I am part of Generation Y. While navigating my post-college life in the past few years, I've come to realize that one of the defining characteristics of my generation (as much our saving grace as it is our fatal flaw) is that we are a generation that feels entitled. We feel entitled to have jobs that match our ideals and intellectual curiosities; we didn't experience the urgency of needing a job purely for survival like our grandparents did during the great depression. We feel entitled to instant communication; we were youths when the internet became all-pervasive and are coming of age when it is indispensible. We are largely culturally liberal, as the first civil unions in the US were offered in 2000 in Vermont, and have lived in a time of increasing protections for the LGBT community. We like the sound of human capital more than financial capital. We are champions of human rights and individual identity. We feel entitled to things that empower us, and that is what makes us so strong. Sometimes, however, the dark side of our generation rears its head. We are all striving to be superhuman, inspired by images of ideal people that are unobtainable. I want to be successful like Bill Gates. I want to make an impact in this world. I want to be sexy like the airbrushed models in magazines (women & men). I want to be seen. As important as self-empowerment is, an unintended consequence of wanting so much is that we forget about what we need. What we need is a bit more emotional capital. In a time when we seem to be able to have it all, including medicine that will take away our anxieties when we don't get it all, how do we stay sane?
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