The Millennial Trap: Living Life With An Insatiable Need to Improve It

Millennial, noun, a person born between 1982-2000, reaching adulthood in the early 21st century.

You know what? I'm going to do it differently this time.

I'll give you the TL;DR version of this piece right away, millennial-style. Who's got time to read a 500-word blog post anyway?

Too Long; Didn't Read

What us millennials forget to realize is that our expectations, the room for improvement we see, and the idealized future we seem to regard as our birthright, are robbing us of the imperfect beauty that is actually manifesting itself right in front of us every day.

That's it. You can go get an artisan latte now.

In all seriousness, what follows is an attempt to give you a surface-level overview of what millennials are struggling with from what I've seen, being a millennial myself.

Our desires have been fed from the time they were born. “You can be anything you want!”, said the mother of the millennial dreamer. Not just our desires, but also our belief in our own capabilities, coupled with the participation awards that confirmed our inherent worth and bolstered our self-esteem. Our inclination to continue to exist and enhance ourselves, or conatus, as Spinoza called it, has been well- if not over-developed.

So dream we did. We dreamt of being a superhero that ‘makes a dent in the universe’ from the comfort of an open office space filled with bean bags, sexy colleagues, amazing coffee, constant praise from our superiors, and quick promotions to the top that prove our genius. 

And we expected our dreams to come true. Can you blame us for it? Advertising, our culture (or are the two synonymous?), our parents and rich, perhaps over-stimulated imaginations, set us up for disappointment.

A disappointment that hit as soon as we entered ‘the real world’. And when we did, we worked our ass off to prove to ourselves that we could indeed have what we had always dreamed of, until the constant praise and awards stayed out and we inevitably ran out of steam.

That’s when we got our first burnouts and started to realize that we’re already 30 and not millionaires yet. Or we haven’t found the perfect life partner yet. And look at the small apartment we’re still living in! Where’s that villa and where is that dent in the universe we were supposed to have made already? 

Not meeting our own expectations leads to frustration and self-blame. The self-blame is worsened by the “success” of others we see all around us on social media, combined with the fact that we know we are responsible, all too responsible, for our own success. When we fail to achieve it, we blame ourselves.

And so the house of cards collapses, and room is made for life, for real life, to sink in.

But the hole left by our expectations quickly gets filled by something else. Some will lose themselves to the bottle, drugs, or entertainment-addiction in one of its many forms. We're seeing extreme forms of this in the U.S.

Others get their act together however, start being less hard on themselves and learn to appreciate what they do have, which, by current and historical standards, is a helluva lot.

Because this may be the key characteristic of a wasted life; being unappreciated. A life spent in denial of itself through an insatiable need to improve it.

Here's Family Guy's hilarious take on the Millennial Trap: