hope z
For as long as I can remember, my usual workout time has been between midnight and 3:00 AM. A couple of weeks back, two young guys—Josh and DaeDae—started working the overnight shift at my gym.
I’ve been chatting with them here and there—when I arrive, when I leave or whenever they happen to be cleaning nearby. Nice guys. But until recently, it’s been mostly small talk.
Friday morning, on my way out, I decided to go a little deeper with them. I wanted to ask about something that’s been on my mind quite a lot lately, especially where Gen Z is concerned.
You see, I’ve noticed a distinct change in people’s mind sets over the last five or six years. I suspect it’s been brought about by a perfect storm of political upheaval, a pandemic, a stark rise in hate crimes and a 24-hour news cycle (or pseudo-news cycle, in many cases) where strong personalities seem bent on peddling controversy and worst-case scenarios in exchange for ratings or personal social-media followings.
Meanwhile, we’re being continually bombarded with click bait—video and article titles that are intentionally vague, misleading, skewed or outright false. If they’re to be believed, everything we know and love is a hair’s breath away from being torn away from us. Our freedom. Our democracy. Our safety. Our health.
Our very existence as a species on planet earth.
And the result has been an outbreak of fear, anxiety, depression and doom every bit as widespread, infectious and devastating as COVID-19.
So I stopped and asked Josh and DaeDae this question: “How do you feel when you think about your future?”
And in stereophonic unison, they immediately replied.
Excited.
Not much surprises me, but I admit that this did.
And it encouraged me.
And piqued my curiosity.
I continued. “That’s great to hear. So… what do you do when you hear all the bad news about, like, the United States maybe not surviving, or climate change, or meteors that might wipe out all life on earth or whatever?”
Josh took a few beats then said this:
“I can’t worry about all that. All of that stuff is outside of my control. I can only control my own choices. So I just make the best choices I can today. That’s all I can do. If the rest of that stuff happens, you just have to deal with it as it comes.”
DaeDae jumped in. “Exactly. Worrying won’t change anything. Nothing. So you just do what you can do, and you choose to be happy and believe that the future will be good. I’ve never been more excited about the future than I am right now.”
I promise, I’m not putting words in their mouths. To the best of my recollection, this is precisely what they said and how they said it.
This is remarkable in and of itself. It very nearly sums up the contents of my entire first three books.
But let me take things up a notch by telling you a little more about Josh and DaeDae.
Josh is Puerto Rican. DaeDae is black. Both are 19. Both are out of high school now and working the overnight at a low-wage job that mostly consists of restocking paper towels, mopping floors and cleaning bathrooms.
And they’ve never been more excited about their future than they are right now.
In case you’re starting in with your yes-buts, please don’t chalk their positive outlook up to youth or naivety. They’ve experienced firsthand the inherent inequities in the system. They’re well aware of racism and race-related violence. And where we older generation practiced fire drills in school, Josh and DaeDae practiced armed-intruder drills from first grade on.
These two Gen Z guys have already managed to figure out something vitally important to peace, happiness and success—something that many, many others with more years, more privilege, more money seem to miss.
All of that stuff is outside of my control. I can only control my own choices. So I just make the best choices I can today. That’s all I can do.
I’ll add a few thoughts of my own to those of Josh and DaeDae:
What you consider to be your sources of news—and how much time you devote to watching them—is your choice.
How far you go down the rabbit hole of sensationalistic internet articles, social media and online videos is your choice.
Which conversations you get into and with whom is your choice.
If politics worries you—vote. Write letters to your congressperson. Financially support the candidates you believe in.
If climate change worries you, recycle. Find ways to reduce your carbon footprint. Get involved in activism. Donate to worthy, well-vetted causes.
If you feel helpless, help someone in need. Appreciate the many good things you do have in the present rather than dwelling on those you don’t have, or which you may or may not have at some nebulous later date.
These are all choices you can make.
Conversely, worry is no more than wasting time, thought and emotion on choices you cannot make. That is the very definition of futility. And futility breeds hopelessness.
From The Best Advice So Far:
Worry serves no purpose
but to ruin the present.
I do hope you will take both courage and encouragement from Josh and DaeDae’s wisdom and outlook, and that you too will be able to join them in saying,
I’ve never been more excited about the future
than I am right now.
P.S. If you or your discussion group are looking for a personal, practical and experiential approach to rediscovering what’s right with your life, the world and the people in it, I invite you to check out my new book, Alternate Reality.
