Human Maturity

Human Maturity

Introduction:
Maturity is a continuous growth. The normal maturity starts with dependence, independence and later to interdependence. This is maturity continuum. The state of immaturity also starts with dependence (others must provide their basic needs and satisfy their wants and needs) to counter dependency (people encage themselves in fight-flight behavior). They don’t take risks and accept realities and to co-dependency (cooperation in destructive ways). E.g. planning together to destroy oneself and others. There is only subjective pleasure co-dependency. This is immaturity continuum.
Physical dimension, emotional dimension, behavioral dimension, behavioral, spiritual dimensions form the maturity of a person. And these all dimensions are very much related to each other. Cognitive (intellectual), connative (motor activities), affective failures when they do not function well, we become psychosis.
Causes of immaturity:
When the person is reactive (doubting oneself and blaming others). Reactive people are conditioned beings. They are driven by the pleasure principles. They are like unmoved movers. They demand for their needs and wants.
When a person is working without any end in life. These people work without any proper motivation in mind.
When the persons are always doing the urgent things first. They forget about the important things in their lives.
When the persons are always thinking in terms of winning at the cost of others. I am winning or gaining by destroying the other. They make use of their money, authority etc.
When the persons demand to be understood first.
Ready to compromise with any value when these persons cannot win.
Fear of change and putting off all the improvement programmes. Because they do not want to take risks.
It is comparatively very difficult to change habits, to develop virtues, to learn basic disciplines, to keep promise, to be faithful to the vows, to exercise courage, to be genuinely considerate of the feelings and convictions of others.
Essence of Human maturity: “to value oneself and at eh same time subordinate oneself to higher purposes and principles is the paradoxical essence of highest humanity.” The very essence of human maturity is this. A person who is not happy with himself would behave two different ways: submissively and arrogantly. The person who is happy, capable etc can surrender or be submissive.
Our Motivation:
“A process-involving goal seeking behavior. Growing out of some activating forces like needs, drives are motives.”
Two basic needs:
Physiological or biological needs (primary needs). E.g. Food, rest, shelter, sex etc.
Socio-psychological needs:
Need for freedom or gaining independence.
Need for security.
Need to achieve.
Need for affection.
Need for recognition or social approval.
Need for companionship.
Need for self-assertion.
Need for self-actualization.
The characteristics of a well adjusted person
Awareness of one’s own strengths and limitations.
Respecting oneself and others.
An adequate level of aspiration.
Satisfaction of the basic needs.
No critical or fault finding attitude.
Flexibility in his behavior.
Realistic perception of the world.
Feeling at home with his or her surroundings.
Adequate philosophy of life.
We are different from each ether and difference needs to be appreciated. Do not demand that others should become like you. Never feel worried that you are not like the other one. Never compare yourself with the other.
Factors influencing happiness:
a. Health (good health).
Physical attractiveness (the more you feel you are attractive, more you are open to all and social to all).
Degree of autonomy (the more freedom is given to you, the more responsible you become).
Interactional opportunities outside the family (coming to know other people).
The type of work you do (satisfactory).
Work status (successfulness determines the prestige issue).
Living conditions (with who so you lie especially of different language people, cultural people etc.).
Material possessions.
Balance between expectations and achievements (realistic expectations).
Emotional adjustment.
Attitude towards and age periods.
Realism of self concepts (self efficacy).
Realism of role concepts (different roles such as a son, a candidate, father etc.).
Three types of behaviors:
a. Approach Behavior: Natural human tendency for interrelating with one another. This type of person is more open to himself and others. He is very social type of person.
Avoidant Behavior: Individuals keep a security zone- security, integrity, wisdom and knowledge. Avoiding situations and giving excuses to substantiate their point. These people enter into a state of self-pity (autojustification). Later these people feel irritated (self condemnation). These people take decisions without having adequate information. These people feel themselves to be useless, stupid etc.
Against Behavior: anti social activities are expressed though alcoholic addiction, sexual deviations etc. Jealousy is one of the means though people express anti social activity. Anti social activity disowns one’s responsibilities. The feeling of belongingness is not there. The moment these people are questioned about their actions, they get agitated. These people are pleasure seekers. They are carried away easily by persons, objects, events etc. they do not see into their values. Anti social activities happen when one doesn’t do one’s responsibility, decision, etc. The primary importance for these people is their won protection, own welfare, and security. They do not follow the principles of “live and let live”. Pure egoism prevails among this people. An egoist can help neither himself nor others. There is also a possessive tendency seen among this people. This is very much destructive in communities.
