that once was so significant that it leaves a space in your heart in the shape of little closed windows; no comforting breeze blows in through those windows anymore, leaving those spaces suffocating.
The most harrowing of all is losing someone to death. The grave reality that you are never going to see someone again is so haunting. Death is the biggest reality of the world, but the truth is, when you are young you feel so invincible. You know it happens, but you do not really believe that it can happen to someone you hold so dearly. You do not realise that when you are gaining strength and growing up, people around you are getting weaker and older. Death is a taboo topic - we do not talk about it, we do not mention it on either happy or sad days, and we certainly do not want to talk about it in relation to our loved ones and ourselves. So eventually, when it comes our way, it brings a galactic amount of grief and sounds so unacceptable that it makes us lose sense of reality attached to it.
If someone asked, I would say the most difficult thing about adulthood is accepting that we are not immortals, that people we love are not immortals. Throughout human history, men have created some ways to cope with this feeling. Many religions have the concept of reincarnation where they believe souls transmigrate and are reborn, thus their life cycle is going to continue forever.
It got ancient Egyptians burying their dead in the glory of gold and papyrus scrolls to ease the next life of their kin and kith. Same with religions where people find comfort in the concept that their loved ones are in heaven for eternity now, a place far better than this world.
Even with these attempts at comfort, you will still find a mother crying over her daughter she lost decades before. You will still see a child missing their mother at every important phase of their life.
Sometimes, time does not heal wounds. It festers them, making them itch more than other days. Coming to terms with someone’s death is never a straight path but a curving line. Some days are going to be harder than others.
Some days you are going to miss them like you are missing a limb. Other days you may smile at things that make you remember them. It is not about forgetting someone you lost but cherishing their memories and keeping them in your heart forever.
You are never going to fill that part inside your heart, but maybe that is what most of us would want too, to be remembered by the people we once held close to our heart.
