The Jefferson Fisher Podcast - Top 3 Signs of Emotional Immaturity

Episode Date: August 12, 2025

Let’s talk about emotional immaturity—because spotting it early can save you a whole lot of pain. In this episode, I’m breaking down three clear signs that someone’s not ready to handle their emotions like an adult. From causing scenes in public to taking everything personal, and going straight for the low-blow insults—these are major red flags. Thank you to our sponsors: Cozy Earth. Upgrade Your Every Day. Get 40% off at cozyearth.com/jefferson or use code JEFFERSON at check out. LMNT. Head to drinkLMNT.com/jefferson to try risk free. BetterHelp. Click https://betterhelp.com/jeffersonfisher for a discount on your first month of therapy. Order my new book, The Next Conversation, or listen to the full audiobook today. Like what you hear? Don’t forget to subscribe and leave a 5-star review! Suggest a topic or ask a question for me to answer on the show!  Want a FREE communication tip each week? Click here to join my newsletter.  Join My School of Communication Watch my podcast on YouTube  Follow me on Instagram  Follow me on TikTok Follow me on LinkedIn Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Stop right now before you go into your next relationship, or if you're in one right now, if you want to save yourself a lot of grief and a lot of heartache, I want you to know right away. There are three signs that are going to let you know if somebody is emotionally immature. This is the Jefferson Fisher podcast. Wherever you're listening, I'm going to ask that you find the word subscribe or a like or a heart and click it. It's not a forever thing, but what it does is it tells whatever platform you're listening to that this is good content. And that's my promise to you to continue to deliver good content and make you a better communicator.

So thank you. Before we keep going, this episode is brought to you by Cozy Earth. One thing that I love about Cozy Earth is their bed sheets and their bath towels. I am officially at the age where I really care about that kind of stuff. I care a lot about what I'm sleeping in. And when I'm traveling, there's nothing worse than knowing that that's not your bed. It's not how it feels. The sheets aren't great.

I've never had to worry about that with Cozy Earth. Once we put them on our bed sheets at home on every single bed, it's been a game changer. So if you're like me and you enjoy having cool cozy sheets, I'm going to encourage you to go to cozyearth.com slash jefferson for 40% off. That's an entire 40% off, y'all. CozyEarth.com slash Jefferson. Use the code Jefferson. That's the key.

Use the code Jefferson for 40% off. They have a 100-night risk-free trial. So what's stopping you? Go to Cozy Earth. And now back to the episode. All right, let's get down to it. There is nothing worse than being around somebody or being with somebody who is emotionally immature.

They can't handle these emotions. If you're thinking of somebody right now, it comes to mind, just nod your head with me. Nod your head, mm-hmm, yep, I know somebody exactly like this. I'm gonna give you some signs that's gonna make it very clear to you that this person is not only lacking

in emotional intelligence, emotional depth, they are lacking in emotional mature. and that is a big red flag for you. Are you ready? Number one, they have an argument in all the wrong places. They have no problem causing a scene wherever they go. That is a problem. If you're at dinner with somebody and they start an argument

and all of a sudden you're like, okay, well we can talk about this later. And they're like, no, we're gonna talk about this right now. In fact, I'm gonna be so loud that everybody needs to know. Everybody needs to know how you're treating me and all of a sudden they're playing the victim and you're going, wait, wait, can we please not do this right now? The type of people that get in arguments in the line at the grocery store or at dinner or in public places or in front of other people and you're going, hey, this is not that big of a deal. Can we address this later? Can we address this like adults and just talk about this and say, hey, we're going to table this and we'll address this later? No, they can't deal with them. They don't have that capacity. They don't have that bandwidth. They do not have the, what, emotional maturity to be able to regulate the emotions that they're feeling. So they have to have it out right then. It's like the kid, you've seen those kids in the, I mean, we've all been one of them that was in the grocery store line and there's the Rosa candy right before you check out and they just absolutely have a fit or have a fit anywhere in the store that they are not getting their way right in that moment and they need to let everybody else know that there's an injustice. Now, don't come at me to say, well, there's all kinds of reasons kids can behaving that way. Yes, of course I know that. I'm just using that as a metaphor. There are people, okay, that don't have the ability to regulate their emotions because they don't have.

