This is not an inspirational post. At least, not directly.
This is an angry post, because I’m angry.
Something kind of just occurred to me recently. Or rather, it was something I’ve known for awhile now, but only recently have been able to put into words accurately enough.
“You can be whatever you want” and “Follow your dreams” are almost as burned into my generation’s brains as much as the freaking D.A.R.E. campaign. It’s practically propaganda. And honestly, if that was the end of it, if that was the only thing, I could at least understand it. It’s largely coming from a place of love, or hope, or compassion, or at least ignorance.
It’s the second part that’s so infuriating, and frustrating, and honestly kind of baffling.
How many articles are there out there about how millennials keep expecting unrealistic things like ‘work-life balance’ and ‘jobs that make them satisfied’ and ‘reasonable pay’ and, God fucking forbid, ‘happiness’.
You cannot tell people to follow their dreams, and that they can be whatever they want, and then turn around and tell them ‘WTF are you trying to be happy for? Get the fuck over yourself and take a job you hate like the rest of us. Stop trying to be happy.’
I’ve legit heard people say ‘Maybe you should stop looking for a job that makes you happy and start looking for a job that makes you money.’
To be clear: I get that on a certain level. Yes, most of us have had to work shit jobs. I did, and then I got insanely lucky. It isn’t that we are expected to work jobs we hate at some point in our life. It’s the idea that we’re expected to settle into a career we hate for the rest of our life.
You can’t fucking plant seeds and then begin frothing at the fucking mouth in anger when the seed you planted actually grows. Like, who the fuck does that?
I know I’m generalizing. I know there are lazy, entitled shitheads my age out there, and there are honest, realistic, reasonable, non-asshole people from the next generation up and beyond, but it can’t be denied that a lot of people made this happen.
And honestly, this doesn’t even begin to touch on all the problems that were dumped in my generation’s lap, nor the ways in which the world has changed, like actually changed in a fundamental and objective ways, and for some reason older generations literally refuse to acknowledge this fact.
But this is what was on my mind.
I don’t really know how to end this. I guess by saying: If someone is miserable, and wants to be happier, maybe the correct answer isn’t ‘Get the fuck over yourself’.