Maturity in Teens

Maturity in Teens by Aubrey West staff writer

The popular topic of conversation between adults and Generation Z teens

was around 11 when I first felt like I was becoming more mature. This is when puberty hit; I was changing as a person and didn’t know how to handle it. I was growing up. I learned from the people around me what to do and what not to do, and I started to understand a lot more of what was going on around me, from home life to how people were acting in school and their behaviors. My home life wasn’t all that fun, and I loved going to school to get away from home. School

Iwas where all my friends were, yet that was when I started to realize that I didn’t have the best of friends or a good group around me. I went down a pretty hard path to get where I am today, but it gave me the knowledge of what is right and what is wrong for me. I would say that I grew up a bit too fast, and I experienced things that I shouldn’t have when I was super young, but the path that I went down was the right one for me to be who I am today.

Graphic: A. McGraw

For one Central student, maturity was served through a life-changing medical diagnosis. The moment James Edwardson ‘24 found out he had Type One Diabetes, he knew he would be going through significant changes in his life and would have to learn how to handle them. “When I was 13, and I found out I had diabetes. It really changed my life and made me stronger, and I learned how to cope with other things from that experience,” Edwardson states. He sees other teens being immature, often taking out their depression, anger, and anxiety on others, even bullying others to try and make themselves feel better. In contrast though, he often sees teens being mature. “They are very respectful to teachers and other students. They are helpful, rather than mak[ing] fun of them and bully[ing them].” Certain teenage behaviors don’t just occur in school; these behaviors can change when they are at home with family. There’s many common demands from parents: do the dishes, take out the trash, sweep the kitchen, clean your room, put your phone down, take the dog outside. These are all requests that can sometimes aggravate teenagers. Why? The parents’ reasons for telling adolescents these things are so they’re teaching them responsibility. Someday they’re going to be taking care of a house on their own and raising children. So, with teenagers helping around the house, they’ll know how to do those things in the future. With becoming older comes more responsibility and more experiences on how to become mature for their young-adult age. With also becoming older comes having a job; your first time can be scary, but eventually you’ll be able to hold the responsibility of saving money, and working more for other people. This experience of your first job can help you grow into a young adult and start to

realize what adulthood will be like, and it’s best to prepare early. Meredith Nissley ‘23 also finds this to be the case. “I feel like we’re at an age where we can handle having more responsibilities because at some point we’re going to be off on our own, and we need to know what to do and how to function,” Nissley says. She believes that teenagers all throughout high school have the full capability of being able to handle their own responsibilities. With growing up, parents and adults would expect that you’re now responsible enough to make your own decisions in life, and in your current life as well. Decisions such as coming up with a decision about their consequences, “Do the dishes, take out pursuing college, having children at a young age, and other choicthe trash, sweep the kitchen, clean your room, es in those “big” situations. It all comes down to what you would like to pursue in your future, put your phone down, whether or not you care about your career and your high school and take the dog outside.” diploma or your degree. Of all the factors related to maturity, home life impacts school life and students’ futures more than anything. Usually an unhealthy home life counters the examples of an unhealthy environment with a toxic family. Or maybe your home life isn’t meeting the expectations and its needs correctly, or it can even be something to do with yourself. A toxic family usually means there’s conflict, feuding, neglect, abuse, irresponsibility, and delinquency. If there’s problems with yourself, maybe there’s just some improvements that need to be made. You can do this by changing your mindset or looking for a good inspiration to help you overcome struggles. Maybe that’s an idol, or a friend or family member, or your hopes and dreams of your future. I know that my inspiration was an old friend that I used to think was so successful. I wanted to be like them, so I looked up to them as an inspiration and eventually got my way with how I wanted to be with my responsibilities. //