"I spent about twenty years being confused about what emotional maturity actually meant. I thought it meant not getting angry. Or getting angry but being nice about it. It meant saying "I hear you" and "let me understand where you're coming from" and generally performing a kind of emotional competence that made other people feel validated. I was pretty good at it, actually. People liked me. I didn't blow up at anyone. I solved problems collaboratively. I was emotionally intelligent, or so I thought."
"She said, "You're not emotionally mature. You're emotionally sophisticated. There's a difference." She said I was very good at managing other people's emotions, which is a useful skill, but I was terrible at being clear about my own. She said I'd spent my whole life translating my actual feelings into forms that wouldn't disturb anyone, and that was the opposite of maturity. Maturity, she said, was about clarity. Knowing what you feel and being able to say it without apology or performance."
Emotional maturity requires clarity about personal feelings and the capacity to state them honestly without apology or performance. Emotional sophistication centers on managing other people's emotions and reshaping one's feelings to avoid upsetting others. Performing validation and hedging opinions can mask avoidance of self-expression and lead to dishonest behavior despite good intentions. Avoiding direct communication yields passive withdrawal, hedged responses, and withheld feedback. True maturity prioritizes naming and communicating feelings directly rather than prioritizing situational management or others' comfort over authenticity.
Read at Silicon Canals
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