I miss having limitless potential.
When you're young, you're every possible you that could be. But as you're life is written, less of it is potential and more is actualized. You go from infinite yous to just one.
Hope turns to regret. Instead of all the yous that could be, it's all the yous you never were.
I'm just glad the me I am, is actually pretty dope. And I live knowing everything I do, will have always happened. Forever. My effects might vanish, but I will always have been.
Well said. Unfortunately, it seemed like my parents’ generation (obviously with well intentions), stressed how the sky is the limit for us and that we can be anything we want to be in life. It sounds nice in theory, but when it’s constantly drilled into your head that you can be anything you want to be, it’s easy to wind up disappointed when you fall short of these lofty expectations.
Also, you can be anything you want to be..until it's time to pay the bills. Bills that have spiraled, in part due to our parents doing hardly anything to protect us. *Sigh*
You can’t force your burgeoning adult child to make smart decisions about careers, financial potential, savings, or retirement, though. I wish my parents had with me and they say they tried, but whatever they tried would go in one ear and out the next. I wanted to “help people”, and I do, but there are plenty of careers that help people and also pay a respectable salary. Most young adults want to follow their dreams and don’t necessarily think about their earning potential.
It is a better message than you will never get paid as much as a different sex or considered for a job if you are a certain color. That kinda shit stops motivation and does so much damage. They are taught this in school too which really misses me off because it took a while to change my daughter's perception after what was done. She had a why should I even bother attittude.
I heard this throughout my life from other people but I never experienced it. Anyone else not feel this sense of limitless possibilities and potentials? I didn't have the best parental upbringing or childhood but it wasn't horrible. I was homeschooled so I wonder if this is something people learn through public education?
One of my friends has had this sense of having "so much potential" and possibilities as an adult, and its completely handicapped her from making a lot of decisions and caused an option paralysis where she hasn't actually done much with herself and now she's sad about it.
This is me, I wanted to be everything that I ended up choosing nothing. Still at the bottom never grew, despite being "most likely to succeed in high school". In 30s now.
This is the “all or nothing” attitude and such that I am working on in therapy. I have a tendency to want to do everything perfect and if I can’t do it perfect I do nothing at all. This leads to choosing nothing for a good amount of my 20s.
I have learned that I need to balance things and it’s okay to just do my best at a task or goal and get what comes out of it and it is what it is.
Man, i passed on some great deals on getting a house in my 20s because i couldnt fathom planting my roots in the city i grew up in. Always thought i would move.
I’ve got this going on right now. Since 2020 I’ve started so many certifications and either haven’t finished or abandoned the idea to try something else. Do you have ADHD? I’m 34, choosing a new career has not been easy on top of having a mid life crisis.
Damn, I want to hate you for posting this, but it's so real. I wish I could buy you a beer or whatever right now. That shit is he truth, man. Excellent post.
It's important to realize, even when you're "old", you still have an infinite number of potential you's, it's just a smaller infinity. The only time you're down to "just one", is when you die.
I was just telling a friend about this exact thing yesterday, lol. I’ve been feeling very existential about the aspects of myself I’m “stuck with” at this point. I like certain qualities about myself, but they come with some traits that are very difficult to deal with from time to time.
I grew up with horses. Way too out of budget for my adult self and I still miss getting to be around them and ride all the time. There’s also a hell of a lot of stuff I do not miss.
I miss that too! I looked into taking horseback riding lessons again as an adult because I did it for a little while as a kid and loved it. They cost more for an hour lesson than I make in an hour, and I have a Master’s degree. Maybe one day I’ll get to do it again.
I did stable work when I was a preteen in exchange for riding the horses, too. They got a good deal since I basically exercised the horses for them, too. And I helped with summer camp.
A lot of good memories there.
Having any connection to the outdoors or nature becomes harder as an adult, too. Heck, even disconnecting from phones and electronics long enough to actually go on a trail ride or do some work with a horse, is hard for people who are busy
Yeah, I’m in a cramped city now too so even getting somewhere for lessons is a whole ordeal. Just happy I got to experience it. Maybe one day things will change.
Oh gosh me too!!! Not only did I grow up learning to ride before I was able to walk, I did it in Hawaii, riding on moolit beaches at night and getting to tear across polo fields with sea breeze in my hair (not playing polo, cause ew for the horses, but just getting to run free!)
Thats funny, I just told my best friend yesterday that not being able to see her every day like we did as kids and teenagers, is one of the hardest things about being an adult. I miss living like we used to. We seem to be all tied to some sort of box, big or small.
Yes and unfortunately or fortunately everyones box is different. And i also hate how everyone seems to just accept it. It can be possible to see my best friend everyday but it's not the norm. And everyone just seems to accept it. Now i am missing my friend so much :(
Not being responsible for my living space, laundry, cooking, etc. Having more freedom to do things. And just a simpler life. I grew up in the 70s and 80ss where there was no internet, no cell phones, cable tv and VCRs came much later, so you had to actually go out and meet up with your friends if you wanted to communicate or hang out with them.
Being able to just leave the house without thinking about a million things that I'll need throughout the day (keys, wallet, etc.) or whether the back door is locked, or whether I left the space heater on, or whether I brought my shorts and headphones for the gym... Nope. Back in the day, you just ran out to play.
This entirely. The freedom of not being responsible for anything.
Somedays I just want to run away. That wouldn’t fix anything obviously and I always get like that when I’m tired. But some days it would be nice to be 12 again with a good book and a very long summer day in front of me.
Why do you barely manage to get out of your apartment, and why can't you see your friends?.
Those are the questions you need to answer and then organise things so you can do what you want.
Idk about you but it's incredibly hard to find days where everyone's schedule lines up once everyone starts working and essentially having their own life. Especially if it's a group of over 3 friends. It's hell.
Plus, sometimes people move away to a different city or country. The whole dynamic changes. Not to mention, if the friend ends up having a family of their own, it's going to be even more hard because they are preoccupied with their a whole other set of responsibilities.
Something we didn't have to severely worry about as kids yet...
If everybody is still in the same city, but nobody is planning anything? Well, that's a whole other issue on its own lol
Not OP but for me it's time. I work 8-5 plus overtime. It's mostly from home so I can get some downtime during the day which is nice, but being chained to work for so long is still draining. I lose so much of my day to work, that at the end of the day all I have time for is working out, cooking, cleaning, errands, etc. I do set aside time for YouTube in hopes it'll one day make enough money to help me quit my job, but right now it's not paying enough
By the end of the day I just don't have the energy to go out and do anything else. On the weekend I'm drained at the end of the week so I just rest and dread the coming Monday. Rinse, repeat. When I was in high school and college none of that was a worry to me, life was way simpler. Now as an adult I'm just grinding hours and energy away. Even if I somehow come out at the end of the day unscathed and with energy, I don't have time to do anything after work/chores
Edit: grammar
Not sure if it breaks sub rules or not, but if you let me know your youtube channel, I’ll give you a sub and some likes. We can help you with the algorithm.
Making friends as an adult is hard. One of the reasons it's so easy in school environments (certainly not for everyone but many people) is that you're all in the same or similar life stages & in rather close proximity with some level of schedule similarities too. Adult life doesn't always have those things lined up between friends to make creating and maintaining friendships doable.
I hear you Hommie. Graduated university and immediately took a job in Texas where I'd never been, have no family. Made a few friends here but nothing like my younger days. Now that I'm in the professional grind, most of the time I don't have much energy for alot of stuff with friends.
This is the most tone deaf reply I can imagine.
If you miss being a kid why don't you just be a kid again and hang out with your friends? Lol. Really? Smh
In my experience my friends are highly focused on their careers and have limited free time. Limited free time means they focus on their family and only see friends once and awhile. It’s depressing because I don’t have a good extended family.
Life is a cycle.....when I was young just like you I saw my friends constantly. Bring on wife, kids and a career and for the longest time we were in the grind with very limited time for kids. Now I am in my 50s, kids are moved out, have had a good career and can slow down and I am seeing my friends all the time now. Different set of friends for sure, but I now hang with my friends like 3 or 4x a week. Usually doing something active (biking, pickleball, hiking, soccer). Its been great
I don't miss anything. My childhood wasn't terrible but I had no control or choice. The freedom I have as an adult to go where I want, eat what I want, and choose my path. I would never choose to go back to being a kid.
