Maturity Map

We don’t just become mature by accident. How often have we seen grown adults act like a toddler when they don’t get their way? These are “holes” in their maturity. Have you ever encountered a guide to know where you are on your road to maturity? Here’s a map to bring attention to areas where we may be stuck.

My Story:

Things tend to fall apart when we aren’t at the level of maturity required for the role we are given. Motherhood was one such situation for me. You see, we can only give what we ourselves have. Because I was lacking the maturity skills needed, I faked it. I wore a pseudo-maturity mask. I’d been wearing them for decades in one way or another, but motherhood truly brought me to my knees. I admitted my weakness and brokenness and realized that unprocessed trauma had me stuck. Though I had a struggling heart that loved Jesus, vast biblical knowledge, and had been in church all my life, I knew there was a disconnect between my knowledge and my capacity.

That is when the Lord brought a friend into my life who gave me this book. What you read below are highlights from Living From the Heart Jesus Gave You.

Stage 1 of maturity

This may seem obvious, but a baby can only be born once it has reached the capacity to live outside of the mother. God’s design is that we live to our fullest in each stage of maturity. Our physical bodies have a timeline for maturity and our emotional development does too. Ideally, at each specific age, we will reach that specific stage of maturity. But because we live in a broken world, there are often adults walking around with infant level maturity. We have maturity tasks to accomplish at each stage of life in order to grow into integrated maturity. We cannot give life without first receiving life. If we try to give without receiving life, we will die. If we try to receive without giving, we will wither up.

Infant Stage- Birth - Age Three

• We receive life.

• We live and grow in joy. We are delighted in.

• We build strong loving bonds and develop trust.

• We learn to receive. We don’t know what we want, but our caregivers do and ideally they meet our needs in a consistent manner. They attune to our desire to connect (joy) and disconnect (rest.) This constant rhythm builds a strong joy center & identity center in the brain.

• We start to organize ourselves into a person through our relationships. We are valued for just being ourselves.

• We learn how to return to joy from every unpleasant emotion.

Child Stage-Ages 4-12

• We receive life.

• We know what we need and can ask for it.

• We learn what brings satisfaction.

• We can do hard things.

• We develop our personal abilites.

• We know ourselves and work to make ourselves understandable to others.

• We understand how we fit into the big picture of life.
  

Adult Stage- Ages 13- Birth of first child.

• We learn to give and receive life in mutually satisfying ways.

• We develop the capacity to care for ourselves and others at the same time. (This leads to parenthood!)

• We can remain stable in hard situations and can return self and others to joy.

• We bond with peers and form group identity.

• We own our behaviors. We protect others from ourselves.

• We contribute to our people group/ community.

• We express the characteristics of our hearts in our own way.

Parent: Birth of first child until youngest child is an adult.

• We still receive life, but we are more fulfilled to give than to receive.

• We protect, serve and enjoy our family

• We care for children without expecting to be cared for in return.

• We allow & provide spiritual parents and sibling for our kids.

• We learn how to bring our kids through tough times, and return to joy from negative emotions.

Elder Stage: Beginning when youngest child has become an adult.

• We help establish an accurate community identity. We act like self in tough times.

• We treasure all community members & enjoy the true self in each person.

• We help parent and mature the community.

• We give life to those without family through spiritual adoption.

Further Reading:

Integrated Maturity is: The capacity to stay relational with God & others and to act like your true self under a variety of difficult, stressful or painful situations.

Integrated Maturity is: The ability to see yourself and others as Jesus would see you regardless of the emotions involved. This requires working through our major wounds and finding healing with Immanuel. This maturity has nothing to do with our value, where we learn to do hard things.

Integrated Maturity IS NOT: Salvation

Integrated Maturity IS NOT: Knowing a lot of Bible verses or fancy theological terms.

To know God’s word or to be strong in withstanding pain have long been the bench mark to maturity. But Jesus spoke the truth IN LOVE. Jesus allowed himself to be weak by taking on the very nature of a servant. Integrated maturity means to have a full identity in Christ and endure hardship well, protect others & see others like Jesus.

Too many adults out there were never given an understanding of what maturity means or requires of them. Our physical age does not portend our emotional age. In an ideal world, maturity would happen organically. We would have all we needed in each stage of life and we would absorb the relational skills needed through modeling by the mature in our communities. You can be a fully mature infant, child, etc when you are living from the heart Jesus gave you and have had learned the skills for that age. When we are triggered by a negative emotion, we may revert back to a lower level of maturity for a time. Yet another reason why it’s so important to return to joy!