You’ve heard of the “Baby Boomers” or “Boomers”. Now there is hyper-focus on the 70-million individuals that make up the newest generation, the Millennials. But what about the generation that falls between the boomers and millennials, the ones who have gotten lost in the shuffle? “X” marks the spot.
We are Generation X (ages 38 – 53 in 2019) and for the most part, we have essentially fallen off the radar. No one really talks about us. We are the ones that were once called the “slacker generation” or the “forgotten middle child.”
Throughout our younger years, the boomers sucked up all the oxygen in the room, leaving us gasping. They dominated the political, educational, business and social arenas. We have always been lost under their shadow.
Many of us grew up as latchkey kids because both of our parents had to work or we were part of a divorced household. We witness so many changes over the course of our lifetime, from televisions only having three stations to now having approximately 700 with half being in high definition. We grew up with Sesame Street, Saturday morning cartoons, The Brady Bunch and don’t forget American Bandstand, Soul Train and the birth of MTV.
There were also jack rocks and marbles, play doh and silly putty, rubik's cube and Nintendo games, eight-tracks, cassettes and disk players, VCRs and DVDs, fast food and Happy Meals. We were grunge, 80's pop, hip hop music, and indie films.
We were there in the beginning of ATM machines, started careers around the dot.com boom, watch computers migrate to PCs, laptops and tablets. We lugged around cell phones bags that weighed about 3-pounds and we watched the hand-held brick phone transition to the iPhone. We had just reached adulthood when the internet opened up and now email, social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram have become a daily part of our everyday lives.
We saw the first man land on the moon, the Berlin Wall fall, the Cold War end, Communism disintegrate and the end of Apartheid in South Africa. And now we are living in a world of same sex marriages, black lives matter, the #metoo movement, as our country takes a right turn.
We’ve watched the culture shift from boomers to millennials like the Gen-Xers don’t exist. There are over 66 million of us and as we watch the world change right before our eyes and we find that we are changing along with it…we are maturing, we are powerful adults that have lived to tell about it, we understand work-life balance, with entrepreneurial spirits and we are in a position to become the wealthiest generation, above boomers, within the next few years.
Some of us are homeowners, parents and even grandparents. We are struggling to pay debt along with struggling to save for retirement. Roughly half of our generation is financially supporting both a parent and a child at the same time and we have the burden of making decisions that can affect all three generations.
We are becoming the elders, but we do not see ourselves as old as our parents were when they were our age. We are facing middle-age, but still holding onto our youth because we aren’t ready to let go and just grow old, we still have a zest for life.
We are faced with external exasperations and internal irritations on a daily basis. Major life changes such as a death of a parent, the environment, unpredictable events, fear, beliefs, uncertainty and the lack of control are stressors that continuously affect our health and well-being.
With each passing decade, we enter a new stage of life full of its own unique challenges and priorities. Fifty may be the new 40 but that doesn’t change the fact that our bodies are still 50 years old.
We have been subjected to years of fast food, genetically modified organisms, poor diets and the evils of big pharma. Some of our ailments will announce themselves suddenly and painfully. The aches and ouches that we may not have worried much about when we were younger could now be signs of bigger problems.
As a forgotten generation, at times we may feel like Ducky at the prom or the brain, Brian Johnson (Anthony Michael Hall) from the 80's cult classics, Pretty In Pink & The Breakfast Club. But we have to remember that we are poised, we are the dominant group that is running businesses and working in politics, we are the powerhouses of this new millennium with a strong influence on the other generations.
Although we are Gen-Xers and we have hit that half-century mark, it doesn’t mean we have to fade away quietly or continue to be lost in the shadows of the other generations. We still have the rest of our life time, probably more than we think to stand up and stand out.
We need to be conscious of how we continue forward. If you haven’t started already, then take note that we need to take better care of ourselves, work to reverse the damage that has been placed on our minds and bodies.
We are no longer slackers, we are the decision makers, the influencers, and we have lived through many worldly changes. Be proud that you were born and have lived thus far during a wonderful period of time. Wouldn’t it be awesome to see what we will encounter over the next few decades?
We are coming out of the shadow…we are Generation X!
Comments