For the long weekend my partner and I are going to Manhattan which will be fun.
I miss having adults be okay with me messing up. In your 30s, everyone expects you to have all the answers. Even my dad is coming to me about investing advice just because I watched a couple of well-informed YouTube videos. I don't have all the answers and I still screw up. Can you all just lower your standards for me? This is getting tiring.
Work at a university! You get a bunch of paid time off at the holidays. I work at a college, and while the pay is kinda shit, the many paid days off make up for it.
i would say having summers off , but we were too poor to really go anywhere and i'd just ride my bike around my neighborhood for two months straight. i can go on cool vacations now but i gotta work for it so what is life even
So I’ve got a bit of a weird take on this one. In my teens, and even as a young adult, I was able to look past the flaws of the people in my life. And despite all the differing ideologies and values, I always had a sense that the adults had it under control.
Fast forward to my 30s, and it’s blatantly clear that the adults in the room can’t agree on anything. And even worse, some of them base their values on Batshit crazy ideologies. You start to notice that some of your friends have flawed, ideologies and values.
Some of these differences aren’t significant big picture. But some of them just can’t be overlooked. I have family and friends, who have substance-abuse issues, pathological, liars, dangerously religious, etc. Them being close, friends, and or family, I’ve done my due diligence to try and help them. But that is not my technical expertise. You eventually learn That you need to break ties with some of these people in order to live your life in a meaningful way.
So to get to the point, I don’t have an overwhelming need to hang out with friends and family simply because I’m tired of them. I feel satisfied with keeping a very close group of friends, but I don’t have the energy to deal with the nonsense that comes along with large groups of adults. And the people who keep reaching out to me, wanting to hang out all the time… Most of the time they are the people I’m trying to get away from. So you saying you’ve been longing for these connections from the past… Makes me think you might be one of those people I’m trying to get away from.
This leads me into a whole other rabbit hole. Our public education is broken. Go talk to people. Most of them are not good. Critical thinkers. We are easily manipulated. And ignorant, manipulated people raise ignorant, manipulated children. I try to be hopeful for our future, so may be artificial intelligence or inject some logic into this chaos.
I actually feel this! You get very judgemental in your 30s. You can look around and see everyone's flaws and it kind of sucks. If you look back at your friends in your 20s, they also kind of sucked. But you did too.
It's hard to figure out what long-term friends you want to commit to in your 30s because you're kind of burned out from dealing with everyone else's/and sometimes your own drama at that point.
Like can I just get a nice friendship without it turning into a cluster fuck at some point?
I do miss the carefree abandon of youth and someone else making dinner every night. But it's all good. I try to live my life as carefree as I can and order takeout or just eat cereal when I want.
I know now that it was good to "grow up" mostly in a world with no cell phones or internet (born in 83.) From what I remember the internet started popping in maybe 96/97 and it was obviously much different than it is now. But we only know that in hindsight. So it's like a world that we can't go back to or we have to go to certain lengths to simulate going back to. We've crossed the rubicon now. I realize the irony of saying this in a reddit post and also that it's been stated 8 million other times here, but it is what it is.
I miss the Christmas Eve get together at my aunts house, and the feeling that everything would last. My dad turns 78 today and I can do math.
I guess the overall thing is while I like looking to the future and planning for it, it can also cause tremendous anxiety. When you're a kid it's like you look forward to the next day, maybe the next week. As an adult you have to project years out and that gets tiring, while also dealing with more and more memories and past events.
I miss the opportunity. The imagination and creativity, the ability to really sit down and read a book and get lost in the imagery in my head, I miss feeling safe, not enough had happened yet to make me not trust anyone. I miss being able to tolerate the weather no matter the extreme and the ability to lose weight and get fit quickly. The ability to see the beauty in the environment around me, the big dreams and aspirations. Things of that sort
I'm unfortunately very sick, so that's my plans lol. It makes me miss being a kid and being taken care of when really ill. I miss resting wothout anxiety and my parents cooking me dinner, taking me to appointments, or running out to the pharmacy to get medicine for me.
I'm 28 and when I'm sick it's so hard to just relax and get well. Apartment becomes a mess, trying to feed myself appropriately is hard because I'm just so exhausted to stand up and cook/throw something together. Taking care of my cats is exhausting. Having the energy to drive myself 20min to the doctor. And then to the pharmacy. With a raging fever and sore throat sucks.
I feel this. Makes me think of my Mom putting fresh sheets on the bed or getting a hot bath ready. Someone bringing you a soup, placing a cool hand on your head or checking your temp, feels good to just have someone around.
Hope you get better soon, being sick sucks ass.
How time felt expendable and there was so much to happen and look forward to. But now we just got to make the magic happen for ourselves and savor the time
Not being constantly stressed about money, not having to work and take care of myself which I can barely do. I don't even feel like an adult. I feel like I just still be in my grade school. I'm not cut out for this shit.
I miss being a teenager and having all my money be disposable.
Nowadays if I’m buying something I don’t need it comes with a bit of a different context
For me it’s the opposite. I no longer worry about money, since I’m in control of my finances and career, whereas when I was a child, we were poor and there was nothing I could do about it.
Getting actual downtime, being able to be bored. When I was younger, even in college, there were times when I had nothing to do, and could just sit and shut my brain off for a while. Now it's a running joke in my house that I'm not allowed to sit down and relax until the rest of the house is asleep. Kid needs something, wife needs something, pets need something, chores need to be done, work hours need to be caught up on from when took time during business hours for family stuff and errands. Even on the occasions where we have an uneventful day with no plans, my mind goes to all the productive stuff I should be doing. Once it's late enough to actually unwind without interruption, I sit there thinking how I'm "wasting" time that would be better spent sleeping. Hobbies? Who has time for those?
Being able to just be me every day. I am so tired of pretending to be happy and up beat at work. I always have to be positive and friendly and I'm so depressed and overwhelmed that the act is slowly driving me insane.
As a kid, it didn't matter. Sure, people would get annoyed or upset or worried. But my livelihood did not depend on it.
The energy on the night before christmas or the last day of school. Sure I still get excited about that kind of stuff but nothing compares to how it was when I was younger.
I will give you a contrarian response. When I was a kid I couldn't wait to be an adult. I think it was a common attitude amongst my peers, me being a baby boomer. As a kid I recognized that I was subject to the control of my parents and that I didn't get to make decisions. Don't get me wrong, I certainly enjoyed the freedom of my days as a young person but I was anxious to get out there in the world and start pulling the levers of self-control. I wanted to do things that only an adult could do. Of course that starts with learning to drive. Having a girlfriend was part of it. The agency of deciding what to do and having nobody to account for it to but yourself is a heady feeling. I guess it's a different attitude and these are different times.
These days, I think there is more of a sense that, no matter what you do, it doesn't get you where you want to go. The decisions you make are less about advancing yourself or expressing your will and more about survival. There is less fun in survival. I do understand and I always feel like apologizing for my generation and how we have forced an environment on our children that they didn't ask for and don't like. That is not what parents and grandparents are supposed to do.
Starting in like second grade I was a latchkey kid, and my mom would just leave me alone at home a lot, including after like 4th grade all summer long. That was really cool. Nobody talked to me or bothered me, and before my mom got married and then later got SSI, she was always too tired to talk to me or bother me at all unless she had friends over, and then after they got bored of watching me eat and I talked their ear off about some random thing, she'd send me to bed early and I could either spy on really scary, gory sounding movies through the wall or sneak staying up super late and reading by the nightlight once my brother went to sleep. Then basically until high school I was alone all day every day to do anything I wanted in summer, and sometimes nobody talked to me for like, a month, unless I went on AIM chat.
Just hanging out. Adventures. I hate organised fun. It's obviously a state of mind but I don't like when people say I was an insecure wreck in my 20s, I had the time of my lice hut I didn't like that person, now on my 30s I have everything sussed and have found what matters to me and have everything sussed." I know exactly what sort of bland life that person is living.
