Maturing

Could not “maturing”–an increasingly antiquated concept–be viewed as the progressive development of self regulation?  Is it something other than being able to manage calmly increasingly difficult and heterogeneous situations and people?

Put another way, would maturing not consist in the ability to deal better with life without activating the “fight, flight, freeze” system?

The opposite, self evidently, of self regulation, is OTHER regulation, which is what we are seeing on college campuses.  The sense is that creating safe spaces will make them safer, but the reality is that by making them weaker and less resilient, less self regulating in a healthy way, it will make them more anxious, more violent, and less able to live happy lives.

A wise person once said “It’s a great life if you don’t weaken”.  This is a good motto.

The converse is “It’s a shitty life, if you are weak”.

The task of good people is to become strong themselves–to be able self regulate in highly heterogeneous and challenging situations–and to help others do likewise.

And those who seek to cultivate weakness in others, and to accept it in themselves, make everything worse.  We see this.  We feel this.  But I am trying to explain it more clearly.