Is it just me or does the world get more complex as you age?

[OrmIrian]

The older I get (and I am now 42 so fairly old already ) the more I see things in shades of grey. I find it hard to take a firm stance on everything and hold onto it come what may because whatever my opinions have been, more often than not experience has forced me to alter it. When I was 18 just about everything was simple and I was 100% certain of right and wrong, before I had DCs my views on childrearing were fairly straightforward too, but now, I?ve had so many reasons to alter my views I rarely bother taking a strong moral stand on anything in case something comes along and knocks me off. Sometimes I would like to be able to say ?I am here and now stating that this A is totally unacceptable? without almost instaneously having to also say ?but obviously there are cases where it might not be? .

If I don?t watch it I?m going to turn into that terrible thing, a liberal old woman Is it something to do with getting older or am I just severely lacking in moral backbone?

Yes. There is that fio, of course. But genuinely I do find it hard to have a hardline view on anything. I thought that old people were all supposed to be zimmer-weilding Hitlers who hated anyone who has a different tea-making technique. When does that come?

i don't know. i'm getting more hardline but that's probably because i hand around with oaps

hang hahah

Probably because the older you get, the more experience you have and the more likely you are to be proven wrong or meet people/circumstances which challenge your previous stance. That's what I've found (and I have 3 yrs on you OrmIrian).

... although I am looking forward to being 'old' and being able to get away with anything.

I lack moral backbone as well. and I do see things in shades of grey as well. But I've always been like that. There are a few things I won't compromise on though

www.quotedb.com/quotes/1343

"When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years."

www.quotedb.com/quotes/93

"The old believe everything, the middle-aged suspect everything, the young know everything."
-- Oscar Wilde

PMSL at the first one especially iota.

I cringe now when I think of the arguments I had with my dad in my teens. I remember telling him that I hated soldiers - I didn't see why we needed an army and that they were all murderers.... not realising at the time how many close friends and brothers of close friends he lost in WWII. And without thinking that someone who had been through a war might have sensitivties I couldn't guess at. He didn't get angry just resigned and changed the subject

sorry.... just read that back . I meant he 'looked resigned'.