Will I ever be as cool as my parents?

Sometimes I worry that at 23 I'll never be as cool as my parents were. People don't usually think of their parents as cool, but mine definitely were. They never tried to kid us into thinking they were angels, reflecting on their decisions and hoping to impart at least some of their wisdom on us. But my parents were the people who DID things. They were slightly rebellious, outgoing, adventurous people. Sometimes I worry that my goody-two-shoes life means that I've let all my opportunities for acceptable rebellious adventures pass me by. It's almost time for... REAL LIFE. Ugh. How depressing does that sound? I'm jealous of my brother who has always bucked the conventional trends and is pursuing a career in culinary arts. (Plus, that will DEFINITELY benefit me later on!) And my little sister, who is applying to schools near Tahoe so that she can snowboard all the time. She's also debating deferring for a year and literally just working retail or waitressing while spending all her spare time with her boyfriend on their boards on the mountain. I am JEALOUS.

But then I remind myself that there's no need to have accomplished everything by age 23. In fact, by this time in my mother's life she was already pregnant with me and their lives were settling down. This year my mother will have been married more of her life than she was single. It's a bizzare concept when I really think about it.

I think what it comes down to is that I've always focused so much on pleasing my parents by focusing on the things you're supposed to that I gave up free time for the wild, crazy things I wanted to do. Don't get me wrong, I am thrilled to be graduating Northeastern magna cum laude with my bachelor's in journalism and sociology. I just... feel like I haven't quite reached my full potential yet. As soon as classes/finals are over, I'm going to go back to making more me time. And in that me time I want to work on my lists of goals that I've created (To Do Before 30 and Life Overall). I'm totally inspired too by the blogs My 99 Problems and Boston in 60. Maybe I'll work on a format like that for 2009?

Collar bones, smart asses & the bureaucratic process

Small but significant non-scale related skinny moments:

• My favorite pair of black work pants is now akin to wide-leg trousers. (Thanks to Kate Moss for making them “in” yet again.)
• I have collarbones! I can see them! And they are cute!
• When I suck in my tummy, it actually goes inward instead of simply going flat.
• Rings that used to fit only on my pinky now sit comfortably on my ring finger.

I’m trying really, really hard to learn to bite my tongue. Participating in larger blog communities invites a lot of praise AND criticism. I’m well aware that everyone who reads something I post won’t agree with me, and that is completely fine. However, I’d appreciate that if you do leave a negative comment you say something constructive instead of simply referring to me (and all of my peers) as smart asses.

The sheer amount of detail-oriented things that need to be thought about on a day-to-day as an adult continues to blow me away. To update my car’s registration and get my own insurance required carefully coordinated power-of-attorney forms, which then allowed the title to be changed to my name. And the car was registered in my name, so that I could get my own insurance. This process also apparently required getting new license plates, which meant that I couldn’t apply for my school parking permits until I got the new plate number. And at some point within the next 10 days it needs to be inspected, back in the state it’s registered. Holy shit, what a process! I don’t whether to scream at the sheer bureaucracy of it or call my daddy and cry for him to take care of it like he’s always done. Probably neither, I suppose.

And I leave you with this:

I wanted a perfect ending. Now I've learned, the hard way, that some poems don't rhyme, and some stories don't have a clear beginning, middle, and end. Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what's going to happen next. Delicious Ambiguity. (Gilda Radner)

The New Recruiting Psychographic Persona

This was a piece I put together as part of a presentation to my company's HR department as background for redesigning their recruiting materials. Although some of it seems pretty obvious to a twentysomething, some of the people that it was presented to were absolutely amazed.

“I” statements that reflect what recent graduates are looking for:

• The most important things to me are my coworkers and the company’s culture. I want to work with people who are enthusiastic, stimulating, friendly, competent, and fun. I like to be able to form friendships with my coworkers and also want to have a good relationship with my boss. I think coworkers and management should be approachable, especially if I need help.
  
