Emotional-Immature-Girlfriend-min

What is emotional immaturity and how to work around an emotionally immature girlfriend or boyfriend

Reading Time: 10 minutes
  1. Signs of emotional immaturity are:

    1. extreme sensitivity to criticism – even constructive criticism. A person that lacks emotional maturity takes everything personally or as an attack against them. Then they hold grudges and do not have the maturity to forgive and forget.
    2. The inability to regulate emotions. These people will often get extremely angry about something most people would only find mildly irritating. Easily angered and will have a hard time letting things roll off their backs, so to speak. Their lives usually are overly dramatic, with constant ups and downs. They are prone to jealousy that is excessive and even bullying.
    3. Difficulty taking ownership of their actions. No responsibility on their part. They will put fault onto others and not see that their own actions are what caused something negative to occur. Instead of trying to come up with a solution to the problem, they continue to blame.
    4. They have little to no impulse control. If they want something right now, they will get it, with no regard for others. They will act out, like a kid would, without thinking about what the actions may further cause. Usually, they have no filter when they talk. They sometimes say things before they really think it through. There’s little if any thought in regards to consequences.
    5. They still think the world revolves around them
.much like a young child would (which is normal behavior when you’re a young child). However, the child-like emotions are now running through an adult
they like being everyone’s center of attention. Most often they are self-centered and even could show mild traits of Narcissism.

    Those are just a few and could be applied to men and women, both.

This is how to detect toxicity in people:

  1. High maintenance; they exhaust you with their demanding behavior!
  2. Everything is about them. Please keep your focus because your needs hardly exist in this relationship.
  3. They create drama over the slightest of things. And they exhaust you emotionally.
  4. Their rages, even in public are beyond comprehension.
  5. Their words cut deep. They will bring you down every single time.
  6. You feel anxious around them because you don’t know whether you may say something innocently and they may wish to turn it the wrong way.
  7. You are to blame for everything. That is their mentality.
  8. They know how to hate people for something really stupid.
  9. They must be adored.
  10. They will tend to use their sexuality to get what they want.

What options do you have with such a girl?

  1. Continue relationship with her – That would mean handling all the drama, you would need a lot of patience and it would drain so much energy like on daily basis you would be having issues/fights on small things, and you have to give her attention continuously, explaining to her every small thing like why you didn’t call/text. This becomes so tiring man especially when you have a full-time job and working on your goals too, the relationship used to kill my mental/emotional peace daily.
  2. Breakup with her – If to you peace and happiness is more important in life, then that would require ending things with her.

I went with 2nd option bro in my situation. Life is too short for other things, there is so much too do in this outer world than just dealing with bs on daily basis. The world is full of great people and you would be happy with your decision in the future (saying this from experience) …

You just sit her down and tell her the relationship can’t continue. She needs to work on herself and grow up. Being in a relationship like that will bring unnecessary stress on the other person and cause turmoil you guys will most likely clash often which is never good. To keep your sanity you need to get away from her regardless if she feels bad or worst you can’t fix her problems. This might seem a bit cold but it’s the honest truth don’t lose your mind struggling with someone else’s demons if you don’t have to. Get away from her!

The answer to that question can get very complicated. You can see the widely varied opinions in the other answers, so I will answer it as follows


Yes. They do change over time.

Emotionally immature people are usually emotionally-driven. They do what makes them feel good. Their interests can fluctuate according to what makes them feel good, although usually they have one core interest and branch out from that. I know one such person who has been a petrolhead his whole life, but in his mid-teens wanted to join the military, and shortly after that decided to become a volunteer firefighter. He has a good heart, which is what makes my next point so ironic.

These people are usually very counter-intuitive with their thinking. My petrolhead acquaintance has a tendency to get bored (not enough stuff around to keep him emotionally engaged) and when he does this, he starts anxiously running around the house, pager riveted to his hip, and firefighting gear waiting by the door praying for a callout – a house fire, a car crash, anything so that he is not bored! Considering how much he genuinely cares for people, this is very much against his character. He is hoping that another human will suffer harm or severe loss just so that he is not bored!

He has lost his desire to join the military because his family and friends did not applaud him for it. There was no pride or special treatment given to him for wanting to join the military. He did not feel validated, because the crowd did not encourage him in it. Emotionally immature people go wherever they feel validated. Not necessarily wherever they need to go.

Perhaps even ironically, this susceptibility to peer pressure, is also why emotionally immature people don’t change.

They have low self-esteem. They must be validated at every turn. If the world doesn’t endorse their plans, then clearly their plans suck. There is no room for everyone around them to simply be wrong or malicious. This is the issue of intellectual democracy – people who make their plans and decisions based on the view of and depending on the support of, the majority within their circles. This keeps them trapped within their own existence.

It keeps them from learning and exploring – if people are constantly downplaying their intellect, they remain emotionally immature since they don’t believe themselves capable of growing their understanding. With expanded intelligence comes expanded potential for emotional maturity. Note that I say the potential for emotional maturity – I know a great many geniuses who have no emotional maturity whatsoever. Anyone can be emotionally mature if they want to be.

The peer pressure ensures that the emotionally immature person remains with the friend group that validates them best – an emotionally immature petrolhead sticks with petrolhead friends. A DJ remains with partygoers. An unfaithful wife stays with those that support her right to ‘be free’. The old saying “You are who you hang around” is especially relevant to these people, since their identity is really just a mixture of the people that validate them the most. It’s an identity trap, where the victims think they are expressing themselves, but they are really just assimilating the personalities of their emotional benefactors.


Summary

Emotionally immature people can change over time, however without something that specifically addresses their emotional maturity issues, they will not get more mature. They lack the willpower to form their own identity. Their interests aren’t fixed. Rather, their interests and even personality move with the need to be validated by their peers, or the need to dominate people they find intimidating. If one or both of these proves impossible, then they will go into panic mode. That’s when things get really nasty. Because they tend to hang around the people that validate their pre-existing interests, attitudes, and beliefs, they usually don’t change. It’s a continuous loop that will run until they either die or accept the challenge to grow.

It saddens me to think that there are people who live their lives in such an unproductive way. I wish these people would experience some kind of defining moment – anything to jar them loose and force them to grow. However, they need strong, independent, objective support when these things happen. Otherwise, they get ‘cured’ and go straight back into this vicious cycle. As a dog returns to it’s vomit, so does an emotionally immature person, without proper guidance, will also return to theirs. Mindset has a huge part to play in this – see this graphic to understand Fixed vs Growth Mindset:

If you are asking regarding a friend, it may be time to start getting that friend around to social events with more emotionally mature people (try and get about 5 people that they regularly spend time with). Using their key vulnerability to start the growing process is quite effective if followed up with professional help. There is no shame in seeing a counselor or life coach. That was the best decision I have ever made and positioned me to establish my company, for which I am now pursuing a very promising venture capital lead.

I will leave you with these little gems of wisdom:

Show me your friends and I will show you your future. Show me the five people closest to you, and I will show you who will be in five years time.

-Dan Pena

You are the average of the five people who spend the most time with.

-Jim Rohn

This article has been borrowed from a number of answers on the same subject from Quora. To read more on the original forum kindly click here to view the original forum.

1500

Leave a Reply

Pin It on Pinterest

fr_FRFR