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July
197
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changes from child to man or woman.
Suddenly the young person feels
"grown up" - adult. He usually does
not realize that at this stage the body
makes a rather sudden leap toward
maturity,
while the mind makes no cor–
responding advanre!
The mind contin–
ues on at only the same year-to-year
gradual
development.
The mind
is
sti/1
more child than adult.
l ts interests are
still mostly "having fun," games,
entertainments. Sexual maturity is sud–
denly reached, long in advance of men–
tal, emotional and spiritual maturity.
A human being is not a mere body.
The married state needs maturity of
mind, emotions, and spiritual qualities
as much as physical adulthood.
A boy or girl is physically able to
become a father or mother years before
he or she is quali.6ed to assume the
¡·esponsibilities
of parenthood.
But, suddenly becoming taller and
physically developed, the boy or girl
feels
mature. A new awareness of the
opposite sex is present. What the chi ld
of this age does not yet know, 1 repeat,
he usually fails utterly to realize.
The attraction of the other sex acts as
a magnet. The girl dreams of her Prince
Charming, desire is awakened m the
boy to hold an attractive girl in his
arms.
The girl often falls in !ove with !ove,
a certain boy being the focal point of
her fantasy. Of course she only sees this
particular boy as she imagines him to
be,
not as he really is. She is dead sure
she is in !ove. And no one can awaken
her from this entrancing dream. There
are many facts of reality about this
puppy-love affair of which she is totally
unaware.
But, again, what she doesn't know
that her parents see so plainly, she sim–
ply doesn't know that she doesn't
know! She has to outgrow it! The very
fact
that she is not mature enough to
1
ecognize her immaturity is proof that
~he
is still too immature for marriage.
At this stage, the parents have a
problem on their hands, and need great
wisdom to deal properly with it.
1 repeat, marriage is not for children.
The Preparatory Years
But when does a child become an
adult? When is one ready for marriage?
The
PLAlN TRUTH
Marriage is in itself a career. One is
not ready to enter upon any profession
or career until after full preparation.
This
pt'eparation
may be divided,
roughly, into three stages. First, that of
infancy, preparing the child for school.
Second, elementary and preparatory
schooling prior to, thirdly, more
advanced education and specialized
training for the adult l ife's work.
There are really three stages, roughly,
of mental development that parallel
these stages of preparation. First, the
change from babyhood to boy-
oc
girl–
hood around age six. Then the mind as
a rule has absorbed enough elementary
and semimature knowledge by age
16
to
begin
more mature thinking and
learning. Age
16
is a crucial year in
mental development.
Prior to age
16
the average youth has
little awareness of the seriousness of
life, or world conditions, of human
problems or the purposes of life. In our
American public school system, he
enters senior high school, or the last
two years of preparatory school at about
this age.
But the mind does not really mature,
on the average, unti l age 25. At age 25
33
a more definite adulthood of mind,
attitude, interests, is reached. The mind
becomes more "set"
in
its ways.
The years between ages
16
and
2
5 are
the
vital/y impo,.Jant
years of adult
preparation for life's wock. These are
the
cmciaJ
years of
PREPARATION.
During these years the mind is capable
of
act¡11iring
faster than at any other
stage of life the advanced knowledge
needed
befo,·e beginning
one's adult
career - whether it be business, profes–
sion, occupation, or marriage. Before
age
16
the mind has not acquired the
basic elementary knowledge needed as a
foundation for entering more advanced
study - and the mind has not devel–
oped in serious comprehension to the
level of advanced knowledge. After age
25, the mind which has stagnated since
age
16
finds it difficult to enter upon
more mature study.
Before age
16
the mind simply is not
mature. At age
16
it is merely prepared
to
begin
acquiring the more mature
preparation
for either career, business, or
marriage.
lt should be borne in mind
1
am
speaking of average ages. There are, of
course, exceptions to all rules - but
in
m
y
experience about 99 in
l
00 follow
this pattern.
Another stage of maturity seems
to
be
reached at about age 30. 1 have noticed
that, although most young people reach
a certain mental matucity at age 25, a
far more complete maturity of mind,
personality, performance, and influence
on others is reached at age 30.
By age 30 the man or woman has
added five years of practica!
experimce,
in addition to further study, to the
preparatory knowledge and final reach–
ing of mental maturity attained at 25.
Prior to 25, the young man is often
called just that - "young man" - by
older men. 1 can remember how, in my
carnal vanity, 1 smarted under being
spoken to as "young roan" by business
executives I dealt with. This expression
simply meant they did not accept me,
yet, as a fully mature man, and 1
knew it.
Somehow, the vanity in a young man
of 18 and older makes him want to be
considered
mat11re
-
as a completely
adult, fully experienced
MAN.
He wants
to be considered older than he is. But as