It Takes a Village to Raise an Adult

There are many breakthroughs that come from writing novels and the writing process in general. Joan Didion may have famously said, “I don’t know what I think until I write it down,” but it has long been known that writing, along with speaking and reading, is a tool for deep thinking—a practice explored by greats like Aristotle, Cicero, Augustine, and Montaigne.

Getting our thoughts on paper can also lead to profound conclusions about our lives, shared struggles, and ways forward. It can even provide closure.

While writing some of that closure for my own novel—spoiler alert—one of my characters states, “They say it takes a village to raise a child. I think it takes a village to raise an adult.” Since publishing the novel, readers have repeatedly quoted that line back to me.

Without spoiling too much more, one of the final chapters of the novel includes some "real talk" about tragically falling behind in childhood due to heartbreaking family circumstances. It was such a heavy chapter to write. I cried through it so many times. I didn’t want to include it in the novel.

But that real talk illustrates character motivations—essentially how and why we do the things we do and how our childhood can affect our future, our own sad and happy endings, our own heroes’ or heroines’ journeys.

Since publishing the novel, I’ve been thinking even more about the deeper meaning of childhood. Maybe that's because I published Girl, Unemployed a year after my own daughter was born, and now I’m responsible for someone else’s childhood and for building someone else’s village. But here’s the thought I want to leave you with, one I keep coming back to:

Children who play catch-up as children become adults who play catch-up as adults.

Maybe to move forward and embrace our purpose, we need to give ourselves—and our past—grace. We weren’t always given the tools to navigate life, and that’s okay. But what if we keep going anyway and allow ourselves the chance to catch up, so we can fully step into the life we are meant to live?

Go on and build that village as an adult.