The Millenials' Challenge

As a member of the Millenial generation, I have an understanding of the fatal flaw that the American culture suffers from. Our elders are from an era of American prosperity when the wealth was abundant and access to successful endeavors were available to anyone willing to work for them. Unfortunately, America is no longer that nation of opportunity. The millenials, myself included, were raised to believe that we could do anything we wanted, but we, instead, are meeting our futures with disappointment.

Just as we are entering into adulthood, the world seems to be closing its doors on us. We are left holding the reigns of our future while the "roadmaps" that once led us to our destinations seem to be leading us even deeper into the world of inopportunity. It seems like some kind of premise for a Greek Tragedy, doesn't it? A hero on a journey of insurmountable odds....So let's stick with that analogy for a moment.

We are now in the depths of the "labyrinth", but this is our time to prove ourselves. It would be easy to convince ourselves that we are deserving of this misfortune and give up, but the point of this challenge is to prove our worth. In the original Greek tragedies, the protagonist would be given a challenge wherein he/she would have to prove his-/herself as being stronger than the gods believed possible from a mere human. In this challenge, the hero had to descend into darkness and, in doing so, become removed from the comforts of the outside world. Starting to understand the analogy?

The point is that we, as a generation, have been charged with the responsibility of repairing the broken pieces of our country, and with reshaping the pieces that don't seem to fit right anymore. If we can lead our country through this catharsis then we will know we have trascended the limitations placed upon our futures. So don't get discouraged by all the closed doors because they are only making us stronger as a generation.

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To make a better world...

Psychology is the study of the human brain, the cognitive processes, and the biological and social factors which influence our behavior. In American culture, the topic is devalued due to reasons in which I will discuss in a future post, but for now, just know that a firm understanding of how people think and interact is a powerful foundation in life whether or not our society is outwardly aware of it. I would even argue that a course in psychology should be included in the required curriculum of high school graduates as it both prepares you for interactions in the business world (for non-collegiate tracks) and provides you with a very applicable knowledge base for social and science majors.

Within the field, psychologists typically choose to specialize in:

• Neuroscience: the cellular, biological and physiological factors influencing behavior
• Social psychology: study of the behavior of individuals in a group and the behavior of the group as a seperate entity
• Cognition: the study of thought processes and the areas of the brain involved in behavior
• Clinical psychology: the therapeutic application of psychology on individuals in ways shown to provide benefit to disorders in thought, development, emotion, and memory

Obviously this list isn't exhaustive, but it gives you a sense of the shear immensity of information that resides within the study of psychology. Understanding even a portion of it would help to benefit society and reduce the errors in behavior that run so rampant in our culture today. Moreover, it would help to reduce the level at which the population is decieved by the media and government bodies that capitalize on psychological manipulation.

In terms of individual benefits, one particlularly useful skill that one often discovers in psychology is the understanding of the self. "Who am I?" is the cliche question asked by all twenty-somethings, and topics such as personality typification help to provide a guide map for the path to self-discovery. For instance, according to the Myers-Briggs Test of Personality, I am an

INTP - "Architect". Greatest precision in thought and language. Can readily discern contradictions and inconsistencies. The world exists primarily to be understood. 3.3% of total population.

Take Free Jung Personality Test
personality tests by similarminds.com

With this knowledge, one can do a quick google search to see what career choices an INTP would perform best within. Furthermore, it provides the weak and strong points of your personality type so as to better interact with people accordingly. Perhaps its just my personal preference for both abstract and practical ideas, but either way, I believe that psychology is an under-valued subject that would do nothing but strengthen us as a society if more individuals were educated in it. OK, I guess that's enough self-promotion for one day!!

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The Reality of Dreams (my guest blog on Change Bound)

The Reality of Dreams

Change Bound: The Reality of Dreams

“Each man should frame life so that at some future hour fact and his dreaming meet. “ - Victor Hugo

I recently wrote a guest piece on a blog that is run by one of my high school teachers. I thought I would share it on my blog today, as well, as it gives you a little more info about me, in case you were wondering.