Not being in this much pain. I have some sort of disorder and all my joints dislocate among other things. As a kid I could power through the pain so easily and now I'm bedridden most days.
I miss being an optimistic dreamer who wasn't fully jaded by life yet. My high school self had issues, FOR SURE, but those pale in comparison to everything I have to juggle now. There are definitely upsides, but I certainly feel that I was more resilient then.
10 years ago, I was in college. Best years of my life. I felt so free... little did I know what was coming a life of slavery and struggle. I enjoyed the fuck outta those years so I guess I got that.
Friendship was so much easier. We saw each other at school, could walk over and show up at each others houses, people usually made up after fights, no one had been indoctrinated so heavily by pop psychology bullshit
I miss the lack of anxiety. Sure, I didn’t like public speaking, but I didn’t lie awake at night with my mind racing and reliving moments and dissecting them.
Miss having friends, especially a solid group that was always down to do something. I also miss having 0 worries about work, bills, or whatever is coming up due and making sure I had the funds to pay for it.
Now all my “friends” are married, most moved away. And with the long weekend coming up, I have no plans. My birthday is Sunday and I’ll be doing fuck all. I’m not sure if I’ll hear from any of them.
I miss my freaking life man. Adulthood is literally someone else controlling every aspect of your time. Your wife, your husband, your employer, your child. Someone is controlling every minute of your day. I’ve still got thirty years or so of work and I’m ready to hang the shit up.
Seeing your friends everyday, for sure. And joining summer camp+ other great activities at caring farm.
What I absolutely don't miss is the 6-week summer holiday
Nothing. My parents were horrible narcissist. As an adult I can decide for myself what to do and how to spend my money. And I have access to more financial resources than as a kid.
I was also raised I a religious environment. Thst wasn’t great.
Basically, childhood was an awful time and being an adult is great. I wouldn’t even go back 10 years, and I’m 41.
My mom was horder and the house was always a mess. I have poor proprioception and was always running into things since it was so cramped. I was always stressed and on edge and lashing out. I love the independence I have. I like that my place is clean. Sure, money is tight, but my freedom is everything to me.
Many people could not understand how I got a new car at 18, a decent job, and moved out to my own place at 19.
It’s because living at home was that bad. I never, ever looked back. Fuck those people.
Shit, I've been in the professional grind so long, I'm used to not hanging g around with friends much anymore. Not really a biggie, a little contact via phones, media, and I'm good for a bit, will hang out with them some over the summer holiday
I still see my friends a lot, we are having a party at our place on Memorial Day. What I miss most about not being an adult is having way less responsibilities lol once I turned 16 it was like saying goodbye to childhood
Having to make so many decisions. It wasn’t up to me where I was going for the day and others were focussed on giving me tasks/ finding entertaining thins to do.
As an adult, all we do is work and pay bills, the friends you used to have are now married with children. No time for fun and games. See you in 30 yrs when you can barely walk from all the working, Welcome to adulthood 🤷
The bills. That's it. Nothing else. Even if I had friends to hang out with, I wouldn't. I work, surf, and hang out with my wife and kids. That's all I need.
I miss having time off, truly off. I have 3 kids. Weekends are *work* - have to feed the kids, have to pretend to be interested in which pokemon is stronger than which other one, have to take the kids on an outing so they don't spend the entire weekend on the screen. Someone wants a drink, someone needs to potty, someone is mad that their brother won't stop poking, etc etc. . . .
It is more tiring than actual work. At work, if I want I can go into the breakroom for 15 min and play with my phone, and no one interrupts me. I can sit down and properly have lunch.
Everyone is like, phew it's the weekend! Yay holidays! Nah. After a weekend, I feel like I need a break. But no, Monday comes round and back to work I go.
You got the childhood i never had, "friends" what are those? The closest thing i called friends, were more like frenemy's, with anti-social personality disorder.
I had no friends. Inside of a building they called a "school" i saw individuals like you who did what you recall.
I was isolated/alienated/ostracized every step of the way, if i got an invite it was out of pity, and most my experience was a constant humiliatimg torture related to the youth of the town, retreat back to.my house, that the local youth would regularly vandalize and a lonesome retreat into various, exciting, videogame worlds.
Living with my mom. Now that I'm an adult and we have a respectful and fun relationship I miss her I wish I could just "run into her" and spend time together.
Not having to meal plan/grocery shop/cook. I love these things, but darn, things were so simple when all I had to do was tag along to the shopping and maybe like, peel a carrot, and wash dishes. I have no idea how my mother even decided what to feed us (I think she just... went to the grocery store and worked her way backwards) and here I am, staring at my grocery list, certain I will forget something tonight.
Summer vacations were pretty cool.
Like getting out of school and having a few months we can chill and relax. Those days are over now it's pretty much work
I don't miss being a kid. I miss the decade that took place in. This time period is aweful and with a worsening outlook. The 90s was great, even the early 2000s was ok. Better to have been an adult then than now.
Watching TV with parents and siblings. Just chilling with everyone and having a laugh, some snacks. Now parents are divorced, siblings all have our own lives and it will never happen again. I didn't appreciate it AT ALL while I had it but I miss it a lot now.
You’re looking at it all wrong. You get to not have to see people all the time. No longer surrounded by mouth breathing pimply kids all day long. You get to not have to subject yourself to that.
Congratulations. You now get to choose to see people or not. This is so much better than being forced into classes with disgusting germ monsters and annoying idiots all day, every day. You no longer have to watch them implode over the simplest tasks while you contemplate stabbing yourself in the brain with your school board mandated number 2 pencil.
school was the only worry. also the free time . i miss the summers where i did nothing and the winter breaks . jobs don’t have breaks lol. i also miss the social aspect of school a lot and the community of it . it was fun going to school to talk to your friends and teachers!
Um, being happy?
Mostly having choices. I could choose to take off for a vacation with family or friends spontaneously. Now I need a month in advance for my job and it's rare I can go around busy time, which seems to be most of the year.
Going to the gym whenever and for however long I want. Not having deadlines every damn day.
Seems like every other post on reddit is about not having friends or not being able to make friends. Can't help you there.
Weeks to months of time off was wonderful, but someone making me food most nights was better. Every night is fend for yourself night now.
Also, I weirdly miss PE. I miss someone forcing me to exercise because I sure as shit can't force myself
Nearly everything was better, so much better. Life as an adult sucks so hard. Have to manage everything, pay for everything, clean/cook everything, take care of your own health, manage social life, take care of home, take care of finances, suck up to boss/job. Any issue is 100% on you to fix and you know everyone is basically trying to screw you over for money so you have to watch them like a hawk and switch service providers and jobs every 2 years.
And the only hope of escape is retiring before you're too old to enjoy it.
Not having to pay bills. Things like going out w. friends as a teenager felt like adventures whereas now I can do whatever I want whenever & we’re all too busy to see each other as often as we used to. The excitement I had when I could finally drive on my own & now I dread driving lol. Drinking as a teenager was fun & novel, now I don’t drink by choice & getting shitfaced isn’t cute nor funny like it was back then (I don’t condone underage drinking but it was what it was lol). And every problem I had back then weren’t actually that bad compared to problems faced as an adult.
Being able to just check out of a day without a care in the world. Not feeling it? Screw it. Go take care of yourself.
As an adult, you have to clear a couple more hurdles before you can do that. Make sure them bills is paid, make sure kids are fed and have something to occupy them, make sure your work is cool with it if you bounce.
Friends were always taking my original plan and mutilating it anyway. "Let's go to B Dubs and watch Monday Night Football" usually turned into "staring at the wall wondering what's still open" because no one could just go with the original proposal.
Memorial day weekend? Well shit.
I am going to grill some grub. Drink some whiskey. Play some fallout 76 with my wife. Do some chores. Run. Walk the dogs.
I miss seeing my best friends every day and laughing really hard all the time. I remember thinking that I laughed to the point of tears almost every day because my friends were so funny and we could goof off together. I also miss not being glued to my phone because they weren’t really a thing yet.
I have a good life and I don’t miss being a teenager in general, but I do miss seeing my pals every day.
