That said, I love watching people. Observing who they are. Listening to where they've come from in life, making up who they are. It's fascinating to me and I enjoy getting to know everyone. There's people you agree with, disagree with. Connect with or intentionally avoid. But it's a wonderful experience because you get to find out yourself amidst others who are doing the same thing in their own way. It's the coolest and at the same time, oddest dichotomy. We're together in finding our individuality.
Being a communication major I think I pay more attention to this than others, because a lot of what I study is metrics. So I'm constantly watching others. What they like or don't like, what the majority opinion is on topics, etc. And the other day in class, we had a discussion about the future. Sounds vague, I know. But our professor spent time to tell us that we actually do matter, aren't just a number, yadda yadda. We're two weeks out from finishing the quarter, but that speech solidified the fact that even he's checked out of the quarter too. It's cool, we all are over it at this point too, professor.
What caught my eye about this particular conversation though was the responses to his speech and PowerPoint. Most didn't agree with him that it takes work to get somewhere of relative success in life.
It took a lot of effort on my part to subtly pick my jaw up off the ground.
I couldn't believe it. I mean, I know my generation is lazy and self-entitled, but to actually stand up and say that against someone who's trying to motivate us? It was shocking to me that someone would actually do that on a topic that really isn't controversial. This isn't like we were debating abortion rights or something. It was just a speech on how to land a job that will pay well so we could live a good life.
But this student decided to say "nope, I'd rather rely on blind luck that someone will offer me a job and I can then go from there. But I'm not going to seek anything out".
I'm writing this because I come from a place of hard work. Anything I've wanted in life I've been told I had to work for it. Nothing comes free and everything has a price. It comes down to how bad you want it before you get it. It could take days, months, weeks, years or even decades, but if you want it, you have to work to get it.
Call me crazy, but I'm pretty sure that's how any corporation is, too. Ask any CEO from any company that does an effective job, and 9 out 10 will say they had to work their butts off to get where they are today. Sure, not everyone will be a CEO, or even a manager, but shouldn't you work your hardest and best at anything you ever do?
I guess this student expects someone to hand a job to them, and I'm assuming they're going to wait a long time before something decent comes along their way. But this generational mentality scares me. Why should we expect others to just do stuff for us? Why can't we learn to do it ourselves? Sure it takes hard work, but I don't think there's ever been a person in the history of ever that said it wasn't a good payoff once the job was completed.
We're the next leaders of the world in many capacities. Parents of the upcoming generation, leaders of the current companies, voters for the next leaders of the country, and much more. It seems like not many of my age take this as seriously as they should. Why else do we have teen parents going to jail for child abuse, or record lows at the poll booths? I'm not writing this with the intent to offend, I'm writing this with the intent to inspire and think about what our world is, and what we can do to make it better. Life won't get better if you don't decide to make a change. You can't lose weight by just not eating Twinkies anymore. You have to go to the gym to exercise and burn the fat off. You can't be smarter by leaving a book on the shelf. You have to pick it up and study, or you have to seek those who are smarter and have been there before you to understand the concepts and theories. It takes work. It takes dedication and discipline. That's what will impress others. That's what will help land a good job. That's what will give you a better life, because you worked hard to get to a good point.
I guess I'm "old fashioned". But I want to be the best, and I know that the best don't stop at "just okay", and they never settle. My generation needs to wake up and stop twiddling their thumbs expecting to be vine famous. Our parents thought 15 minutes of fame was fast. Our generation is even faster. Ask anyone where today's viral hits are now that they aren't viral anymore. Even then, to maintain that level of fame is intensive work. Jerome Jarre, famous French viner now has his own team to help him assemble his vines and Instagram photos/videos literally frame by frame to make sure it'll be a hit. They spend hours a day filming and refilming six second clips. He isn't just good at going on the fly with his work. It's planned and worked on before people see it. But all people think about is getting millions of views off a video. They don't consider the work that has to go into the production of it. Yet it comes as a shock when they see just how much they have to do to be a legitimate success. Why not realize this before you want a well off life, and work on having a strong work ethic before you even do anything of relative success? Personal opinion, but I have a feeling that if you premeditate your level of work before you do it, you'll be more successful in actually doing it.
Anyway, I know this is long winded writing, but I like to type my thoughts out loud. Thank you to those of you who have read all the way to this point. You rock. Really, you do.