just have not reached the point in their life yet of being able to express them in a mature way and saying, okay, how about instead of me lashing out and having an argument and making a big show, you know exactly the type of person I'm talking about. These are the people that cause a scene. They love the drama. Drama makes them feel important. Drama is how they relate to the world. That is a big reg flag. Don't get involved with it. The point is they don't have any impulse control. That's the takeaway. Zero impulse control. They will have an argument wherever you are. Why? Because they do not have the ability to control the impulse. And it's a sign of no emotional maturity. Number two, they take anything that you say personally and anything they say as a joke, as a joke, not to be

considered serious. But if you were to say it, oh, it's World War III. It's terrible. It's how could you dare say something like that, but they could say the same thing and go, I was just joking. Hey, don't be so sensitive. You know what that is? That's an imbalance. It's a skewed version of reality to say that everything I do is just fine. I don't mean it. Of course, why would you take it personally? But if you say to them, oh my goodness, it couldn't be any more harm done. Have you ever had those kind of conversations with people that they're talking about maybe somebody else to try to gossip in some way? and they start rehashing a story about I can't believe that she did this or he did this and you're thinking this doesn't feel that bad of a thing I mean I really and you actually try

to be the reasonable person in the conversation and you're like well maybe they're just you know having a bad day and and they almost get offended that you don't take their side immediately instead of having a wherewithal the emotion maturity go how maybe you're right maybe I need to just think about this in a different way they go oh I mean oh is you're just taking their side oh okay and then they continue to just spiral you into it. It's because they have this skewed, the skewed version. They're not able to see things clearly. They're always seeing it from a hill. Everything is a slope to them and everything slopes their way. It's the most infuriating thing. They can dish it out. They can't take it. They can

dish it out. They can give it all away. They can say what they want to say. Doesn't matter. No consequence. I'm just joking. Don't be so sensitive. But if you say it, they cannot take it. It is a sign of an imbalance. They're not able to regulate those emotions. They're not able to control it. It is a big red flag of lacking emotional maturity. So watch out for it. Again, there's, and I want to make this distinction,

we all can be this person, all right? We all can be this person where I'm in a mood that, yeah, look, I can say it, but if you say it back, I can't take it. There's times that everybody's like that. I'm talking, this is a repeatable pattern. I think that's what a pattern is. It repeats, right? So this is, let's just say a pattern.

A pattern that continues to exhibit signs of not being able to regulate the emotion of being able to see two sides of a different coin. To be able to see both sides of an argument, the ability to go, huh, yeah, I guess I could see it that way. I can see how they could say that. They don't have that ability. They do not have, along with the impulse control, they do not have the ability to step outside themselves and see that their words could have the same kind of effect that they feel

they can't do that. Now before we keep going, I want to take a second to tell you about element. And here's the truth. When I'm filling off, maybe I'm feeling sluggish, brain fog, you name it. It's almost always because I'm not hydrated. Maybe like you, I tend to go for something else, like ice coffee, maybe any coffee, anything but water. And it definitely has an effect. effect on my behavior. Usually if I have like a headache or maybe I'm not, I'm in a grumpy mood. It's typically because I'm not hydrated. Element has fixed all of that. It's nothing but a little bitty packet that you can rip off put into your water. It's potassium, magnesium, sodium, and they have all different flavors that are great. My favorite is lemon salt. It's cold. It's salty.