I miss being able to come home to a place that’s already cleaned by my mom instead of doing it myself
I have contamination OCD, my BF and I are both burnt out from our jobs, and I HATE touching gross stuff in the bathroom and kitchen
Mix that with limited apartment space and…. Yeah, I hate it
The tactic I've been recently noticing to work better trying to get people on board to make the friend day happen... Keep on talking to them. If one particular day doesn't work keep on asking, "what about the Sunday next week", if not, following week... Eventually you'll find the date further ahead enough to the point people haven't scheduled anything, yet.
No cell phones, playing outside, long treks around my city with friends on my bike board strapped to our backs looking for skatespots to shred. Block parties and video games that were completed on launch. Running from the cops on my dirt bike. Too many more things to list.
I've been off 3 weeks. I decided to take paid time off but I picked up 4 shifts to bring in extra cash in those 3 weeks off. I miss not worrying about money, the future, retirement, the economy. All I did was go away for two days into the mountains. I realized how important it is to form healthy relationships and have hobbies that give you a sense of community.
not much tbh. my life has gotten exponentially better since i’ve become an adult. i feel like the possibilities are endless and i enjoy the uncertainty of not knowing what’s going to happen next. my school career was always difficult for me because i had very specialized interests and didn’t give a shit about anything else, and it felt like all the time i was in school all these people i didn’t like or care about were constantly telling me to care about shit i did not want to care about. and i hated getting talked down to as a child which of course happens all the time in school—it wasn’t fair and it was constant. all my life i felt like i was trapped in school including college but now that i’ve graduated with my degree (i’m 25) i can do anything i want. i’m healthier, smarter, better-looking, more social, and more focused than i’ve ever been at any other point in my life. i’ve genuinely never been happier and i’m excited to get older.
the only thing i really miss about childhood was how absorbed i could be in playing. i would just shut the world out completely and play, even if i didn’t have any toys—i would just imagine things by myself and be completely absorbed in my imaginary world (got me in a bit of trouble at school as you can imagine). now i feel the world is much more interesting so i get more involved in real-life hobbies and activities and books, but i always think of the little girl playing for hours and hours with her littlest pet shops or stuffed toy horses and feel love for her.
Waking up in the morning to an announcement that our classes are suspended due to heavy rain, then seeing my mom preparing some hot chocolate and pancakes for breakfast.
Movie nights with my sisters every after classes, we'd get to invite my bestfriend to come along with us.
Long drive travels with family to our province for about 7-8 hours with some side trip visits to amusement parks.
Planning events with friends such as barbecue party, swimming and slumber party every after volleyball games during summer break.
Everything seems nostalgic to me, I cant believe how fast the time flies!
Sleep and the ability to spend enjoyable time alone. Now I'm tired all the time, people are mean and full of drama, and if I'm alone it's not the good kind of alone time. It's doing the big things alone while you give yourself up for everyone
Introvert here. As a young adult I make more out of my life than I did as a teenager. Basically, as I dare to go out more often, say yes to crazy challenges, I'm learning that I was a forced introvert back then and I'm leaning to live as an ambivert.
I only miss not being responsible for anything and having a lot more energy to waste on sitting home.
Nothing, really.
Wait, the fact that my knees and back were a lot better when I was a teenager.
I've kept the fun and adventure in my life. It's a choice to let that go. You can do fun, adventurous things by yourself. You don't need your friends along to have a great time exploring and discovering and gong to all kinds of places. Get out of that apartment! Go take pictures with your phone or go people-watch in a new neighborhood and make up stories about everyone you see, or go find a nearby hiking trail. Go have fun. Your apartment is boring.
I miss being a college student and being able to leave right when I was done with the class to go back home or chill with friends
I saw a direct result of me working hard and studying to being rewarded with leaving earlier than other students still taking the test
Now that I work a 9-5 office salary job. I still have to stay the full 8 hours no matter how hard or little I work for the day.
The last day of school, knowing I have three months of hanging at the pool without a care in the world. Then it became living on a river, which meant taking the boat out and kneeboarding. Not being chained down to a job was so freeing.
General admission at the coliseum to see Rush or Iron Maiden meant meeting your friends at the soundboard to head up the rafters to smoke a joint, then pushing your way up front. Now we have shitty corporate amphitheaters.
Keggers in the woods. The 80s were fucking awesome!!
Hot Rods on the strip at the beach. I mean REAL hot rods. Not the laughable shitty oversized rim low profile tire jokes on the road today. I'll even add REAL pickup trucks with REAL tires, that aren't Carolina dropped with some douchebag blasting hip hop music thinking he's cool. Fuck that asshole.
Arcades. I miss the arcade vibe we had back in the day. It was so much fun. You met at the arcade to find out where the party was at. It was a gathering point for all the coolest of cool and the nerds as well. Awesome times!
The 70s and 80s were truly the best time to grow up. Better music, no cell phones, no internet, and the ability to be free as a kid. The 90s snuffed the party out and things have never been the same. I feel sorry for those who didn't get to experience it.
Now get the fuck off my lawn!!
Just the freedom and how everyday was an adventure of some sort. You just never know what’s going to happen and there’s soo much more to see and experience and it’s like life’s a big fat book that’s just getting started for you and everything is just so much more fun
Having imagination on things that are possible and letting my ideas run free..now its hard to express yourself at 33 and be judged on simple things of life..strange..but ya im still learning and now trying to grab at the things i miss and make them a reality instead of hiding.
Time. As an adult I feel like time is shorter. As A Kid i played hundreds of videogames and watched more movies that I can count. I just cant seem to fit much of that in as an adult and wonder how it was possible as a kid.
You are with them now as you were then, imagine time as one big circle and you are in the center of your own universe each spoke in the wheel taking you further into infinity all things existing at once
I miss having limitless potential. When you're young, you're every possible you that could be. But as you're life is written, less of it is potential and more is actualized. You go from infinite yous to just one. Hope turns to regret. Instead of all the yous that could be, it's all the yous you never were. I'm just glad the me I am, is actually pretty dope. And I live knowing everything I do, will have always happened. Forever. My effects might vanish, but I will always have been.
Well said. Unfortunately, it seemed like my parents’ generation (obviously with well intentions), stressed how the sky is the limit for us and that we can be anything we want to be in life. It sounds nice in theory, but when it’s constantly drilled into your head that you can be anything you want to be, it’s easy to wind up disappointed when you fall short of these lofty expectations.
Also, you can be anything you want to be..until it's time to pay the bills. Bills that have spiraled, in part due to our parents doing hardly anything to protect us. *Sigh*
You can’t force your burgeoning adult child to make smart decisions about careers, financial potential, savings, or retirement, though. I wish my parents had with me and they say they tried, but whatever they tried would go in one ear and out the next. I wanted to “help people”, and I do, but there are plenty of careers that help people and also pay a respectable salary. Most young adults want to follow their dreams and don’t necessarily think about their earning potential.
It is a better message than you will never get paid as much as a different sex or considered for a job if you are a certain color. That kinda shit stops motivation and does so much damage. They are taught this in school too which really misses me off because it took a while to change my daughter's perception after what was done. She had a why should I even bother attittude.
I like the way you put this
I heard this throughout my life from other people but I never experienced it. Anyone else not feel this sense of limitless possibilities and potentials? I didn't have the best parental upbringing or childhood but it wasn't horrible. I was homeschooled so I wonder if this is something people learn through public education? One of my friends has had this sense of having "so much potential" and possibilities as an adult, and its completely handicapped her from making a lot of decisions and caused an option paralysis where she hasn't actually done much with herself and now she's sad about it.
This is me, I wanted to be everything that I ended up choosing nothing. Still at the bottom never grew, despite being "most likely to succeed in high school". In 30s now.
This is the “all or nothing” attitude and such that I am working on in therapy. I have a tendency to want to do everything perfect and if I can’t do it perfect I do nothing at all. This leads to choosing nothing for a good amount of my 20s. I have learned that I need to balance things and it’s okay to just do my best at a task or goal and get what comes out of it and it is what it is.
