On Growing Up

I used to think growing up was a destination. Some threshold you crossed once and stayed on the other side of. I was wrong. Growing up is a posture, repeated daily, mostly in private.

It looks like answering the email you’ve been avoiding. Telling the truth before you’re asked. Sitting on the floor with your son when you’d rather scroll. Praying when you don’t feel like it.

Nobody hands you a certificate for any of this. There’s no audience. That’s the point. The work of becoming a man — a real one, not a performance — happens in rooms with no witnesses.

I’m not arrived. I’m still walking. But I’ve stopped pretending I’m further along than I am, and somehow that’s the most grown-up thing I’ve ever done.