Gen Y

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A Few Words of Advice to Gen Y From a Baby Boomer


One thing having lived a lot of years does for you, it gives you a ton of perspective.  Here are a few things I have learned along the way, only too often the hard way.

1.  Marry your best friend — That’s right!  The guy or woman you want is your best friend.  Marriages generally end over three things, money, trust, and communication.  Consider, that person you consider your best friend is a person you would hate to lie to, would trust with your life, and will tell pretty much everything.  And that is exactly the type of person, if not the person you want to marry.

(January 4, 2013 amendment)  A response I received to this section of this post, though maybe given a bit tongue-in-cheek, did none-the-less give me pause to think I had been less than clear, and that there is more to say.

From experience I known people say “we are just friends” and by extension say “why would I want to ruin a good friendship.”  The backdrop to such statements is the consideration of dating such a person, and that dating a friend might ruin a good friendship that you value.  I am asserting that such a belief is absolutely wrong.

If you are a woman and have some really good friends who are male, one of them may well be your best match as a partner in life, as a spouse.  The same is true for guys who might consider one of their best female friends.  My wife is also my best friend, and because of that I believe that it is the best combination possible.  Dating a friend cannot ruin a good friendship because real friends stay with you regardless of events.  If you truly are friends, dating such a person and then finding out the romantic feelings you need just are there should in no way hinder you from going back to being really good friends.  If anything, such an experience should only strengthen such a friendship.

2.  Make a career out of what thrills you — Our society sadly places a lot of emphasis on how much a person earns.  The thing is, what most of us want the most is happiness.  And that leads to the question of how happy can you be when you are making a ton of money in a job you hate?  At some point you burn out and start asking yourself why it was you got into that profession in the first place.  You ask yourself if it was really worth it.  When the time comes you can consider retirement, you should find it almost unthinkable as continuing in your chosen profession still thrills you.

3. Resolve all family issues — I have this saying, “all families are crazy, it’s just a matter of degree.”  I really believe that.  We only get one set of parents and they are gone too often too early.  My father died right before my 21st birthday, and I had so much left to say to him and talk to him about.  When my mother died, she was 89, I felt there was nothing I had left unsaid, and that felt really good.  You can pick your friends but you cannot pick your relatives.  That is not to say you have to be on good terms with all your relatives, but it is good to remember that the ones you would rather not see probably have no knowledge of your feeling that way. With such people politeness and kindness goes a long way, and requires nearly nothing from you.  And for those in your immediate family that you feel have done you some sort of egregious wrong, come to terms with the issue by either resolving it with the person involved, or, accepting that this person’s failure in your eyes needs to have minimal effect upon you as you go forth.  Do whatever it takes to make that statement true.  But at the end of the day, know in your heart that you have done your level best with your parents and siblings, and that nothing that needs saying, particularly “I love you,” is left unsaid.

5.  Make self-care a priority — This is the sort of selfishness that is in keeping with a healthy mind, body, and spirit.  It is natural for most people to think of other people first and themselves 2nd or 3rd or even lower.  That is always the wrong approach.  A healthy body is paramount to how a person feels about himself.  Eat properly, exercise moderately, and see a doctor and a dentist on a regular, scheduled, basis.  Being in your 20s is not a free pass for good health.  Women can develop breast cancer and cervical cancer in their 20s.  Men can get heart disease and diabetes in their 20s.  Worse, since during our 20s we feel the best about our general state of health, these diseases can go undiagnosed until they present a far greater health risk than would have happened with a regular checkup.  Also, pretty much everyone gets gum disease and cavities regardless of age.  People with the healthiest minds are those who realise the need to talk out their problems, regardless of the nature of the problem, with either an expert or someone they trust, a best friend.  Getting feedback on our problems requires us to consider what we are doing and that we might find a better way of doing things.  Or it might reassure us that we are doing the right thing or are okay.  And lastly, but maybe most importantly, we need to find a healthy outlet for our anxieties.  We need a healthy distraction that takes our attention away from weighty things and towards something that makes us feel good in a healthy way.  This needs to be practiced daily if possible, but be something we know we can turn to as needed.  Having taken care of ourselves in this manner, we find ourselves more appealing, more available, and more attentive to others, particularly those we love and care about.  It is difficult for anyone who is not healthy in any of these three respects, physically, mentally, and spiritually, to be at our best for those who need us.

