[September 20, 2024] Stop acting like a 10-Year-Old. Grow up and go on an adventure. Take on some responsibility. You are answerable to your own destiny. This article is an excerpt from my book, “55 Rules for a Good Life.” It is one of the more popular chapters, so please enjoy the tough “rule” I’m providing here.
A mature adult is a person with the instinctive desire to adopt responsibility for one’s self and others and do so willingly. That person is the one interested in the unknown, has the yearning to explore, find new things, carry a heavy load, and be a rebel in a world of safety and conformity. Mature adulthood is based on the universal and ancient need to be accountable for one’s actions. This mission is the ancient call to adventure and heroism.
True enough, the burden is not and will never be easy. So stop acting like a 10-year-old and get on with it.
An old story makes this point from Greek mythology about the Titan god Atlas. In this famous story told worldwide, Atlas carries the world’s weight on his shoulders. Atlas is a universal symbol of endurance, strength, and resoluteness, as he calmly bears his pain of responsibility. To this day, Atlas remains one of the most enduring themes in art and literature. Why is this story so alluring? Why is it that we are sympathetic to Atlas? Why do we admire him so? The answer is that we are instinctively drawn to those who can hold the world (or family, community, team) together and voluntarily bear the weight of its problems.
Choose the weight you have to carry. Choose it so that you can justify your existence to yourself and end your day and think, “Look, I did what I needed to do to set things right today.” And now, you don’t have to feel the shame of your failures. And, as you carry that weight, it will gain you a bit of self-respect, which will carry you through terrible times. Carrying that heavy load gives your life meaning and keeps despair and depression away.
Do those things that make you better, and hold onto the humility necessary to do so. Take on those lowly tasks that need doing, and do them with a smile on your face and contentment in your heart. Some of your fondest memories will be from those times, your camaraderie with others doing those tasks, and you will look back upon them with a smile and a longing that you may say, “I miss those times.” The “why” is that you carried the responsibility and did so willingly, contently, and thankfully, not with an arrogant attitude. If you are unhappy, look around and see if there are opportunities, even flawed ones, you can take on. You can exploit those imperfect prospects to learn and grow.
Stop acting like a 10-year-old. You are answerable to your own destiny.
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Please read my books:
The ATLAS story:
“An old story makes this point from Greek mythology about the Titan god Atlas. In this famous story told worldwide, Atlas carries the world’s weight on his shoulders. Atlas is a universal symbol of endurance, strength, and resoluteness, as he calmly bears his pain of responsibility. To this day, Atlas remains one of the most enduring themes in art and literature. Why is this story so alluring? Why is it that we are sympathetic to Atlas? Why do we admire him so? The answer is that we are instinctively drawn to those who can hold the world (or family, community, team) together and voluntarily bear the weight of its problems.” And this is why we should pay attention, because the lesson of taking on a burden is one of those that goes back before recorded history. This is the human condition. Gen. Satterfield has captured that sentiment here.
Army Captain, you are right about that and this is why Gen. Satterfield’s book is spot on. it is also under-rated. Let’s all get a copy and read it. For something so inexpensive, we could all afford it.
“Carrying that heavy load gives your life meaning and keeps despair and depression away.” – Gen. Doug Satterfield and sounds a lot like Dr. Jordan Peterson who would approve.
Gen. Satterfield has some powerful advice for everyone in his book, “55 Rules for a Good Life,” and we should be paying close attention to those rules. Another name for them would be ADVICE and yes it is advice. But if you decide you truly want a good life, then know up-front that the journey is going to be hard but in the long run it is going to give you the best life you could live with the best “adventures” that you could possibly imagine. Special thanks to Gen. Satterfield for posting this today and for his book of rules. Go and get yourself a copy now, don’t wait. Just below his article is a direct link to Amazon where you can get a copy for about $10. Cheap and worth every penny.
The reason in America that so many vote for the anti-American establishment in the Democrat Party is that they are immature and still believe and act like they are 10 years old. I wanna …. I wanna …. I wanna …. way to go parents, not bringing up your kids properly to be adults but to be in a perpetual state of infanthood.
Well said, Harry.
Great advice, Gen. Satterfield and thanks for emphasizing one of your book chapters from “55 Rules for a Good Life.”
https://www.amazon.com/55-Rules-Good-Life-Responsibility/dp/1737915529/
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Too bad we have too many immature adults these days. Their decisions are made on their FEELINGS and not on what is actually good for them or good for the community.
🤷♀️ “GROW UP” … that’s what my mother always told me whenever she found out I was doing something stupid and immature, which was often. But I did grow up. And now the young adults today haven’t yet learned how to be an adult because their emotions take them down the wrong path inevitably. 🤦♂️ It’s like nobody can tell them anything since they know everything and you are some kind of bigot if you try to tell them that what they are doing is wrong or could be done another way that is better. Well, we’ll jsut have to let them do their thing and let them explore their lives on their own without guidance. Let’s see how that works out for them. 🤷♂️
Sounds like my son-in-law could use a lesson from Gen. Satterfield.
Yeah, Mikka , learning how to be a real man is a tough job with these Gen Z’ers and Millenials since they have been treated so softly all their lives and never had to want anything without getting it. They also got a trophy for finishing last in a competition. That makes them want to do nothing since there is no challenge to it and no adventure (as Gen. Satterfield would say). Let them eat cake….. huh?
——– they will never learn and America will have them in charge one day. Heaven protect us from the adult children who never matured.