Twenty-three and still growing...

As a graduate student taking Developmental Psychology, I learn about people from their infancy stage until they reach their late adulthood. Biologically, we all grow old each year, each day, each hour... It's inevitable that we grow older in time.

A lot of people have been afraid of growing old. Maybe because growing old leads to other health complications or maybe because we link it to inescapable death (which can actually strike at any point in our lives) or maybe because it leads to "looking old" which others dread so much. But I think that what we should actually fear is not growing old. I think more than that, we should be fearful of not growing up.

We might have different views about growing up. I think, as most things, growing up exists in a continuum with two extreme ends. There's Peter Pan who will always remain the boy who never grows up. And then there are others who are too serious in life who consider themselves all grown-up for being square about everything. For me, those who can balance enjoying life and still be matured enough to face the responsibilities that life holds for them are those who have truly grown. As always, it is a matter of balancing. And I for one, have to keep on telling myself that.

Even if I'm 23 now, there's a child in me that keeps on coming out. I don't consider myself all grown-up... maybe because I still haven't truly balanced everything in my life. I still have my own questions about where I want to be, who I am, and how I can contribute something to society in my lifetime.

But I think that we all grow up, in one way or another... maybe not in the same pace as to how we grow old. Sometimes we grow up slowly but other times, we experience "growth spurts" as well. If biology and time make us grow old, I think our experiences and our reactions to them are what make us grow up. It is no wonder that we could be stagnant for a year and even grow so much more in just a month or sometimes even a weekend.

I guess this is why I love experiencing new things. Discovering life's beauty is a way of growing up along with discovering pain and fear. I don't have a perfect life but I have a happy one. :) I'm not all grown-up but I think I'm on my way there... smelling the flowers (even if I'm scared of them) and jumping over thorns... enjoying the sunshine in the morning and basking in the moonlight at night.

Life is all good. :)


Adventures in Lalalaaand

I started my blog before summer began and emailed Joey Alarilla for Inq7 YOU's Blog Addict a month and a half after. It could be seen here . Upon reading it now (a little more than a month after) I realized that I've somehow grown again. And if I were to answer the same questions all over again now, my answers would be a bit different.

I'd still describe myself as a dance enthusiast who loves trying out new things but the rest would be shorter and more concise: I can be sweet and tough at the same time. I'm really friendly even if I was born shy. I'm just happy with life no matter how many "no's" I've heard. And I treasure my family, my friends, and Franco so much that I think I've already written about my life's 3 Fs thrice. ;) And the best times I've ever had while blogging were the times I wrote about all of them. I write as my life keeps unfolding into a bigger and wider world.

Now that summer is almost over, I think I'll always be a traveler at heart. I am coming back to school in a few weeks and I'll be continuing our Psych research in a few days but I'll always have this little girl in me, in awe with life and the world.