Ok Doomer: Are Millennials ‘Generation Exhausted’?

Posted byContent CatnipPosted inA Day in the Life, BlogTags:, , , , , , , , ,
purple sunset

Covid and endless inflation, AI and global conflicts, misinformation and political instability. Climate change and extinction. The world is full of unknowns and bin fires at the moment.

All of the above unknowns are getting onto my head like a low-key buzzing static sound just below perceptible  human hearing. Animals hear it. Plants hear it. It’s the sound of the natural world being throttled. It’s the sound of the natural world screaming.

With so much uncertainty, is it any wonder millennials and younger are feeling tired. I feel fucken exhausted. There I’ll say it…..I wonder if you can relate?

Sorry if this comes as a departure from my usual nourishing and optimistic stuff.

The burn-out and the feeling of exhausting one’s personal resources to cope in this rapidly changing world is a shared experience. At least from articles I’ve been seeing lately.

When you love your work and consider it a calling, or if you’re exceptionally purpose-driven and committed, your job will demand a lot of you. You can often find yourself overextended, because you’re so passionate about your cause and care so deeply about improving others’ lives, or you’re overcommitted to your organization’s mission or goals. But without sufficient periods to rest and recharge, the risk is high for exhaustion, depersonalization, and, down the line, a lack of efficacy, as you become increasingly overwhelmed and depleted.

When work becomes the central focus of our lives (for any reason)—or when our identity gets excessively wrapped up in what we do for a living—we run the risk of making too many personal sacrifices and losing sight of our own self-care, leaving us ripe for burnout.

When Meaningful Work Backfires, Time Magazine

There was the great resignation, when people left their jobs en masse circa 2021. “Quiet quitting” described people refusing to work outside their paid hours amid pressure to work overtime or be constantly on-call.

Now a new term has emerged: The Great Exhaustion, which starts with stress directly related to work and piles on wider anxieties about the state of the world — such as climate change, war, political instability and the rising cost of living.

“The Great Exhaustion is a reflection of this collective experience of being burned out, tired, emotionally fatigued, by work and all things in our world, as well, that go beyond work,” said Jennifer Dimoff, an organizational psychologist who teaches at the Telfer School of Management at the University of Ottawa.

Stressed at work? Anxious about the wider world? You might be part of ‘The Great Exhaustion, CBC

Feel the burn(out): Millennials are aging from bright-eyed ‘hustle culture’ workers into exhausted middle managers, Fortune

Just searching on the topic of burnout and modern malaise brings back many results but about 90% of them are about work and ‘optimising people to ensure they perform’. What about if you don’t want to be optimised? What about if you do not believe in the sanitised corporate lie you are being fed? You can just stop…for a while at least. If you have the means to get off the train do so.

I think part of the exhaustion for me is realising I posesss a fragile, mortal and organic body made from the same stuff as ancient people had. Yet they didn’t have the internet or late stage capitalism or the 24 hour news cycle, or debt peonage or the underclass of the gig economy any of that shit. Instead they were looking to the sky, the soil and the animals for clues and portents.

We are wired that way, in the deepest parts of us if we search far enough we can remember our impermanence and interconnectedness with nature. Being plugged in to the ‘in silico cyberpunk’ modern world is taxing on our stone age brains and bodies and this is why we’re exhausted. I know I can’t speak for anyone here except myself.

Maybe you are older than me or younger, maybe you feel really great and highly motivated right now. If so I humbly ask what keeps you feeling that way and if I can cultivate some of the same I will try. But don’t do it for the corporate overlords or the greedy gods of productivity – they will never be satisfied. Endless growth is their motto and the natural world with us as individuals inside are not made to healthily grow in this way.

The only things that endlessly grow in this world are cancers and corporate profits.

Published by Content Catnip

Content Catnip is a quirky internet wunderkammer written by an Intergalactic Space Māori named Content Catnip. Join me as I meander through the quirky and curious aspects of history, indigenous spirituality, the natural world, animals, art, storytelling, books, philosophy, travel, Māori culture and loads more.

20 thoughts on “Ok Doomer: Are Millennials ‘Generation Exhausted’?”

  2. My perspective on today’s generation is shaped by the stark contrast between their experiences and the circumstances I encountered growing up. By the age of 16, I was navigating life independently, working to support myself, and overcoming the challenges of homelessness by living out of my car or staying with friends. I funded my college education through diligent savings, avoiding the burden of debt. At 26, after enduring numerous unreliable landlords, I was able to purchase my first home. By 40, I had achieved my dream of buying a forever home and had entered into a loving marriage. Though I now enjoy a life free of debt, the journey was arduous, exacting a significant toll on me physically, emotionally, and mentally.

    In my view, the challenges faced by young people today stem from unrealistic goals and expectations. Many appear to aspire to sudden success via social media, or rely on external sympathy and financial handouts, rather than setting achievable targets and working towards them with resilience and determination.

    Thoughts?

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    1. I don’t really agree actually Thomas financial handouts, such as free education or free healthcare can mean the difference between someone escaping poverty or not. There are many factors that impact someone’s success in life, how poor their parents were, what kind of education they got. If they were physically or sexually abused as a child. What country they were born in or grew up in. If they are disabled or not, their intelligence and ability to learn. If they are refugees or their second language is English. People can overcome different barriers through perseverance but the more barriers people have the harder the uphill battle. Learning people’s individual stories with empathy is good I think as everyone is different and have different strengths. Glad you overcame all of that Thomas. I overcame a lot as well.

