Millennials – Online Counselling

Is the “Generation Me”, as baby-boomers and generation X call them, or the millennials which I think is a more proper name as they were born towards the end of the last millennial, narcissistic?

There’re many studies trying to characterize millennials but psychologists are divided. Some say the evidence that millennials are overwhelmingly centered, others just as strongly disagree. The differences might rise from how we formulate these studies, criteria, comparison and what group of millennials  we take into account.

It may be the truth that millennials are more self-assured comparing to previous generations but isn’t a healthy sign of confidence? Should we worry about their narcissism?

Think about politicians, successful businessmen and businesswomen, investors or developers, people who lead this world. The prevailing majority of them are baby-boomers and generation X. It might be just me but I see in them the traits we accredit to millennials. Aren’t they self-focused, careless, prioritizing themselves, profits and personal interests overriding social justice or environmental concerns, concerns of future generations ? Don’t do they behave as they are the center of this world?

The most promising approach to understand millennials is when we consider the trends how human personalities develop and change along with consciousness, intelligence, emotional intelligence, awareness, and social, cultural and technological development. These determine how millennials behave, struggle or thrive, if they can or can’t succeed, how they can achieve or fail, how they can see the meanings and fulfillment.

Generation X and baby-boomers criticize millennials taking selfies, spending hours on social media, promoting themselves, and so on. Well, what do you think would happen if they when they were young had technologies as millennials have these days? Social media would be flooded by their selfies, their self-centered references, constantly updating their feelings, thinking or their properties and achievements.

I have two millennial children, as a counsellor I met many millennials, my siblings and friends have children born after 1980. The millennials I know are amazing. When the researchers slice the data they find the same pattern in generation, narcissism has been declining among young people since the 90-s. Perhaps we should stop labeling millennials and see them as they are.

• They are sociable (aren’t we jealous if we see these as a problem)
• They energetic and conscientious
• The are sensitive and carrying
• They sense social justice
• They care about environment and future generations
• They are generous and willing to share including with homeless and people in need
• They tolerate differences religious, racial and sexual
• They are opinionated and in many ways independent and perhaps sometimes rebelious

In a press release, Roberts (a personality expert who with his colleagues compared scores on the Narcissism Inventory among several cohorts of over 50,000 students who attended three American universities in three separate eras: the 1990s, 2000s and early 2010s) said that older generations may have forgotten their own youthful narcissism; it fades with age.

“We have faulty memories,” Roberts said, “so we don’t remember that we were rather self-centered when we were that age.”

“Millennials are an exceptionally generous generation that hold great promise for improving the world” – Jeffrey Arnett

If millennials stop minimizing their struggles, recognize their small successes, know themselves, stop been obsessed by comparison with others, they have a great chance to bring a unique essence to life.