A lot of times I heard or read people write that “I’m too old to play computer games” or “to old to do xyz”. I find this rather silly, why can’t you enjoy what you liked when you were a teenager?
Such things have little to do with maturity but a video I watched recently on youtube made me write down these thoughts:
This video was a commentary on a video that is also on youtube, of an interview with an ‘adult film’ performer. The interesting thing was the behaviour and style of talking of this woman, was that of a girl, rather than an adult woman. The way she talked about certain occurrences was also rather simple. I had by accident seen a few short videos of or with a few others from that ‘industry’ and they were all unhinged or mentally unstable. It makes sense that this is so and it is apparently so that many people enter that industry (I mean with explicit content, not just nude photos) because of having problems in their lives. But instead of getting out of the problems they get into more problems because it is based around an extremely superficial way to live, which is destructive to mental/spiritual growth.
One of the comments said that this style of talking comes from not growing up and is likely connected to the mental issues she had before entering that industry. I can see this makes sense, but I will leave the full explanation of how this works to the end of this article. I will add this for those who want to figure it out themselves: Another person commented that he knew a young woman who was mentally not so stable and was obsessed with Disney (probably the animation films, fairy tales etc.). Why is this so? It is the same reason as talking in the style of a 12 year old.
But now back to game playing, or any other hobbies: Does anyone ever say it’s immature to run a marathon, or go to a casino (though these days people are I think more likely to use a gambling site or a virtual casino, i.e. via some website such as PlayAmo and many more), or to build a house? Why should you be young to do anything? There is of course a clear difference between those things and liking certain animated films, but still, it depends on the way you treat such interests. A woman could collect dolls but she need not be child-like to do so. They are probably in some way related to her youth, but still then she can see them as something that is perhaps nostalgic, but still not treat it as if it is anything more than that. For mechanical toys, let’s take as examples Meccano or Lego, how can you say it’s child-like to like playing with that and build models with them? After all it’s about creation (at least if you build your own models), not just following some build plan, and even that is not really a sign of anything child-like.
What matters is your view on why you like things that you liked also in your youth. If you derive joy from them rather than an escape from reality, and especially an escape to your youth, then there is nothing wrong with that.
“Prone to fits of apathy. Introvert. Award-winning internet evangelist. Extreme beer expert.”
