While I was reading a news paper article "Adult doesn't just happen" by Peter Goddard, a sentence "Becoming an adult is an act of will" attracted my attention by it's deep and obstruct meaning. What does it mean to become an adult? And when does this usually happen? There are many issues that could be brought up and discussed when asked this question.
I think that there is no specific period of time or age when teens become adults. It's possible to become an adult in any time of life, because it's doesn't depend on your age, it depends on your "self-creation" and "self-realization". Speaking in terms of adulthood, I want to add two more very important aspects which are also required in order to become an adult: responsibility and self-independence. I have my own definition of being an adult. It states that ones you become totally independent from your parents, moreover become their caretaker; once you realize that you, and only you, are responsible for your own life (and maybe life of others), then you can consider yourself matured, not only physically, but psychologically and financially. .
One of my best friends, who is 18 in present, happens to have no father since he was 13. Being a 13-year-old kid he had to find a job and not to drop a school. Although, he wasn't really independent at that time, he had a responsibility both for himself and his mother. These circumstances made him to become an adult in such an early age. Certainly, I felt sorry for him, realizing that ones you become an adult there is no way to go back. With adulthood come hundreds of new responsibilities and duties. The final stage of becoming an adult is usually when you give a birth to a child. That's the time when you take care not only of yourself but your offspring as well. Because society has changed, the family's function within society has changed as well. Being a parent, you even have to provide your child with emotional security.
