Confessions of a Geriatric Millennial*

When I occasionally hear people complaining about "millennials" -- I sure as hell know they're not talking about me.

I may be a millennial by birth and, ok, I admit I love a perfectly ripe avocado once in a blue moon (I also enjoy Blue Moon), but I'm not exactly sure why all the hate against my same-age tribe...

As a MILLENNIAL, I...

- spend less time on my phone than many Gen X'ers (and even some Boomers I know)

- prefer reading print/hardcover books to e-books

- have always gravitated toward deep commitment and monogamous relationships

- have found the most meaningful relationships in my life through friends and face-to-face encounters (vs. online)

- have a high standard for myself and don't expect any participation trophies, ever

- am not physically or emotionally or mentally lazy (spend an hour with me)

- vote and am politically engaged in a way that makes sense for me

- pride myself on relatively strong communications skills, where I go to great lengths to make sure I'm listening more than I am talking, and finding common ground

- donate to causes local and global, because I am quite aware of my privileged middle-class life

- enjoy spending time with, and learning from, folks older and more experienced than I am (and grateful for the mentorship)

- try to balance my personal life with my career -- in fact, as a career coach, I spend most of my days helping "successful" professionals navigate (read: leave) toxic jobs

- avoid social media, other than LinkedIn for work purposes (and for the occasional snarky post like this one)

- avoid flaking out and flakes and flakiness (like the plague)

- have job-hopped a few times before realizing that I didn't enjoy working for corporations that sometimes peddled expensive stuff to people who didn't need (or couldn't afford) it

- bake my own bread (way before covid) and cook my own meals and craft my own Nutella-esque spread when the spirit moves me; don't worry, I have an Amazon account like you, though I try not to use it too much, favoring instead local or small business where possible

- worked and paid my own way through college (note: I did receive significant help from merit-based scholarships, which I like to think I earned through academic effort, a different sort of "work")

- happily pay my fair share of taxes

- never ask my parents for money

- random: grew up in a time and place where my baby diapers were not disposable, but were instead the kind that were washed and re-used (ecofriendly before that was a trendy term, am I right?)

I'm not perfect (fairly flawed, if you must know), but I just don't know why people like to shit on us millennials. In the same way, it gets my blood boiling when I see ageism/age discrimination happening especially for my more seasoned career coaching clients -- and we often work through that challenge together)...

I suppose this is nothing new. It is human nature to make assumptions / biases about any group of people... but it is LIKEWISE human nature to question those silly biases and try to do better.

Let's--all of us--do better.

?

*Geriatric Millennial is a term coined by the fabulous Erica Dhawan: https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/ericadhawan/