kayla nicole smith

I've spent the last hour and a half reading my developmental psychology textbook. This past chapter was about me. Emerging Adults, it was titled. It's about being aged 18 to 25, and not wanting to grow up. Sort of like Peter Pan, but with a lot more STDs and drug addiction, apparently. But anyway, the part that was about me is the part that describes putting off adulthood, putting off a "good plan" as far as settling down and being married and getting kids and having a plan for the rest of your life. That used to be normal at the beginning of adulthood, 18 to 22. Now it's not so clear cut as that.


But now I'm wondering, when I feel some deep sort of ache that tells me I don't want to be here the rest of my life, am I a victim of culture? Do I just want to live in another country, and keep moving and learning and helping people and meeting people and not really settling down, because I'm a product of the relatively new developmental stage of "emerging adulthood"? Usually I don't care about this stuff, and I don't care much about psychology in general, but when you see all these statistics you wonder if you're shrinking into part of the equation.

In the end, I make the decision of what's next. And I'm praying that God will show me what that is, what He wants and what kind of life is most beautiful and pleasing to Him. I don't expect a bush to blow up in flames and start talking to me, but there's a way of listening where you are just sort of quiet. Internally quiet, and not thinking about things, or the idea of thinking about things. And that's when you hear this voice, sometimes a very soft Voice, with ideas separate from your own. And it doesn't sound at all like a psychology textbook, thank the good Lord.