It tastes like lemonade. And it's exactly what I need. So if you're like me and you need a little bit more hydration. I want you to go to drinklminti.com slash Jefferson and you'll get a free sample pack with your order. No risk, no gimmicks. Drinklminti.com slash Jefferson. Element. Hydration without compromise. And now back to the episode. And number three, they go to calling you names and insulting you on a personal level. These are what they call character attacks. Where rather than describing the behavior of what happened, they go to insulting you. They quickly go to just insulting you, your character. So let me give you an example. If you say something mean to me, let's say you say something mean. I don't know, imagine it in your mind. Don't make it too mean,

right? But just imagine it. And while I'm talking to you, instead of me going, you know, when you said that, that really upset me, and those kind of words, really make me feel, again, what I'm describing the behavior, what you said. People with emotional immaturity go straight to name-calling you. You jerk, you idiot. How could you be such an idiot? Oh my gosh, you're so stupid. You're just like your mom. You're just like your dad. Oh, my gosh, this is just like you. You're such a liar. Oh, my. And they color you. They paint you in a particular light, personal attacks, character attacks. Let me tell you this. It is very lazy arguing. It is a lazy way to disagree. What it's telling you when somebody is personally attacking

your character, it means they have not only no impulse control, not only do they have the inability to regulate their motions. It means that they have no other argument left. There's no logic for them. They have no other point. So they have to go to what? The lowest hanging fruit. They go straight to the bottom where it's, I don't have anything else to say. I'm just going to say, I don't like you. You know what? I don't like your face. They have nothing left. So it's just an insult. That's where they're going. It's a sign of emotional immaturity. You see this in kids. You see this in teenagers. What do people do? I mean, junior high can be the worst. Why? Because they're not arguing and characterizing behaviors, they're characterizing you.

They're insulting your face, your looks, everything about you, they're calling you dumb, talking about your intelligence. It's usually a major sign when somebody in arguing is going straight to insulting your intelligence, saying you're stupid, you're dumb, you're an idiot, you're worthless, you're lazy, all of those kind of insults,

was a personal attacks. There's a personal attacks that are not only incredibly hurtful, right? It is lazy arguing, it means they do not have the ability to reason. It means they do not have the ability to add logic and create an argument and to advocate and persuade. They don't have that ability, all right? You're not going to find a podcast that I'm on that says how to make somebody have emotional maturity. It doesn't work that way. There's nothing I can do. There's nothing. You can say it is all within them in their own life

experience. That's why a lot of the times when you're talking to these people and maybe you're in a relationship with this person and you find out later, they really don't have emotional maturity, it ties to things that happen in their childhood that they never grew out of. People enabled that kind of behavior. Why? Because they always got what they wanted. They always got what they wanted. Huge number three, red flag of emotional immaturity is that they immediately or quickly go to insults, personal attacks. Don't put up with it and don't be in a relationship with these kind of people, right? So what are the three signs that somebody is emotionally immature? Number one, they have zero impulse control. They have an argument wherever they are, wherever they are, regardless of who's watching, and if it's the appropriate time. They'll have an argument at a funeral and a wedding. It doesn't matter to them. Drama, they love to collect it. Number two, they take anything you say personally, as if like, how can you dare say that? And anything they say, they say, it's not that serious. It's just a joke. Just kidding. They don't have the ability to balance it out and be able to reason both sides of it. And number three, one of the biggest red flags of all is they quickly go to insulting you, your character, and your intelligence. Do not put up with these people. So what's the takeaway here, Jefferson? I have lots of different stuff in my podcasts, in my content, and in my book, the next conversation about how to deal with these kinds of people. the other little behaviors that they exhibit, biggest thing is you have to be able to first

identify these signs, right? I'm going to talk to you later. I'm going to make another episode on how do you handle the people that are emotionally immature? What do you do about it? How do you respond to them? Again, we can't control what they're doing. But the takeaway here for this episode is, I want you to be able to identify. I know the question you're asking right now is, okay, Jefferson, got it. How do I deal with them? I'm going to make another. episode for that. I first need you to really have a very strong awareness and sense of, okay, I'm hearing that they're immediately going to personal attacks. I can tell they're not having emotional maturity. They're not there. They don't have the bandwidth, right? You need to be

able to identify that first to then take it to step two. So I'm getting you there. I need you to, I need you to trust me. We're getting there. All right. Three signs of people being emotionally immature. Go out and do good things and use your words for all. all the good in the world. As always, you can try that and follow me.