Is there a word for this?

[topum]

I wonder if there is a word in any language to describe that exact feeling one has when one sees someone much younger doing exactly the same stupid shit one did at their age.

You know when you know exactly how the shit they are getting themselves into is going to develop and end but there is nothing you can do to create a shortcut for them to skip all the mess and save all the time. You know that there is nothing you can say that would make sense to them now and stop them. Nothing. Because those exact very simple and logical things you want to say to them were said to you over and over again at their age but somehow they didn't make any sense at all to you then and you just thought that the people who said them were very very annoying and couldn't possibly comprehend the super unique issues of your super unique life.

If there isn't a word for this, I think we should create one.

I wonder if the Germans have it. They seem to have many cool ones:
http://topum.livejournal.com/12529.html

Comments

[topum.livejournal.com]

I think that there is a much wider gap on this between a 20 years old and a 30 years old than there is between a 30 years old and a 40 or 50 years old for example. A much much wider one.

[diejacobsleiter.livejournal.com]

Well, yes, the age between 15 and 25 is the champion in stupidity, so even a 10-12 y.o. child can be wiser than 17 y.o. person. And yes, the gap berween 20 and any other age is the widest. But this is not the only one stupid age: the midlife crisis of 40s is quite a disaster too...

But my thought was that we do stupid things all our life; that's what we do. And there could always be an older man (or ourselves in an older age) who can say "What an idiot this youngster is (or I was)!"