Act your age!

Haven't we heard that saying sooo many times?

It seems that no matter how hard we try to act our age, we would never know exactly whether we are actually acting our age or not. Confusing isn't it?

Stereotypically, it's suppose to be: the older you get, the wiser and more mature you become. But is that really the case? I certainly don't think so.

I've actually been thinking about it for a while now. It's amazing how many things you notice when you actually take the time to observe your surroundings. And just hearing things, you learn a lot.

Different people act differently. This applies to everything in life, whether it be work, school or just the way they act. It doesn't matter whether they are the same gender, age, height etc.

A teenage kid could act like a mature adult while an 50 year old mother could act like a little kid. It doesn't matter. But it seems as if people in society make it matter, want it to matter. I mean, just the fact that we are so familiar with the phrase "act your age" proves the fact that many people want us to act our 'apparent age'.

The problem is: how can we act our age when we don't really have a specific criteria or cut-off to abide by?

The answer: we just don't act our age. Simple as that. Well...i suppose you are still acting your age, it's just that you are acting the age that YOU yourself are comfortable with, whether it be that mature, professional side or the childish side. It doesn't matter how OTHER people act. Just because they act a certain way, it most certainly does not mean that you have to act that way. If they are able to act a certain way and feel comfortable about it, what is stopping you from doing exactly the same thing, except for the fact that you are acting differently.

So the next time someone goes "Act your age", you say to them "I am acting my age!"

~Aurora

Crushes

Crushes. Everyone has them, whether they are a guy or a girl. It's that physical or mental attraction that a person has for another person. There are many different types of crushes:
- one where you like the person because of their physical appearance
- one where you like them because of their personality
- something that they did for you that has left you falling
- the simple touch they give you
- their uniqueness that you haven't quite seen in others
- someone who is different from the bland, everyday people you usually see
- and many other reasons

From these crushes comes the rush of all different feelings. There are some people who would just take these crushes into stride, admire the crush but would eventually get over it and move on. Other people would admire their crushes but only from afar, never daring to confront them. And then there are some who would act upon this attraction, starting up a conversation which would either lead to them finding out they don't actually like the person anymore, being rejected or blossoming this attraction to something more.

Whether it be blossoming this attraction or just admiring them from afar, these crushes would all become a distant memory after a while, something that you would recall later in life saying 'I remember crushing over this one guy/girl! I couldn't help falling for their..."

In some cases, these crushes could cause people to feel immense pain in the process. There are some people who, when find out that their crushes either have boy/girlfriends or just aren't interested, feel horrible about themself. They begin to doubt themselves, thinking "Maybe i'm ugly? Maybe I'm worthless." or who begin to regret not taking up the oppotunity and acting on their feelings, not trying hard enough to grab the oppotunity while they had the chance. Thus, they begin to feel horrible, falling in the dark pits, not so far as to depression but far enough to know that they aren't happy.

To these people, I say: So be it. You didn't grab the oppotunity while you could, you lost your chance to something that could have blossomed. But you see, you don't know if it could have blossomed. You don't know if something great could have resulted from that chance. The worst thing you could do to yourself from this experience is waste your time thinking of the 'what-if's, replaying every little detail, every little chance you had to grab this oppotunity, imagining what could have happened if you did this, if you did that.

Don't delve in the past, life is too short for you to spend time worrying about something you can't exactly fix anymore. As I said before, everyone has crushes and it's not just one; it's many. So you couldn't begin something with this one, maybe it just wasn't meant to be. Maybe you were meant for someone better, someone who would be even more worthwhile than this one. Someone who you won't even get to meet because you are too busy consuming your time thinking about the 'what-if's.

So I say to you: move on from this. Open your eyes and look around you. Don't focus your time and energy on someone who you can't obtain, find that other crush, the one who you are MEANT for. This crush, the one you missed your oppotunity to grab, let it be a distant memory, like all the other crushes you had. So what if it was deeper than those other discarded crushes, so what if you had put more feeling, time and thought into this one. At the end of the day, aren't they all crushes? So put that crush to the side, leave it as a distan memory, one that you can recall later on it life, saying "I remember that one crush, I fell hard for that person because..."

And then live on. Live on to see the more worthwhile things in life. And live on to find that one crush, that one crush that you'll be able to act upon and maybe even start something even more special.

~Aurora