• A competitive salary is also important to me. With college loans looming, I’m very concerned about money. As it becomes the norm to have an undergrad degree I would like to maintain a competitive edge by pursuing a graduate degree. I am very interested in finding an employer who will help finance my MBA.
  
• I would like to be appreciated for my accomplishments. It’s important for me to receive actionable and detailed feedback, so that I can improve and exceed your expectations.
  
• I am aggressive and constantly seeking to improve myself. I want to be challenged. I am looking for a job that allows me to participate fully in the projects I am working on. I am comfortable working on teams, in a supportive or leadership role.
  
• I want the work I do to mean something. I would like to work with a product that correlates with my ideals and may be important to society.

Read the full article at Employee Evolution.

Some of what I've been saying lately...

In response to an email from Ryan Healy of Employee Evolution regarding a podcast tonight for the WSJ with Ramit Sethi:

As far as opinions on the podcast goes -- I wonder if maybe the reason we're so ready, willing, and able to embrace our impatience is because we were told from a very young age, "You can do whatever you want. You can be whatever you want." I also know that my parents have also tended to talk to me as an adult, and an equal, engaging in discussions that ran the gamut of politics, careers, social issues, and the like. Also, at this point in our lives very few of us have responsibilities that ground us to certain locations or positions. This is the ideal time to explore, travel, and embrace any opportunity. I'm a firm believer that you never know where the path may take you - it's so filled with twists and turns - and that you will regret more those things which you did not do more than those stupid things you may have tried and failed at.

I think it's also easier for people our age to express our opinions without being censored by a heirarchical media structure thanks to the prevalance of blogging and sites like Facebook. This helps us engage each other and mobilize. We're not staging protests like Kent State in the 70s, but we're connecting, discussing, and mobilizing online -- with a much wider network. It's easier to express your opinions, to quit a job and pursue something you really want to do, or push back against the ideals of your parents/grandparents if you know that you're not alone.

Comment thread to the lastest Twentysomething post on Brazen Careerist, "The Paradox of Choice, Gen-Y Style":

Interesting how most of the comments to this post focus not on the general topic, but on specifics that Ryan mentions - moving home, joining the Peace Corps, etc. Isn’t the whole point of this discussion to talk about how there are CHOICES, which basically comes to meaning that what may be right for you may not be right for me, and vice versa. It also means that what may be right for me this year, may be the complete opposite of what will be right for me next year. I was a straight-A (almost) student in HS, I have a 3.9 GPA in college, and I’m on a pretty good track toward finding out what kind of job I want to have when I graduate. Other the other hand, my brother couldn’t care less about school (he gets mostly Bs & Cs), but he could take my car apart and rebuild it into something else without any kind of instructions. I think it’s important to remember that we each bring our own bias and personal experiences to this ongoing discussion. And that’s what it should be - a discussion - not an argument, not a “I’m right and you’re wrong” battle.

And please don’t even start with the fact that you’re 30 and somehow that means you’re past your peak. Are you kidding me? My mom is 45 and she’s looking to shift jobs because she’s found that after 9 years hers is not longer challenging or satisfying anyone. She also pursues several active hobbies on the side, including gardening and hiking. The fact that somehow by you being 30 you’ve ‘missed the boat’ is the biggest cop-out. You don’t have to quit your job and join the peace corps, especially if you’re settled. But no one is stopping you from pursuing hobbies on the side of your regular job. And how knows, maybe you’ll end up changing careers somewhere
down the line.

Comment on the same post on the Employee Evolution site:

I think change can be really hard for some people. And maybe some of them feel insulted that we're pushing back and saying, no I'm sorry, that's not what I want. Like it somehow devalues what they've worked so hard to attain. It will be interesting, however, to see what happens as all those hardworking boomers start hitting their retirement years. I think they're going to cause as much of a shift in that area as we're going to cause coming into the workforce.