Adults and peers shaped your values and beliefs, not to mention your feelings about ourselves. Philosophy contributes to expanding who you are by helping you to independently think for yourself. It allows you to sharpen the tools of your brain to a achieve your goals in an effective manner. This is the essence of philosophical thinking. Not to do this means that you are merely thinking other people's chewed-up thoughts and attitudes.
All logical thought goes on in the form of statements, and statements about statements.
You can make those statements only through language, as well as in a different symbol system like mathematics. If you cannot make statements, and statements about statements logically, clearly, and coherently, then you cannot think or make rational decisions. It is no coincidence that the Greeks, who first used prose as a conscious form of reasoning, were the first to provide for everyone a visible record of the works of their mind. Thinking is coherent discourse, and logic and prose require one another. Coherent, continuous thought is impossible for those who cannot construct coherent, continuous prose.