2 Weird Yet Practical Ways to Grow Your Maturity

Peter Mbayaki
3 min readAug 30, 2023

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Ramp Up Your Maturity Level

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Do you want to be more mature?

Definitely, the word maturity gets bounced off regularly. It’s a great word — which as for me — sounds brilliant theoretically — but hard to apply in the real world.

According to the online Cambridge dictionary, maturity refers to the quality of being physically and mentally well-developed, and therefore responsible.

Ideally, mature people complain less, rarely judge, and take more responsibility for their lives. They don’t blame others but instead accept, and learn from their mistakes.

What if I told you that there are 2 weird, yet highly practical ways to increase your maturity level? Have a scoop:

  1. Reducing Pleasure Habits

Have you ever heard of the idea that human beings barely use more than 10% of their brains?

Look: I don’t claim to be aware of the ways to optimize our brain capacity, but I’ve been thinking about this lately. I think that our self-sabotaging characters as humans slow down our potential to grow and fully mature.

You know you do some stupid things which reduce your chances of success. Whether it’s drinking, oversleeping, lusting, or binge-watching Netflix, we have a high-level proclivity for pleasure.

One of the painstaking yet most effective ways of boosting your maturity levels and maybe even using more than 10% of your brain or potential is by reducing your pleasure habits which slows down your growth process.

You clearly know the habits that bog you down and reduce your chances of success. Sure, you’re not perfect — neither am I. Regardless, just strive to be pretty reasonable.

“Don’t strive for impossible perfection. Instead, just aim to be pretty reasonable.”

So, that stupid thing that you do can bog you down. So, try reducing it. You can even try to reduce your pleasure habits by just 50%. You don’t have to get rid of it completely, rather just reduce it and see how your life will dramatically improve.

I’ve recently embarked on the same journey by cutting down on alcohol consumption and devoting my time to studying more and building my writing career.

2. Be Less Defensive

What if I told you that the truth can set you free? But what if that truth is painful?

We tend to gravitate towards people or things that generally make us feel good about ourselves. However, when people criticize us or give us tough advice on how to improve, the human impulse drives us to get defensive.

I recently realized that my parents are indeed wise. Well, there are some things about technology or personal development that I know, but I’ve realized that they’re deeper than I thought.

When they noticed that I was delving deep into alcohol, they kept warning me endlessly to stop, otherwise, I’d pay for it. Eventually, they hauled me to the rehab. At the time, I was very defensive.

Although I didn’t like it, I learned a lot and developed emotionally and physically; thanks to the experience.

I’ve learned that sometimes when people send criticisms my way especially when I’m wrong, I should put my ego aside and get as many lessons from the criticism.

That way, I learn a thing or two about how to develop my life.

Ending Off

Maturity is definitely a good thing. However, developing it is no walk in the park. It’s possible though if you keep these tips in mind and resolve to grow consistently. Once you commit to grow, things will work out in your favor.

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Peter Mbayaki

Peter Mbayaki is a lawyer, freelance writer, content strategist, aspiring entrepreneur and traveler.