Effects of “Inferiority Complex”:
The person who doesn’t feel self-esteem or self worth and it is a complex, which needs to be overcome. Inferiority complex is also sometimes learnt. Genetic determinism, psychic and environmental determinism are some of the causes foe it. 20% of Genetic determinism and 80% of psychic and environmental determinisms cause it.
Getting angry: these people get angry for anything and everything for no reasons.
Irritation: moodless people often feel irritated.
c. Fear and fear of failure: feeling of fear of failure. They do not start doing anything new and avoid everything that come on their way.
d. Critical attitude: always seeing the negative things in others. These people are doing this to get attention.
e. Exaggeration: it is negative.
f. Perfectionism: it is a negative factor. They never find happiness in what they do; they cannot work with others because they feel they do not do it perfectly.
g. Shyness: feeling shyness.
h. Daydreaming: this happens when they are faced problems in their lives. This is to escape from reality.
i. Blindly following others: these people are like wooden plank thrown into the sea and they are twisted upon by the waves.
j. Suspicion: we cannot treat this disorder. This suspicion can lead to paranoid. They normally commit suicide or die of hear failures.
k. Loneliness: these people get easily attached to opposite sex.
l. Defense mechanism: projection. Regression is defense mechanism. Repression would mean that these people would deny the fact that nothing serious has taken place.
Different parental upbringing and our behavioral pattern:
Due to the parental upbringing the people tend to behave differently. Now let us consider some of forms of parents:
a. Overprotective parents: parents who have a mentality of over controlling children with orders, with reminders, criticisms, and warnings. They encourage dependent attachment. They do not encourage kids to do anything of their own. They discourage skills and development of the children. The child does not know one’s own limitations.
Reactions: insecure and passive dependence, submissiveness, always need help for doing anything and everything, they also become less competitive (fragile), feel put down by others, become rebellious in the future.
b. Indulgent Pampering parent: telling the children that they are beautiful, granting every wish of the children without telling ‘no’ to the children. Parents become competitive among themselves (father and mother).
Reactions: possibility for Narcism (self centered), demanding, undisciplined they want more attention, they are over confident as long as thing go on their own way, irritable and blame others for thing going wrong, they exploit others and disregard others.
c. Negative unemotional parents: they have very little time for their children; they are unexpressive when they are at home and they are very cold type of parents.
Reactions: schizoid (they want to have nothing to do with anything), no closeness or no intimate relation with other human persons. These people feel lonely and they keep people at a distance.
d. Rejecting parents: they openly put down the child, hurt the feelings of the child, and destroy the self-confidence of the child.
Reactions: avoidant, angry, or anxious or both, becomes self critical and self centered.
e. Authoritarian parents: they are not looking into the needs of the children; they demand only two things from children: - obedience and respect. These parents have got cultural gap.
Reactions: they are quick to get angry but only often passive aggressiveness, aimless and oppositional and not for anything, they do not cooperate and they claim that things should be done my own way.
f. Overly permissive parents: they do not make any demands from heir children, giving into the desires, impulses and actions of their children.
Reactions: these people are demanding and aggressive, rebellious, dominating and without explicit ambitions or value, and under achievers.
g. Hostile punitive (punishing) parents: anger of the parents are shown on the children, bent up their feeling on children by stating that it is to discipline the child, this provides a mean behavior.
Reactions: the physical punishment does not permit the person to grow in a normal way; there is a direct correlation between carphoral behavior and aggressive behavior in the children, the more and more physical punishment a child receives the child does not learn anything new, the fantasize revengeful acts as if he is attacking the parents etc, every time the child is beaten the child begins to feel that whenever there is a conflict, he needs to start beating, normally for their children parents are Gods and thrust them and consider them as pleasure givers, but here the child becomes irritated of seeing them, the parents teach the children that might become the right due to beating. The child may become anti social, feel no good, revengeful, and distrustful, feel guilt about relaxing etc.
h. Hypocondriarchal parents: worrying about health, they talk about illness and get sympathy; they use it as an excuse for not doing a job. People feel pain from top to bottom.
i. Alcoholic parents: parents who use alcohols or drugs to escape from problems.
