Don’t Be Immature, Be Childish
It is both an insult and the norm to be immature.
And sadly, it is only an insult and not the norm to be childish.
Just like in my article on the differences between self-control and self-discipline, the below definitions of immaturity and childishness are largely my own. The dictionary might understand the terms as being similar, but my own distinction is less about being semantically correct and more about expressing a point.
Immaturity vs. Childishness
Whereas childishness is a virtue, immaturity is a vice.
In a separate article on the matter, I defined the terms largely as such:
- Immaturity signals a lack of self-awareness and empathy. Immature individuals handle personal and interpersonal conflicts in a way that worsens the problem, by harboring or exhibiting negative or harmful reactions. These often stem from a subconscious desire to protect the self from criticism and any difficult changes that would have to follow from that realization.
- Childishness reflects characteristics commonly linked to children, like adventurousness, childlike wonder, motives for learning, and creative play. These are very admirable traits that are often reduced to naivete, or dismissed as an inferior lack of experience and knowledge, when they are actually the reason these younger individuals mature with age.
This distinction is imperative, because it reveals something important: childishness is about developing as a person, whereas immaturity means regressing. Sure, both are terms referring to the under-development of a human at some stage in life (children, the champions of childishness, are not yet “fully grown”, and immature people, on their side, frequently seem like they haven’t either). But whereas one is determined by age (all children are childish), the other is determined by choice.
Furthermore, at their core, childishness and immaturity differ in their impact on the individual and the people that their behavior concerns.
An immature person chooses to make psychologically, physiologically, or socially harmful decisions (like being rude to someone or refusing to learn from a mistake). A childish individual, as per my own definition, harms no one, because they use their lack of knowledge or experience within certain areas of life to learn and grow. Both are imperfect people (as anyone is), but whereas one recognizes their shortcomings and uses these to improve, the other rejects them and ultimately fails to learn.
Therefore, using the terms interchangeably might be counterintuitive.
After all, all children are childish, but only some are immature.
Live Childishly, Not Immaturely
Living childishly might be the key to personal development.
This is what it means to be childish in life:
- Learning from mistakes and seeking to grow
- Exploring the world through play and creativity
- Looking at new experiences through a fresh lens
- Being honest about inner emotions and opinions
- Seeking to establish close social connections
Children have these inherent qualities, and it is these that cause them to develop from infancy to adulthood. But many adults choose to “outgrow” these tendencies. They lock into patterns of thinking and behaving that have accumulated throughout their lives, and they fail to tap into their innate childish curiosity and creativity to continue their self-development.
Thus, childishness becomes an insult, and immaturity becomes the norm.
But living life with the innocent and inquisitive mindset of a child should not be made into an insult. Children continue to impress with their larger-than-life ideas and even larger questions, and it is by nurturing this inner knack for learning and growing that they persevere and move forward, regardless of the challenges and failures they meet. As an adult, you can learn from your younger self and improve aspects of your life by doing as they did: always learning new ways to think, feel, behave, and live.
You can learn a lot from children.
Especially if you are immature.
