8/01/25 - Being a teenage girl (adj.), and the pressure to grow up / two

Hello!! Recently I've been thinking a lot about what being a teenage girl means. I'm as much girl as I am boy, yet socially I am treated as a woman and I am very feminine, so that's the space in which I exist lol. 

I think that being frivolous and silly seems to be inherently tied to the experience of being a teen, though more so teen girls. Being obsessed with a musician, making mistakes and bold choices appearance-wise, social media usage, etc. Even being sentimental and emotional, traits that I consider to just be human, are thought of by many as relating specifically to teenage girls or young women. These are also traits that I consider inherent to myself; I have shelves full of cards people have given me, photos of Paul McCartney and my friends are tacked to my wall, and I cry whenever I give away a stuffed animal. It's the way I've always been, perhaps childish but still irrevocably me. 

Now, as I am only sixteen, I've never not been a child. Maybe my tendency towards the emotional and soft aspects of life will be things I grow out of - like my past fear of the dark. But thinking of "growing up" in the way largely expected of me makes me sad. There seems to still be a sort of pressure from the adults around me to eventually put away the pink and band posters, and be an adult in the traditional sense of the word. 

Yet, I don't think the adults of the world like this very much either. From peter pan to Adam Sandler movies, there seems to be a pervasive culture around not growing up, whether meant literally or in a more abstract sense. I think that generally, people want to keep the soft parts of themselves, the "inner child" if you will, intact. My question is, if people still like the more "childish" parts of life and of themselves, why must the inner child stay inner?

Obviously I'm not saying maturity is a bad thing. Reason and logic are extremely important abilities to have, and I'm sure that if everyone stayed sixteen forever the pervasiveness of said abilities societally would diminish quickly. And the age old tale of a too-childish adult or parent messing things up certainly isn't baseless. 

I suppose my main issue isn't with maturity, but rather conformity. The embarrassment that comes with being into childish things the older you get, and the public shame that often accompanies these things as well. I'm reminded of Disney adults, and how people often shame them for... being too into mickey mouse still? Sure, maybe it's a bit silly, but certainly ridiculing them for being into something made for a younger audience still is sillier. After all, to afford Disneyworld trips one must be making decent money, and making decent money usually comes with some semblance of maturity. 

Some Disney adults are immature, I'm sure. There's immature people in every group, and you could possibly find an argument that being so overtly into something childish makes you more of a child yourself. Still, correlation isn't always causation, and I'm sure there's as many immature and illogical adults who exclusively watch r rated violence and spend their money on casinos and golf as there are immature and illogical Disney adults. The interests don't make the person. 

I also think that truthfully, most, if not all, adults have one or more "childish" hobbies or interests. Baseball cards, doodling, animated movies, hell even my grandma had a doll collection. Why is shame around these things so common, then? Why do I feel that to succeed in this world and be a real adult, I have to stop making edits and shove my dolls to the back of my closet? 

Would you call me ridiculous if I blamed capitalism in part? 

After all, you can't exactly profit off of browsing Tumblr or blogging about your day. Sure, investing your money into enjoyment of these things (Disney, cartoons, collectables, etc.) does fuel the system, but it's not like you're profiting off of it. You're being "lazy", childlike, and you're not turning a profit or doing something "respectable" with your free time. Obviously there's other aspects to it too, but I don't think I'm being obtuse by placing a lot of the blame on the system we live in. 

Human expression and innate enjoyment in simple pleasures and childlike pursuits doesn't generate income. And we've been taught to be ashamed of that, or to feel like these things have the time limit of "childhood" placed upon them. 

Those with much more wisdom and experience than I possess have made numerous articles and books on the subject, and I encourage you to look further into those if this subject interests you. I'm not exactly being a revolutionary here, however opening up the discussion and bringing my perspective and thoughts on it felt like a valuable use of my time. I apologize if this feels disjointed in any way, I am mostly spitballing and didn't really dedicate much time to editing. 

I'd love to have a conversation about any of these ideas if anyone is up for a continued dialogue! ^^ Thank you for reading!! <3