Reactions: the children become super responsible (everything should come under their control) because their parents are not doing anything, children become scapegoats (blamed for anything and everything), they become rebellious and alcoholic, feel loneliness and powerless. These parents learn three things in life: do not trust, do not talk and do not feel. They become (male generation) more addicted to alcohols and use four times more than parents. Female generation undergoes depression and so many problems are caused.
Parents make unrealistic demands from the children and they compare their children with others with regard to academic performances etc.
Parents need to listen to their children and allow them to communicate, granting them what is necessary, appreciation, correction based on explanations.
Abuses
a. Child abuse
75% of children are being abused physically, emotionally, sexually, and neglected. About 75% of abuses are caused by parents, 10% are by relatives, 2% are by caretakers and 13 are by unknown people says the recent survey. These children undergo frustration, anger, and distrust, because of physical abuses.
Emotional abuse: Emotional abuse is the most dangerous. It is a systematic tearing down of an individual. Emotional abuse can lead to Neurosis and later to psychotic level common injunctions (e.g. should not cry, speak etc), rejection of children, terrorizing, intrusiveness (entering into the privacy of the grown up children), preferring of sex child, isolation etc.
Effects of Emotional abuse: the self-concept of individual is distorted (no self image or low self esteem). Adolsere = growing towards maturity. The person who is trying to know “who am I?” “ What am I going to do with my life?” Self-identity is lost.
Sexual abuse: normal reactions to sexual abuse are denial by the victim to escape from eh unpleasant memories, minimizing (it was not so much bad incident, suppression of the abuse), rationalizing (feeling sympathy for the person because he or she has done so much for me, blocking out).
Effects of abuse:
1. Emotional effects of these abuses:
a. a. Guilt feeling (cursing oneself for she or he being cause for the abuse). Complexity problem created more guilt feeling for cooperating with the other person for abuse. Pleasure seeking behavior also created more guilt.
b. Shame is the outcome of guilt feeling. The shame is rooted in the physical abused one (Feeling that she or he didn’t fight against the abuse).
c. Low self worth: the self is distorted and feeling bad about your body. This leads people into victim mentality. Victim mentality is learned helplessness.
d. Anger and hatred leading to depression and despair. The abused people defrauded.
e. Fearfulness and anxiety (of things that have happened).
2. Behavioral problems:
a. Betrayed trust (protector becomes the abuser, grows suspicious and do not trust anyone).
b. Interrupted sexual development.
c. Confused roles (entering into premature adulthood). The childhood is lost. Sexual proximity- cheating others and themselves and they enter into more and more sexual activities. Afraid of marriage due to fear of virginity, they do not want to become parents because they think they may abuse their children in the future sometimes.
3. The spiritual problems:
No trust in God because they blame on God for letting this happen to him or her. They get angry with God and distorted identify in Christ.
Counseling the abused persons:
a. Provide security: they feel sage and sound to talk to the counselor more openly. Regularly talking to them, listening to them, celebrating together etc can make the person get out of the trauma.
b. Provide affirmation: making the person feel that he or she is with the victim and there is no need to worry about it. This way we can generate a sense of confidence in the person.
c. Provide belongingness: feeling part and parcel of the society or community. Making the victim feel that he or she is worth in the society.
d. Provide intimacy: being careful with the words that are used to the victim. No joke about sexual abuses while counseling.
e. Provide friendship: making the person friendlier and making him feel that he or she is just merely the client.
Healing for the abused:
a. Claim the past: accepting and formulating what has taken place. What happened in the past I could not control but the future is going to be controlled by the victim. It helps the them accept their past as a fact. There is a catharsis-taking place.
b. Give forgiveness: abused forgiving the abuser. As a result of this the victim is relieved from revengeful mentality. One becomes wiling to bear the pain of another’s sin. We wait for God to work and act of release within us.
c. Determine to recover: 1 Cor. 6: 9-11. No one is beyond the circle of God’s healing power.
d. Learn self-acceptance: this is a healing process. Refuse the effects of the past, nurture oneself into the present, and try to become an achiever not an underachiever.
8. Masturbation:
Manost + Stuparo = hands + defilement. Defilement by hands is called masturbation.
Reasons for people entering into masturbation:
Masturbation is not inborn and genetically determined. It is learnt through observations and experiences. People involve in masturbation when they feel inferiority complex, anger and find relaxation in releasing semen through masturbation. Even they create conditions to enter into masturbation. This becomes a conditioned behavior. From here they enter into homosexual tendency. Masturbation can slowly lead us into affective, anxiety disorders. It affects mental structure and lacks concentration, losing sleep (insomnia), sleeping too much (hypersomnia) are symptoms. It disturbs the interpersonal relationship. This can led to psychotic tendency.
