HOW DO YOU KNOW YOU’RE AN ADULT?

Jeffrey Arnett, a Clark University psychologist who’s studied the experiences of emerging adults (between ages 18 and 29) as well as established adults (between ages 25 and 39). He’s found that one key marker of the transition to adulthood is accepting, and being content with, reality. Dr. Arnett says that part of what it means to be an adult is you make your choices, and you stop constantly hoping for something better. You realize that the range of possibilities that is open to you is not unlimited. In other words, you may never find the ideal mate that you always dreamed of, but you’ll find someone great, in spite of her apparent flaws. You may never land your dream job, but you’ll find a position you enjoy enough that you’re no longer spending every free second on job-search sites. “By the end of their 20s, most people have made those choices, and it works out pretty well for most people,” Arnett says. “They compromise, as people have to do. They realize they can’t get exactly what they wanted, and so they decide that what they can get is good enough.”
* Thank you, Doctor Settle.
* Be sure to share this news with your partner tonight during dinner.
* I guess being an adult means coming to the realization that those Nine Inch Nails posters aren’t going to come off the walls by themselves.
* Accepting reality? I haven’t even thought about doing that.
* It sounds to me like this Jeffrey guy just gave up.
* I also got creeped out by the New Age-sounding phrase, “emerging adults.”
* This study emerged all right…right out of his rear end.
* PHONE TOPIC: What was the moment when you had the realization that: “Oh, my god, I’m an adult”?