Carefree

Looking back at your youth you come to realise how carefree you were. Naive almost. Carefree; before the challenges you’ve faced, the emotions you’ve felt, the battles you’ve won or lost. Big or small, all have an effect on how you’ve grown.

That time when your greatest concern was your sibling teasing you over something so incredibly minor which you made a huge fuss about to your other family members. The concern of you not quite succeeding in that spelling test or the worry of not being picked for the team that your best friend was in, in that weekly PE lesson. But in those years it affected you because you had nothing else, nothing seriously major in the grand scheme of things to overwhelm your mind.

At that stage in your youth, the prime of your childhood, you couldn’t even imagine becoming a grown-up. But you find even though you leave the safe and structured education system, the learning never comes to a halt.

Being a grown up brings the personal dilemmas you face which can truly effect others, which you never even gave a thought to as your younger carefree self.

Like that time the other week at a dinner party with friends when something you said in conversation and it was taken out of context. Someone took offence and you feel awful about it because causing offence is never anyone’s intention. There’s the need to make a mends and clear the air. because as an adult you can’t just blow a raspberry  and sulk at your friend then go find another like you would in the playground. maturity and dignity come into play.

Adult-life brings things like being let-down or rejected by someone who you counted on, or someone who you thought you wanted in your life. You learn that you don’t need them after all and have to make decisions which are in your best interests but be gracious in doing so.

As a carefree kid, having struggles with money and any uncertainty for the future wasn’t anywhere near your thoughts at that age.  You were just in your routine of what you knew, in the safety bubble of childhood, protected from the bad things or the real worries of life to come.

Not that adult life is shit and entirely full of worry and troubles. it isn’t. There’s independence and knowledge, socialising and great experiences. you discover your boundaries, your strengths, your weaknesses, your loves and hates, hopes and ambitions. every lesson, whether you’re conscious of it or not, changes you as a being. They change your outlooks or beliefs, and adds to self-growth and awareness.

You grow up forever learning and changing, but the difference with these in comparison to your childhood self is that there becomes increased responsibility and often pressure. But the lessons learnt help you manage your responsibilities and overcome pressure in challenges you face.

The simplicity and glee of childhood is something you look back on with a blurred memory but it comes with the realisation of how fast life passes by, and how challenges and obstacles alter your thoughts and priorities.

 Laura Sewell