Grown up, and that is a terribly hard thing to do. It is much easier to skip it and go from one childhood to another.
Interpretation
Growing up is a difficult process that requires effort, unlike the ease of remaining in a perpetual state of childhood.
In this quote, F. Scott Fitzgerald reflects on the challenges of adulthood and the maturity that comes with it. He suggests that many people find it simpler to avoid the responsibilities and complexities of growing up, preferring instead to navigate life in a childlike state, which lacks depth and growth. The quote underscores the significance of embracing the arduous journey of maturity to fully understand life and oneself.
In practice
In a graduation speech, one might encourage young adults to embrace the challenges of growing up rather than resisting them.
Don't be so anxious about it,' she laughed. 'I'm not used to being loved. I wouldn't know what to do; I never got the trick of it.' She looked down at him, shy and fatigued. 'So here we are. I told you years ago that I had the makings of Cinderella.' He took her hand; she drew it back instinctively and then replaced it in his. 'Beg your pardon. Not even used to being touched. But I'm not afraid of you, if you stay quiet and don't move suddenly.
The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.
It was about then [1920] that I wrote a line which certain people will not let me forget: "She was a faded but still lovely woman of twenty-seven."
The words seemed to bite physically into Gatsby.
But you can love more than just one person, can't you?
A sudden gust of rain blew over them and then another - as if small liquid clouds were bouncing along the land. Lightning entered the sea far off and the air blew full of crackling thunder. The table cloths blew around the pillars. They blew and blew and blew. The flags twisted around the red chairs like live things, the banners were ragged, the corners of the table tore off through the burbling billowing ends of the cloths.
I have been uncompromising, peppery, intractable, monomaniacal, tactless, volatile, and oftentimes disagreeable... I suppose I'm larger than life.
The Annex is an ideal place to hide in. It may be damp and lopsided, but there's probably not a more comfortable hiding place in all of Amsterdam. No, in all of Holland.
My mind was bursting with depression and anguish. I muttered imprecations and murmuring as I passed along. I was full of loathing and abhorrence of life, and all that life carries in its train.
Tell me, what else should I have done? Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon? Tell me, what is it you plan to do With your one wild and precious life?
I had real plans for my next decade and felt I'd worked hard enough to earn it. Will I really not live to see my children married? To watch the World Trade Center rise again? To read - if not indeed write - the obituaries of elderly villains like Henry Kissinger and Joseph Ratzinger?
We don't want to be afraid to make a choice because we're afraid to make a mistake because most decisions aren't final. Feelings change all the time. You can always change your mind and taking risks and making choices is what makes life so exciting because we never know what's going to happen. Every day something new comes our way.
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