To Be Happy, Develop Your Emotional Maturity

In our society, we tend to think that happiness comes from having a lot of money.  And I’ll agree that money does make life easier.  It allows us to live comfortably and take nice vacations.  And it gives us the ability to pay unexpected bills without issue.  And all those things smooth out the rough edges of life.  But money, per se, will not make you happy.  Instead, happiness comes when we develop our emotional maturity.

If you consider the happiest people you know, you’ll notice that they don’t necessarily have a lot of money.  Some happy people you know may be rich, but some may live quite modestly.  However, what they all have in common is that they are emotionally mature.

Emotional maturity allows us to manage life’s disappointments without falling apart.  And it allows us to have positive relationships with other people.

Below are ways to develop your emotional maturity.  Consider working on these areas, so that you can live a happy and good life.

Stop Taking the Comments and Behavior of Others Personally

One trait that all emotionally mature people share is that they don’t take what other people say or do personally.  For example, let’s say that your husband is insecure.  As a result, he flirts with other women. Flirting allows him to get positive feedback from the opposite sex, so that he can keep his insecurities at bay. 

An emotionally immature wife would take her husband’s flirting personally.  She would think, “Well, I must not be pretty enough or interesting enough to hold my husband’s attention.”  By contrast, an emotionally mature wife will realize that her husband’s insecurities drive his behavior, and his extra-marital flirting has nothing to do with her.

That is a common example, and there are countless others.  To develop your emotional maturity, you need to realize that the behavior of others has nothing to do with you.  Instead, other people’s behavior is reflection of how they feel about themselves.

When you become emotionally mature, you stop taking what others do and say personally.  And then, it’s far easier to be happy.  That is because the actions of others don’t undermine your feelings of self-worth.  Instead, you feel confident and good about yourself, no matter what those around you are doing or saying.

Don’t Be Afraid to Set Boundaries

Emotionally mature people are good at setting boundaries in their relationships with other people.  They realize that boundaries aren’t selfish.  Rather, setting boundaries with other people is the way that we protect our emotional health and happiness.

For example, over the years, I’ve learned to set boundaries with people who are needy.  These are the folks who start nearly every sentence with the words, “Can you…”  People who are needy just like having other people do stuff for them.  They are insecure, and getting people to do stuff for them makes them feel important.

Over the years, I’ve learned that it’s critical to set boundaries with needy people.  I don’t set boundaries with these folks because I’m unhelpful!  I’m happy to help people who actually need help.  Rather, setting boundaries is about protecting my time.  I can’t waste my time doing stuff for others merely to assuage their insecurities.  That isn’t a good use of my time.

It takes emotional maturity to set boundaries and protect yourself.  But when we are emotionally mature, we understand that boundary setting isn’t about hurting other people.  Rather, it’s about protecting our own quality of life and happiness. (To read about the benefits of daily self-care, click here.)

To Develop Your Emotional Maturity, Stop Falling Apart When Things Don’t Go Your Way

There are lots of emotionally immature people who cannot handle when life doesn’t go their way.  If life doesn’t go exactly as they would like, they yell, complain or shut down.  Effectively, they fall apart if life doesn’t go according to their plans, or if other people don’t do exactly what they would like them to do.

To be emotionally mature, you can’t fall apart just because things don’t go your way.  Nor can you punish others who don’t do things exactly as you would like.  Instead, you have to grow up and rally!

For example, I once had a friend who was a paralegal and was incredibly smart.  She had a dream of becoming a lawyer, so she took the LSAT and applied to local law schools.  Unfortunately, none of them accepted her.  She understandably was disappointed. 

Fortunately, my friend was a very emotionally mature person.  So, she continued to do her top notch paralegal work, and she didn’t let that one disappointment frustrate her.  She just figured that life had other, better opportunities in store for her.

Emotionally mature people accept that life is sometimes imperfect.  And that life is a journey.  They realize that while not everything will go their way in life, some stuff will!  So, develop your emotional maturity and learn to not fall apart just because of a bad day or a bad break. 

To Be Emotionally Mature, Learn to Agree to Disagree

If you absolutely need to have people to agree with you about politics, religion, abortion or any other issue in order to be in a relationship with them, then you have an emotional maturity problem. Emotionally mature people can relate to people who hold different points of view.  And they don’t start yelling and ranting to bully others to see things their way.  Instead, they try to see the issue from the other person’s point of view. And they are OK with the fact that others don’t view the world as they do.

Being able to deal with folks who have differing points of view doesn’t only require emotional maturity, it requires confidence.  If you are confident in yourself and in your intelligence, then you won’t be threatened if someone disagrees with you.  However, if you are insecure, then if someone disagrees with you, you’ll view the disagreement not just as merely a disagreement, but as an attack on your intelligence.

So, learn to be confident in yourself and in your intellect!  Develop your emotional maturity, and become the kind of person who can agree to disagree.  When you do, both your relationships and overall happiness will improve.

Learn to Manage Difficult Feelings

From time to time, we all experience feelings of sadness, disappointment, frustration and hurt.  Those feelings are an unavoidable part of the human experience.  Emotionally mature people grasp that fact and learn to manage those feelings in positive ways.

When emotionally mature people experience uncomfortable feelings, they take a step back and realize that those kinds of feelings are not simply negative.  They understand that those feelings are necessary for personal growth.  That is because if you never experience hurt or disappointment, you won’t develop certain important qualities.

For example, I have a friend who has had a relatively easy life.  She has positive relationships with both her parents, and she has been blessed with a good, long-term marriage.  She has experienced few bumps in the road of life.  As a result, while she is a lovely, kind person, she lacks the wisdom and depth of someone who has had to contend with major life challenges.

Now having difficulties in life isn’t necessarily going to make you a wiser, more emotionally mature person.  I know plenty of people who have experienced difficult life circumstances who are bitter, grouchy and resentful.  But emotionally mature people choose to use their life challenges as the impetus to become more compassionate toward others.  They use their life challenges to give them a wisdom and perspective on life that they otherwise would not have.

So, when developing your emotional maturity, learn to have the right attitude when dealing with life’s uncomfortable feelings.   Realize that those uncomfortable feelings and hard experiences ultimately can make you a wiser, kinder and more compassionate person. (To read about embracing failure on the path to success, click here.)

Use Your Relationships for Connection, Not Validation

Emotionally immature people use their relationships to validate their own self-worth.  So, for example, an emotionally immature person may seek out friends who aren’t as accomplished.  That way they can go through life feeling like the smartest person in the room.  Or, alternatively, an emotionally immature person may seek out friends who are wealthy or highly accomplished, so that he or she can feel like they too are successful.

By contrast, emotionally mature people don’t use their relationships to feel better about themselves.  Their self-worth is internal.  They are confident because they simply like the person who stares back at them in the mirror! 

Your relationships should be for one purpose only – connection.  They shouldn’t be for the purpose of fueling your ego.  When your relationships are driven by the desire to have an emotional connection with another person, those relationships naturally are more positive.  You won’t be using other people to feel good about yourself.  Instead, you’ll genuinely care about the people in your life, and you’ll desire their happiness as much as your own. 

So, to develop your emotional maturity, don’t have relationships for the purpose of supporting your ego.  Instead, choose to relate to others for the sole purpose of making an emotional connection.  Care about what other people think and desire.  Be concerned about their best interests.  When you do, your relationships will improve dramatically. (To read about 8 skills you need for successful relationships, click here.)

The best way to be happy is to work on your emotional maturity.  It is only by becoming emotionally mature that we learn to manage our emotions properly and relate to others properly.  And that is truly the key to happiness.