"Some people would argue that success is best measured by the number in their bank account statement while some would counter that it’s more about the number of credentials attached to the end of your name. Maybe it’s my naivety that rejects these measures, but I believe that the only true confirmation of one’s success is in having achieved the dreams and aspirations that are unique to your own soul. As a recent college graduate, perhaps my lack of experience distorts my opinion, but I think that our culture needs more optimism like mine. In a world where conflict and economic strife are the headlines of the daily news, the only thing that we can hold onto is our hope that things will get better. One of my strongest personal beliefs is that we each have, within us, the power to shape our world and to determine the direction that our lives will take. Call it cliché, but this idea has always been a driving force in my life.

As a psychology major at Emory University, I was a research assistant and I studied the development of memory in children. One major bullet point that I retained from that experience was the pivotal role that socialization plays in molding a child’s developing mind. In many ways, the brain of a child is like a molten lava flow; it is vibrant and energetic yet ultimately shaped by the environment through which it flows. For me, as a child raised in the tiny town of Clinton, Tennessee, it would have been easy to accept the idea that my future was restricted to my hometown like so many of my classmates were led to believe. Luckily, though, I was fortunate enough to have a vibrant imagination, a family that encouraged my innate passions, and a few great teachers that taught me that my strongest attributes were my heart and my mind.

Much of my own childhood was spent living vicariously through the characters of books that I read, but in the real world, many would say that I was sort of an outsider among my classmates. Understandably, being excluded had a profound effect on me, but not so much in a negative way. Maybe it was my natural disposition, but I believe that it helped to breed in me a desire to work harder. I learned to read people and understand situations much more quickly than my peers because I was constantly attempting to fit into their socially constructed roles. By the end of high school I had constructed a life of which I could finally be proud, and while I was unaware of it at the time, I now understand that much of that success was due to the self-confidence that came with believing that anything was possible. I have never been afraid to try the improbable, and I suppose my comfort on the road less traveled is one of the aforementioned perks of being a wallflower. So I took that road to Atlanta, GA and attended Emory University.

Needless to say, sometimes our dreams take us to places that seem more like nightmares upon first glance; I was a small-pond-fish among big-ocean-sharks, and I slowly began to understand the cold realities of our society. Money, which until this point was a foreign language to me, was the ultimate distinction between my classmates and myself: namely I had little and they had lots. While it was difficult without the constant comforts of home, I managed to use my inner strengths to my advantage and make a few good friends while doing well in my classes. Predictably, though, I lost my self-confidence at some point in the chaos, and its disappearance became a near disaster for me. I took a leave of absence from school to find myself again, but it wasn’t easy. My father fell extremely ill during this period of time and the fear of losing him made me question even my deepest held values. Yet the one faint glow in that darkness was that faint optimism left from my youth; the belief that I possessed everything I needed within myself. So I worked harder than ever and I managed to rekindle my passions. With renewed vigor, I finished my degree and proved to myself that the once clear image of my future was, in fact, attainable all along.

So what would be my advice for dealing with life’s unpredictability? Well, I always keep some of that “molten lava” from my childhood burning so that when my environment inevitably changes, I am able to mold myself to it without breaking. In all seriousness, sometimes we forget that children possess the hope that many of us so desperately need. We spend a lot of time teaching them the things we want them to know, but I know, for me at least, there is a lot I could learn from my younger self. The biggest challenges in my life have always been and will always be in keeping my dreams alive long enough to attain them and in allowing my life to change without believing that “who I am” has to change with it."

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The Lesson of the Newtown Tragedy

Post-Newtown: Has America finally learned its lesson?

...& was it the right lesson?

