Miley Cyrus still sings. She still can act. But the former Miss Hannah Montana has really become more of a professional celebrity. She has the ability to make tabloid mags and gossip sites weak in the knees, and a good chunk of America is forever eager to see what sort of outrageous misstep she makes next.
I’m not a Miley watcher—at least not a willing one. We sometimes do a Culture Clip on the young lady, but I take no joy in either reading or writing them. I have a daughter about the same age as Miley, so maybe her trajectory feels especially sad and scary to me. I just kinda wish she’d skip the latest party and spend a night or two in her slippers, eating chicken noodle soup and reading.
But even as she talks about drugs on her new hit song and makes obscene gestures on her new hit video and talks about how she never really liked being Hannah Montana much anyway, Miley did say something recently I found pretty interesting. She reminded the Associated Press that she’s just 20 years old, and as such, she’s doing exactly what she should be doing at that age: going a little nuts. She says:
That’s why I think some people kind of fall off and they end up going crazy because you don’t give yourself time to go crazy. That’s what you’re supposed to do; you are 20, you are supposed to be a mess because you haven’t figured it out yet, and 10 years from now I am supposed to have it all together.
Is this actually a self-aware statement from Miley? Because in a way, I think she has a point. Neuroscientists now say that the human brain doesn’t fully develop until about age 25—meaning people are mentally and emotionally immature for several years after their bodies have fully developed and they’re legally emancipated. The 20s often are a time of self-discovery and adventure—and that often includes making our share of mistakes along the way. As Christians, we above all should understand how fallible we are as humans. Mistakes are part of our makeup. It seems disingenuous and ungenerous to ask our favorite celebrities to grow up seamlessly when many of us had our own share of emotional growing pains.
But I also think that Miley’s making the sort of statement you’d expect from a very rich, somewhat pampered girl who has the luxury to go off the rails for a while. Those of us who were forced to take on adult-like responsibilities when we were 20—well, perhaps the inevitable breakdown is still to come. But so far, most of us are doing OK.
I just finished watching Orange Is the New Black on Netflix for a Plugged In review. In her 20s, main character Piper Chapman was the lesbian lover of an international drug smuggler. Now in her 30s and engaged to a guy, she writes it off as “my lost-soul, post-college adventure phase.” Which maybe it was. But it’s not much of a moral defense. It’s certainly not a legal one, and she goes to jail anyway.
I also reviewed Fruitvale Station, about a 22-year-old sometime drug dealer who’s doing what he can to make up for his own past mistakes and immaturity. He has a steady girlfriend, a daughter he loves dearly and the best of intentions—but he’s shot and killed before we can see what his life might’ve been.
We all make mistakes. But that doesn’t mean we don’t pay for them. We may get it all together by the time we’re 30 (as Miley suggests), but there’s no guarantee we’ll get there. Mistakes are a part of life, but that’s no reason to set aside a decade to make as many as we can.
By the time he was 20—the age Miley is now—Bill Gates had founded Microsoft. Isaac Newton had begun work on what would become known as differential and integral calculus. Jane Austen had written Pride and Prejudice. By the time he was 25—the age our brains supposedly mature—Orson Welles had co-written, directed and starred in Citizen Kane. Charles Lindbergh had flown across the Atlantic Ocean.
Yeah, we all make mistakes. We can’t expect to be perfect. And certainly we can’t all be a Bill Gates or an Isaac Newton. But nor should we waste the time—the precious, precious time we’re allotted here on earth—with the idea that we can make it up down the road. We’ve got to make the most of what we’ve been given: our energy, our talents and, especially, our time. Because no amount of money, no measure of fame, will buy us an extra second.
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