Some collegians think manual labor is the president of Mexico—until they graduate. Suddenly the light dawns. Reality frowns. And that sheltered, brainy scholar who has majored in medieval literature and minored in Latin comes of age. He experiences a strange sensation deep within two weeks after framing his diploma. Hunger. Remarkable motivation accompanies this feeling.

What those little Visine drops do for our eyes, relief does for our sighs . . . “it gets the red out.” Few feelings bring a greater sense of satisfaction than relief, which Webster defines as “the removal or lightening of something oppressive, painful, or distressing.”

Ever felt weird because you were “normal”? I remember the first time I had that feeling. I was a teenager surrounded by other teenagers in a testimony meeting. One girl, with tears running down her face, told of an alcoholic father who beat her mother almost every weekend. She described how she would hide in the closet lest she become a target of his drunken rage. Then she told how her friend at school had led her to Christ.

To be mature is to be fully developed, complete, and “grown up.” Becoming mature is a process of consistently moving toward emotional and spiritual adulthood. In that process we leave childish and adolescent habits and adopt a lifestyle where we are fully responsible for our own decisions, motives, actions, and consequences.