6.  Never loan anyone money — This might seem a bit rash but it is not.  I remember years ago a guy who asked to borrow $5 from me with the promise he would pay me back.  He never has paid me back and I have never forgotten that.  He is also dead now.  What I knew, even before that incident, was that I should give the person the money requested with the understanding that they would not pay me back.  The only requirement I put on them is that the time will come that someone needs to borrow some money from them and when they give that person the money, I will have been paid back.  I also tell them I do not want to hear about how that happens for them.  Remember, it is impossible to cop a resentment over money you give away while it is far to easy to get resentful over money loaned and not repaid.

7.  Don’t worry over what people think about you — Everyone wants to be thought well of but that, of course, is an impossibility.  Regardless of where we are, there will be people who do not care for us.  Maybe they would even say they hate us.  The amount of weight that has is entirely dependent upon how we view it.  I know there are people who I do not want to be around and people who do not want to be around me.  I accept that.  Getting caught up in the reasons one person hates me, or whatever, is a fool’s task.  Short of asking them, I can never be certain.  I do need to ask myself why it is important for me to know and what I intend to do with the information if I were to get it.  I am most likely wasting time that could be better used in another direction entirely.  Being grateful for the friends I do have and being grateful for them is usually all I have to remember to make the fact that someone does not like me unimportant.

8.  Always have a Plan B — I actually learned this from my years on active duty in the army.  We used to like to say, “anything that can go wrong probably will, and at the worst possible moment.”  Keeping that in mind has told me that my initial plan, “Plan A,” may fail and that I will be well served to have a “Plan B” in the ready.  It doesn’t hurt to have a “Plan C” and a “Plan D” as well, depending upon how important success is.  Life loves to throw us curve balls which means we are going to be needing a “Plan B” a lot!

9.  Life is messy — This is the natural follow-on to the previous mention, having a Plan B.  Said Robert Burns in his famous poem “To a Mouse, on Turning Her Up in Her Nest with the Plough,” said,

“But little Mouse, you are not alone,
In proving foresight may be vain:
The best laid schemes of mice and men
Go often awry,
And leave us nothing but grief and pain,
For promised joy!”

We make the perfect plan and still things go wrong, people do not react as we would hope, the weather does not cooperate, and our family drives us nuts.  But think how boring life would be were it predictable.  That challenge comes from meeting life’s messiness with the belief that we can persevere if only we do not allow things to get to us.

10.  Don’t take your self so damn seriously! — A couple of things that can quickly get us into trouble is our thinking how important our belief is or, worse, how important it is for us to be right, or worst of all, how important we are.  Throughout the history of man, all of the most important people who have ever lived have all died, sooner or later, and yet the world has not only gone on without them, but has done quite well.  Most of us have certain very strong beliefs that we are willing to fight for.  The thing with beliefs is, they are each and every one quite personal and unique to one person, ourself.  That is, it is difficult to find anyone who agrees 100% with any one of our beliefs 100% of the time.  While it is good to have strong beliefs, convictions, it is also good to remember that belief which differ from our own are equally important to their owner and deserving of respect.  A person who laughs at himself easily, is one other people will listen to respectfully.  And a person with strong convictions who respects another person of equally strong convictions, though they may be in direct opposition to his own, is a person whose convictions will gain consideration by those of other beliefs.

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Getting Sober In Your 20s


I have long thought about writing on this subject but have been reticent about “outing” myself.  But that has changed.  In January of this year, 2012, a young woman who I was friends with lost her battle with alcohol and prescription medication.   A little bit about her:  She was 31 years old at the time of her death.  I had known her for 3 years at that time and we had become close, closer than I even knew.  She came from a good family of substantial means.  She was a Yale graduate and a navy veteran.  She was tall, lean, well-liked, and by all outward appearances, in great health.  She was very athletic, able to run a marathon.  But in the end, all that was simply window dressing to a serious problem.

