Why Slow-Adulting is a Good Thing

"Adulting" is not a very attractive word, and the millennial hang-up around it has made this generation the butt of a lot of jokes. By the end of the 2010s, millennials had started to embrace the mundane joys of grown-up life and clap back at Boomers for launching such an unfair critique after passing down a hostile economy. But then, millennials found themselves roasted yet again by the kids coming up behind them, as Gen-Z mercilessly took their elders to task for talking about adulting all the time, whether to complain or brag about their latest grown-up pseudo-milestone. Here’s our Take on how the millennial conversations about Adulting have shed much-needed light on that transition, and helped change how our culture views the purpose of our twenties and thirties. (In other words, you’re welcome, Gen-Z.)

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[milktoasted]

"Just because people have been growing up fast for generations doesn't mean they've been growing up well."

YUP

[remidogger]

I'm 27. A week ago my nephew who's 5 years old looked at me very seriously and said 'you're actually just still a kid too, aren't you?'. Little dude is way too wise

[raywilliams]

Maybe we resist becoming "adults" because we remember how horrible the adults in our own lives were when we were growing up. Becoming that kind of person didn't look very appealing.

[indieflopqueen]

can we all agree that having kids does not make you an adult?

[heatherwills]

What I like about the word "adulting" is that it deconstructs what adulthood is. We've turned all the responsibilities of adulthood into a verb. Something that we must do, but it's not who we are. We've broken down the rules of what it means to be an adult and realized that we don't have to let go of the things we enjoy simply because we've reached a certain age. As long as we get the "adulting" done, we're free to do whatever we want.

[CaregivingVlogs]

My mom has told me ever since I was a kid, to slow adult. Not to settle for anything, career, marriage and wait until you feel ready to have kids. That is why I am slow adulting. I am a very together millennial, I think waiting is a good thing. I may feel like an imposter sometimes but I also feel grateful to my mom for helping me through this process of becoming an adult.

[suedejones]

The thing with “Adulting” is, we need more money.

[Hannah-whvo]

There's also a lot of survivor bias in older generations. We don't get to hear from older adults who didn't make it - those who lost their lives in the AIDS crisis, were traumatised or living with undiagnosed mental illness or disability, were victims of domestic abuse, etc. It's a privilege to survive long enough to sneer at younger generations. I wasn't diagnosed with ADHD and autism until my early 30s and was suicidally depressed at the time. If I were born fifty years earlier I'd either be institutionalised or dead by that stage. Autistic adults are still one of the most under-employed demographics because of the gross lack of accommodation and acceptance. So yea, "adulting" is hard and I'm alive and able to talk about it on the internet. The boomer version of me was silent and invisible and the world pretended she didn't exist.

[MegArbo]

Guys! Guys! I have to tell you something: I'm 48 and feel like an imposter, too. So do your parents! Really! They don't know what the hell they are doing either. Everyone makes it up as they go along. Also, a lot of the stuff Society tells you that you want really might not be right for you anyway. I didn't own a house till I was 45 and sometimes miss renting. With the exception of three couples, everyone I know who got married under 30 are now divorced, some with kids. Not fun. Sure, pay your bills and such but don't worry about being self - actualized before 30. Take your time. Figure out who you are.

[merefinl]

Generationally speaking, Millennials grew up during a time of relative prosperity and then had it all crash right as they were expected to become independent. Gen Z grew up during and after that crash, and I think a lot of the Gen Z attitude toward Millennials comes from an understanding that they are starting from even farther back than many Millennials, and that there is a new degree of seriousness needed in order for most members of Gen Z to survive. I'm right in between both generations and I think Millennials were allowed to develop a lot of expectations for their futures that Gen Z grew up knowing they'd never have a chance at. Millennials are justified for feeling disillusioned and taking things slow, but Gen Z needs to be quick on the uptake and adaptable in order to have any chance at life. I think that's the difference.

[ham]

I honestly don't get why some of my fellow Gen Zs have the need to constantly make fun of milennials. Maybe it's because I am an older GZ and so have some things in common with milennials, but I feel like most of our issues are so similar and instead of berating each other we should stop the whole 'my generation is better than yours' and start helping each other. I think that the previous generation made so many things easier for mine, so thank you

[Da_dctr]

I don't think we are all that unique. I think all past generations struggled with their own version of this but we struggle openly and past generations have a revisionist history version of how simple things used to be. We also exist at a tipping point where the bad decisions of past generations are boiling over.

[Jaghatardig]

I love shows that are realistic about adult life. About how confused and lost we feel. Adulthood is scaring. Everyone is just taking it one step at a time. I love how Issa is lost and kinda stuck in Insecure. We don't have anything figured out. We are just trying to survive out here and figuring out how disappointing the adult world is. How cruel.

Also, I love how our generation have different priorities. We might never own a house, we might never be rich, but we are trying to be present, to be there, to show up, to speak up. I love that.

[kennedyjojackson]

I really like this video. I'm 19 years old and this past year has really stunk. I graduated high school in 2020, I settled for online community college instead of university classes. I felt it was safer due to the virus. I did awful my first semester and realized I wouldn't have done much better at uni. Despite being a good student in high school (choir soloist, dance team captain, ap classes, avid volunteer) I lost every bit of motivation. The scholarships I applied for didn't roll in the way they were supposed to. What saddened me the most, but also oddly made me happy was knowing many of my classmates were experiencing the same thing. Adulting is scary, but knowing I'm not alone remedies some of my fear.

[Angi_]

I always feel bad because I'm 27 and I still don't have it together. It doesn't help that my disabilities, mental illness and trauma took my childhood away. I watched my mom struggle and I knew things got a lot harder as an adult. Why would I want that?

My parents are the last ones of the boomers (model 63 lol). When they started working in their early 20s, they immediately got amazing jobs with all the benefits and stability of the 80s economy (pensions, paid leave, 20 days of paid holidays, etc.). My dad was even able to afford 2 flats when he was 24 and got another one with my mom when they got married at 25. They were parents of two kids when they were 29. My mom decided to become a full time mom at 30 because they really didn't need another income to keep their lifestyle and she really wanted to be with us. My dad retired when he was 52 and it is now living the life with my mom...
All of that is impossible in today's world. I go through life doing my best given the circumstances and, if buying a Lego set makes me forget at least for 10 minutes that I will never be able to stop working because I won't have a pension in my 60s (if climate change doesn't kill us all first), I will freaking buy a Lego set!

[loverrlee]

So much of being an “adult” is based on monetary ownership... which is kept from most of us

[gardenboydon]

There's often a classism argument that is left out of these "adult hood" conversations. It is a privilege for people, whom are well off financially, to delay adulthood. People in lower classes often don't have a choice but to work straight out of high school or get married to sustain rising living costs

[troywalkertheprogressivean]

its difficult to adult on poverty wages

[PinkPeonyClubb]

The issue with this milestone "race" is that adulting is post 18 to the end of individuals lives. Do we want to be the generation that thinks compulsory HigH sChoOL were the best years of our lives because we rushed things afterwards?