astrogirl
First Grade
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LOL, I'm not sure that I identify with this entire article but it's kind of interesting 
I do agree with the point made that "As a generation that has grown up around technology, we have low attention spans and we’re always looking for the next best thing." So very true.
http://radar.smh.com.au/articles/2004/03/09/1078594365527.html
The quarterlife crisis March 10, 2004
Our 20s and 30s should be the best years of our lives - so why do so many of us feel like we're going nowhere? Michael Condon reports.
QLC stands for quarterlife crisis. Lots of people suffer from it but no one knows if it really exists. Astrologers call it “Saturn Return” – the point in our late 20s when the ringed planet returns to the same point it was when we were born.
There are online diaries (or blogs), support groups, books – even a screenplay nominated for an Australian Writers Guild award and a Los Angeles rock band named after the phenomenon. The authors of the QLC bible, Quarterlife Crisis: the Unique Challenges of Life in Your Twenties, published in 2001, recently started a QLC career advisory service. They are now planning a QLC conference in the United States in August, complete with “workshops that would provide practical advice and tools for getting through your quarterlife crisis”.
“I believe that the quarterlife crisis will essentially replace the midlife crisis for our generation,” says Quarterlife Crisis co-author Abby Wilner. “It’s taking us so long to get all that our parents complained about at the midlife – the house, car and kids – that once we do finally settle down, we’ll feel so relieved that I don’t think we’ll want to change anything.”
Psychologists are “finally beginning to pay attention to this major life transition”, Wilner says.
“Some are calling it Emerging Adulthood, others Prolonged Adolescence. Although the quarterlife crisis has always existed ... it is a more significant and prolonged process today, because of job hopping and delayed marriage and family life, just to name a couple of reasons.
“In the US,” says Wilner, “the average person now goes through eight jobs before the age of 32 and the average age to get married is now 27. As a generation that has grown up around technology, we have low attention spans and we’re always looking for the next best thing.”
At 23, Danny Johnston* was on his way to being a bank manager. He had a dual degree in business and economics and a coveted graduate position at a major Australian bank. He was earning good money and had a respected job, but something wasn’t right.
Johnston was depressed.
He looked at other young people around him – many of them were depressed, too.
At first, he thought it was the job. “I worked at 10 different branches during my time training as a manager and every single person was unhappy,” he says. “That’s not an exaggeration, there was not a single person who was happy in their job at any of the branches.”
But Johnston soon realised the unhappiness reached into other areas of his life. He quit and drove around Queensland for three months until his money ran out. Then he went on the dole.
James Arvanitakis was a successful banker and economist whose major concern in life was his share portfolio and whose greatest delight was correctly forecasting the direction of interest rates. At 26, he owned a Mercedes and was paying off a home in Sydney. A year later he threw it all away.
“I was 27 and looking at my superannuation and estimating how many millions I would have when I retired,” he says. Arvanitakis abandoned a disastrous relationship and took a year off to travel. In Bolivia, he visited an aluminium and copper mine that used child labour. He decided he could never go back to his job and now develops economic policy aimed at helping poor countries.
“I became a person obsessed with money,” he says.
“I was lucky – at 27, I got to reinvent myself.”
There are hundreds of similar accounts on Wilner’s website (www.quarterlifecrisis.com). “At this point, I don’t have a clue as to who I am or even what I want,” says one. “I just have this horrible feeling that I’m wasting my life. I have no definition. Some people would say that it’s exciting – I’m a blank canvas with lots of potential. I just find it extremely scary.”
Psychologist Rebekka Sommer, of the University of Technology, Sydney, says many young people are struck by the “tyranny of the shoulds”– an inner battle over everything parents, teachers, friends, bosses, partners and authorities tell us we “should do”.
“People are made to believe that life should be a certain way – ‘I should have a high-status job, I should have a great harmonious relationship, I should be slim, sexy and have a high libido.’ If something in our life challenges these shoulds, it sends us into crisis.”
This is exacerbated for recent generations – sons and daughters of privilege who have a multitude of options and often do not know which way to turn.
“I think there is more pressure on this generation to achieve happiness,” Sommer says. “Women, particularly, now have more options, thanks to previous generations. Previously, your path was set; for example, young men might be expected to take over the family business. Now each individual really chooses their own path – and there is a whole lot of pressure that comes with that.”
Gone too are the days of a job for life. Some say that may not be a bad thing.
