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Adulthood – Coaching Lesson

Welcome VIP and ACC members to our coaching lesson this month, Adults. The benefits, feel more confident, more powerful, more strong, stronger. See, it’s weird, it’s very strange to me now when I think about it, that we have these kind of negative feelings about adulthood. We discussed this in the conversation a bit.

I certainly did as a teenager and even in my 20s, I had these kind of negative feelings about being an adult. It comes from the media and schools, I think, and it’s this image that being an adult means being boring. I’m an adult. I’m boring. I just spend every day worrying about insurance and taxes. Right? That’s the image we’re given, especially as young people, are given that image.

And so it’s not surprising that so many young people now are avoiding adulthood. They seem to not want to become adults, older and older and older. But this is very, very, very unhealthy because, you see, adulthood means full responsibility and that means full power, full confidence in yourself. Without that, you remain a child. You remain weak.

So how do you become an adult? You see, the thing is in America, I know, you see people who are 40 years old, 50 years old, they’re still not adults. They look like adults on the outside but you start to talk to them and you realize, my god, they’re still like children. It’s unbelievable. It’s sad actually and as they get older and older, it’s pathetic, meaning really, really, really sad, miserable.

So how do we become adults? And really, how can we become even more adult, using adult in a very positive way. Because we all have parts of our lives where we still act childish. I know I do. And so we can always benefit from thinking about this and how can I become more of an adult in my life? More powerful, more confident, stronger, more responsible. Well there are two parts to adulthood, in my opinion.

Part number one is self-reliance, that’s the first step, the first necessary step to be an adult, self-reliance. If you have children or if you will have children in the future, you must teach your children self-reliance. You want them to be healthy adults. They must learn self-reliance. You’ve got to teach this to them. The second part of becoming an adult, which you must also teach children and teenagers especially, contribution beyond yourself, going beyond just yourself.

Let’s talk about these two, about why they’re important in our own lives so that we can be a good role model, a good example to younger people. And also that when we have children we know how to teach them these things and how we can help others achieve these things. Okay, self-reliance, what is self- reliance? It’s a very, very, very positive word and it just means, y’know, literally, the literal, direct meaning

is to rely on yourself. Seems obvious.

Well, let me give you an example. There’s a friend of my family and she’s 24 years old. 24, now 50 years ago, 100 years ago, 24 was definitely an adult, okay? At age 15 there were people who were completely independent doing amazing things. Now 24, we still have lots and lots and lots and lots and lots of 24-year-olds who are still basically children, and it’s sad. And this family friend’s an example.

Number one, she’s indecisive. She cannot make decisions about her life, especially big decisions like which job should I take. Where should I live? Should I move to this city to get a higher-paying job or should I stay in my home and make less but be closer to my family? She can’t make these decisions. She just, like paralyzed, and she runs to her parents and to other adults, older people. What should I do? And just asks them. She wants someone else to decide for her. She cannot rely on herself to make a decision. She’s indecisive.

Number two, financially, she cannot manage her money. She’s still getting money from her parents. She’s not taking care of herself financially. Still acting like a child, a dependent child. And finally, she has a victim mindset, a victim, passive, victim mindset. Her mindset is the world is a bad place and a difficult place that is doing unfair things to her. It’s not her own fault. She’s not responsible for her life. No, it’s everybody out there, the world, that is causing her problems. This is a childish mindset, even though she’s 24. She should be an adult but she’s not.

So what is self-reliance? Self-reliance is the opposite of all of that. It’s being 100% responsible for your life. It means that any situation in your life, you decide, you are responsible. Does that mean it’s your fault that you caused it? Not always, no. Maybe you didn’t cause it, right? Things happen out in the world that we don’t cause. But still, we are 100% responsible to adapt, to find a solution to a problem. No one else is going to do it for you. We have to do that for ourselves. And part of being a real adult is saying, yes, I am 100% responsible. Accepting that and realizing that that is actually powerful and good. So 100% responsibility is part of adulthood.

Decisions, being decisive, making your own decisions powerfully. That is a very important part of being an adult and we see so much indecisiveness now or, I don’t know what to do. What should I do? Eventually, you just decide. You decide. You accept the results. Sometimes you decide, it’s a bad decision, you get bad results. You don’t cry about it. You learn and then you go forward and you make another decision. That’s part of being an adult, being decisive.

And finally, at a very basic level, part of being an adult is taking care of your own basic needs, financially, especially, right? So you’re not depending on your parents for money or someone else or the government. You’re doing it, right? You take care of your own housing, shelter, your own food, your own clothing, all those basic things. That seems quite obvious and simple and yet we have lots and lots and lots of people who don’t take responsibility for those things.

So that’s self-reliance and that is the very basic, basic level of adulthood. But it’s still not quite being a real adult, in my opinion. For that we have to go beyond just ourselves. So self-reliance is really about ourselves as individuals. That’s important. But to be full adults we have to go beyond. We have to become members of society and contribute beyond ourselves.

