How Adulthood Happens | Hacker News Reader

How Adulthood Happens

nytimes.com

55 pointschejazi51 comments

If I read that correctly there is little support for the 'age' component of adulthood and a lot of support for 'required to act independently without a safety net'. It might explain why people who were 16 in the 19th century were considered ready to kick out into the "real" world.

In my own experience I did a couple of internships in my high school summers which required that I live away from home, plan all my own meals, budget my expenses, manage my housing situation, and track everything required to succeed in my internship. I had some really eye opening experiences (like having my motorcycle be in the shop and catching the bus to work but getting on the wrong direction and ending at the depot far from work.) That experience helped me "grow up" in many ways, and it was one of the reasons when I had kids my wife and I gave them responsibility as soon as we thought they could take it, so from age 10 on for example they did all of their own laundry. At 12 they were called on to cook a meal for the family from time to time, Etc. If nothing else that helped them be more functional when they got to college.

> required to act independently without a safety net'

Then no one is an adult any longer, especially those of a leftist political bent. They speak of their political programs in those exact terms, "safety nets".

There are degrees. Most people who have any family that is not destitute have some level of safety net, but that's not at all the same as having mom & dad right on hand to save the day.

Being an adult is not binary. And I think the possibility we have of not having to be fully "grown up" is one of the great advances of modern society. Keep the child in you alive. It's what makes you creative and open to the new.

> any longer

and almost no one ever was. Independence from family is a very modern American notion. For most of history and the world, family/clan interdependence was/is a major component of culture. Modern left-leaning societies installed government-run interdependence to replace the clan (and some rare far-left governments displaced the family)

It seems to resonate. One of the most mature guys I ever met had been forced in his late teen to take over running his father's construction subcontracting business, help his mother get around (they immigrated to the USA and the mother didn't speak English well), help his younger siblings graduate high school and get into college, and help make decisions about his father's cancer treatment for a year before his dad passed away.

I met him when he was about to turn 30, and after we'd known each other for a while he told me about it. He was one of the most calm and steadfast people I ever met; nothing ever got to him. And when you think about it, that's exactly the sort of maturity you'd expect that someone who was head of household for 15 years, helped raise 2-3 kids, ran a business with some tough guys working for him.

He explained it all rather matter of factly, made me reflect a lot on what maturity is. Given a really horrible set of cards, he managed to take care of everyone as best as he could and got his family through it. And things that would set almost anyone off didn't even register with him.

What's fascinating, to me, is the difference between the environment college provides and the environment post-college life provides. The contrast in the societal structure most people experience at these two points of life is fascinating. From a world of community (college) to a world of isolation (working world). I think the return of well-off young people to the cities is driven by a search for a society that feels like it has the community of college. (That was a motivation for me at the least.)

I found college to be an exceedingly isolating environment myself. During my entire time there I don't think I made a single lasting friend, and the people I did meet were mostly brief acquaintances who turned out to be completely untrustworthy, negative influences (theft, lying, sexual assaults, alcoholism, etc). The availability of new interactions seemed to make individuals easily replaceable, as well as the transience of the experience meant there was no reason to invest in a relationship when you'd both be parting ways soon. All of which leads to the people around you becoming a disposable commodity. Perhaps they were just different environments? I was at a large state school - things might be different at smaller or more selective institutions.

Unfortunately this was my experience at a large state school as well.

Actually, your description of college seems to fit most large cities as well, or pretty much any place with a large transient population.

So GP's point might still be true, albeit in an unintended way. Cities are sufficiently similar to large universities that people who are familiar with college will often find city life familiar as well.

I think it's a matter of perspective from both parties. Both people can choose to try to build a long lasting friendship or not. It's a matter of both the individuals and the environment.

I mean, if you were to meet someone as a freshman in high school, would you were about the same thing? You have 4 years. So what about college was different?

I couldn't answer exactly, but one guess would be that there is more turnover in relationships at very large universities. In high school you largely move through the same classes with the same people in the same grade, versus college where you initially take a bunch of gen ed classes with people whom you may never even run into on campus again, and with more intermixing among a larger population. Also that you're younger in high school, so the time spent there is a greater fraction of your life up to that point, making the experience seem longer overall. A year or two at high school age can seem like an eternity, where as a year or two in your late teens or earlier twenties is a smaller drop in the bucket. Hopefully not just my perception - many seem to acknowledge that time seems to go by faster as you get older. Plus many people go to college, at least the large state schools, with no real intention of actually finishing. Fewer people have that attitude towards high school.

Both people can try to build a long lasting friendship, but if only one is trying while the other is being opportunistic, it's less likely to go anywhere (speaking generously).