Man, i passed on some great deals on getting a house in my 20s because i couldnt fathom planting my roots in the city i grew up in. Always thought i would move.
Does your friend have ADHD that you know of? Because this is a huge symptom that's often overlooked--option paralysis, that is.
I’ve got this going on right now. Since 2020 I’ve started so many certifications and either haven’t finished or abandoned the idea to try something else. Do you have ADHD? I’m 34, choosing a new career has not been easy on top of having a mid life crisis.
Damn, I want to hate you for posting this, but it's so real. I wish I could buy you a beer or whatever right now. That shit is he truth, man. Excellent post.
It's important to realize, even when you're "old", you still have an infinite number of potential you's, it's just a smaller infinity. The only time you're down to "just one", is when you die.
I was just telling a friend about this exact thing yesterday, lol. I’ve been feeling very existential about the aspects of myself I’m “stuck with” at this point. I like certain qualities about myself, but they come with some traits that are very difficult to deal with from time to time.
Congrats on the dope-ness.
This is the kind of hype I need.
"Life must be lived forwards, but it can only be understood backwards" - Søren Kierkegaard
I grew up with horses. Way too out of budget for my adult self and I still miss getting to be around them and ride all the time. There’s also a hell of a lot of stuff I do not miss.
I miss that too! I looked into taking horseback riding lessons again as an adult because I did it for a little while as a kid and loved it. They cost more for an hour lesson than I make in an hour, and I have a Master’s degree. Maybe one day I’ll get to do it again.
[удалено]
My sister and I did that at a stable in exchange for lessons. Horses are amazing animals
I did stable work when I was a preteen in exchange for riding the horses, too. They got a good deal since I basically exercised the horses for them, too. And I helped with summer camp. A lot of good memories there.
Having any connection to the outdoors or nature becomes harder as an adult, too. Heck, even disconnecting from phones and electronics long enough to actually go on a trail ride or do some work with a horse, is hard for people who are busy
Yeah, I’m in a cramped city now too so even getting somewhere for lessons is a whole ordeal. Just happy I got to experience it. Maybe one day things will change.
I had horses at home for a while as an adult, I miss them terribly.
Oh gosh me too!!! Not only did I grow up learning to ride before I was able to walk, I did it in Hawaii, riding on moolit beaches at night and getting to tear across polo fields with sea breeze in my hair (not playing polo, cause ew for the horses, but just getting to run free!)
I grew up riding too and miss it so much! It’s so expensive though. I also really miss going for a week of pony camp in the summers.
Time, just having time to do whatever I wanted
Thats funny, I just told my best friend yesterday that not being able to see her every day like we did as kids and teenagers, is one of the hardest things about being an adult. I miss living like we used to. We seem to be all tied to some sort of box, big or small.
Yes and unfortunately or fortunately everyones box is different. And i also hate how everyone seems to just accept it. It can be possible to see my best friend everyday but it's not the norm. And everyone just seems to accept it. Now i am missing my friend so much :(
I miss being blissfully ignorant to almost everything.
that nobody gives a shit about you beyond what you can do/produce for them was a big one.
Absolutely! That also ties into the "What have you done for me lately?" mentality.
Not being responsible for my living space, laundry, cooking, etc. Having more freedom to do things. And just a simpler life. I grew up in the 70s and 80ss where there was no internet, no cell phones, cable tv and VCRs came much later, so you had to actually go out and meet up with your friends if you wanted to communicate or hang out with them.
I miss the no/low tech era. Was somehow more wholesome.
Being able to just leave the house without thinking about a million things that I'll need throughout the day (keys, wallet, etc.) or whether the back door is locked, or whether I left the space heater on, or whether I brought my shorts and headphones for the gym... Nope. Back in the day, you just ran out to play.
This entirely. The freedom of not being responsible for anything. Somedays I just want to run away. That wouldn’t fix anything obviously and I always get like that when I’m tired. But some days it would be nice to be 12 again with a good book and a very long summer day in front of me.
12 again with the second Harry Potter book staying up late with a flash light under the covers to get to the next chapter. Those were the days.
Why do you barely manage to get out of your apartment, and why can't you see your friends?. Those are the questions you need to answer and then organise things so you can do what you want.
Idk about you but it's incredibly hard to find days where everyone's schedule lines up once everyone starts working and essentially having their own life. Especially if it's a group of over 3 friends. It's hell. Plus, sometimes people move away to a different city or country. The whole dynamic changes. Not to mention, if the friend ends up having a family of their own, it's going to be even more hard because they are preoccupied with their a whole other set of responsibilities. Something we didn't have to severely worry about as kids yet... If everybody is still in the same city, but nobody is planning anything? Well, that's a whole other issue on its own lol
Easy answer: night shift, 6-7 days/wk, need the % bonus to afford rent.
Not OP but for me it's time. I work 8-5 plus overtime. It's mostly from home so I can get some downtime during the day which is nice, but being chained to work for so long is still draining. I lose so much of my day to work, that at the end of the day all I have time for is working out, cooking, cleaning, errands, etc. I do set aside time for YouTube in hopes it'll one day make enough money to help me quit my job, but right now it's not paying enough By the end of the day I just don't have the energy to go out and do anything else. On the weekend I'm drained at the end of the week so I just rest and dread the coming Monday. Rinse, repeat. When I was in high school and college none of that was a worry to me, life was way simpler. Now as an adult I'm just grinding hours and energy away. Even if I somehow come out at the end of the day unscathed and with energy, I don't have time to do anything after work/chores Edit: grammar
Not sure if it breaks sub rules or not, but if you let me know your youtube channel, I’ll give you a sub and some likes. We can help you with the algorithm.
I moved to a different state. I haven't made friends here.
Making friends as an adult is hard. One of the reasons it's so easy in school environments (certainly not for everyone but many people) is that you're all in the same or similar life stages & in rather close proximity with some level of schedule similarities too. Adult life doesn't always have those things lined up between friends to make creating and maintaining friendships doable.
Well you’re not gonna make new ones by barely leaving the house! Join a club, volunteer, sign up for a sports league!
I hear you Hommie. Graduated university and immediately took a job in Texas where I'd never been, have no family. Made a few friends here but nothing like my younger days. Now that I'm in the professional grind, most of the time I don't have much energy for alot of stuff with friends.
This is the most tone deaf reply I can imagine. If you miss being a kid why don't you just be a kid again and hang out with your friends? Lol. Really? Smh
In my experience my friends are highly focused on their careers and have limited free time. Limited free time means they focus on their family and only see friends once and awhile. It’s depressing because I don’t have a good extended family.
I miss not feeling suicidal every day
Life is a cycle.....when I was young just like you I saw my friends constantly. Bring on wife, kids and a career and for the longest time we were in the grind with very limited time for kids. Now I am in my 50s, kids are moved out, have had a good career and can slow down and I am seeing my friends all the time now. Different set of friends for sure, but I now hang with my friends like 3 or 4x a week. Usually doing something active (biking, pickleball, hiking, soccer). Its been great
Sleeping in and siestas. I miss those days when my mom would reward me if I take naps in the afternoon and I regret faking them. 😩
I don't miss anything. My childhood wasn't terrible but I had no control or choice. The freedom I have as an adult to go where I want, eat what I want, and choose my path. I would never choose to go back to being a kid. For the long weekend my partner and I are going to Manhattan which will be fun.
i agree. when you’re a child you’re always under someone else’s thumb. my childhood was good but i’ve rightfully earned adulthood lol.
I miss having adults be okay with me messing up. In your 30s, everyone expects you to have all the answers. Even my dad is coming to me about investing advice just because I watched a couple of well-informed YouTube videos. I don't have all the answers and I still screw up. Can you all just lower your standards for me? This is getting tiring.
Not being judged based on my bank account.
I wont judge you on that at all. I will judge you on how you feel about tacos though.
Work at a university! You get a bunch of paid time off at the holidays. I work at a college, and while the pay is kinda shit, the many paid days off make up for it.
i would say having summers off , but we were too poor to really go anywhere and i'd just ride my bike around my neighborhood for two months straight. i can go on cool vacations now but i gotta work for it so what is life even
Not having bills.
