Just something I've been thinking about now that I'm 40. A complete lack of leadership and mentoring from the boomers.
Parents were just focused on academic success and getting me off to college. Never learned to use tools, tend to plants and animals, do sports or hunt.
In my career, I was just given lots of responsibility and risk. No mentoring or leadership. No actual control to go along with the responsibility.
Was it like this for anyone else? Now that I'm middle aged and see the problem, I'm trying to be different for the younger generation.
I completely agree... Even my boss and his son who is technically the next generation... He just wanted them to go to college... Even if they maybe don't do anything useful with it. They've been programmed that it's a good idea. Fortunately, my husband's dad taught him to do a lot and then he's taught himself to do anything else. I also have been a woman who wasn't taught anything, but learned it and liked to do things myself. No one taught me how to cook or bake, but I do it and find great recipes. Enough that other women ask for them. I tweak recipes once I have them to what we like. I've also learned a lot of crafts. I started making my own bar soap. I help my husband with our home projects. We don't pay anyone to come into our home and fix anything or install anything. I'm glad that we know better today. We just had our first son in November, and he would only go to college if he has a real desire for a good subject...and we'd do so warily. Otherwise we'd rather him learn skills and start a business of his own. That is the better, more successful route. We know many older men in our neighborhood who have their own businesses who were very successful. It's always better than working for someone else.
On one hand, I think that having to learn everything for ourselves has made millenials much less worried about uncertain times because we know we van figure things out.
On the other, I wonder just how much knowledge we've lost due to pointless hoarding.