Millennial Speech

Comments (Archived):

1. Simon, Simon, Simon. He really is good. I watched the video until the end (well worth it) and he re-hooked me. His description of his new book is delightful and it will be a a gift that I give. Just so refreshing to hear someone speak about millennials and send the message that “it is not their fault” how their brains developed. It is significant that Simon focuses on how the (corporate) world responds to their brains/motivations and what happens in the mix. All evidence about early childhood and prefrontal cortex development reinforces the critical role of eye to eye contact. I am finding this to be true for my adult relationships as well – esp in building trust and dealing with friction.

   1. Agree on the focus on the business side. Quite interesting take

   2. Just a fun fact: eye contact was *brutal* for my kid with sensory processing issues when he was little. Don’t forget that prolonged eye contact is also a signal of aggression and domination. Teachers would insist my kid look them in the eye, and then he couldn’t process a word they said. It was equivalent to psychological torture, no joke. We had to tell them all to knock it off, all the time.Now that he’s older, he’s fine with eye contact. By not forcing it on him, he’s found his own way to it.

      1. Interesting. Is he an intellectual? We have a really brainy kid who was both obsessed and fearful of eyes. He’s in gr. 5 or 6 now and he’s doing better.

         1. Heh, he’s 10, so it’s unclear if he’s an intellectual. Ha ha! But he’s definitely more into history and animals than he is into sports.Kids with high IQ’s often come with other learning deficits (the trade term is “2E” for twice exceptional, I think). I don’t know my son’s IQ just yet. We may find out soon. But we don’t have any reason to believe his IQ is remarkably high. Of course *I* think he’s a genius, har. If the boy in your school hasn’t been looked at for sensory issues, it probably wouldn’t be a bad idea. Could be any number of issues though (like OCD or just a good ol’ phobia), or just a phase 🙂

      2. Definitely for some people there are times & situations when eye contact is too much & too intense. Also cultural – many indigenous people (Canadian context at least) where making eye contact is considered a sign of disrespect. Causes all sorts of miscommunication when teachers are brought in to the reserve schools and tell kids to “look me in the eye”. Learning when and how much is as much a skill as speaking. My point is that eye contact (esp with the primary caregiver) connects neurons in specific parts of the brain related to executive function. Differences in brain development is very interesting and I understand Simon’s point about establishing that intimate connection that builds a relationship. My brother also struggled with early eye contact and learning disabilities. Even as an adult he has to force himself to meet gazes. He now works with adults with disabilities and is very sensitive to their individual needs.

2. Yikes, I feel scolded. (And I’m a gen-xer.)

   1. I kept thinking, so why are GenXer’s all depressed and isolated and entitled? What’s our excuse? 😛

      1. LolEach generation is different. Big fan of them all for different reasons

         1. Indeed!

3. I don’t know how much responsibiltiy corporations should take to build their self-esteem. That sounds weird. Everyone is responsible for their own spiritual growth (capacity to remain present under stress, to develop resisilience, etc). Corporations can always help us along yes… I like the practice of banks encouraging the members to save by acknowledging the attainment of savings goals, but I’m not a millennial. I dunno, at the elementary school where I work, it’s pretty dog-eat-dog. If we had more funding from the government, we could be more present with the kids… but definitely nobody gets a certificate for being last place. We don’t have the funding to coddle and be fruity even if we wanted to.

   1. Actually, one thing that bugs me is kids and their fidgets and rocking chairs to help them fidget and rock out their stress in class. I mean, here’s a market for entrepreneurs to help upcoming generations to know how to handle anxiety and stress (fidgets on one end of the spectrum and actual meditation and healing on the other end). I agree kids have more stress to process these days than previous generations- due to technology- but everyone throughout history has had to take the journey to learn how to metabolize their stress, and now so must they. If anything millennials are way more equipped to deal with it because medicine and neuroscience have already made the link between the calming and healing effects of meditation on stress… so there you go millennials. You’re welcome.

      1. PE outside three times a day would be a start

         1. Yeah, exercise and the outdoors are super important.

      2. I think maybe a lot of people aren’t aware of the benefits these things bring to kids with sensory processing issues (which admittedly seems to be much higher in the new generation, for reasons unknown). My kids both have sensory issues (mild but very real). They meditate, but fidget spinners and sitting on a ball instead of a chair do wonders for them in terms of calming them and allowing them to focus.

         1. I guess I’ve never held a fidget spinner in my hand, so I don’t know what it feels like. Re: sensory issues, to our credit, our school recognizes that some kids get heightened anxiety around too much noise, so we provide them with headphones.

