{"id":1715,"date":"2013-11-21T20:59:42","date_gmt":"2013-11-22T01:59:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/StillmanLeaders\/?p=1715"},"modified":"2013-11-21T21:04:44","modified_gmt":"2013-11-22T02:04:44","slug":"generation-ys-biggest-problem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/StillmanLeaders\/2013\/11\/generation-ys-biggest-problem\/","title":{"rendered":"“Generation Y’s” Biggest Problem"},"content":{"rendered":"

Another member of our Leadership Advisory Council, Vice President of Chubb Insurance, Joe Szary, shared a completely\u00a0eye-opening<\/strong> article called\u00a0Why Generation Y Yuppies Are Unhappy\u00a0<\/b><\/em>about why those predominantly in the young-adults’ age group are more unhappy now than those in their parents’ generation were at this point in their lives.<\/p>\n

It’s a MUST READ<\/b>\u00a0\u00a0when teaching “Generation Y” the nature of extraordinary ambitions, off-the-charts self esteem and grand perception of self worth. As this article boils down to the expectations versus reality dilemma, it’s a great article pinpointing major underlying problems that may just change the perspective of “Generation Y” for the better, help older generations understand their children or grandchildren better, and serve as a warning for the upcoming generation to ensure happy, fulfilling lives.<\/p>\n

Thank you so much, Mr. Szary, for sharing this article!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Below is the article directly from Mr. Szary’s e-mail from the website Waitbutwhy.com:<\/em> http:\/\/www.waitbutwhy.com\/2013\/09\/why-generation-y-yuppies-are-unhappy.html<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

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wait but why<\/b><\/span><\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n
Why Generation Y Yuppies Are Unhappy\u00a0<\/b><\/span> Say hi to Lucy.<\/div>\n
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Lucy is part of Generation Y, the generation born between the late 1970s and the mid 1990s. \u00a0She’s also part of a yuppie culture that makes up a large portion of Gen Y. <\/a>I have a term for yuppies in the Gen Y age group\u2014I call them Gen Y Protagonists & Special Yuppies, or GYPSYs. \u00a0A\u00a0GYPSY\u00a0is a unique brand of yuppie, one who thinks they are the main character of a very special story. So Lucy’s enjoying her\u00a0GYPSY\u00a0life, and she’s very pleased to be Lucy. \u00a0Only issue is this one thing: Lucy’s kind of unhappy. To get to the bottom of why, we need to define what makes someone happy or unhappy in the first place. \u00a0It comes down to a simple formula:<\/div>\n
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It’s pretty straightforward\u2014when the reality of someone’s life is better than they had expected, they’re happy. \u00a0When reality turns out to be worse than the expectations, they’re unhappy. To provide some context, let’s start by bringing Lucy’s parents into the discussion:<\/div>\n
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Lucy’s parents were born in the 50s\u2014they’re Baby Boomers. \u00a0They were raised by Lucy’s grandparents, members of the G.I. Generation, or “the Greatest Generation,” who grew up during the Great Depression and fought in World War II, and were most definitely not\u00a0GYPSYs.<\/div>\n
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Lucy’s Depression Era grandparents were obsessed with economic security and raised her parents to build practical, secure careers. \u00a0They wanted her parents’ careers to have greener grass than their own, and Lucy’s parents were brought up to envision a prosperous and stable career for themselves. \u00a0Something like this:<\/div>\n
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They were taught that there was nothing stopping them from getting to that lush, green lawn of a career, but that they’d need to put in years of hard work to make it happen.<\/div>\n
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After graduating from being insufferable hippies, Lucy’s parents embarked on their careers. \u00a0As the 70s, 80s, and 90s rolled along, the world entered a time of unprecedented economic prosperity. \u00a0Lucy’s parents did even better than they expected to. \u00a0This left them feeling gratified and optimistic.<\/div>\n
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With a smoother, more positive life experience than that of their own parents, Lucy’s parents raised Lucy with a sense of optimism and unbounded possibility. \u00a0And they weren’t alone. \u00a0Baby Boomers all around the country and world told their Gen Y kids that they could be whatever they wanted to be, instilling the special protagonist identity deep within their psyches. This left\u00a0GYPSYs\u00a0feeling tremendously hopeful about their careers, to the point where their parents’ goals of a green lawn of secure prosperity didn’t really do it for them. \u00a0A\u00a0GYPSY-worthy lawn has\u00a0flowers<\/i>.<\/div>\n
