Maybe it’s a random number that I’ve chosen. Maybe it’s sixteen or eighteen, but I’ll stick with seventeen. Does anyone ever get over seventeen?

When we’re seventeen, we’ve moved into a world of our own. We are no longer defined by our parent’s identity alone. We now have our own identity. We have our own friends, our own problems and challenges. We have an identity defined by who we are and not who someone else is. We are not defined by who or how our parents are, nor are we completely defined by who our friends are.

We are students who maybe have part time jobs. We are not defined by that job, nor are we defined by the subjects which we study. We are a collection of all of those things and a lot, lot more. We are things unseen, things not yet experienced. We have likely been involved in losing someone, either a death of a friend or loved one or perhaps a good friend has moved very far away.

We now have issues in our lives that we try to handle by ourselves instead of asking our parents to fix them for us. We have dreams and aspirations that are our very own. Some of these dreams will be fulfilled. That will help to define us as we go forward. Some of these dreams and aspirations will not be fulfilled. That too will contribute to our future view of self.

We have emotions which are more complex than angry, happy or sad. We have come to deal with anxiety, love, infatuation, grief and sorrow. We have had to deal with friends that have betrayed us and look at our family in the cold light of reality, which reveals them to be flawed and human, rather than perfect and knowing all the right answers. We are, in short, ourselves. We are alone, an individual.

We are a book not yet completely written. We have questions about how the future chapters will unfold. We are just now realizing that we are, in fact, the author of this story. We have this individual freedom. We have this hope and promise that truly anything can happen, and the scariest part of it all is that it is completely true. It is scary because although anything is possible, we suddenly realize that all of those possibilities are our responsibility.

Seventeen has hope and promise. It carries the alarming reality of “self” being called to autonomy.

Everyone failed at seventeen and missed some opportunities, forgot who they were as that individual of promise and have looked back with some measure of regret for things that might have been. In that moment we feel the grief over things that were once so alive and vital; things that were the essence of seventeen’s very nature, but that have gone undone or unrealized. It often feels too late.

Here’s the good news: seventeen is not gone. Seventeen still lives very much in our hearts and memories. If you don’t believe me, play a song from when you were seventeen. You’ll likely remember some or all of the lyrics and know the melody by heart.

Although seventeen may feel like it has come and gone. It has not. It is also not necessary to quit this life in order to find those dreams. Those dreams were in the context of a seventeen year old. But what if the dreams could be acquired by whatever year old you are right now? Not in the same context that a seventeen year old dreamed them, but in a context that fits your life as it exists today?

God doesn’t ask us to stop dreaming. He inspires dreaming and helps dreams to become fulfilled. We don’t ever truly get over seventeen and we don’t need to have a mid-life crisis in order to fulfill those dreams. We can still be us and let those old wonderful dreams take on a new, more realistic and mature look. We can fulfill them in a way that enhances our life that we now have, our here and now, seventeen-plus however many years life.

We never get over seventeen. Why not let a little of seventeen’s hope shine through today? Blessings!

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