The Existential Millennial Impasse: Quarter-Life Crisis Personified
We all heard it, the story of Little Red Riding hood; girls more than boys, but it was something known. We regaled at the fact that she went away from the path; the road to her Mimoh’s house. That was her biggest mistake, as away from the path, she encountered an enemy, the fox, and that was it.
It’s funny, how something like this makes so much more sense in adulthood. Just a month ago, I found myself thinking about such stories told in childhood. It’s all crap but quite effective. Scientists call it socialization; and family, peers, religion, community, and media act as the most effective agents of socialization.
“Socialization is the process of internalizing the norms, cultures, and ideologies of a specific society”
Thinking about it critically means that most choices were already made for us even before we were conceived.
Why do you do things the way you do? Seriously, what choices in your life are truly yours?
I don’t think we ever had a chance to survive it!
We were all set on a certain path since birth, it may feel like our own path in adulthood, but, if we’re brutally honest with ourselves, it’s not our path. Unfortunately, I only came to realize this at the prime age of 27. And with it began my quarter-life crisis. Many of you have felt the depression and a momentary loss of direction creep in. It all starts with a complete lack of passion for something you previously loved doing. This may be a hobby, a career, a lover, a marriage, and even religion. Everything seems upside down, it just makes no sense. It is categorized as a rebellion by older family or a lack of focus. Let’s face it, the older generation does not get this generation at all.
When it happened, I left my two-year-old with my partner and took an abrupt solo trip. It was completely out of character for me. I’m very organized and love planning for stuff months in advance. Not this time, I just packaged my bags and left. I spent two days with absolute strangers in a scenic place, just to organize my thoughts and my feelings without interruptions.
The Muse defines it as a moment of intense soul-searching and stress occurring in millennials in the mid-20s to early 30s. Research conducted by Gumtree indicates that 86% of all millennials experience some form of quarter-life crisis. It’s characterized by feelings of loneliness, disappointment, insecurities, and depression. Statistics in 2014, indicated that millennials in the U.S make up 40% of all unemployed, despite being the most educated generation. The most recent numbers indicate that the average youth unemployment rate in the U.S at 8.3%, which is still a huge number considering that there are more than two million millennials in the country. The CDC in 2016, found that suicides are the second largest killer in the U.S, and many of those suicides are of people below the age of 35.
“It’s characterized by feelings of loneliness, disappointment, insecurities, and depression”
In many cases, it occurs in four phases.
The first phase is the feeling of being “caged” and “lost”. It feels like you’ve no direction, or as if you are in a fast moving vehicle, but you can’t find the brakes or even the controls. You’re pretty sure that you’re heading for a crash, but have no way to stop it.
Now, this stage is the actual devil incarnate especially for a planner like me. I enjoy the fact that I’m certain to a certain degree how my week will look like. It is easy to fall into the trap of seeking a release for this phase using things like alcohol, marijuana, or other hard drugs.
Honestly, it doesn’t help!
The second phase is the actual Everest!! It feels like there is nothing you can do about your impending doom. You have lost all control, and are just a pawn in someone else’s game. It is characterized by a lot of indifference, breaking off from normal behavior, and in many days, it takes a few hours to convince yourself to get out of bed.
Every Damn thing is a struggle! A lot of isolation happens at this phase, feels like you can’t “do people today” but every day. I took about five months in this stage, it was awful and completely out of character for an extrovert like me.
This stage can go on for years unless you decide that it’s time for a different reality.
But there is always hope.
Phase 3 feels like finally letting go of the mask, a re-birth, and start of a new life. This is the time that you’ll let go of all expectations, and just begin to find your true self. It is not uncommon to see people make shifts in career, sexuality, beliefs, and even geographical location.
Phase 4 is all about cementing your new interests, values, and goals, as well as unlearning socialized behaviors.
This is the fun part you get to choose who you are, and let go of who you thought you should be in life.
Please look out for the second part of this article for more ground-breaking realizations.
