Initiation into adulthood, which is taking the parental interactions of youth, into the adult world. We finalize in our identity, the traits of our own same-sex parent - to use when we have no one else to rely on but ourselves. We are alone. Our parents are gone, yet we still need to harvest the lessons of adulthood from them.

Where "initiation rituals" of the past, formalized the process of initiation, and gave it legitimacy,  we have very few ritualized "rites of passage" today. The best approximation of the cultural edicts of the past which more or less, guaranteed that girls grew into mature women and boys grew into mature men, is today's concept of our life's challenges. In and of themselves, these are initiating experiences as much, or more so, than those cultural rituals of the past which symbolized initiation - the Bar Mitzvah, the Bat Mitzvah, the prom, graduation from high school or college, or joining the military.

Initiation is like the opportunity to "grow up" in the most rapid, and integrated ways. All of the negative social habits (ego defenses) that help us grow out of adolescence, lead to new, more positive opportunities in the future.