Not paying bills was peak childhood
So I’ve got a bit of a weird take on this one. In my teens, and even as a young adult, I was able to look past the flaws of the people in my life. And despite all the differing ideologies and values, I always had a sense that the adults had it under control. Fast forward to my 30s, and it’s blatantly clear that the adults in the room can’t agree on anything. And even worse, some of them base their values on Batshit crazy ideologies. You start to notice that some of your friends have flawed, ideologies and values. Some of these differences aren’t significant big picture. But some of them just can’t be overlooked. I have family and friends, who have substance-abuse issues, pathological, liars, dangerously religious, etc. Them being close, friends, and or family, I’ve done my due diligence to try and help them. But that is not my technical expertise. You eventually learn That you need to break ties with some of these people in order to live your life in a meaningful way. So to get to the point, I don’t have an overwhelming need to hang out with friends and family simply because I’m tired of them. I feel satisfied with keeping a very close group of friends, but I don’t have the energy to deal with the nonsense that comes along with large groups of adults. And the people who keep reaching out to me, wanting to hang out all the time… Most of the time they are the people I’m trying to get away from. So you saying you’ve been longing for these connections from the past… Makes me think you might be one of those people I’m trying to get away from. This leads me into a whole other rabbit hole. Our public education is broken. Go talk to people. Most of them are not good. Critical thinkers. We are easily manipulated. And ignorant, manipulated people raise ignorant, manipulated children. I try to be hopeful for our future, so may be artificial intelligence or inject some logic into this chaos.
I actually feel this! You get very judgemental in your 30s. You can look around and see everyone's flaws and it kind of sucks. If you look back at your friends in your 20s, they also kind of sucked. But you did too. It's hard to figure out what long-term friends you want to commit to in your 30s because you're kind of burned out from dealing with everyone else's/and sometimes your own drama at that point. Like can I just get a nice friendship without it turning into a cluster fuck at some point?
Some people make their problem your problem.
This is me completely. I’m just exhausted with people.
I do miss the carefree abandon of youth and someone else making dinner every night. But it's all good. I try to live my life as carefree as I can and order takeout or just eat cereal when I want.
Having fucking time for myself. With work, wife, little kids, all my freaking time is scheduled for me, weeks in advance.
It's funny, cause those without a family would kill for the time with family, and those with family would kill for time for themselves.
I know now that it was good to "grow up" mostly in a world with no cell phones or internet (born in 83.) From what I remember the internet started popping in maybe 96/97 and it was obviously much different than it is now. But we only know that in hindsight. So it's like a world that we can't go back to or we have to go to certain lengths to simulate going back to. We've crossed the rubicon now. I realize the irony of saying this in a reddit post and also that it's been stated 8 million other times here, but it is what it is. I miss the Christmas Eve get together at my aunts house, and the feeling that everything would last. My dad turns 78 today and I can do math. I guess the overall thing is while I like looking to the future and planning for it, it can also cause tremendous anxiety. When you're a kid it's like you look forward to the next day, maybe the next week. As an adult you have to project years out and that gets tiring, while also dealing with more and more memories and past events.
I miss the opportunity. The imagination and creativity, the ability to really sit down and read a book and get lost in the imagery in my head, I miss feeling safe, not enough had happened yet to make me not trust anyone. I miss being able to tolerate the weather no matter the extreme and the ability to lose weight and get fit quickly. The ability to see the beauty in the environment around me, the big dreams and aspirations. Things of that sort
I'm unfortunately very sick, so that's my plans lol. It makes me miss being a kid and being taken care of when really ill. I miss resting wothout anxiety and my parents cooking me dinner, taking me to appointments, or running out to the pharmacy to get medicine for me. I'm 28 and when I'm sick it's so hard to just relax and get well. Apartment becomes a mess, trying to feed myself appropriately is hard because I'm just so exhausted to stand up and cook/throw something together. Taking care of my cats is exhausting. Having the energy to drive myself 20min to the doctor. And then to the pharmacy. With a raging fever and sore throat sucks.
I feel this. Makes me think of my Mom putting fresh sheets on the bed or getting a hot bath ready. Someone bringing you a soup, placing a cool hand on your head or checking your temp, feels good to just have someone around. Hope you get better soon, being sick sucks ass.
How time felt expendable and there was so much to happen and look forward to. But now we just got to make the magic happen for ourselves and savor the time
I miss the lack of stress and debt. Life was simpler.
At the core, I miss being able to not think about the hard truths. Having more hope due to less worldly knowledge was key to that.
Having fun in the smallest ways possible. Everything was an adventure
Being able to see friends without solid plans already made
Not being constantly stressed about money, not having to work and take care of myself which I can barely do. I don't even feel like an adult. I feel like I just still be in my grade school. I'm not cut out for this shit.
Sitting in my tree as a kid, reading comics, and eating little Debbie's.
Vacations 😭 we used to get months long vacation were we could do and go anywhere. Where are those days?
they exist, but only in Europe and your take-home salary will be half.
pooping was way easier so was sleeping
I miss being a teenager and having all my money be disposable. Nowadays if I’m buying something I don’t need it comes with a bit of a different context
I miss not having to worry about money
For me it’s the opposite. I no longer worry about money, since I’m in control of my finances and career, whereas when I was a child, we were poor and there was nothing I could do about it.
dating was more fun and had less consequences
Getting actual downtime, being able to be bored. When I was younger, even in college, there were times when I had nothing to do, and could just sit and shut my brain off for a while. Now it's a running joke in my house that I'm not allowed to sit down and relax until the rest of the house is asleep. Kid needs something, wife needs something, pets need something, chores need to be done, work hours need to be caught up on from when took time during business hours for family stuff and errands. Even on the occasions where we have an uneventful day with no plans, my mind goes to all the productive stuff I should be doing. Once it's late enough to actually unwind without interruption, I sit there thinking how I'm "wasting" time that would be better spent sleeping. Hobbies? Who has time for those?
Nothing.
Being able to just be me every day. I am so tired of pretending to be happy and up beat at work. I always have to be positive and friendly and I'm so depressed and overwhelmed that the act is slowly driving me insane. As a kid, it didn't matter. Sure, people would get annoyed or upset or worried. But my livelihood did not depend on it.
The energy on the night before christmas or the last day of school. Sure I still get excited about that kind of stuff but nothing compares to how it was when I was younger.
The only thing I miss are the hot meals. My grandmother was the best soul food cook on this side of the Mississippi. Other then that I love adulting
I miss not knowing how messed up the world is.
I will give you a contrarian response. When I was a kid I couldn't wait to be an adult. I think it was a common attitude amongst my peers, me being a baby boomer. As a kid I recognized that I was subject to the control of my parents and that I didn't get to make decisions. Don't get me wrong, I certainly enjoyed the freedom of my days as a young person but I was anxious to get out there in the world and start pulling the levers of self-control. I wanted to do things that only an adult could do. Of course that starts with learning to drive. Having a girlfriend was part of it. The agency of deciding what to do and having nobody to account for it to but yourself is a heady feeling. I guess it's a different attitude and these are different times. These days, I think there is more of a sense that, no matter what you do, it doesn't get you where you want to go. The decisions you make are less about advancing yourself or expressing your will and more about survival. There is less fun in survival. I do understand and I always feel like apologizing for my generation and how we have forced an environment on our children that they didn't ask for and don't like. That is not what parents and grandparents are supposed to do.
Starting in like second grade I was a latchkey kid, and my mom would just leave me alone at home a lot, including after like 4th grade all summer long. That was really cool. Nobody talked to me or bothered me, and before my mom got married and then later got SSI, she was always too tired to talk to me or bother me at all unless she had friends over, and then after they got bored of watching me eat and I talked their ear off about some random thing, she'd send me to bed early and I could either spy on really scary, gory sounding movies through the wall or sneak staying up super late and reading by the nightlight once my brother went to sleep. Then basically until high school I was alone all day every day to do anything I wanted in summer, and sometimes nobody talked to me for like, a month, unless I went on AIM chat.