I have been a member of Alcoholics Anonymous for almost 14 years now.  I could easily have convinced myself that I did not have a problem with alcohol as I was never an everyday drinker, I had a job that I had held for a long time, and by all outward appearance, I was doing pretty well.  That just was not the case.  My inner turmoil was tremendous and had been that way since I was a teenager.  Whenever I felt an unpleasant emotion or unpleasant situation descending upon me, I would use alcohol at a means to blunt those feelings.  I also used the excuse of drinking to be “more socialable.”  And I really believed that was true!  But the truth was, I was failing to deal with my fears by covering them up which allowed me to do things that scared me.   That is, by any stretch of the imagination, not a healthy way to deal with problems.  In point of fact, it only serves to make the problems worse.

When I stopped drinking my only reason was to gain peace and sanity, neither of wich I had.  I did not believe I had an alcohol problem, but if the Alcoholics Anonymous program would help me with a legion of other problems I had, I would do it.  Fourteen years later I can say that regardless of what I believed all those years ago, my life today is fabulous because I made a commitment to stop drinking and to closely adhere to this 12-step program.   For as much as I hated life back then, I love it now.

My young friend who died early this year had a future as bright as anyone could want.  But I firmly believe she had some inner demons that kept dragging her down.  And within those demons was one in particular that told her that because she was so young and so healthy she could have another drink.  But that was the big lie.  For whatever reason, her last drink killed her.  And the truth is, it did not have to be that way.

I remember my 20s.  I was drinking hard and it never occurred to me that I either had a problem or that my drinking could have killed me.  It was not that I felt invincable, but that I refused to consider my actions as being all that dangerous to my own health and welfare.  Worse, it never occurred to me that it was having a hugely negative effect upon those people in my life, but it did.

I see young people coming into Alcoholics Anonymous all the time, as young as 17 I have seen.  It is extremely difficult for those people to believe that it would be best if they never took another drink.  Their concept of drinking is that it is something everyone does and that they are going to be just fine.  They cannot imagine being out with their friends who are drinking and not drinking themselves.  They are victims to peer pressure and their own faulty thinking.

Here is something to consider.  Have you ever made the statement, even to just yourself, that you need a drink or that you have to have a drink?  Most people would have to honestly answer that question with a “yes.”  The follow-up question necessarily has to be “why?”   Almost without exception, if a person is being entirely honest, the answer is going to come along the lines of having to deal with uncomfortable feelings or situations.  And then the honest person must ask themself how taking a drink is going to help that situation.  And the honest answer is, it will not!  The strong sober person deals with those feelings and situations head-on, without feeling it necessary to anaesthetizing themself.   They will actually view taking a drink as getting in the way of good progress.

Webster’s Dictionary defines sober as “straightforward: serious; plain or subdued; devoid of frivolity, exaggeration, or speculative imagination.”  I particularly like that last definition because it harkens unto “magical thinking.”  That is, the belief that if I take a drink I will somehow be better at something.   That, of course, is totally illogical, but that is also very common thinking.  Everyone does it but it is never right.

People in their 20s, the “Gen-Y” people, are prone to this magical thinking mostly because they lack the experience of life to tell them that the truth lies somewhere else.  It is not their fault.  It is just something every person must go through.  It is really easy for a person in their 20s to deny that they have any problem with alcohol because, as the thinking goes, they are too young to have such a problem.  That, of course, is pure b.s.  A problem drink is any drink that is taken in lieu of something else.

Anther thing, while people in their 20s and 30s may not believe they are immortal, they usually believe they have a lot of time in front of them and that they need not concern themselves with some of their immediate problems.  That somehow, those problems will work themselves out or that they will simply grow out of them or that they are just going through a phase.  All of this happens when anyone, regardless of age, is in denial about their root problems.

I feel certain my friend who died was in denial about her vulnerability to her problems with alcohol.  I think everyone uses denial at some time in their life, if not frequently, because a problem or situation feels overwhelming and that somehow, by denying the problem, it will eventually go away or fix itself.  From my own personal experience, I can tell you absolutely that this is just a big lie we tell ourselves. It is never ever true.

To those people who are in their 20s and 30s I ask that you consider if you have ever wondered if you have a drinking problem, or if it has ever been suggested that you might have one, that you take that extremely seriously.  Consider if a doctor suggested you might have skin cancer, would you ignore that in the hope that it would just go away?   Of course not!  Problem drinking is a medical problem in exactly the same way.  It is also, by definition, a spiritual problem.   I promise that those of you in your 20s and 30s, if you were to go to an alcoholics anonymous meeting you will not be in the presence of a bunch of old people who are one step removed from homelessness, although such people certainly attend such meetings.  In fact, you will find there is an entire portion of Alcoholics Anonymous devoted to young people that includes meetings that are mostly attended by young people.  There is a whole group of young people in Alcoholics Anonymous who refer to themselves as “never having had a legal drink,” and yet they have stayed away from alcohol for many years.

