Wanting your parents to be proud is normal. Building a whole life just to get one nod from them is a heavy way to live.

The wish for a parent’s approval does not switch off at eighteen, or at forty, and there is nothing immature about it. What gets heavy is when the approval becomes the point: a degree chosen for it, a career held onto for it, years spent auditioning for somebody who may not even know they are holding the scorecard. Some parents cannot give that nod in the form you want it.

Separate the two columns on paper once: what you want, and what you are doing to be approved of. Where they overlap, carry on. Where they do not, pick one small thing this term that is yours.