“My suspicion is that the number of people changing careers in their 20s is on the increase,” says Jim Bright, author of Should I Stay or Should I Go?
“I believe a lot of people in their 20s are looking at their parents in their 40s and 50s, who have slogged their guts out and had a breakdown or other health problems, or have been given the flick after being a loyal employee all their working lives.”
David Ellis has written a screenplay called Quarterlife Crisis – a romantic comedy nominated for an Australian Writers Guild award – after noticing many of his friends floundering in their mid-20s.
“I think we subconsciously try to emulate our parents but can’t achieve what they have or, alternatively, have achieved it and it’s not what we thought it would be,” Ellis says.“There’s almost a lost generation out there who are faced with such an enormous amount of options that they often don’t know what to do.”
For many, the solution is opting out – often on the “big trip”. Rachelle Hill*, a 23-year-old executive, broke off her five-year relationship with her live-in boyfriend and went overseas on a two-year sojourn.
“I needed to find out my own identity. I was so miserable. It was an incredibly hard thing to do. But now I’ve never felt so much freedom.”
Says Ellis: “Often people get this ‘deer trapped in the headlights’ mentality where they feel like they can’t move or can’t say anything to their partner. I think a lot of the time they need to follow their instincts to avoid getting hit by the traffic.”
Here’s what Abby Wilner suggests you do if you think you’re having a quarterlife crisis:
+ Don’t have a career plan? Don’t worry. Don’t think that the people with plans have it all figured out – and don’t think of it all as some kind of race.
+ Separate the meaning of a job from its trappings. Forget about how much money a job will pay you, forget about societal prestige, and forget about what your parents and friends think about your job. You have to figure out what’s meaningful to you in your career and what will warm your heart.
+ Reflect on a settled period of life. This is a period when you had the time, energy, and confidence to know what you liked.
+ It often helps to compromise at least a little bit. Sacrifices in the short term may make you better off in the long run.
+ Don’t be afraid of trial and error to find a fit for your strengths and tastes. Switching jobs quickly is not a bad thing, but first make an effort to like where you are now.
*Not their real names
Source: Quarterlife Crisis: the Unique Challenges of Life in Your Twenties, by Abby Wilner and Alexandra Robbins, Bloomsbury Publishing, $19.95.
I do agree with the point made that "As a generation that has grown up around technology, we have low attention spans and we’re always looking for the next best thing." So very true.
http://radar.smh.com.au/articles/2004/03/09/1078594365527.html
The quarterlife crisis March 10, 2004
Our 20s and 30s should be the best years of our lives - so why do so many of us feel like we're going nowhere? Michael Condon reports.
QLC stands for quarterlife crisis. Lots of people suffer from it but no one knows if it really exists. Astrologers call it “Saturn Return” – the point in our late 20s when the ringed planet returns to the same point it was when we were born.
There are online diaries (or blogs), support groups, books – even a screenplay nominated for an Australian Writers Guild award and a Los Angeles rock band named after the phenomenon. The authors of the QLC bible, Quarterlife Crisis: the Unique Challenges of Life in Your Twenties, published in 2001, recently started a QLC career advisory service. They are now planning a QLC conference in the United States in August, complete with “workshops that would provide practical advice and tools for getting through your quarterlife crisis”.
“I believe that the quarterlife crisis will essentially replace the midlife crisis for our generation,” says Quarterlife Crisis co-author Abby Wilner. “It’s taking us so long to get all that our parents complained about at the midlife – the house, car and kids – that once we do finally settle down, we’ll feel so relieved that I don’t think we’ll want to change anything.”
Psychologists are “finally beginning to pay attention to this major life transition”, Wilner says.
“Some are calling it Emerging Adulthood, others Prolonged Adolescence. Although the quarterlife crisis has always existed ... it is a more significant and prolonged process today, because of job hopping and delayed marriage and family life, just to name a couple of reasons.
“In the US,” says Wilner, “the average person now goes through eight jobs before the age of 32 and the average age to get married is now 27. As a generation that has grown up around technology, we have low attention spans and we’re always looking for the next best thing.”
At 23, Danny Johnston* was on his way to being a bank manager. He had a dual degree in business and economics and a coveted graduate position at a major Australian bank. He was earning good money and had a respected job, but something wasn’t right.
Johnston was depressed.
He looked at other young people around him – many of them were depressed, too.