If you think you have a problem and want more information, feel free to contact me via email here, or, you can always find a central office of Alcoholics Anonymous listed in phone books and on the Internet regardless of where you live.

My hope in posting this it that it will give pause to young people to at least consider how they drink.  Even the slightest suspicion is worthy of attention.

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Job Advice to “Gen Y”


The posting was evoked by a blogger whose writing I consider to generally be excellent.  I recommend you visit her site http://lostgenygirl.com/2012/07/29/companies-need-to-make-it-easier-for-gen-y-to-job-hop/

That link will take you to her most recent post about Gen Y job hopping.

I am 63 years old and have been retired for over 5 years now.  In my lifetime have held a total of six different full-time jobs.  My last job lasted 19 years and gave me the means to retire both early and comfortably.

Were you to see my resume’, in addition to those six full-time jobs, you would see that I am a US Army veteran, have a B.S. degree and a Master of Arts degree.  But even though my master’s degree is from an extremely well thought of university, I would not want to be looking for a job in today’s market.

When I speak to young people today I always advise them to do a job that thrills them, and not to settle for something that just makes good money.  I tell them that they should look forward to going to work every day and if they do not, they should reconsider the decisions they have made thus far.  It is too easy to lay the blame for not liking a job at the employer’s feet.  The fact is, for most of us we sought out them to employ us.  We went to them.  They did not come to us.  It is not enough to say “I can do this job” but you have to be able to say “I can do this job and it meets most of my requirements for my own personal success and for my future desires.”

In my last job I had to work for a few bosses who were less than wonderful, who were jerks.  But I still performed to the best of my ability and then maneuvered myself within the company into a better position and a better boss.  It is up to you to not only meet the expectations of the job into which you are hired, but to inform your boss of your personal expectations from him and the company, particularly when those needs are not being met.  Personal responsibility is key to personal success.

One of the qualities that makes a person particularly desirable to a prospective employer, beyond your formal education, are the special skills you bring to the table.  It is rare that you cannot specialize within your chosen career field, and if you cannot then possibly  you need to reconsider your career choice.  Figure out the niche you like and that is attractive to your employer and then get him to pay for it.  Most will.  Such skills gain you leverage not only within that company, but with prospective employers in your future.  For example, I worked in aviation safety and was considered a “subject matter expert” in certain aspects of aircraft.  I became that by doing the laborious and tedious work of learning as much as I could about a very specific aspect of my job.  That is both highly desirable by a present employer and as a selling point to a prospective employer.

I know from experience that career fields become a small circle of colleagues and your expertise within your field of choice becomes a matter a basic public knowledge over time.  That does not mean everyone knows your name, but it means that by presenting a small set of facts you become both a known a desirable quantity.

People who job hop cannot gain long-term skills.  As time passes, job hoppers become less and less desirable to companies.  A person is judged by their history.  Good managers budget for years in advance and they have little desire to employ a person who has shown a propensity to leave a job after a short time.

Any company that plans in the long-term does not want high turn-over, and certainly will not plan for such.  Most companies hope that once a person reaches the age of 30 he has gotten a grasp on what he wants and will stay in his job for the long-term.  Before you think of job-hopping, consider how you are going to look to a prospective employer.  It is expected you will change jobs, just do not make a habit of it.

 

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Young People in the Workforce Dealing With Their Significantly Older Co-workers


This posting is inspired by a young lady who blogs on wordpress.com, http://lostgenygirl.com/2012/04/17/how-to-get-along-with-older-coworkers/ and that is a link to her post.  I recommend that everyone read it as she not only writes well, but she brings up many points about what young people encounter in the workplace.  I am most definitely one of those “older than her parents” people she would encounter.  She wonders how to relate to us and that is an exceptionally good question.  Other of her posts deal with what leadership her generation, “Gen-Y” needs to give.  Those thoughts dovetail nicely.

