When we are born, every door we enter is a new one, every face we see is a fresh one and every arm we hold is attached to an undiscovered heart.
As babies, we lack true consciousness; our minds are a blank canvas to paint upon. Our fresh brains contain no memories of bitterness, bliss or boredom. Experiences that come our way are new beginnings to grasp.
However, as we grow older, we become more practical, or even cynical. Doors we see are a mere construction of blank wood; Faces we see are ones we’ve known our entire life and arms we touch are connected to individuals whom we know the flaws.
Developing from adolescence into adulthood makes people rely on their logic-based thinking, making them forget about the pleasures of youth. People learn to stop romanticizing their lives and instead focus on trying to overcome the harsh realities of life.
The first day of school changes when you grow up. As a little girl, the first day of school for me used to be one filled with curiosity and excitement. I would skip into a vibrantly decorated classroom and stare at the alphabet poster placed above the “Counting to 100” chart. Eagerly, I would look for my cubby to hang my bright blue backpack, then sit down next to equally eager strangers, soon to become my friends.
The first day of school now holds feelings of tiredness and dread. I stay up the night before thinking about how I can make the right amount of small talk to develop fulfilling friendships, but not too much to where I might drain myself. I show up to school, participate in class icebreakers and then go home to immediately lie down on my bed.
Absent-mindedly making decisions, interacting with my peers and handling everyday occurrences has prevented me from feeling cheerful, and from being able to remain hopeful.
A high school student gets her math test handed back to her, only to see a large “58” written in red. Rather than acquiring an attitude of acceptance and reassurance by studying for the retest, she begins to cry, resentfully complain to her friends and give up on math.
When I embody this mindset, it tends to make me hostile and judgmental towards new people, changing the way I form relationships.
The adoption of this behavior, over the long-term, weakens one’s mental health. It becomes our nature to take on a state of antagonism and distrust. Remaining in this constant state takes away from our ability to find contentment in our lives or feel exhilarated from the joys that come our way.
“If you are less willing to express yourself in imaginative ways by holding yourself to some unrealistic expectation, you’re not able to do a lot of the things that you may enjoy like drawing or painting,” Coppell High School psychology teacher Abigail Atchison said. “It could definitely affect your mental health if you are manipulating your true desires or personality in order to be more logical.”
The frontal lobes in our brain develop through the primary years of our life. The frontal lobes are responsible for rational decision making processes. This development in our brains is one of the reasons why we turn to practicality as we age.
As kids, people would harshly be told to “act more mature” in order to become more manageable. Social standards oftentimes encourage youth to act more adult-like, telling them to utilize their logic-based thinking skills, and to abandon their spontaneous, spirited traits. This conditioning makes older individuals conform to a more sophisticated persona.
However, we don’t have to accept hopelessness from the sorrows of life. We can learn to rekindle the curiosity, energy and emotion we forgot how to feel.
Paint your walls the same color as your childhood bedroom, compliment the beauty of those faces you’ve seen today and appreciate the stability provided by the shoulders of the arms we lean on. Perhaps it will make you feel like a naive child, but let that be a good thing.
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