Generation "Why"

As a Millennial (aka a member of Generation Y), I've noticed myself and a lot of my peers struggling with finding purpose. This starts in our careers and bleeds over into our lives. We have a hard time connecting with why do we do what we do for so many hours a week: why is it important, valuable, or engaging?

Over the past 100 years, I feel people have moved away from simply making a living with their jobs towards trying to enrich their lives with their careers.

What has changed over time that has made us so restless? For starters, we have many more job options available to us now, thanks to ease of access to both information and travel. Additionally, with the accessibility of higher education, there is a prescribed path laid out for many of us: go to primary school up through high school, then go to college, then get a job (and/or pursue a graduate degree). We have clearly defined goals and timelines up until the time when we get a job and join the workforce.

Once we're out in the "real world," it's up to us to decide what's important, to choose what we want to do, and to find our own "why." However, we were never taught how to live a meaningful life in school. Our society focuses on outcomes, following a formula for success, and checking boxes. There is much less emphasis on the process, understanding that things don't go according to plan, and figuring it out as you go along.

Increase in options + Newfound freedom + Lack of direction = Analysis paralysis

When you combine an increase in options with newfound freedom and a lack of direction, and you end up with a classic case of analysis paralysis. There are so many great options, but when you don't have enough direction, it's overwhelming and difficult to choose. Everyone always talks about finding your passion, but how? They don't give any practical advice on how to do this.*

One of my favorite classes in college was a senior seminar called Wisdom and Well-being. It addressed real life matters: how to make good decisions, how to manage emotion, how to be wise, how to be happy -- and what is happiness, anyway? We even took time to explore our own personal values and goals for the future, which was an incredibly worthwhile exercise.

Based on my experiences thus far, and that of my friends and peers, I believe we need more education like my Wisdom and Well-being class to prepare us to live life. Uncovering your core beliefs and values, determining what is important to you, and trying to find the meaning in whatever you do should be the undercurrent of education.

A few months ago, I finished Simon Sinek's book, Start with Why. He asserts that you should first start with why you are doing something, then how you will do it, and then what you will actually do. While he was looking at this through the lens of business primarily, I see many parallels to everyday life. "Why" should come first - and the rest will follow.

I'd love to hear your thoughts - do you think this is a Millennial thing, a young adult thing (regardless of generation), or simply an adult thing (regardless of age)?

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* By the way - If you're having trouble discovering your core values, you could perform a root cause analysis. Ask yourself a question like, "What's important to me?" and then once you have an answer, ask "Why is that important to me?" and just keep asking "Why" until you've reached a value or principle that cannot be explained further.