Predictable Crises of Adulthood
No one wants to stray too far from home too fast, or become and individual overnight. We want to be able to crawl back to our parents when the tough gets going. Pulling up the roots in Gail Sheehy’s Predictable Crisis of Adulthood refers to the stage after adolescence when you should be “pulling up your roots”. Your roots in this aspect, is referring to your home. We try to separate our own views of the world from our families. In the process of separating our views from our parents we normally are attracted to fads that are unfamiliar and questionable by our parents. I know piercings is definitely one of the fads my parents will never understand and it’s something I absolutely love. Along with piercings, tattoos are another example of a fad that parents are normally not familiar with. Even though some parents might have one or two from back in the day, the new thing is starting to be full sleeves on kids arms. During this stage we try to find ourselves and start to associate with an anticipated occupation, a sex role, a peer group and a world view. You begin to pull your roots emotionally after you have pulled them physically, by moving out. This is an important crisis in the passage of becoming an adult because if you don’t experience this crisis in the time frame of eighteen to twenty you will later on in life, and the repercussions for having it later could be more severe. The trying twenties imply that we are trying to be an adult and trying new things. During this stage we definitely try to take hold of our lives in an adult aspect. We tend to do the things we should. Our shoulds are modeled by everything: family values, pressing culture, the prejudice of our peers. During this period we try to build some stability for ourselves and making important commitments. During this period we also explore and experiment. I relate to this stage specifically in Gail Sheehy’s Predictable Crisis of Adulthood because I, myself am in my trying twenties. One of my