When I grow up…

Today I think I will write something very different but not unrelated with our daily lives and our work lives which aren’t necessarily separate.

One day I stumbled on an article written by a girl who would turn thirty (30) in less than 2 months and she was saying that a few days earlier someone asked her what she wants to be when she grows up and she thought ‘grow up?” The last time she thought she was still growing up was fifteen years before.

We all had dreams in this life about what we want to be or wanted to be when we grow up. I remember as a young girl of eleven and twelve years, feeding my mind with all the “Mills and Boon” romantic novels and thinking, by the time I am twenty years the prince would have sought me out and we will live happily ever after. I am not even sure when I got to twenty; all of a sudden I was up but not sure when the growing happened.

Life presents different types of pressures and even if we do not have people – parents, friends, colleagues, relatives, society (which is rather faceless), name it, hounding at us, the pressures mount anyway. Pressures come from within, expectations, comparisons – pressure to follow in the footsteps of our chosen heroes, parents, role models, and the list is endless.

What do you want to be when you grow up?

The older you get the more you begin to ‘disregard’ the chronological dates and cycles apart from the wisdom (or sometimes foolishness) that comes with it. We then begin to make ‘peace’ with who we are and as disappointed as we may be with where we are, we find some contentment in being alive. Age is one of the ironies of this life, when you are young, you cannot wait to ‘grow up’ and ‘growing up’ has a different meaning. Growing up could mean, financial independence, moral independence (you can do what you want when you want), independence from parents again the list is endless. I have a sister who wanted more than anything else to sleep in late every morning when she grows up. She hated that she had to wake up in the morning to do any chores before going to school even if the chores are only to take a bath (which she really really hated) and going to school. I will like to ask her today how many hours of sleep she is now getting in a whole week as a ‘grown up’.

I have a son who by all standards is very smart and intelligent (even if I say so as the mother but he truly has a very sharp mind). At 5 years, he seemed to be very sure about what he wants to be when he grows up and the list has been growing ever since. However, in their ‘creative writing’ exams, he was asked to write about what he wants to be when he grows up and he again wrote a list but this time the list is slightly shorter and they include Super hero (so that he can save the world), a Pastor (because he wants to preach like the pastor of his church), a soccer player (because he wants to play like David Beckham), and the President (because he wants to rule the country). This was all he wrote. The teachers had to let me know because most kids chose one or two things and they wanted to be what their parents are or sisters or some relatives but not my son (now that I am writing, I am beginning to think that he must be very disappointed with his parents) because we are not any of those things in his list and I doubt that we are aspiring to be any of those but you never know!

I hope he knows that the clocks are ticking and before he knows it, he is up and grown. But he can be all of the above and even more.

When I grow up, I want to be and that time is now. If you missed the opportunity at 20, grab it at 30 or 40, you can still be what you dream to be but do not die not ‘growing up’. Better late than never as they say. Procrastination is the thief of our lives and guess what? Your best life could be now no matter what the chronological clocks tell you.