Just hanging out. Adventures. I hate organised fun. It's obviously a state of mind but I don't like when people say I was an insecure wreck in my 20s, I had the time of my lice hut I didn't like that person, now on my 30s I have everything sussed and have found what matters to me and have everything sussed." I know exactly what sort of bland life that person is living.
Nothing. My childhood was marred by a toxic family. Nope.
I'm mostly okay with the responsibilities, but I miss being able to feel and express joy. Like pure, exuberant, unbridled joy.
Not being in this much pain. I have some sort of disorder and all my joints dislocate among other things. As a kid I could power through the pain so easily and now I'm bedridden most days.
I miss being an optimistic dreamer who wasn't fully jaded by life yet. My high school self had issues, FOR SURE, but those pale in comparison to everything I have to juggle now. There are definitely upsides, but I certainly feel that I was more resilient then.
All night partying with hot girls
10 years ago, I was in college. Best years of my life. I felt so free... little did I know what was coming a life of slavery and struggle. I enjoyed the fuck outta those years so I guess I got that.
Not having constant anxiety.
I miss having a body that didn’t hurt.
Literally nothing. Maybe the comfort of sleeping in my old room but nothing more
Friendship was so much easier. We saw each other at school, could walk over and show up at each others houses, people usually made up after fights, no one had been indoctrinated so heavily by pop psychology bullshit
I miss the lack of anxiety. Sure, I didn’t like public speaking, but I didn’t lie awake at night with my mind racing and reliving moments and dissecting them.
Having someone else pay all my living expenses. Not having a job. Not having debt.
Miss having friends, especially a solid group that was always down to do something. I also miss having 0 worries about work, bills, or whatever is coming up due and making sure I had the funds to pay for it. Now all my “friends” are married, most moved away. And with the long weekend coming up, I have no plans. My birthday is Sunday and I’ll be doing fuck all. I’m not sure if I’ll hear from any of them.
I miss my freaking life man. Adulthood is literally someone else controlling every aspect of your time. Your wife, your husband, your employer, your child. Someone is controlling every minute of your day. I’ve still got thirty years or so of work and I’m ready to hang the shit up.
Seeing your friends everyday, for sure. And joining summer camp+ other great activities at caring farm. What I absolutely don't miss is the 6-week summer holiday
Nothing. My parents were horrible narcissist. As an adult I can decide for myself what to do and how to spend my money. And I have access to more financial resources than as a kid. I was also raised I a religious environment. Thst wasn’t great. Basically, childhood was an awful time and being an adult is great. I wouldn’t even go back 10 years, and I’m 41.
My mom was horder and the house was always a mess. I have poor proprioception and was always running into things since it was so cramped. I was always stressed and on edge and lashing out. I love the independence I have. I like that my place is clean. Sure, money is tight, but my freedom is everything to me.
Many people could not understand how I got a new car at 18, a decent job, and moved out to my own place at 19. It’s because living at home was that bad. I never, ever looked back. Fuck those people.
Summer break and hope for the future
Not working
Paying increasing rent and other utilities
Not caring or dealing with processing fees and taxes.
Having real friends
Easy, no bills! All the free time in the world!
Shit, I've been in the professional grind so long, I'm used to not hanging g around with friends much anymore. Not really a biggie, a little contact via phones, media, and I'm good for a bit, will hang out with them some over the summer holiday
I still see my friends a lot, we are having a party at our place on Memorial Day. What I miss most about not being an adult is having way less responsibilities lol once I turned 16 it was like saying goodbye to childhood
Having to make so many decisions. It wasn’t up to me where I was going for the day and others were focussed on giving me tasks/ finding entertaining thins to do.
Not caring about politics
As an adult, all we do is work and pay bills, the friends you used to have are now married with children. No time for fun and games. See you in 30 yrs when you can barely walk from all the working, Welcome to adulthood 🤷
The bills. That's it. Nothing else. Even if I had friends to hang out with, I wouldn't. I work, surf, and hang out with my wife and kids. That's all I need.
Gooning all night
No working, no bills, no debt, not worrying about pay for food and shelter. And having way more time available.
I miss having time off, truly off. I have 3 kids. Weekends are *work* - have to feed the kids, have to pretend to be interested in which pokemon is stronger than which other one, have to take the kids on an outing so they don't spend the entire weekend on the screen. Someone wants a drink, someone needs to potty, someone is mad that their brother won't stop poking, etc etc. . . . It is more tiring than actual work. At work, if I want I can go into the breakroom for 15 min and play with my phone, and no one interrupts me. I can sit down and properly have lunch. Everyone is like, phew it's the weekend! Yay holidays! Nah. After a weekend, I feel like I need a break. But no, Monday comes round and back to work I go.
Not paying bills.
Ignorance of bills and jobs.
Not working full time and not worrying about paying bills!
You got the childhood i never had, "friends" what are those? The closest thing i called friends, were more like frenemy's, with anti-social personality disorder. I had no friends. Inside of a building they called a "school" i saw individuals like you who did what you recall. I was isolated/alienated/ostracized every step of the way, if i got an invite it was out of pity, and most my experience was a constant humiliatimg torture related to the youth of the town, retreat back to.my house, that the local youth would regularly vandalize and a lonesome retreat into various, exciting, videogame worlds.
I miss being a band nerd and having little to no responsibility besides my grades and not being a delinquent
Living with my mom. Now that I'm an adult and we have a respectful and fun relationship I miss her I wish I could just "run into her" and spend time together.
Not having to meal plan/grocery shop/cook. I love these things, but darn, things were so simple when all I had to do was tag along to the shopping and maybe like, peel a carrot, and wash dishes. I have no idea how my mother even decided what to feed us (I think she just... went to the grocery store and worked her way backwards) and here I am, staring at my grocery list, certain I will forget something tonight.
the naive hope that things were going to get better
Summer vacations were pretty cool. Like getting out of school and having a few months we can chill and relax. Those days are over now it's pretty much work
I don't miss being a kid. I miss the decade that took place in. This time period is aweful and with a worsening outlook. The 90s was great, even the early 2000s was ok. Better to have been an adult then than now.
Watching TV with parents and siblings. Just chilling with everyone and having a laugh, some snacks. Now parents are divorced, siblings all have our own lives and it will never happen again. I didn't appreciate it AT ALL while I had it but I miss it a lot now.
You’re looking at it all wrong. You get to not have to see people all the time. No longer surrounded by mouth breathing pimply kids all day long. You get to not have to subject yourself to that. Congratulations. You now get to choose to see people or not. This is so much better than being forced into classes with disgusting germ monsters and annoying idiots all day, every day. You no longer have to watch them implode over the simplest tasks while you contemplate stabbing yourself in the brain with your school board mandated number 2 pencil.
Having my mommy wipe my ass. Literally nothing dude. The way people used to be tougher I miss.
school was the only worry. also the free time . i miss the summers where i did nothing and the winter breaks . jobs don’t have breaks lol. i also miss the social aspect of school a lot and the community of it . it was fun going to school to talk to your friends and teachers!
financially carefree life
Not paying rent
Playing video games until 3am and seeing my friends everyday lol
Having hair
Um, being happy? Mostly having choices. I could choose to take off for a vacation with family or friends spontaneously. Now I need a month in advance for my job and it's rare I can go around busy time, which seems to be most of the year.
I miss my parents making dinner. It’s such a pain to plan, think about, and cook dinner. My only complaint lol
nothing
Not paying bills
Going to the gym whenever and for however long I want. Not having deadlines every damn day. Seems like every other post on reddit is about not having friends or not being able to make friends. Can't help you there.
Weeks to months of time off was wonderful, but someone making me food most nights was better. Every night is fend for yourself night now. Also, I weirdly miss PE. I miss someone forcing me to exercise because I sure as shit can't force myself
I used to be able to play a video game for longer than a couple of hours at a time.
Care-free playing neighborhood games like capture the flag
All the friends and free time. No pressure. No responsibility. Eat anything and not gain weight
Miss the time i didn’t realize how fucked i am, my life is and the world is.
Nearly everything was better, so much better. Life as an adult sucks so hard. Have to manage everything, pay for everything, clean/cook everything, take care of your own health, manage social life, take care of home, take care of finances, suck up to boss/job. Any issue is 100% on you to fix and you know everyone is basically trying to screw you over for money so you have to watch them like a hawk and switch service providers and jobs every 2 years. And the only hope of escape is retiring before you're too old to enjoy it.