Several years ago I was in the position of hiring my replacement.  I had decided to retire at age 58.  I was burned out, to say the least.  You can read more about that in my previous posting.  I hired a young man who was getting his B.S. degree in aeronautical engineering and had plans to continue with his master degree in that same field.  I felt he was perfect, even though I am not that sort of engineer.  I was heavily involved with aircraft safety and was working on FAA and NASA projects.  Over the next year I was able to guide him into the job.

Engineers have this tendency to be socially awkward individuals who are frequently at a loss of how to interact.  I, fortunately, have never been so burdened.  In shepherding him along I saw him as a perfect fit who would in a very short time be doing my job much better than I ever had.

This was not the first time I had “summer interns” working for me.  We had a program to hire such individuals to do some of the analysis we simply did not have the time to do.  They were usually quite bright and highly motivated.  Most times their work was part of a thesis they had to present prior to graduation.  They were also always from far away places which meant they always left.  That last summer was different as I insisted to my boss that we hire this local fellow.  He was unaware of my retirement desire.

I considered it my job to make this young man as comfortable in his job as was possible.  The first job in your field of study can be daunting, and the fear of failure palpable.  But I thought it my responsibility to reassure him that he could only fail by not trying to do what was asked of him.  I told him that I did not expect him to grasp the entirety of what I did in one summer, or as it turned out, over the next year.   What I did expect of him was to show an aptitude for the work, which he did during the summer, and the willingness to do whatever he needed to plug on and succeed.   I told him that I expected he would make lots of mistakes and that was all right.  It is simply a part of the learning process.  The only bad mistake you can make is to not admit in a timely manner when you think you have made a mistake.

Rare is the job a person does that is so unique that most people in that workplace do not understand what you are doing.  But such jobs are usually the domain of much older workers anyway.  A young person entering the workplace is the future of the company.   They provide an energy all companies need.  But more importantly, they are frequently the source of innovation.  They come into the workplace unjaded, full of ideas, optimism, and youthful idealism, all good things.  But then they look at their coworkers and see a lot of people who are 15, 25, or more years older than they are.  How to relate?

One of the first things any new worker can do is to ask they fellow workers what they do.  I think of that as networking within the workplace.  Most people are more than willing to talk about what they do.  For the young person this can prove to be hugely helpful as they day will come when they will have a question one of those people can answer and they will know exactly who to ask.  Also, most jobs overlap which means other people are doing things relevent to your job.   That gives each worker, regardless of age, something they can relate to one another.  For the young worker, you can endear yourself to the older worker in this process, and that is extremely valuable.

Young college graduates are almost always hired into a workplace filled with college graduates.  The young person can make “small talk” by asking the older person where they went to college.  That can prove interesting, particularly if you graduated from the same college.  But even more, these days new college graduates are faced with the idea of graduate school, and that can be extremely intimidating.  Again, most of these workplaces are filled with people who completed graduate school.  Such people can prove an enormous resource for those going through the experience of graduate school.  This is particularly true when the master’s thesis looms large.  I know doing my master’s thesis would have been far easier had I been able to avail myself of others who had done it.  It never occurred to me to ask.

Young people, you need to give us “old people” a chance.  When you consider the entire spectrum of activities that interest you, you will almost invariably find overlaps with us.  I am, for example, a huge bicycling fan.  On the eve of the Boston Marathon I got together with a number of much younger people for the midnight ride of the marathon route.  When bicycling was put into focus we not only found common ground, but an activity we were actually able to do together.  We had a blast!

Where music is concerned things can be far more difficult but not impossible.  There are those of us who enjoy certain types of presently popular music from artists such as Katy Perry, Pink, Maroon5, and others, but you may enjoy things like blues, jazz, classical, and other forms of music we enjoy so it is not a hopeless task.

It is rare that I find a person I cannot find common ground with.  Sometimes it requires a fair number of questions, but sooner or later something always seems to come up.  This happened recently with a 22 year-old nephew who has an interest in history.  Although our particular interests are not exact, they are close enough that we can have intelligent discussions.

To all young people I say, give us a chance.  Talk to us about whatever your heart desires and see how we react.  We just might surprise you!  It is impossible to know what interests any person has until you engage that person in a discussion and find out for certain.  You may actually find some of us to be interesting and people who want to get to know better but you do have to give us a chance.