The reason why for many people college felt like a strong community is probably because they found or stumbled upon one of many such communities within their colleges. Things like:

- sports/activity/etc. club with regular events - student organization - dorm life - very specific subculture

The basic formula is time + regular 'unstructured' interaction with a a relatively small group of people. College usually provides the first, but the second might take some work.

In high school, you get both by default, so there's a decent change you at least made some friends, either from the large group you interact with, or from the tiny group of other outcasts that you're part of.

I think many ills of our society would significantly lessen if we create environments and lifestyles where 'time + leisure within small tribe' can exist again. Cities can offer the latter pretty well, but time always seems to be a bit of a problem.

College has 10-20x the number of people per age-cohort.

That's often not true. I went to a high school with fewer than 100 people in my class but then I went to a small liberal arts college where my class was only 5x bigger. I had classmates that went to high schools bigger than our college.

I made a number of good friends in college, and I don't think any were particularly unreliable or shallow- but I do agree that they mostly didn't last. We all went our separate ways, scattered across the world. At least in high school you are all anchored to the same home town- in a big university that draws from far & wide, you don't even have that.

Now, I do know clusters of graduates who wound up working in the same cities, and some of them seem to be pretty steady friends. But without that, there is little to hang on to, even if you were good friends.

Most bonds formed by friendships, however strong, are eventually broken with distance and time. This is different from the "community experience" the OP describes. You don't need eternal lasting meaningful bonds to form a sense of community. The sense of community can be as transient as the bonds of friendship that form the community itself.

College is the last place that can potentially offer this type of community but attending college does not guarantee you'll have such an experience. Even though you missed the experience I'm sure you observed this thing in colleges called "Frats." They get a bad rep, but a fraternity is a good example of a place where you will get this sense of community, however transient it is. Still it is in these communities where you can actually form lasting relationships. Although the majority of people don't see each other again, I'm sure most frat members graduate with one or two lasting friendships.

You're right. The 'community experience' I had (and I in fact went to a large state school as well as the previous poster) was two-fold:

One part was the more transient community you described: I could sit in a downtown coffee shop, sit in a study space on campus, etc. and see throughout the day various friends and acquaintances. And honestly, this felt great. It made me feel surrounded by friends and a quick chat provides a fulfilling diversion from work. Of course, many of these relationships faded/are fading away with time after college as life goes on (and that's neither an inherently good nor bad thing).

But I also made deep, meaningful, friendships. And I think this is important because it prevents you from the depressing 'isolated while surrounded by friends' type of feeling that social media can give. For me, these people came from the guys I lived with and near freshman year and guys/girls whom I went to church with. (A church by no means has a monopoly on creating healthy community and many churches have unhealthy community. But a church, that is healthy in my opinion, has fantastic community. It's one with trust and care towards each other regardless of flaws and mistakes. It's also is a diverse community with people of all sorts being brought together by a common hope.) Interestingly, one focus we had as a church was intentionally building these kinds of relationships: asking each other out to breakfast or lunch just one on one and having honest conversations with each other. I think this is a great way to form deeper relationships with friends.

I'm pushing 30, have a well-paying job, and a long-term significant other, but I never plan on "becoming an adult" if it means religious affiliation, griping about the talking heads like my father, or giving up video games and hangovers.

Same here.

For me "being an adult" just means that I have to be responsible, nothing more.

I keep my self healthy, educated and happy. Also pay my taxes.

I honestly think more folks need a much bigger fire up their ass.

Taking until 30 to start doing something productive with your life and to end the party-party-party phase is, well, slow? Why spend your most productive years in the wilderness?

I do much of what I do from compulsion - I never had the luxury of being able to sit around and contemplate my future on someone else's dollar - I left university heavily in debt, paying my brother's school fees, lumbered with a mortgage on a great aunt's house, with two parents who had gone into hiding on opposite corners of the globe, deep in denial over their divorce proceedings. I left uni with nowhere to go, no money, lots of obligations, and about a week to find myself income before my world imploded.

I found my first job three days after graduating - I went up to London, and went and annoyed financial services companies by literally banging on their doors and going 'interview me'. Eventually someone bit, I spent 18 months there before jumping ship and starting my own thing. This isn't some dim mythical past when jobs grew on trees, rather 2005, and most of my cohort ended up moving home with the folks because they couldn't find jobs - because they didn't try hard enough, because moving home with the folks was an option.

When you remove your fallbacks, all you can do is climb and hope there's somewhere you can take a rest further up.

When I look at my brother (seven years younger) and myself, there is one defining difference between his upbringing and mine - there's always been someone there to bail him out, to pick up the pieces, to solve his problems for him. Far too often that someone has been me. He's leading his own path, finding his own way, but he is going to be 30 by the time he finds it.