Even if you have been living under a rock for the past week, you have probably still heard about the tragic event took place in Newtown, CT last Friday. Even more assuredly, you have witnessed the transformation of even your most politically apathetic friends and family into passionate activists either for or against gun control. Undoubtedly, the recently expired ban on assault weapons needs to be reinstated, but almost all sane American's can agree on that so my question is:

Is there a broader concern in our culture that, as a society, we are neglecting?

Of course there is! When was the last time that our media fixated their cameras on the real cause of our social problems? Their interest in capturing hard-hitting and attention-grabbing headlines has always limited the quality of our information, and the coverage of the Newtown tragedy is no exception. The mention of this issue is included in most reports as a sidebar to the main issue of gun control, but I wholeheartedly disagree. By now, you have hopefully predicted that the issue at which I am hinting is the handling of mental illness in America, and I'm equally hopeful that you are aware that this subject is highly taboo in our culture. But, in essence, mental illness IS our culture. Culture and mental health are so intimately intertwined that one should not appear in textbooks without adequate mentioning of the other. Consider this:

"Cultural and social factors contribute to the causation of mental illness, yet that contribution varies by disorder. Mental illness is considered the product of a complex interaction among biological, psychological, social, and cultural factors. The role of any of these major factors can be stronger or weaker depending on the specific disorder."--http://www.nmha.org

So it isn't a far stretch from this statement to understand how lower-income and social minorities suffer from mental health issues at a higher rate than do the higher-income groups or the social majority. This issue is as much a human rights issue as it is a health one. We have to stop avoiding the issues that make us feel guilty as a society. Let's be honest, we have all overheard the stereotypical behavior of certain homeless people wherein they emphatically declare their opinions about some obscure topic to their hallucinations, and I admit that I, too, have been guilty of laughing at their strange ramblings. Yet, this is the root of our cultural error. We have allowed the capitalist ideals of self-sufficiency and "bootstrap"-style self-improvement to permeate into all aspects of our culture.

We laugh at our fellow man's mental illness as if they have somehow failed at achieving their American dream. But the real irony there is that we never allowed them to have dreams at all. Research has shown that certain genetic attributes are turned on in the presence of extreme environmental stress. You or I could have the same gene in our DNA, lying dormant in anticipation of the event that will activate it. If thats the case the what is the difference between us and the man talking to himself on the street corner? (hint: that's a rhetorical question)..

Now, there are just as many disorders that afflict all socioeconomic groups equally, and these are the disorders that are usually biologically determined at the point of conception. Yet, we are so quick to blame the parents/caregivers for not raising the child "properly." By now, I have made it clear that the source of mental illness is often a topic for which NO ONE has the complete answer given science's current level of understanding. You or I are just as likely as was Nancy Lanza (the mother of the CT shooter) to bear a child that suffers from a disorder like the one Adam Lanza (the CT shooter) suffered from. This is not a question of "who is to blame", this is a question of "what can we do about it now?"

And, yes, we could place the blame on the Lanza family for having guns in their home, but the danger of guns isn't going to go away with a legal prohibition. We can restrict access to assault weapons, but even that has the potential to result in dangerous & unregulated black markets. What we can do is to begin accepting a certain level of responsibility as a society for the Newtown massacre. A few options:

1. Increasing government funding to clinical research of mental illness treatments
2. Pursuing legislation that will require courses be taught on proper mental healthcare in our public schools
3. Decriminalize & distigmatize the label of having a disorder in personality, mood, or thought
4. Requiring that ALL insurance plans include mental health providers in their coverage
5. Starting public awareness campaigns in the media which recommend that everyone begin seeing a therapist twice a year as part of a well-rounded health plan

These are just a few options that could help to fuel positive change in how our country helps the mentally ill. It's the only real way to stop events like the Newtown massacre from happening in an era when guns already permeate the very fabric of our society.

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Welcome!

"Interdependence is and ought to be as much the ideal of man as self-sufficiency. Man is a social being."

-Mahatma Gandhi-

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