How to overcome the problem of Masturbation:
1. Our body is the temple of the Lord and start respecting oneself and one’s body. This would reduce exploiting the genital organs. We need to feel happy with our feelings. We are full of humanness.
2. Assertion of self is required to not to manipulate the other and not allowing other person to manipulate oneself.
3. Claim the past: accept the past and try to control that from happening it to you again. Making a promise to oneself and it should be kept. This shows that you are a man of self-control.
4. Breaking the routine work to avoid masturbating and homosexuality. Circle is being conditioned in our mind.
5. Forgive oneself and forgive the one who has exploited you sexually. This can heal the wound of abuse.
6. Stress + feeling of helplessness causes you emotional distress. When people enter into judgmental attitude, there is no adequate information, so people can enter into stress.
7. By people’s sitting on judgment of other, lack of information, failing to know that there is inner emotional healing capacities, failing to understand the normal human emotional processes, self condemnation or damning are the causes for emotional distress.
Ways out of Masturbation:
a. Appraisal focused: individuals undertake a conscious-logical analysis of what is really troubling them. This involves cognitive redefinition (finding something positive in that). Cognitive avoidance (by denying that this problem does not exist at all).
b. Problem focused: the individuals actively tackle the problem by obtaining guidance form family and friends. They tackle the problem through role innovation (introducing new skills or procedures to tackle the problem), by developing alternative rewards.
c. Emotion focused: by affective regulation. Individuals try to avoid paying attention to them. Resigned acceptance (individuals accept the situation and expect that the worst is like to occur. Using palliatives such as smoking, day dreaming, over eating, over sleeping, taking off from daily timetable etc. or emotional discharge by spreading rumors, losing one’s own temper, being over critical, damaging property and violence which increase the problem.
9. Low Self-esteem:
They do not perceive reality. They are self-centered. They are dependent people. They are very reserved in their relationships, often feeling unworthy makes fear choices, a feeling not belonging, feeling lonely, strive to be perfect and avoid mistakes, consider things what others as most important.
10. High Self-esteem:
Spontaneous relationships, perceive reality, they are task centered, intimate relationships are possible, non judgmental of others, self reliant, enjoy being alone, take risks and face challenges. Self-esteem is something learnt not inborn. Love is an art that is to be learnt.
Principles to follow:
a. Principle centered living: we have values in life. Principles should be like light houses. One should not be carried away with will and fancies, emotions.
1. They are continually learning. The world is not in need of hegemonic personalities (always side with the powerful people). We do not want critical intellectuals (not working for the people who do not work for the upliftment of people). But we need the people of organic personality (half human living and experiencing with the suffering of today).
2. They are service oriented. They see life as a mission not as a carrier. These people radiate positive energy. They are optimistic people. They believe in other people. This should be the outcome of self-trust on others. They live a balanced life. They do not see everything good or bad by they think in terms of continuous, priorities and hierarchies. They do not condemn themselves for every foolish mistake or social blunder they are not workaholics and fanatics. Admit and forget mistakes are their quality. They live sensibly in the present, carefully plan the future and flexibly adapt to changing circumstances. They see life as an adventure. They are synergistic. They allow creative thinking of others. They exercise for self-renewal (discernment for existent reality).
11. Interpersonal Attraction:
Reactive people are those who are carried away by the social weather. They do not have self-control. They are controlled by everything else. Here we need to be proactive person. I am responsible for my life. No one make you feel inferior without your consent. Between stimulus and response we have the freedom to choose. (Sympathetic and parasympathetic system).

Stimulus

Freedom to choose

Response
Causes of interpersonal attraction:
Physical attraction: beauty, physical look or appearance. Anorexic problem: they feel they are fat, though they are lean and slim.
Attitudinal similarity: having same opinion on something with the other persons.
Reciprocity: mutual attraction towards each other.
Complimentarity: what is lacking in me is in somebody and getting attached to him or her.
Proximity: nearness. Sitting next to next etc.
Frequency: frequent meetings with each other.
Romeo-Juliet effect: the more we tell them not to do; they do that thing very often.
I am hard to get effect.
Social status.
Competence.