Finally, part of finding the path is realising that there is no path but the one you make, and that it is its own goal.

There's nothing at the end of it, enjoy the walk.

If there is no path but the one you make, why is partying until your 30s any less valid than an early start to doing something productive? Seems contradictory.

I meant that rather more in the scope of "holding pattern" behaviour. Most folks I know in their early 30's who are still leading that life are still looking for that training contract, or are doing their fifth degree in a new topic. Some want that life - that's cool, but only if it's a decision, rather than a default option.

Direction, even if it's to be a directionless wanderer, matters.

An alternate narrative for your story: Your hard work was not the defining characteristic of your success. But it was in fact luck.

And your rant could amount to: I won the lottery, why the hell doesn't everyone just do that! Look at my brother... he's never won the lottery, what a chump.

Indeed; also note that traits like intelligence and motivation are highly heritable, so the lottery metaphor is not as outlandish as it might seem.

More to the point, though, when did we all agree on a single definition of "productivity", and when did we decide to hold it up as the purpose of life? I must have missed that AGM.

If starting life £200k in the hole with two dependants and nothing to my name is luck, then I'd hate to imagine what bad luck is.

My brother is no chump, he just has the (seeming) luxury of being able to take his time - something we have far less of than we think.

I'm really not clear on what lottery you think I won.

I won't deny that much of life is serendipity, but the difference is having to seize every opportunity you come across, no matter how slight - and we all have plenty of opportunities, but when there is no burning need to assume the risk that goes hand in hand with them, one does not.

I suppose, if anything, the moral is that having both everything and nothing to lose is an almighty motivator.

> If starting life £200k in the hole with two dependants and nothing to my name is luck, then I'd hate to imagine what bad luck is.

Not even being able to take out a £2k loan, let alone £200k?

Having three dependents, two of whom have serious disabilities that require all of your time and money to care for?

Even your definition of "starting life" is ridiculous. You define it as leaving uni with a degree that would allow you to cold call financial services companies. How about growing up in a place where nobody ever teaches you that uni is within the realm of possibilities, and everyone bullies you for daring to think that it might in fact be possible? All because you were born to the wrong parents.

I agree with you that your brother enjoyed a lot of luxuries. I'm just pointing out that you also enjoyed almost all of the same luxuries.

That was where my parents started. My dad is a Nigerian-Austrian, grew up working Plymouth docks, my mum a navy nco's brat, grew up in a caravan on base in Scotland and left home at 14.

I'm fully aware of the privilege that I've had, and yes, in some regards I've been fortunate. There are many who have been less, and more, fortunate. Most of the £200k was mortgage debt in my dad's name that I was paying so my great aunt didn't end up losing her house. I could barely hold a bank account my credit rating was so shot.

But this is all besides the point.

That was my impression as well.

According to GP's narrative, he was "lucky" because his ass was on fire. After all, he didn't do anything to deserve the situation he found himself in, did he?

On the other hand, his brother was "unlucky" because his ass was NOT on fire. (Having a competent older sibling tends to do that to a younger sibling's ass.) GP wishes that more people were as lucky as he was.

Oh, and GP even had the luxury of being able to annoy financial services companies. Many people would kill for the luxury of being able to annoy McDonald's managers in the same way.

Yes, the luxury afforded by a single train ticket and paying cash to stay in s hostel, sweaty nights knowing that I had money for six days and beyond that, black hole I didn't want to think about. I found a job on day six after maybe 150 companies. QA. Manual testing. Fabulous job for a physics graduate! Oh wait, no, the pits, but work, and income, and oh my god I can have a roof over my head and almost make ends meet. Now I just need to freelance and find a bar job too.

"Luxury!" (Yorkshire accent)

If you think my situation sounds like it was remotely pleasurable, be grateful you haven't been there. There are far easier and kinder ways to have ones safety net removed than to have your family completely explode and dump their obligations on you. Had to pack up and auction off the family home at 19. Every penny went against lawyers or their debt. Shit ain't easy, I promise you.

Your post follows a pattern we hear quite often: "I had a lot of problems I overcame them. I'm proud of that. So we should perpetuate problems, in order to have something to overcome and be proud of."

Imagine we are all carrying a ladder, and eventually we have to climb it. You were forced to immediately lean your ladder against whichever wall happened to be nearby. As a result, you now are trying to justify the value of reaching the top of that particular wall. Your life choices were made when you were not yet ready to make good choices, and to avoid admitting that, you redefine "good" to mean whatever you ended up with.

> 86 percent agree with the statement, “I am confident that eventually I will get what I want out of life.”

