Adulting By Accepting Three Core Truths

What does it mean to act like an adult? We all know it includes things like laundry, bill-paying, and going to the dentist, but what underlies those activities and determines the priorities of an emotional adult?  Today Cinthia explains how the three core truths she teaches apply to the topic of growing up emotionally.   

As an example of what this looks like, Cinthia described her husband Michael’s approach to some significant medical problems that he recently faced.   Although he experienced significant pain and some very scary circumstances, Michael took charge of his health and did all he could to survive and get healthier for the people who love him.  Although the medical problems were his, Michael understood that the situation was not just about him; it impacted his family, friends, and others.  Knowing this, he controlled the factors that were his to control and followed through with healthy decisions, even when they were not easy to execute.

Adulthood as we are discussing it is about more than just remaining alive past one’s eighteenth birthday.  It is about growing up emotionally: facing reality, becoming your own parent, and fulfilling your responsibilities to yourself and others rather than expecting the world to make you okay.  This necessitates, among other things, knowing your own internal world, being aware of it and how it affects your external world.  It involves making the hard decisions to live according to reality rather than in denial.  It also means figuring out why you are here on the planet and what to do with the time you are given. 

The first truth Cinthia urges us to accept is the reality of our own individual uniqueness as created beings.  You were not made by yourself or for your own purposes; you were made by a Creator Who wanted to create you and is very happy that He did so.  You were made according to a unique design- even identical twins do not have identical fingerprints.  Cinthia states, “When God thought you up, He was really excited.  He was excited about you.  It was an original design.”  He had a purpose for this design, and He made you in exactly the way that was best for that purpose.  Now you as an adult have the option to embrace that design and purpose or not.  Learning to live as your own best version means learning to live out what the Creator had in mind when He made you.  Striving toward what you think you should be or who others want you to be will not achieve this.  So Step One is to accept and believe that you are alive for a reason.  You didn’t sneak onto the planet.  You don’t have to prove that you deserve to be here.  God decided to create you and to do it at this time.  He wants you to enjoy who He made you to be, as He does.  Jesus gave up His life to be with you.  Satan wants to make you think you have to prove your worth and value instead of walking it out.  Dysfunction is never original or creative.  Show up in your own life, and walk out the value you have. 

Next, accept and believe that you can effect change in yourself and in the world around you.  You cannot control everything about your life, your circumstances, or the world around you, but neither are you irrelevant.  Your actions and behaviors matter, and your thoughts matter.  Change is primarily an “inside job,” and it requires each of us to address our own thoughts and belief systems.  Living in the past will get in the way whether your past was good or bad -- your past may be brilliant or awful, but it’s not new.

Proverbs tells us that “as a man thinks in his heart, so is he.”  You can control what you think and dwell on. We often try to change the outside world, not recognizing that what we can control and order is the inside of ourselves.  If the internal doesn’t work, the external won’t work.  If you live trying to change people, places, and things, you will fail.  You cannot create outside yourself what is not within you.  Parents, leaders, and friends will focus on the outside because they cannot be on the inside of you.  You have to deal with the inside.  The fastest, most effective, and most efficient way to influence change is to change your internal world.  You matter, and you have a responsibility to the world around you.

Third, as an adult you must learn to deal with pain.  In this world pain is inevitable; the effective management of it is imperative if you are going to be who you are meant to be.  You can have “pain for gain,” as Cinthia says, or you can have “pain in vain.”  But in this world as it is now, you cannot be without pain.  You get to choose to survive in it or thrive in it and how close to be to the version of yourself that God intended.  You get to choose whether to add to or detract from others by what version of yourself you live out as you face your pain, whether to accept the gifts that can come hidden in pain.  Avoiding pain only brings more of it and causes me to live as a victim of my circumstances and of my own internal world.  Learn to let pain produce something good in you instead of making you bitter.

The best version of yourself is the one the Creator had in mind when He made you.  Accepting this may mean you have to get over yourself.  If God is happy with you, you must learn to be happy with yourself, too (which is not the same as being happy with every decision you make).  Both your strengths and weaknesses are unique and must be managed.  We tend to want to spend our focus on our strengths, but don’t be afraid of your weaknesses.  Don’t hate yourself for the mistakes.  Learn from them.  Be compassionate to yourself and others.  Remember, the goal in this life is not the total alleviation of pain (that is impossible) but the acceptance of it and use of it for gain.