Emotionally immature people can be extremely charming and at points entertaining to be around. The best thing about physical maturity is that it’s very easy to spot; we can so easily tell when someone has another decade of growth to go, and can therefore set our expectations, and our levels of forbearance accordingly. This also applies to emotional maturity.
According to Monique Judge, editor of The Root:
Emotional maturity is the ability to handle situations without escalating them. Instead of seeking to blame someone else for their problems or behaviors, emotionally mature people seek to fix the problem or behavior. They accept accountability for their actions.
Below are signs of emotional Immaturity:
Difficulty Apologising
Emotionally immature people find it hard to apologise when they are wrong. Deep down, emotionally immature partners know when they are wrong, but they tend to deny it to themselves too. To avoid taking responsibility for what they did or said, they focus on what you did so that you feel bad for it, this behavior is also known as blame-shifting.
Words as Weapon
Emotionally immature partners often struggle to regulate their emotions. As a result, they use words to hurt. According to an article published in Psychology Today, we’re hardwired to feel emotional pain as well as physical pain. This is why words can be hurtful. And this is also why some people use them intentionally to hurt, out of anger. Words should be used as tools to communicate in a healthy way and build trust.
Controlling
Emotionally immature partners are often controlling. They have a need to know everything going on with their partners and when they are not told, they nag or make big issues out of it. Though, being controlling doesn’t always mean your partner openly demands that you must share everything with them in clear terms. In fact, emotionally immature partners often disguise their need to control as a joke.
No one is perfect. Everyone behaves immaturely from time to time. We all have insecurities and it shows in our actions sometimes, however, when we don’t even acknowledge them and don’t work on removing them, they can doom our relationships in the long-term.
