" I still do n’t sense like an adult and I ’m mediate - senior . I still look around for the real adult to solve the problem before gain it ’s me . "
As much as the generations love to disagree with one another, let’s face it: older people have tons of wisdom that us young adults are completely clueless about (and would be wise to take). Adulting is, like, possibly the weirdest thing about being human, so we should probably take all the advice we can get.
So recently, people on Reddit were sharing themost surprising lessonsabout adulthood they learned the hard way — and there were some fascinating answers. So here’s what people said:
1.“Work is for survival, and enjoyment is hard to come by. And you do this for a long time.”
— The_Chosen_Pun _
" When I was a nestling , I heard , ' Life ’s a beef , and then you die . ' As a small fry , I laughed it off as a joke . As I got older , it got more and more and more real . It ’s no longer a express mirth topic whatsoever . "
— Valendr0s
2.“A lot of people never get out of high school personality-wise.”
— Future_Usual_8698
3.“That people actually save enough to put 20% down on a house.”
" Like , how the fuck do you do that ? "
— Smartone1927
4.“I have more time, per se, but less will to do anything.”
— 3RacoonsInAJacket
" With sure things , you just do n’t have the same desire any longer . "
— thrivingandstriving
5.“Eating all the ice cream I want has consequences.”
— Intrepid - Scar-1849
" There ’s a quote that goes something like that . It ’s like , ' Being an grownup is knowing you may have ice cream for dinner party and prefer not to . ' "
— devont
6.“Those aches and pains your parents complained about come a lot sooner than you think they will.”
— Roadshell
7.“I always thought adults know what they’re doing and they all have a plan, but now that I’m 33 years old it becomes clearer and clearer that everyone is just stumbling ahead in life without a clue until they die.”
— I - like - good - food
" Nobody knows what they ’re doing . Everyone is just winging it . "
— KaceyCats0714
8.“It takes a ton of time to be in OK shape.”
— BadJokesGreatTits
9.“I remember 40 bucks in high school equalling a week’s worth of snacks and food after school if I walked home. 40 bucks now can disappear in one fucking day, and you don’t even flinch.”
— PsychologicalMurl
10.“Just how much tax I would be paying. Also, the more I earn, the more I pay in tax. I now have a high-paying job and pay a massive amount in tax. It feels a little pointless, to be honest.”
" Take - home is n’t that much good than when I earned less . "
— NashAttor
11.“How much having a community can make or break you.”
" You never know what you ’ll experience . It ’s important to have good masses who worry about you around to serve you contain the core you face and enjoy your successes . It ’s important to be that for others as well . "
— trxvvrci
12.“You can do everything perfectly and still lose. Life is seriously un-fucking-fair, and no one is coming to save you.”
— Suspicious_Agent_599
13.“Most adults don’t exercise their free will enough and put themselves in miserable little boxes for no reason.”
— toxic_daydreams
14.“Even though I have way more time than when I was a student, I still can’t have a decent sleep schedule.”
— Witty - Table-8556
15.“I still don’t feel like an adult and I’m middle-aged. I still look around for the real adult to solve the problem before realizing it’s me.”
— MissPeppingtosh
16.“How expensive it is to simply just exist.”
— SnooPeanuts2620
" requisite , food for thought , family , and rates payment . "
— JulianMcC
17.“I’m the one responsible for remembering where I parked.
— TheSwedishFishTheory
18.“That balding, muscle aches, nose and ear hair, becoming gray-haired, getting death-wish hangovers…they can start as early as 21. I thought it was a year-50 thing.”
19.“Nothing is ever clean. I feel like I am constantly cleaning and I fucking hate it. I want to be a 1%‘er, strictly so I can have someone clean up after me.”
— meet_me_n_montauk
20.“How adulthood doesn’t get as boring as I thought.”
— ChucklesMuffin
21.“Nobody really has authority over you — they just have different forms of leverage with varying levels of effort needed to overcome them.”
— FractalWormFromTT
22.“That you have to figure out what to cook for dinner every single day.”
— Accomplished_Map7752
23.“How hard it is to find a career that at least allows me to make ends meet. My Boomer parents said it was easy to find a career that paid a living wage or above.”
— The_turqouise_cat
24.“Everyone is pretty much focused on themselves. Everyone is dealing with some kind of shit, so it’s hard to get real interest in what you’re up to.”
— MrRichardSuc
25.“The biggest surprise would have to be just how clueless everyone is. People generally can’t help you in the advice department, and over-simplify things.”
— Spiritdiritcel
26.“Being single and childless is really not the worst outcome.”
— sweadle
" I am 43 , never found my person , and did n’t have any kid . I am happy to die a old maid with 30 computed axial tomography . It is better than trying to navigate the dating world of today . "
— violet - Act-9387
27.“People not wanting to better themselves, or refusing to learn anything new. I can’t imagine hitting 28 and thinking, ‘All right, this is who I’m going to be for the rest of my life.'”
— serpentine_valentine
28.“You can make decisions for yourself, follow through on your beliefs, self-advocate, dream big, love life, enjoy the things that fuel you and bring you peace, and generally become a better version of yourself every day, which makes all of the above more abundant and fulfilling.”
— deltasine
29.“Majority of people spend most of their time talking about their kids.”
— RiverBlueSkyWest
30.“That you never really become an adult. You do adult things, but your brain is still the little kid you grew up with!”
— Altruistic - Box-3778
" We end up in this eldritch situation where mentally we stay young while our body age . Mentally I still identify as eld 24 , but I ’m actually over 50 .
My mama is 78 . She said in her judgment she ’s still around 30 . She hates looking in the mirror and see how she ’s aged . "
— Interesting_Sir7520
31.“Existential boredom is a real thing. This is a major reason why folks reach for drugs and alcohol. You have to keep the mind engaged in learning new and interesting things or you’ll find yourself addicted to something terrible and/or cognitive decline will happen rapidly.”
" facilitate others . Be kind . We ’re all human being out here winging it . "
— Creepy_Animal7993
32.“It’s been a lot harder to make friends as an adult. Especially the more involved I get in ‘adult stuff’ like getting married and having kids.”
— Orca - stratingChaos
33.“That you end up hanging out with adults you wouldn’t normally because of social situations and your kids.”
" I see myself at a bonfire dyad of times with a tramp couple just because our Thomas Kyd were the same age . Ick . "
— CriscoCamping
34.“You can still get zits.”
— DerbyWearingDude
" Yep , I ’m 67 old age old and still pay off zits . Like , WTF ? ! "
— thomport
35.“The price of things like toilet paper and trash cans. I expected insurance, bills, and food to be expensive, but not toilet paper and trash cans.”
— yalluminati
36.“The rate at which unintelligent folks procreate compared to the rate intellectual and clever ones do.”
— bradstero
37.“Every decade is better than the one before.”
" Being a tike was not gracious . I had to deal with the consequences of other people ’s bad decisions .
Now I have agency , and I will never leave to use it . People who are more and more miserable every tenner are n’t making decisions in their own good stake . "
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Note : Some responses have been edited for duration and/or clearness .
