The Magic of Turning Two (Again)
My friend just turned two. At the party, frosting covered little cheeks, and there was a line for the swings. Turning two is extra special, a time when the brain explodes with new function, perception expands, and little humans become more aware and engaged with their world.
We call it the “terrible twos,” but that phrase misses the magic. Before integration, there’s often disintegration. What looks like regression – sleep disruptions, meltdowns, sudden defiance – is the brain developing new capacity. It’s challenging for parents. Every day is different, and it goes on like that for a while.
What I Thought Adulthood Would Be
Approaching fifty now, I sometimes think about what I imagined adulthood to be when I was a child. I believed there was an age when you simply knew what you needed to know about life. I was sure that age was twenty-five.
In my twenties, I extended the deadline. Maybe forty? Surely by then I’d feel complete, certain, steady.
What I’ve learned in my forties is that growth, expanded perception, and becoming a fully mature human never end. If we’re lucky... they never do.
The developmental leap at two years old is unlike anything else in our lives. The brain is never again as malleable, adaptable, or rapidly building new, clean pathways. Still, I’m certain (research in neuroplasticity supports this) that adulthood offers endless opportunities for expansion. The catch is our willingness and capacity to change.
A two-year-old’s brain reorganization is like suddenly seeing in color. Imagine never having seen red and then spotting a rose. Or encountering the ocean after never seeing blue. How would you make sense of it? Would it be scary? Exciting? (Babies and toddlers do see colors, just an analogy.)
Adult reorganization isn’t so different. It’s like seeing gradients of color for the first time — noticing the complements, or even feeling in color. It’s waking up in the same place you’ve been for years and suddenly experiencing it differently.
Sometimes it arrives through loss — of a loved one, a job, a relationship, health, or home. Other times from the collapse of our coping mechanisms: sex, drugs, and rock ’n’ roll for some; overwork, self-recrimination, and neuroticism for others. Most of us swing between extremes before we relax into new ways of seeing — unlearning, relearning, and even not knowing.
How do you make sense of it? Is it scary? Exciting?
When Falling Apart Becomes Part of Growth
Those who can lean into this perceptual expansion tend to be more comfortable with uncertainty, ambiguity, and change. What’s new and what’s next comes with acceptance and grace. Many of us, though, resist with all our might. The struggle between more life and the life we know can stretch into a decades-long ordeal.
Sometimes what we call “falling apart” is simply the nervous system trying to reorganize – much like a two-year-old’s brain does, only with higher stakes. But other times, the experience overwhelms our capacity to stay intact. That’s where trauma enters the story.
Trauma isn’t just what happens to us; it’s what happens inside us when we can’t process what’s happening around us. It’s an event we can’t fully hold – whether mentally, emotionally, or physically – especially without the support within reach to move through it in a good way.
What’s traumatic is deeply personal. Not all soldiers on the same mission are traumatized, because it’s not the event itself; it’s the individual’s capacity. Even science hints that something as simple as the state of our gut that day might shape what we can handle. It’s not simply that some of us are stronger.
The worst conditions of our lives – then ones we’re unsure we’ll survive, that reverberate through our bodies long after – often become fertile ground for expanded perception and growth. Everything changes. And since everything changes anyway, perhaps the best we can do is hold a good thought for ourselves, lean into uncertainty, ambiguity, and change — maybe even treat ourselves like we’re two years old, seeing facets of the world for the first time.
Learning to Grow (Again & Again)
In child development, we group years into stages:
2–3 years: potty training, parallel play, emergent problem-solving.
3–5 years: improved coordination, imagination, friendship, and basic skills like counting, colors, and shapes.
5–8 years: growing independence, literacy, social awareness, and budding emotional regulation.
What if we slowed down – with ourselves and with each other – and treated the hard things in our lives as stages of development?
Year 0–2: Orient, eat when you’re hungry, sleep when you’re tired, seek safety, survive. Ask for help. Receive help from everywhere.
Year 2–3: Stabilize basic self-care and emotional awareness. Engage in parallel play. Try problem-solving. Seek guides. Become teachable.
Year 3–5: Improve coordination, explore new interests, nurture imagination and friendships, strengthen foundational skills. Seek teachers. Deepen curiosity.
Year 5–8: Cultivate joy, humanity, and emotional regulation. This is when we return from devastation with something that feeds our soul and serves our community. Become the help, the guide, the teacher.
What if we slowed down – ourselves and with each other – and gave every hard season the same grace we give a child?
Maybe we’re all just turning two again, over and over — hopefully seeing more of the world in new gradients of color.