You guessed it right, Erik, I was surprised by their replies. Wow. You met two pretty impressive people. I really do hope that Gen Z embraces that kind of positivity as a whole, because that’s the attitude that also believes that change is possible. I love your line, “If you feel helpless, help someone.” Not only does it demonstrate that there are things we can control and ways that we can make a difference, but I think it’s the key to having an empowered sense of self and positive view of life. Great post. Wonderful to see you’re alive and well, my friend. <3
Thanks, Diana. When I told Josh and DaeDae how surprising and encouraging I found their reply, they seemed surprised as well. It just seemed sort of obvious to them that this is how to live, which is what made it all the more remarkable. When I decided that this needed to be a blog post and interviewed them for permission and accuracy, and then provided them with a custom link to the post, it was fun to see them feel “internet famous.” But in keeping with their honest response to my initial question, my underlying goal was to use what lies within my own power of choice in order to help spread that kind of thinking as much as possible. I think that when most people get to feeling fatalistic, it really comes down to feeling frustrated that they can’t magically make a big, one-time decision that changes a systemic issue, which only distracts from the many, many powerful small choices we can each make every day — choices which collectively can change even that big thing that had us immobilized.
I love it that they enjoyed the mention. I can’t help smiling. I thought my generation was going to make things better, Erik. Fat chance! But I have huge hope for the Gen Z’s. They just seem to have their heads on straight, their hearts in the right places, and a powerful collective voice. Tell them, I thought their attitude and perspective was great.
I will tell them tonight. In fact, I’ll tell them and then just let them read your words for themselves. They’ll enjoy that!
Excellent. Have a great workout. 🙂
In the course of my climate activism, Erik, I work alongside and mentor many Gen Z youths, and they are for the most part hopeful for the future, I have found. Whereas boomers and Xers dream of a better (read: conservative) past — the sock hops of the 1950s and video arcades of the 1980s, respectively — Gen Z dreams of a better (read: progressive) future.
Accordingly, I feel it’s the moral obligation of boomers and Xers who aren’t mired in nostalgia for the good ol’ days — and we do exist! — to support these young people. That can be done actively, through encouragement and mentoring and direct assistance, or merely passively: i.e., not standing in the way of letting them envision (and reify) a new sociopolitical compact for a correspondingly new millennium.
I share the frustration — and sometimes even (justified) outrage — they feel about being stymied by older generations that want to turn back the clock, but I also share in their tremendous optimism for the possibilities of how we might further, by quantum leaps, the projects of democracy and civilization this century. They give me optimism; they’re the source of my hope. These days, optimism is a revolutionary act.
“These days, optimism is a revolutionary act.”
I’m realizing this more every day. And it is informing how I talk about (i.e., “market”) what I myself do. It’s my observation that most self-help / personal-development books, podcasts, programs, etc. are about making me better. I feel strongly that what I bring to the table that sets me apart is that my approach to “making me better” is always within the context of making us better.
A new friend of mine recently asked me what I thought the world would look like if everyone loved themselves more. He seemed surprised at my suggestion that the main problem I see is that too many people love themselves (and only themselves) too much, not too little. Too many are motivated only by being the one perceived as the torch bearer who lights the brightest beacon, not about getting the right beacon lit by the best means possible — even if that means that they must pass the torch and stand on the sidelines while someone else blazes ahead.
I am involved. But my biggest role as time goes on is to encourage, empower and equip the younger generation to carry those torches to the right places.
Making us better — yes, I love that!
I’ve written extensively on my own blog, as you know, Erik, about how so much of our popular fiction has conditioned us to think of ourselves as the lone protagonist of our own heroic narrative — and everyone else as a supporting character, villain, or bit player — whereas what we really need more of are stories that promote an ethos of We’re all in this together. That’s what we need from the storytellers right now.
Agreed. And I know that your current work is one of those stories. Looking forward to its publication.
It certainly aspires to be, Erik! And this one will be published, one way or another. Working on that right now…
This was so inspiring! I couldn’t help but to share it. So true. People need to read this.
So nice to see you again, Helena. And I’m glad Josh and Daedae’s thoughts continue to inspire others. In a world where the 24-hour news cycle seems to be peddling fatalism, I find the world still looks bright to me based on the conversations I often have, the communities I build around me (even there at the gym in the middle of the night) and just making the choice to see what is right with the world instead of what is wrong with it. I’ll be sure to show those two young men your comment. I know it will encourage them as well and keep the inspiration going.
That will be such a privilege!