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      1. For example, my family would not have been able to send me to college if they had to pay upfront. I was able to get a loan to pay for that from the Australian government meaning I could get an education and elevate myself out of that.

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      2. Hi Thomas I am really sorry if my comment came over as a bit harsh. I want you to know I really respect and admire you and feel sad to hear of your experiences. It’s an enormous credit to you that you overcame all of that and you are an incredible person with a lot of wisdom to share. I thought looking back on that comment it might have seemed harsh but I hope you didnt take it this way. Take care my friend.

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  3. I’m a genx and yes it does feel tiring, more than I did when I was younger and these problems existed back then. We were told oil would run out in 25 years, sea levels would rise to swamp cities in 25 years, nuclear threat from Russia, Iran Iraq conflists, Northern Ireland conflict… the list goes on.

    The difference is that it’s fed to us all the time and it’s not the situations it’s now they’re presented to us. Situations come at us from the point of view of we need to solve it when as an indvidual we don’t have the power to.

    Mayeb that’s why we’re al exhausted?

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    1. You are so spot on Simon. Yes I think that’s the root of it, the feeling of helplessness and hopelessness. These are problems to do with policy and decisions made by government to ignore things or ‘let the market decide’ in other words let very wealthy powerful people decide on the fate of us peons or peasants at the bottom. It’s why I started doing activism, to be honest it helped with the feeling of hopelessness I was feeling, sometimes even that though it can be exhausting. You are right, the news is always bad or ‘the worst it will ever be’….I heard someone call the news “misery porn” and its addictive but knowing all about it or staying informed about it doesn’t make it easier. I wish I could have a nice dog and build a hut in a forest instead hehe https://youtu.be/TWRx3omTAZg?si=7WK0r4czIKWzmkIX

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      1. I feel I could happily retreat to a hut in the forest with a dog as well. The problem I have is everyone is feeding us their own narrative and nobody knows what’s the truth.
        I admire you for your activism, but I avoid the news mostly at all costs and live my life as best I can. I can’t know it all or know what’s best… Is it even my place to?

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  4. I’m a millennial and the modern world really is exhausting. You hit the nail on the head – there is so corporate greed, and it’s leading to sickness, economic struggles, and a sense of listlessness. Even people who “make it” are barely getting by and, when things like home ownership and a family seem impossibly out-of-reach, what’s the point of even trying? I know a lot of people who feel hopeless, and it’s really sad.

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    1. I feel you my friend on all counts about home ownership, family, all of it. The uncertainty about the future of our world was what made me finally decide to not have kids, but it’s a personal decision and I fully respect anyone’s decision to have kids. Yeah I know what you mean about ‘making it’, I rather like my job and what it entails but due to inflation it feels like it’s a constant battle financially just to stay afloat. All of the articles are saying it used to be easier for older generations. I believe the greedy ones at the top who pay almost zero tax on their billions in profit should be held accountable.

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      1. Yes, I agree, 100% on all points. It’s tough, and the generations before that had things good are changing the rules to make it harder for young people to succeed. It’s rough.

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  6. All too often I see articles about younger generations claiming that we don’t want to work, that we’re lazy, etc. What they choose not to acknowledge is that we are not actually lazy, nor do we have a poor work ethic.

    We’re simply tired of being taken advantage of for the sake of corporate greed and profits. We collectively decided to not feed into it any longer and reclaim our sense of belonging; our purpose. We are not machines to “optimize output”. We are flesh and bones who have wants and desires that we deem more important than our jobs.

    We don’t live to work like our parents/grandparents. We saw the effect that had on them and made it a point to not live that way. Additionally, they were rewarded with actual incentives when they performed well; a bonus, a raise, better benefits, etc; something that motivated them. As much as we love food, pizza is not a proper motivator.

    If corporate wants to have a high performer, they need to incentivize workers properly for their hard work; not an office pizza party which rewards everyone regardless of how they perform. I could go on, and on, but I’ll call it quits for the sake of my sanity.

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    1. You are SO RIGHT Dezerae! I couldn’t have said it better myself. There is a tangible sense that corporatisation of our lives has taken hold of every aspect of life. People can’t just relax anymore it’s a case of optimising our downtime or some other bullshit like that. Also the idea that we have to pay a tonne of money to go to a retreat to relax I find equally as insulting when it should be everyone’s right to tune-out and enjoy life and enjoy nature…it’s the commodification of everything quiet and sacred in our world I find distasteful.

      I really agree with your point here about how our parents and grandparents had a clear path to follow through life, a clear trajectory of a working life, mortgage, family, retirement etc, but for us with AI and everything else, there is no clear path for us. This is both an opportunity but also a source of great anxiety for me . But just trying to see it as an opportunity and think about enjoying ‘right now’ and not being too worried about what the outcome of all of this will be.

      I agree about your statement about the performance versus pay thing as well, it is massively demotivating. I am sorry as well for my doomer response. An idea…perhaps if we come together as a generation, be kind to one another and form communities to talk over issues like these…I think it would be beneficial for us.

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