Why are most people so lame after 25?

Life does have a dark side. Especially if you’ve lived long enough. Can’t always be exciting and glamorous.

After 25, you learn that it is not cool to talk about yourself so much. Once you mature, you realize that it is more fun to talk about commonalities than just blabber on about yourself and about how your life is oh-so-unique---even if it is unique.

So...in America we have sports and shows in common. They are safe, fun topics.

No one at my work knows that:

I am an All-American distance runner.

I climb multi-pitch routes like Devil's Tower every year.

I mountain biked across Iceland this summer.

I archery hunt elk every year.

I....etc.

Why does no one know? Because I don't talk about myself like a little child. Notice all of those sentences started with "I?"

No one wants to hear those types of sentences. I am not a Freshman trying to get laid. I am trying to get my next paycheck so that I can go do things I love with the people I love.

I suspect that many of my co-workers are much more complex than I would assume.

MooseInWyoming wrote:

I am an All-American distance runner.

This is LRC. Being a DIII AA in 1994 doesn't fly as "am," at best you "were."

In all seriousness I think you are spot on.

Lameness is usually caused by having a nitwit as your coach at a young age.

The reason is most of us don't have our parents bankrolling us to do whatever is our whim past a certain point in life. So we actually have real responsibilities so we can make money to buy things like food and shelter. Those things are hard to afford if you party every night and come to work hungover each day.

As someone who had these same thoughts in my 20s and resolved to not fall into this "lame" trap, time taught me my mistake.

There seems to be this threshold just after 30 where everything stops being a big sparkling brand new moment and becomes just plain, actual life. The romance that fueled so many previous adventures fades. Why is that? Not sure, perhaps you decide it's time to be an adult.

As a vagabond type I've been intoxicated constantly by the new experiences every place brings. The strange evolution that eventually seeped in faded the starry-eyedness and in came a more practical, logistical natural thinking. "Oh my god look at that cool branch!" turned into, "This branch will provide proper shade from the morning sun." I really do believe there's truth to the whole brain fully growing thing. Rational thinking sweeps in uninvited and trounces your party. It will, I promise.

As far as the whole TV thing- as time goes by it makes more sense. Growing up means you're growing responsible for more and more. That translates into it being your fault and now your job to do something about it. Stress gets real and is hard to deal with. One day you'll want to own something, or take care of someone and that's when your car will break down on a country road where your phone doesn't work and it's 10 degrees outside and you have to figure it out for your family, and then go to work the next day.

I don't do much screen time but I'm grown up now to not judge anyone for how they decide to get by.

All this said, don't grow up faster than you're ready to. Your youthful bravado is good and healthy. Use it to get the most out of life. Don't let yourself be boring! Things don't end when you grow up, but they do change a lot.

You see someone and you make a bunch of assumptions about how lame they are, but in reality, you know zero about them, and you’re probably way off base

They, however, look at you and see a jumped up little toy, and they are spot on

Not me. I’m as boring as I seem with nothing exotic in my past. Oh well. On the bright side, I don’t lose sleep that some millennial thinks I’m dull.

10/10 OP. Good job.

You come off as the soyboy you undoubtedly are.

Coach Hudson is not lame after 25. That's all I'm sayin.

More out of curiosity than anything else, what is the "opposite" of all that you've mentioned that you seek? Define the "other side"? If you're mingling among those you're ridiculing, you're a part of the problem. If you can't find like minds amongst your colleagues it's best to move on. Self-awareness is a heck of a drug; consume it by the truckload and find your niche. The nine or so hours you spend amongst work colleagues cannot define you.

I'm most likely on the other side of the planet to you, so the "Mahomes 15- on-the-back-of-a-jersey" stuff doesn't really apply to me. Strangely enough, as a mid-forties, happily married-with-kids, still trying to be a better runner, craft beer drinking sports fan doing mundane sht for the gubmint, I get where you're coming from.

Get weird, stay weird, tap the brains of some of those >25 folk and you might get a pleasant shock from one of them. Good luck.

PS: for whoever said the OP’s username has to do with pooping and harmonicas, “pinch harmonic” is an electric guitar term.

I've always liked talking with older people, they typically have a lot of knowledge and experience.

An alternative way to look at this is:

Why does it take most people so long (on average, let's say 18-25) from moving out from their parents and living irresponsibly on their own until they realize life is hard and they need some structure to keep going?

Well, most of them are people, and they can't help that. I believe it was Shakespeare who wrote, "To thine own lame self be true." Wise words indeed.

cool story bro, but what does it have to do with most people?

I can’t imagine believing in a well-meaning Creator personally, but I WISH I did, since it would maybe giving some meaning in my life if I thought this all wasn’t just pointless and transitory.

I am a Christian and I understand exactly what you mean. I have suffered from clinical depression and sometimes life seems pointless and transitory. Tough times. I try to return to God’s Word, which reminds all of us that our Jesus loves us dearly, and nothing can separate us from that love, because of we believe in Him, we are part of his family. The second thing I do is remember that trials and difficulties are sometimes allowed by God to make us better and more effective servants, much like a parent or coach might allow a young person to go through a very difficult block of training, to emerge stronger and more complete.

That is hard to accept. I have no easy answers. But in the words of Job:

“I know that my redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand on the earth. And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God; I myself will see him with my own eyes—I, and not another. How my heart yearns within me!”

‭‭Job‬ ‭19:25-27‬ ‭NIV‬‬

http://bible.com/111/job.19.25-27.niv