Up until I was about 21, I really believed that all adults pretty much had it all figured out. I believed that being anautomatically meant that you had all your stuff in order and that you probably knew exactly what you were supposed to do in life, that everything you said was truth, or at least honest.I believed that when I became an adult, I would suddenly feel certain about everything I'd been unsure about up to that point. I believed that I would suddenly be equipped with the maturity and wisdom necessary to do all the things I'd been too young and indecisive to do before.I guess what I pictures was that one day, somewhere in my 20’s, I'd be walking around and suddenly realize I was a grown person. I would go to the bathroom, come back out and be a completely different human being. Like a butterfly bursting from it's cocoon, I'll have transformed into the miraculousI had such unwavering faith that the adult version of myself would appear one day to redeem me that I began assigning duties to her. I put things off for years, trusting that the Adult Me would handle them appropriately when the time came, with her efficient adult sensibilities. If there was something I didn't know, I stored it away on an internal list of "Thing I Must Learn before I Join the World" that I planned to hand to my Adult Self like a laundry list when she arrived and tell her to get busy.I pinned a lot of responsibility on my adult self. I didn’t consider that when she finally arrived, she might be a little overwhelmed by all the chores that had been accumulating in her absence. She would have a lot of work to do.But a few years after I was allowed to attend R-rated films in theaters as per the MPAA rating system, she still hadn't shown up. I began aggressively volunteering myself for anything that sounded grown-up, hoping to gain more experience and somehow level up into adulthood.I guess joining the Navy was another attempt to draw out the Adult Me. I thought if I did something drastic, she might be forced to show herself. But some time passed and as I took on more responsibilities, she still didn’t come.It was a year after I was old enough to legally buy and consume alcohol and she still hadn't come. Where was she while I was there doing all the work? I wasn't supposed to be dealing with all of this stress. I wasn't adequately prepared. Was it possible that I had miscalculated? Maybe Adulthood came later? 30’s maybe? If that was the case, I was definitely not prepared. Had I known that Adulthood would take so long to set in, I would not have put off so many important responsibilities.It wasn’t until I joined the Navy that I realized once and for all that no Adult Me was coming to save the day. It was either that, or everyone else’s Adult versions were also inexcusably late. My leaders were prone to favoritism and bias and poor judgement. There was sexism and racism and unmitigated explosions of anger. RDC's (drill instructors) were peeling off with new recruits in boot camp to have sex in closets and recruiters were withholding astounding amounts of information. Suddenly, it became all too clear that nobody had any idea what they were doing. Everybody, children and Adults alike were all just...it.It was when I was 23, 2 years before my auto insurance rates would drop and there would be just about nothing left to look forward to, that I realized Adults are human. Adults are flawed. Adults are irresponsible and untrustworthy. Adults will try to hide that they forgot to do a thing you asked them to do by telling you it can't be done. Adults will try to save face when they don’t know an answer and give you their best guess. Adults will pin the blame on you when they mess up and take credit for your work when you excel.These irresponsible, reckless, selfish people are in high leadership positions. They're steering the future. How much of what they’re telling us is a complete lie, fabricated to save face? Are they just telling us the most convenient thing because they were too lazy to look it up or never got around to learning it to begin with? Adults are scary, immoral people.Has this always been going on? Have I just been blissfully ignorant this entire time? Was I such a naive, and trusting and impressionable that I let myself be fooled? How did I miss this? Nobody here has any idea what their doing.It’s a terrifying revelation because what it means is that we’re all being led by a bunch of people who are, essentially, just doing their best. They’re in a position that was given to them because they were the best at looking like they knew what was going on or, at the very least, they'd stuck around long enough to have leadership lumped onto them by default.A little while after the big epiphany that grown people don’t automatically know what they’re doing and that the state of Adulthood is a construct of the mind, I was standing in front of a group of people in workout clothes. I was taking roster. Everyone was looking at me, waiting silently. I took everyone’s names down, trying not to make too much eye-contact with any one because I didn't want them to see that I didn't know what I was doing. I was getting down to the end of the sheet of names and I knew that that meant I would have to start leading them soon. I felt anxious and unprepared as always.I started helping out with leading the fitness group because I thought it would help me learn to project my voice better and to make people think I was an Adult. It was three days a week for a full hour, in which I spent doing my best impression of a competent person. I was terrified the entire time. I felt cheated because I thought I would be better prepared for this sort of thing by now but I didn't feel any less nervous and awkward than I did at 13 (the recommended age for girls to have their first pap smear regardless of sexual activity).When they asked me things, I usually flushed beneath a stern look before blurting out a something to make them go away. I didn’t know anything.Actually, learning that I didn’t know anything and that I was never going to, wasn't as big of a shock as you might think-- Well it was a little at first. For a while, I felt nervous and exposed. I was a fraud. What right did I have to lead people? If I would never be prepared for this then how would I ever be prepared to finish college? Or to be married? Or to buy a house? Or to have kids? That's when I realized that I was as prepared then as I ever would be.So then what was stopping me?If we're all just doing our best and no one of us is any better equipped than anyone else, then there's no reason to not go after anything. I have just as much right to greatness as anyone else because everyone else is just as clueless and unqualified as I am. We can all essentially do anything we want because the people who have achieved greatness in the past and today are no more special or wise or mature than anyone else. They're just doing their best.