Slap of maturity

Slap of maturity sounds familiar? It should be.

It's not because it's what you know, it's familiar because you and I have faced it. Looking as ourselves while sitting in a corner of the room, on the office chair, in a coffee shop or at the death bed. We do understand that maturity hit us unknowingly and we just moved with the flow.

Life we once thought of is nowhere to be seen in this maturity. We always say that once I grow up ill do this and that. Earning money, a social status, or a luxury life, is this what being successful is? Is it the standard everyone has to achieve? Is this the maturity everyone talks about to be mature, act mature, and be the one you are meant to be?

Well, if this is the standard and criteria of maturity, I would say it’s a slap in the face of the maturity we all face and is done by society, our parents, and ourselves. We are so bound to these shits that we don’t even understand where we are standing and where we are heading. If this is the maturity, then why do people, after a certain age or level, run backward to peace and old life, where they think of the things they have abandoned to become what they are, and still don’t find peace and soulfulness?

Actually, we don’t really mature when led by others or their ideologies and thoughts. What happens to us is the change that is the result of constant pressure from our parents. No, I’m not blaming, I'm just trying to show the reality here. We in our homes as a man are considered assests. We are the living investments of the parents, actually. Most of the media people also say this. That’s because in a middle-class family, you just have your family in the end, and you are relying on them.

A middle class man is so bound to the chores of life held upon them by the family and society that he forgets to grow. He forgets to look for himself. He forgets to see what he can do and how much he can move forward.

Running behind the ideologies of the parents, we mostly get stuck. A boy wants to study, but ends up working in a coffee shop because the family is not sustainable. Because the father doesn’t earn much. And the family is just waiting for this machine to grow up and start to run in the same race.

Where , by luck or hard work, he might succeed and make a better future for himself and his family. Otherwise he will end up same. Raising a living machine which ends up being a part of the same society where his father and his father and his father ended.

I’m not saying parents are wrong, or that they don’t know. But there is a little difference in the timelines where they and we lived. They didn't have AI or home-based jobs, and they didn't have the fear of losing jobs due to automation. Neither did they have these social anxieties we have now due to social media. But what we have more of are the resources. resources that are turning us evil and taking us to the paths that we were not meant to. And this is the most terrifying thing.

Due to the constant criticisms and pressure of society, we keep running and doing things that we should not. And what's more interesting is that people don't care how or from where the money or resources are coming. The only thing that matters is the steady flow of money and nothing else. It doesn't matter if we lose ourselves in the process. As an individual, we just matter to fulfil the purpose of others.

I personally believe that a man should have the capability to some extent to change. Hange how he looks into things, how he understands them, and how he reacts. He should keep on learning and changing to improve himself until he reaches a certain level where he becomes a man of words. But in our society we just grow up and die for the honor. Honor that can take a innocent life, that can kill the dreams of a child, that can limit the growth of woman and so on.

This is a never-ending debate. We are stuck, continuously struggling to be someone else's shadow, to walk in their steps. These tendencies now seem inherent in us. Remaining in the same state, we unconsciously adopt old thoughts and ideologies that are not only incompatible with society and life but are also harming younger generations.

We always s hear that men are horrible, they are brutal, heartless, don’t care, and don’t respect women, especially. But are you sure the things you are referring to describe a man are truly found in man? Is it really a man or just a cloak-wearing monster who doesn’t understand humanity and sanity? Who is bound by some built-in and most socially embedded thoughts? His actions and visions are a replica of what’s going around him.

In our society, a man who cares for his wife, who works and supports his wife, and wants her to walk by his side is considered a dishonored and selfless man. Who do not know how to enslave and beat awoman is not a man. Who can’t confine a woman is not a man. Is this the maturity we need? Is this thematurity we are being lead to?

We, men, are not monsters or idiots chained to our lust and masculinity. We are humans seeking peace and sanity, hoping to live openly in society. We wish not to be judged by status or income. Deep down, we want to be seen for our feelings, emotions, and thoughts. We long for someone to truly understand us.

All the men who are doing wrong deeds are somewhere in life so manipulated and disturbed that their sanity is lost. There consciousness to differentiate between right and wrong is gone. All they have is the hatred and the burdens that society has given them. Which, when it comes out, causes such heartbreaking and disturbing things that it blackens the honor of man.

Being a man, I feel constantly trapped inside a jar sealed by endless responsibilities. My dreams come last; the needs of others always come first. Parents and society never pause, because they, too, were shoved down the same path. They carry traumas and thoughts they never escaped. Even as adults, their thinking can feel painfully stunted, as if frozen in youth. ridiculously less than an 18-year-old boy.

We are just running in the stream, lost, not knowing when to stop, unaware of how it will all end. This turns us into helpless fragments, born for this endless task, forced to continue. He pushes on until his patience crumbles and his inner darkness explodes. Then, driven by exhaustion, he acts on what feels right to him—ideologies new in method but rooted in ancient spirits. His actions mirror the wounds and storms he has survived.

Then society comes into action and blames everything on man, parents, relatives, wife, children, and others. They start to blame. But they forget that during that whole cycle what he did is to run to achieve what people and society has asked him to do. He forgot who he was and what he wanted to be. Slaves of other thoughts, nothing more.

Just a few of them dare to break away, only to run from homes, live isolated, or sink into depression—not because of what they chose, but because of society's cold response. Abandoning ritual is treated as an unforgivable betrayal met with iron hands. This is the harsh reality where we are surviving.

This is the place where we are living and trying to create a version of ourselves that can contribute to society in one way or another. Here, we work to reduce the beliefs that ruined our childhood so that our siblings or our children do not face the same challenges.

What I think is, maturity is feeling the weight of every choice—knowing exactly what's right and what's wrong, not just following the crowd. It's not about a beard, money, or living a life of luxury. Maturity is owning your decisions and genuinely caring about the world you leave for those who come after. It's truly seeing the difference between right and wrong, and, above all, recognizing what it means to step beyond being a boy and to become a man.

A true man, in my view, is defined by his ideology, consciousness, emotional stability, and ability to change for good. Without these qualities, he cannot be considered a man in the true sense. I believe the slap of maturity, when it hits, is what truly makes you a man. Otherwise, you are simply a machine brought to life to pursue the dreams and ideologies of others, without your own perspective and thoughts.