At first, he thought it was the job. “I worked at 10 different branches during my time training as a manager and every single person was unhappy,” he says. “That’s not an exaggeration, there was not a single person who was happy in their job at any of the branches.”
But Johnston soon realised the unhappiness reached into other areas of his life. He quit and drove around Queensland for three months until his money ran out. Then he went on the dole.
James Arvanitakis was a successful banker and economist whose major concern in life was his share portfolio and whose greatest delight was correctly forecasting the direction of interest rates. At 26, he owned a Mercedes and was paying off a home in Sydney. A year later he threw it all away.
“I was 27 and looking at my superannuation and estimating how many millions I would have when I retired,” he says. Arvanitakis abandoned a disastrous relationship and took a year off to travel. In Bolivia, he visited an aluminium and copper mine that used child labour. He decided he could never go back to his job and now develops economic policy aimed at helping poor countries.
“I became a person obsessed with money,” he says.
“I was lucky – at 27, I got to reinvent myself.”
There are hundreds of similar accounts on Wilner’s website (www.quarterlifecrisis.com). “At this point, I don’t have a clue as to who I am or even what I want,” says one. “I just have this horrible feeling that I’m wasting my life. I have no definition. Some people would say that it’s exciting – I’m a blank canvas with lots of potential. I just find it extremely scary.”
Psychologist Rebekka Sommer, of the University of Technology, Sydney, says many young people are struck by the “tyranny of the shoulds”– an inner battle over everything parents, teachers, friends, bosses, partners and authorities tell us we “should do”.
“People are made to believe that life should be a certain way – ‘I should have a high-status job, I should have a great harmonious relationship, I should be slim, sexy and have a high libido.’ If something in our life challenges these shoulds, it sends us into crisis.”
This is exacerbated for recent generations – sons and daughters of privilege who have a multitude of options and often do not know which way to turn.
“I think there is more pressure on this generation to achieve happiness,” Sommer says. “Women, particularly, now have more options, thanks to previous generations. Previously, your path was set; for example, young men might be expected to take over the family business. Now each individual really chooses their own path – and there is a whole lot of pressure that comes with that.”
Gone too are the days of a job for life. Some say that may not be a bad thing.
“My suspicion is that the number of people changing careers in their 20s is on the increase,” says Jim Bright, author of Should I Stay or Should I Go?
“I believe a lot of people in their 20s are looking at their parents in their 40s and 50s, who have slogged their guts out and had a breakdown or other health problems, or have been given the flick after being a loyal employee all their working lives.”
David Ellis has written a screenplay called Quarterlife Crisis – a romantic comedy nominated for an Australian Writers Guild award – after noticing many of his friends floundering in their mid-20s.
“I think we subconsciously try to emulate our parents but can’t achieve what they have or, alternatively, have achieved it and it’s not what we thought it would be,” Ellis says.“There’s almost a lost generation out there who are faced with such an enormous amount of options that they often don’t know what to do.”
For many, the solution is opting out – often on the “big trip”. Rachelle Hill*, a 23-year-old executive, broke off her five-year relationship with her live-in boyfriend and went overseas on a two-year sojourn.
“I needed to find out my own identity. I was so miserable. It was an incredibly hard thing to do. But now I’ve never felt so much freedom.”
Says Ellis: “Often people get this ‘deer trapped in the headlights’ mentality where they feel like they can’t move or can’t say anything to their partner. I think a lot of the time they need to follow their instincts to avoid getting hit by the traffic.”
Here’s what Abby Wilner suggests you do if you think you’re having a quarterlife crisis:
+ Don’t have a career plan? Don’t worry. Don’t think that the people with plans have it all figured out – and don’t think of it all as some kind of race.
+ Separate the meaning of a job from its trappings. Forget about how much money a job will pay you, forget about societal prestige, and forget about what your parents and friends think about your job. You have to figure out what’s meaningful to you in your career and what will warm your heart.
+ Reflect on a settled period of life. This is a period when you had the time, energy, and confidence to know what you liked.
+ It often helps to compromise at least a little bit. Sacrifices in the short term may make you better off in the long run.
+ Don’t be afraid of trial and error to find a fit for your strengths and tastes. Switching jobs quickly is not a bad thing, but first make an effort to like where you are now.
*Not their real names
Source: Quarterlife Crisis: the Unique Challenges of Life in Your Twenties, by Abby Wilner and Alexandra Robbins, Bloomsbury Publishing, $19.95.