Now what this means really is that you have this idea of responsibility, first for yourself, but then you grow it so that you have a feeling of responsibility for more than just yourself. Probably that starts with your family, so that you’re not only responsible for yourself, now you’re also responsible for the people in your family, for helping them be safe, for helping them be happy, successful, etc.

And then beyond your family, your community, right? Your community of friends, maybe your whole town or city. And beyond that your whole country, your nation, so that you are responsible as a citizen of your nation to fight for what is best for your country, for all of the people in your country. So that you’re trying to contribute beyond just yourself. You’re trying to do what’s good for yourself but also what’s good for your family, your community and your country.

That is true adulthood. That is the mindset, the thinking of adulthood that goes back, back, back to ancient times, hundreds and thousands of years ago. That was the Roman idea, the Greek idea, of being a true adult, a true member of society. We don’t see this a lot now. Some people take responsibility for their families, especially when they have children.

Children often trigger this change to adulthood where we’re not so selfish anymore. Suddenly we realize, oh my god, this child depends on me. I am responsible for this child. And that’s a great first step. It’s great, very good. Because finally, it’s a move into true adulthood, into true contribution beyond yourself, but keep going.

Also be responsible, of course, for your wife or husband, but then for your parents, maybe uncles and aunts, brothers and sisters, so grow that out to your whole community and then to your whole nation. So you’re not passive. So you’re not like a child. So your relationship to your country and your community is not as a child, as somebody who’s weak, who’s disengaged, but rather you are responsible, also. You’re

a responsible member of your community and your nation. And of course, most important of all, your family.

Now here’s the thing. Forget what the media shows us because they always show adults looking like idiots and being miserable. It’s not true. When you really become a true adult, self-reliant, contributing beyond yourself, it’s a wonderful power that you get, first of all. You get this kind of deep confidence. Not confidence like this, yeah, yeah, where you’re doing very big movements and you feel excited. It’s not that.

It’s kind of a peaceful confidence, a peaceful strength. Something that’s deep inside because you know, number one, you have faith in yourself. You believe in yourself that you will take care of yourself, that you will be strong. And number two, you have faith in your family, your community and your nation, and you know that you are working for something more than just yourself. That gives you a kind of power beyond just yourself. It’s like you’re connecting to some bigger, larger power. And you can overcome bigger problems. And you can achieve much bigger things when you do that.

The other thing is, being an adult is fun, okay? It does not mean, to be an adult, to be self-reliant, to contribute, it doesn’t mean you’ve got to be boring, no, no, no. It doesn’t mean you’ve got to be serious all the time. It’s the opposite. You can be fun. You can be playful. In fact, as you become more of a true adult and you get that power and confidence, your energy usually goes up. You actually become a happier person, a more fun and playful person.

Alright, y’know, and we all do this. Look, you’ve got to look at your own life because even though in general you might be an adult, like I, I consider myself to be an adult, in general. But then there’ll be little parts of our lives where we’ll go back to being a child, where we feel weak and eeehhh. I did this recently. This winter, I don’t do well in the winter. There’s not enough sunlight. I sometimes get depressed. My energy goes down.

Well, it happened this winter and then I was just complaining. I’m bored. Complaining, complaining. I was acting like a child, being childish. And then finally I just woke up and I said okay, forget it. I’ve got to, I’ve got to be an adult. So I accepted that I was being a child. I said, okay, I am 100% responsible. I am 100% responsible, not someone else. Not the weather, not anything else. If I want to feel stronger, if I don’t want to be bored, I have to solve this problem, no one else.

So then I made decisions. What am I going to do? Focus on doing lots of exercise. I’m going to work harder on Effortless English, to contribute beyond myself and that is the next step, right? I connected my

actions, my life, to something bigger, helping you. And then I took actions, lots and lots of actions every day, strong action. That’s your homework this month.

So number one, identify in your life an area where you are being childish. Be honest. We all do this sometimes. So look at your life. Where’s a part of your life where you’re not really being an adult. You’re kind of complaining and whining and eeehhh, and you’re acting like a child and you’re hoping someone else will solve your problem for you. That’s being childish. Be honest. Choose one, we all do it, it’s okay.

Next, in this area of your life, decide to take 100% responsibility. Decide only you can solve the problem. No one else will do it for you. It is up to you and only you.

Step three, make a decision. You can think about it for maybe a few days but not too long. You probably already know what you need to do. You’re just being lazy and wimpy. So make a decision. I will do this. Or maybe it’s you will do four things or five things, whatever. Decide what you’re going to do.

Step number four, connect your decision to a larger purpose. How can you use this to help other people also? Like I did connecting it to you.

And then finally, step number five, take big actions every day to solve this problem, to be a true adult in your life. And you can tell me about it on Twitter. My Twitter is ajhoge. Tell me about your experience. Tell me about your problems or successes.

Alright, I will see you next time. Bye for now.