Last month I turned 25. Eleven fifty-one a.m. on June 8 was just another minute of the lunch hour for most people, but for me it was the last in a series of adolescent milestones I had set for myself.
Perhaps it’s the nice mathematical nature of the number itself (1/4 x 100, or 5²), or my mother constantly admonishing me not to get married before 25 “because that’s when your brain stops changing,” or studying Erik Erikson’s theory of human development (he says that adolescence lasts through age 25), but for whatever reason I’ve always seen 25 as the peak of the current mountain I was climbing. I didn’t expect my life to peak — far from it! — but . . . well, I expected to feel differently about life. And actually, I do.
Now that I’ve finished mourning the end of my adolescence (originally I intended to write this on my actual birthday, but I was still too distressed; I may still be a bit, in fact), I want to sit back and figure out what makes 25 different from, say, 20.
I can think of a lot of little differences. Like what stores you buy your clothes from (Kohl’s instead of Aéropostale), what you do for fun with your friends on a Friday night (talk, sip wine, and be in bed by 11 p.m. instead of spontaneously going skinny dipping at 2 a.m.), and even what shows you watch (Breaking Bad instead of America’s Next Top Model). But these are external. What marked coming of age for me was not my change of habits but a change of perspective.
I am a people pleaser. I care a lot about what other people think of me. At least I used to. Chalk it up to my authoritarian upbringing, an inborn character flaw, or a delayed adolescence, I lived and died off of other people’s opinions. If you said you liked me, life was good and everything was as it should be. If I sensed that you didn’t like me, life sucked and I was a failure. But after so many inevitable disappointments that climaxed in one big heartbreak, I was done.
Not that I’ve swung the other way and becoming an insensitive jackass (at least I hope not!). But now instead of doing everything I can to manipulate you into liking me, I think about how to do right by you. After all, I can only do my best in loving you. And if my best isn’t good enough for you — well, at least I was nice to you. I’m not here to be liked by you. I’m here to love you and do what I can to improve your life. And so far what I’ve learned is that though it doesn’t seem as fun and it’s definitely harder, serving people is far more rewarding than merely liking them.
I know, I know. I took longer than most to learn this. And I still have a long, long way to go. But now that I’m more attuned to doing what’s right — a.k.a. pleasing God — I’m freer to work on really growing up.
More on that later.
Reading: War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy; Temple of the Winds (Sword of Truth #4), Terry Goodkind; “Your God Is Too Small,” J. B. Phillips
Listening: Greatest Hits, Queen; Glee
Watching: 40-Year-Old Virgin, The Birds, Drunken Master, St. Elmo’s Fire, The Breakfast Club
Playing: Diablo II: Lord of Destruction (I’m now a level 33 zealot paladin beginning Act V 
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