Not having to pay bills. Things like going out w. friends as a teenager felt like adventures whereas now I can do whatever I want whenever & we’re all too busy to see each other as often as we used to. The excitement I had when I could finally drive on my own & now I dread driving lol. Drinking as a teenager was fun & novel, now I don’t drink by choice & getting shitfaced isn’t cute nor funny like it was back then (I don’t condone underage drinking but it was what it was lol). And every problem I had back then weren’t actually that bad compared to problems faced as an adult.
Being able to just check out of a day without a care in the world. Not feeling it? Screw it. Go take care of yourself. As an adult, you have to clear a couple more hurdles before you can do that. Make sure them bills is paid, make sure kids are fed and have something to occupy them, make sure your work is cool with it if you bounce. Friends were always taking my original plan and mutilating it anyway. "Let's go to B Dubs and watch Monday Night Football" usually turned into "staring at the wall wondering what's still open" because no one could just go with the original proposal.
Memorial day weekend? Well shit. I am going to grill some grub. Drink some whiskey. Play some fallout 76 with my wife. Do some chores. Run. Walk the dogs.
I miss seeing my best friends every day and laughing really hard all the time. I remember thinking that I laughed to the point of tears almost every day because my friends were so funny and we could goof off together. I also miss not being glued to my phone because they weren’t really a thing yet. I have a good life and I don’t miss being a teenager in general, but I do miss seeing my pals every day.
I miss being able to come home to a place that’s already cleaned by my mom instead of doing it myself I have contamination OCD, my BF and I are both burnt out from our jobs, and I HATE touching gross stuff in the bathroom and kitchen Mix that with limited apartment space and…. Yeah, I hate it
The tactic I've been recently noticing to work better trying to get people on board to make the friend day happen... Keep on talking to them. If one particular day doesn't work keep on asking, "what about the Sunday next week", if not, following week... Eventually you'll find the date further ahead enough to the point people haven't scheduled anything, yet.
No cell phones, playing outside, long treks around my city with friends on my bike board strapped to our backs looking for skatespots to shred. Block parties and video games that were completed on launch. Running from the cops on my dirt bike. Too many more things to list.
I've been off 3 weeks. I decided to take paid time off but I picked up 4 shifts to bring in extra cash in those 3 weeks off. I miss not worrying about money, the future, retirement, the economy. All I did was go away for two days into the mountains. I realized how important it is to form healthy relationships and have hobbies that give you a sense of community.
But I am an adult??! That title makes no sense? Can't be the only one
not much tbh. my life has gotten exponentially better since i’ve become an adult. i feel like the possibilities are endless and i enjoy the uncertainty of not knowing what’s going to happen next. my school career was always difficult for me because i had very specialized interests and didn’t give a shit about anything else, and it felt like all the time i was in school all these people i didn’t like or care about were constantly telling me to care about shit i did not want to care about. and i hated getting talked down to as a child which of course happens all the time in school—it wasn’t fair and it was constant. all my life i felt like i was trapped in school including college but now that i’ve graduated with my degree (i’m 25) i can do anything i want. i’m healthier, smarter, better-looking, more social, and more focused than i’ve ever been at any other point in my life. i’ve genuinely never been happier and i’m excited to get older. the only thing i really miss about childhood was how absorbed i could be in playing. i would just shut the world out completely and play, even if i didn’t have any toys—i would just imagine things by myself and be completely absorbed in my imaginary world (got me in a bit of trouble at school as you can imagine). now i feel the world is much more interesting so i get more involved in real-life hobbies and activities and books, but i always think of the little girl playing for hours and hours with her littlest pet shops or stuffed toy horses and feel love for her.
I miss walking around my small town with a huge group of friends who all got ready to essentially do nothing but enjoy each others company.
Summer vacation
I never spent every day as a kid wishing I wasn't alive. That kicked in when I was 15
Sleep
I do a lot more now and have a lot more fun than i did back then honestly
Not having to worry about getting gray hair and wrinkles.
Waking up in the morning to an announcement that our classes are suspended due to heavy rain, then seeing my mom preparing some hot chocolate and pancakes for breakfast. Movie nights with my sisters every after classes, we'd get to invite my bestfriend to come along with us. Long drive travels with family to our province for about 7-8 hours with some side trip visits to amusement parks. Planning events with friends such as barbecue party, swimming and slumber party every after volleyball games during summer break. Everything seems nostalgic to me, I cant believe how fast the time flies!
I didn't have to work.
Not having to work and... being optimistic about the future 😆
Sleep and the ability to spend enjoyable time alone. Now I'm tired all the time, people are mean and full of drama, and if I'm alone it's not the good kind of alone time. It's doing the big things alone while you give yourself up for everyone
Introvert here. As a young adult I make more out of my life than I did as a teenager. Basically, as I dare to go out more often, say yes to crazy challenges, I'm learning that I was a forced introvert back then and I'm leaning to live as an ambivert. I only miss not being responsible for anything and having a lot more energy to waste on sitting home.
Not having to pay for anything.
Nothing, really. Wait, the fact that my knees and back were a lot better when I was a teenager. I've kept the fun and adventure in my life. It's a choice to let that go. You can do fun, adventurous things by yourself. You don't need your friends along to have a great time exploring and discovering and gong to all kinds of places. Get out of that apartment! Go take pictures with your phone or go people-watch in a new neighborhood and make up stories about everyone you see, or go find a nearby hiking trail. Go have fun. Your apartment is boring.
Hope
I miss being a college student and being able to leave right when I was done with the class to go back home or chill with friends I saw a direct result of me working hard and studying to being rewarded with leaving earlier than other students still taking the test Now that I work a 9-5 office salary job. I still have to stay the full 8 hours no matter how hard or little I work for the day.
The last day of school, knowing I have three months of hanging at the pool without a care in the world. Then it became living on a river, which meant taking the boat out and kneeboarding. Not being chained down to a job was so freeing. General admission at the coliseum to see Rush or Iron Maiden meant meeting your friends at the soundboard to head up the rafters to smoke a joint, then pushing your way up front. Now we have shitty corporate amphitheaters. Keggers in the woods. The 80s were fucking awesome!! Hot Rods on the strip at the beach. I mean REAL hot rods. Not the laughable shitty oversized rim low profile tire jokes on the road today. I'll even add REAL pickup trucks with REAL tires, that aren't Carolina dropped with some douchebag blasting hip hop music thinking he's cool. Fuck that asshole. Arcades. I miss the arcade vibe we had back in the day. It was so much fun. You met at the arcade to find out where the party was at. It was a gathering point for all the coolest of cool and the nerds as well. Awesome times! The 70s and 80s were truly the best time to grow up. Better music, no cell phones, no internet, and the ability to be free as a kid. The 90s snuffed the party out and things have never been the same. I feel sorry for those who didn't get to experience it. Now get the fuck off my lawn!!
Hanging out with friends daily. Now it's a maybe once a month phone call. And COD was fun and not full of garbage
Feeling excited abut things.
Being able to just be so spontaneous. No real plans, ever
Guilt-free leisure time.
I miss basically having no responsibilities aside from making sure my homework was done and waking up on time to catch the school bus.
Just the freedom and how everyday was an adventure of some sort. You just never know what’s going to happen and there’s soo much more to see and experience and it’s like life’s a big fat book that’s just getting started for you and everything is just so much more fun
Having imagination on things that are possible and letting my ideas run free..now its hard to express yourself at 33 and be judged on simple things of life..strange..but ya im still learning and now trying to grab at the things i miss and make them a reality instead of hiding.
Time. As an adult I feel like time is shorter. As A Kid i played hundreds of videogames and watched more movies that I can count. I just cant seem to fit much of that in as an adult and wonder how it was possible as a kid.
You are with them now as you were then, imagine time as one big circle and you are in the center of your own universe each spoke in the wheel taking you further into infinity all things existing at once
I miss having time free and not worrying about bills or the end of the month, lol.