Could it be because they don't actually want much, or anything?

Wanting insn't that easy. You have to be inthe kind of place that let's you see what's possible without letting you get it. Too far, and you don't know what's out there. Too close, and you already have so much that no object of desire is left for you to «want».

Adulthood is what happens when you realize that, if you don't do it, it's not going to get done. Don't know how? Learn. Physically can't? Find a way. Nobody is going to do it for you.

This article smacks of "back in my day". Perhaps college students spend "just over one hour per day" studying alone because education has realized the benefit of group learning, interactive education and project-based classes. In the age of Wikipedia and Google the need to memorize and study in silence, as in the monastery, has decreased substantially.

David Brooks' longing for the day when students just shut up and listened to their teachers is patronizing and ignorant.

Did you finish the article? It seems not.

Sure, I finished it. He went on to bemoan jobless college grads, look down on "following your dreams", and tell us that letting our hopes die is normal. We'll just get over it and quit kicking things up by the time we're 30.

I think you took most of that meaning from an angry voice inside your head - not from what he wrote.

Letting your hope die is "normal", but it doesn't mean that you should aim to be normal.

I still want to be an astronaut and I'm 31 and working in totally the wrong field, but damnit, I'll hold that hypothetical dream. Never say never.

Sheesh, at least give me a heads-up before you link me to David Brooks.

The important point here is learning to think for yourself. I've been going through that process over the past year and from my perspective as a 25 year old male, the author is spot on.

Learning to think for yourself is independent and critical thinking, which isn't the same thing as adulthood. I know adults who don't do either, and non-adults who do both. The author is mostly-spot-on that by 30, you become an Adult, but this is still a meaningless concept. Being an adult just means you've fucked up enough times to know better and have finally got the knack of this whole "living" thing.

Well, that was a vacuous piece of fluff. I suppose David Brooks has gotten past his youthful desire to produce meaningful work.

Essential reading: "I am worried about David Brooks"

http://theconcourse.deadspin.com/i-dont-think-david-brooks-i...

somewhat patronizing article was my reaction. "They are largely unattached to religious institutions." As if to say, 'one day you will realize what you are missing'. My bet is that people today, in the age bracket he is referring to may never attach themselves to science fiction as fact.

'Yet here is the good news. By age 30, the vast majority are through it.' and 'After a youth dazzled by possibilities and the fear of missing out, they discover that committing to the few things you love is a sort of liberation.'

I abhor the idea that by 30 I should have to commit the rest of (likely the majority of life) to just a few things.

I'm 24, and I really did not read this article as patronising. In fact, I read it as the author actually understanding my life experience thus far rather well. You're not the only commenter that has read it that way, I wonder if I'm too charitable or others are looking for it to be yet another "kids these days" article, of which there are many.

My families tradition is to kick the kids out at the legal age with nothing but promise of a roof and food if they need it. Grandfather grew up in poverty and is now quite rich, none of trickled to my Dad. The logic being if you have a safe place to sleep and eat, you can do whatever you set your mind to. Dad started his own business, and instead of giving him money, my Grandfather guided him and introduced him to people. Same with my father now. I left home at 16.

I haven't gotten a cent from my parents and it has taught me a lot at a very young age. Meanwhile most of my friends are completely dependant and have adopted a 'the man/system is out to get you' mentality because they didn't get their dream jobs fresh out of school.

How do you teach people to hustle? Cut the life line?

That sounds like a guy I knew. He planned to kick all his kids out as they approached adulthood and if they wanted to leave sooner, he'd let them go with the understanding there was no coming back after leaving the nest.

He's also very strict, hence the possibility the kids might want to leave before they reach adulthood.

It's not something I could do but it probably works for some people.

Whatever the merits of this system might be it is absolutely not how rich people behave as a group. The rich shower opportunity and subsidies on their children, often paying their rent in high cost areas, and helping them secure remunerative positions.

If you have the promise of a roof and food, how can you possibly consider that being kicked out? By your logic my parents kicked me out when I was 16

You know what I meant. Don't be pedantic. They don't literally plant a foot in me around my door until I'm physically out of the house. It's implied and understood that when we're old enough, we leave the house.

How do you teach people to hustle?

Step one to hustle is the hunger. To me it seems like the rest just follows.

I've seen the laziest, most unreliable people hustle like crazy when something they are deeply hungry for is at hand.

Cut the life line. As per my above post, I left home with nothing but a heap of obligations and nowhere to go.

Most of the successful people I know have absent parents - either dead, abusive, insane, or just totally uninterested - and younger siblings they've looked out for.

Most of the bleeding idiots I know who aged 30+ sit around spending their parents' money have lovely, kind, nice, enabler, parents.

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