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This leads to our first fact about\u00a0GYPSYs: GYPSYs Are Wildly Ambitious<\/b><\/span><\/div>\n
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The GYPSY needs a lot more from a career than a nice green lawn of prosperity and security. \u00a0The fact is, a green lawn isn’t quite\u00a0exceptional or unique\u00a0<\/i>enough for a\u00a0GYPSY.\u00a0 Where the Baby Boomers wanted to live The American Dream,\u00a0GYPSYs\u00a0want to live Their Own Personal Dream. Cal Newport\u00a0points out<\/a>\u00a0that “follow your passion” is a catchphrase that has only gotten going in the last 20 years, according to\u00a0Google’s Ngram viewer<\/a>, a tool that shows how prominently a given phrase appears in English print over any\u00a0period of time<\/a>. \u00a0The same Ngram viewer shows that the phrase “a secure career”\u00a0has gone out of style<\/a>, just as the phrase “a fulfilling career”\u00a0has gotten hot<\/a>.<\/div>\n
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To be clear,\u00a0GYPSYs\u00a0want economic prosperity just like their parents did\u2014they just\u00a0also\u00a0<\/i>want to be fulfilled by their career in a way their parents didn’t think about as much.<\/span><\/span>But something else is happening too. \u00a0While the career goals of Gen Y as a whole have become much more particular and ambitious, Lucy has been given a second message throughout her childhood as well:<\/div>\n
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This would probably be a good time to bring in our second fact about\u00a0GYPSYs: GYPSYs Are Delusional<\/b><\/span> “Sure,” Lucy has been taught, “everyone will go and get themselves some fulfilling career, but\u00a0I am unusually wonderful<\/i>\u00a0and as such, my career and life path will stand out amongst the crowd.” \u00a0So on top of the generation as a whole having the bold goal of a flowery career lawn,\u00a0each individual GYPSY\u00a0<\/i>thinks that\u00a0he or she\u00a0<\/i>is destined for something\u00a0even better\u2014 A shiny unicorn on top of the flowery lawn. \u00a0<\/i><\/div>\n
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So why is this delusional? \u00a0Because this is what all\u00a0GYPSYs\u00a0think, which defies the definition of special: spe-cial<\/b><\/span>\u00a0| ‘speSHel |<\/b> adjective<\/i><\/b> better, greater, or otherwise different from what is usual.<\/b> According to this definition, most people are not special\u2014otherwise “special” wouldn’t mean anything. Even right now, the\u00a0GYPSYs\u00a0reading this are thinking, “Good point…but I actually\u00a0am\u00a0<\/i>one of the few special ones”\u2014and this is the problem. A second\u00a0GYPSY\u00a0delusion comes into play once the\u00a0GYPSY\u00a0enters the job market. \u00a0While Lucy’s parents’ expectation was that many years of hard work would eventually lead to a great career, Lucy considers a great career an obvious given for someone as exceptional as she, and for her it’s just a matter of time and choosing which way to go. \u00a0Her pre-workforce expectations look something like this:<\/div>\n
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Unfortunately, the funny thing about the world is that it turns out to not be that easy of a place, and the weird thing about careers is that they’re actually quite hard. \u00a0Great careers take years of blood, sweat and tears to build\u2014even the ones with no flowers or unicorns on them\u2014and even the most successful people are rarely doing anything that great in their early or mid-20s. But\u00a0GYPSYs\u00a0aren’t about to just accept that. Paul Harvey, a University of New Hampshire professor and\u00a0GYPSY\u00a0expert,\u00a0has researched this<\/a>, finding that Gen Y has\u00a0“unrealistic expectations and a strong resistance toward accepting negative feedback,” and “an inflated view of oneself.”\u00a0 He says that “a great source of frustration for people with a strong sense of entitlement is unmet expectations. They often feel entitled to a level of respect and rewards that aren\u2019t in line with their actual ability and effort levels, and so they might not get the level of respect and rewards they are expecting.” For those hiring members of Gen Y, Harvey suggests asking the interview question, \u201cDo you feel you are generally superior to your coworkers\/classmates\/etc., and if so, why?\u201d\u00a0 He says that \u201cif the candidate answers yes to the first part but struggles with the \u2018why,\u2019 there may be an entitlement issue. This is because entitlement perceptions are often based on an unfounded sense of superiority and deservingness. They\u2019ve been led to believe, perhaps through overzealous self-esteem building exercises in their youth, that they are somehow special but often lack any real justification for this belief.” And since the real world has the nerve to consider merit a factor, a few years out of college Lucy finds herself here:<\/div>\n
