one of the more puzzling aspects of the way we're built is that our emotional development does not necessarily or automatically keep pace with our physical growth we can be 55 on the outside and four and a half in terms of our impulses and manner of communicating just as we can be on the threshold of adulthood physically while an emotional sage within in order to assess our own and others emotional development we can make use of a single deceptively simple question that quickly gets to the core of our underlying emotional age when someone on whom we
depend emotionally lets us down disappoints us or leaves us hanging and uncertain what is a characteristic way of responding there are three methods which indicate emotionally immature behavior we might grade ourselves on a scale of 1 to 10 according to our propensity z' firstly we might sulk that is we simultaneously get very upset while refusing to explain to the person who has upset us what the problem might actually be the insult to our pride and dignity feels too great we are too internally fragile to reveal that we've been knocked we hope against hope that another
person might simply magically understand what they've done and fix it without us needing to speak rather as an infant who hasn't yet mastered language might have a hope that a parent would spontaneously enter their minds and just guess what was ailing them secondly we might get furious another response is to get extremely and disproportionately angry with the disappointing person our fury may look powerful but no one who felt powerful would have any need for such titanic rage inside we feel broken at sea and bereft but our only way of reasserting control is to mimic an
aggrieved Emperor or taunted tiger our insults and viciousness are in their coded ways admissions of terror and defenselessness our pain is profoundly poignant a manner of dealing with it a good deal sadder thirdly we might go cold it takes a lot of courage to admit to someone who's hurt us that we care that they have a power over us that a key bit of our life is in their hands it may be a lot easier to put up a strenuous wall of indifference at precisely the moment when we are most emotionally vulnerable to a loved
ones behavior we insist that we haven't noticed a slight and wouldn't give a damn anyway we may not simply be pretending remaining in touch with our wounds may have become conclusively intolerable not feeling anything may have replaced the enormous threat of being fully alive these three responses pointers in turn to the three markers of emotional maturity firstly the capacity to explain that is the power simple to describe but a proper accomplishment in practice to explain why we are upset to the person who's upset us to have faith that we can find the words that we
are not pathetic or wretched for suffering in a given way and that with a bit of luck we will find the words to make ourselves understood by someone whom we can remember deep down even at this moment of stress is not our enemy secondly the capacity to stay calm the mature person knows that robust self assertion is always an option down the line this gives them the confidence not to need to shout immediately to give others the benefit of every doubt and not to assume the worst and then hit back with undue force the mature
like themselves enough not to suspect that everyone would have a good reason to mock and slander them thirdly the capacity to be vulnerable the mature know and have made their peace with the idea that being close to anyone will open them up to being hurt they feel enough inward strength to possess a tolerable relationship with their own weakness they are unembarrassed enough by their emotional nakedness to tell even the person who has apparently humiliated them that they are in need of help they trust ultimately that there is nothing wrong with their tears and that they
have the right to find someone who will know how to bear them in turn these three traits belong to what we can call the three cardinal virtues of emotional maturity communication trust and vulnerability these three virtues were either gifted to us during a warm and nourishing childhood or else we will need to learn them arduously as adults this is akin to the difference between growing up speaking a foreign language and having to learn it over many months as an adult however the comparison at least gives us an impression of the scale of the challenge ahead
of us there is nothing to be ashamed of about our possible present ignorance at least half of us weren't brought up in the land of emotional literacy we may just never have heard adults around us speaking an emotionally mature dialect so we may despite our age need to go right back to school and spend five to ten thousand hours learning with great patience and faith the beautiful and complex grammar of the language of emotional adulthood our emotional barometer is a tool that can help us to more clearly explain our moods click the link on screen
now to find out more you