4. I like Simon Simonek all right, but I started to furrow my brow as soon as he said that social stress, financial stress, and career stress are the primary reasons *alcoholics* drink. He’s conflating alcohol abuse and/or dependency with alcoholism, showing a fundamental lack of understanding of the difference. Given the complexities of alcohol abuse, dependency, addiction and alcoholism, I don’t think it’s a great idea to compare it to over use of social media. After he made that comment, it continued to spring leaks for me:The Premise: Millennials Are “Difficult”The whole premise that Millennials are a problem drives me crazy. I love Millennials! Some Millennials are difficult, most aren’t. Most of the ones I meet have better social skills and are more empathetic to their fellow humans than just about any member of my own generation I know (including me).Millennials Can’t BondI also doubt his interpretation of teens saying they don’t have meaningful relationships with their friends. I would have told you the same thing at 16, and I didn’t have a smart phone or Twitter. That’s not new. When stress showed up in my life at that time (which was a LOT), I didn’t turn to people either. I turned to music, I turned to TV and radio, I went for a drive in my car. Saying “Hi” to your friends via text IS reaching out to your friends! How is that different than a hand-written note?Facebook Makes You DepressedI’m not a fan of Facebook, AT ALL. But we really don’t know (and may never know) if depressed people spend more time on FB, or if spending time on FB makes you feel depressed. Back in the 80’s a pair of teen boys in Reno, NV entered a suicide pact after listening to Judas Priest music all the time. One night they acted on that pact, but one of them survived (minus half his face). The mother of the survivor sued Judas Priest for brain washing her son into doing what he did. The boy claimed that Judas Priest was one of the few things that gave him relief from his already shitty life. Which was true?I won’t even go into how what Simon says completely disregards introverts, cognitively diverse people, and even just disenfranchised people in general.Guaranteed, we can find someone saying almost the exact same kinds of things about GenXers 30 years ago. I really can’t help but see pop psychology here for the purpose of selling a book. “The new generation is doomed!” Pfff. Sure there are scraps of truth in here, but that’s how pop psychology sells.Where I do agree with him is that Millennials are wonderful and deserve our respect. I just think to talk about them like they’re a ‘generation in crisis!’ is over-egging the pudding. (Apologies for such a long comment.)

   1. I can listen to Simon’s messages and think of multiple examples of millennials that do not match the generalizations that he makes. Often happens when people describe generations as though they are all in one bucket i.e baby boomers. The value for me is in describing the system/ environment that created the generalizations that he is speaking about. I find most pre-teens & teenagers to be far less tech dependant (more responsible) than their parents in how they balance their cyber world with the folks in the room.

      1. and think of multiple examples of millennials that do not matchWith any generalization there are always going to be exceptions. However the reason for the generalization is that there is enough evidence of a behavior to form the stereotype if you want to call it that. And to take it further, parents tend to follow this general direction of how things should be (or what is acceptable) based on evidence that they see in the larger group or what they come in contact with. So for example if a few or your friends decide to send their kids off to Europe to study it becomes more acceptable for you to do so (social proof) and therefore it will then encourage even more parents to do so or see that you do it. So it spreads. Or really anything for any age group. It’s not like all the sudden parents independently decided it was good to have kids do after school activities (we didn’t have that really when growing up) it just sort of grew humbly from parents mimicking other parents.(With States, this is also how pot will end up being legalized everywhere literally in short order..)

   2. Guaranteed, we can find someone saying almost the exact same kinds of things about GenXers 30 years ago.Exactly.

5. I have to thank @MsPseudolus:disqus for her comment because it motivated me to start watching this video and so far I am only a minute in and loving it (I am sure I will now spend the next 30 minutes distracted with this video). I just got to the part about trophies. When my 2nd wife and I bought a house in 2010 was the first time I saw the trophy overload in action. As we went to the basement there were a slew of trophies on the ledge going down and I was super impressed with the homeowner’s daughter. I thought ‘wow that is great!’. Was like she was a Rhodes scholar or something. Because back when I was growing up that meant something. I had not yet experienced or really knew about millennials back then (my ex wife primarily raised our two children) and my stepkids were to young then for me to give much thought. Years later that ledge is filled with the trophies of my step kids.I would have to also agree that from my simple observation the parenting plays a big role in this and that is obvious. My daughters actually complained that I made them move in together in NYC in the same apartment (on 86th st.) and that they had to live together. The younger one wanted her own place and the older one (2 years older) didn’t want to share after having a room mate. I was like ‘hah ha no dice you have to live together to bad!!!” and that was the end of it right there. And they knew I meant business and they didn’t stand a chance of changing my mind. (They love it now).With respect to the step kids I have to brag again about how I get them to clean the kitchen floor every single night after getting pissed at how dirty it was and realizing that my working wife wasn’t going to clean it and neither was I. (My first idea was to get the maids to come and do it which led to the solution – have the kids do it! Brilliant!). And to this day every single day they clean that floor and if they don’t do a good job they have to haul their ass down and do it. In the middle of homework? To bad come on down and do a good job. And if there is some excuse for not doing it ‘I had to leave to go to XYZ’ or whatever no dice. You loose your cell phone plan ahead it’s part of life (read that part again). No homework is not the most important thing in life.And keep in mind I am a step parent and take greater risk most would think in being hard with them. Does it impact our relationship? Not at all. In fact it’s the opposite. They like the boundaries and respect earning praise when they do a good job.