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Lucy’s extreme ambition, coupled with the arrogance that comes along with being a bit deluded about one’s own self-worth, has left her with huge expectations for even the early years out of college. \u00a0And her reality pales in comparison to those expectations, leaving her “reality – expectations” happy score coming out at a negative. And it gets even worse. \u00a0On top of all this,\u00a0GYPSYs\u00a0have an extra problem that applies to their whole generation: GYPSYs Are Taunted<\/b><\/span> Sure, some people from Lucy’s parents’ high school or college classes ended up more successful than her parents did. \u00a0And while they may have heard about some of it from time to time through the grapevine, for the most part they didn’t really know what was going on in too many other peoples’ careers. Lucy, on the other hand, finds herself constantly taunted by a modern phenomenon:\u00a0Facebook Image Crafting.<\/a> Social media creates a world for Lucy where A) what everyone else is doing is very out in the open, B) most people present an inflated version of their own existence, and C) the people who chime in the most about their careers are usually those whose careers (or relationships) are going the best, while struggling people tend not to broadcast their situation. \u00a0This leaves Lucy feeling, incorrectly, like everyone else is doing really well, only adding to her misery:<\/div>\n
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So that’s why Lucy is unhappy, or at the least, feeling a bit frustrated and inadequate. \u00a0In fact, she’s probably started off her career perfectly well, but to her, it feels very disappointing. Here’s my advice for Lucy: 1) Stay wildly ambitious. \u00a0<\/b>The current world is bubbling with opportunity for an ambitious person to find flowery, fulfilling success. \u00a0The specific direction may be unclear, but it’ll work itself out\u2014just dive in somewhere. 2) Stop thinking that you’re special. \u00a0<\/b>The fact is, right now, you’re not special. \u00a0You’re another completely inexperienced young person who doesn’t have all that much to offer yet. \u00a0You can become special by working really hard for a long time. 3) Ignore everyone else.\u00a0<\/b>Other people’s grass seeming\u00a0greener is no new concept, but in today’s image crafting world, other people’s grass looks like a glorious meadow. The truth is that everyone else is just as indecisive, self-doubting, and frustrated as you are, and if you just do your thing, you’ll never have any reason to envy others.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Another member of our Leadership Advisory Council, Vice President of Chubb Insurance, Joe Szary, shared a completely\u00a0eye-opening article called\u00a0Why Generation Y Yuppies Are Unhappy\u00a0about why those predominantly in the young-adults’… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1558,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[637,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1715","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-advisory-council","category-team-insight"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/StillmanLeaders\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1715","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/StillmanLeaders\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/StillmanLeaders\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/StillmanLeaders\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1558"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/StillmanLeaders\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1715"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/StillmanLeaders\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1715\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1719,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/StillmanLeaders\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1715\/revisions\/1719"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/StillmanLeaders\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1715"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/StillmanLeaders\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1715"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/StillmanLeaders\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1715"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}