How Milestone Anxiety Is Screwing Over Millenials and Gen Z

Our quest to ‘have it all’ isn’t exactly feasible, and yet some are willing to sacrifice their well-being to attain it

I'm turning 30 in a couple of months. Most people within my social circle have either already passed that dreaded milestone or will do so in a few years. And I have to say; it’s a weird time. Some of my friends are getting engaged and planning their honeymoons and never seem to shut up about all the pricey household items they’ll get once they finally manage to buy their dream homes. Meanwhile, some others need to Google how to make sure their laundry won’t turn pink again and spend their weekends partying with people who look like they belong in high school. But if there’s one thing that unites nearly all of us, it’s a peculiar kind of... panic. Because we’re not where we want to be in life. Because we don’t have it all figured out. And because we haven’t yet reached all the traditional life milestones we ‘should have’ reached. Even people who started ticking off the boxes on society’s milestones list seem to worry they’re not yet the ‘successful’ adults they believe they’re supposed to be, resulting in a rush to keep up and not fall ‘behind’. Well. For all the talk among the younger generations about how there’s no rule book to life, it sure feels lately as if there is a rule book to life, and we’re all stuck on the first few pages. But there’s a reason why so many of us feel like we’re failing. And that’s the same reason why we shouldn’t worry about it nearly as much as we do now.

Most of us are falling ‘behind’ and feeling the stress of it. 

According to recent research by mental health charity Relate, young people are in the middle of a ‘milestone anxiety’ crisis—a term coined to describe the pressure to reach certain traditional life milestones, like finding a partner, having children, buying a house, getting high up the career ladder, and so on. And based on the poll they did among adults in the UK, it looks like 77% of millennials—defined in the study as 25–39-year-olds—and 83% of Gen Z—16–24-year-olds—are currently feeling pressure to reach those milestones. In contrast, 66% of over-75s and 70% of baby boomers felt this way when they were younger. Of all those from younger generations feeling the pressure, 39% said this comes from themselves, followed by society (22%) and their parents (21%). Gen Z were the most likely to say this pressure was coming from social and mainstream media (23%). Interestingly, while the majority of those from older generations agree society is now more accepting of people choosing their own life path, the majority of younger people... disagree. Roughly a third of millennials (34%) and Gen Z (33%) actually feel that those traditional life milestones are outdated altogether, and most of them—88% and 95%, respectively—also think there are certain life milestones that society should better recognize instead.

So the good news is, if you’re a young person feeling left ‘behind’ on the road to accomplishment, you’re hardly the only one. And while it might feel like everyone around you is getting married and buying houses and being promoted, that’s not exactly the case either. Although I know a few ‘successfully’ adulting adults, most of my millennial and Gen Z friends, family members and acquaintances aren’t married, don’t have kids, own a house or make six figures. Recent statistics paint a very similar picture, too. While most baby boomers and many Gen X in Western societies generally married in their 20s, bought a house and had kids soon after, we aren’t hitting those milestones at the same rate. On average, younger people are getting married approximately seven years later than our parents. In the UK, marriages have fallen by 50% since 1972. In the US, only less than half (44%) of millennials are married, while most (75%) of Gen Z are single. Even among the oldest millennials, the homeownership rate—which in the US currently stands at just 60%—lags behind older generations at that same age. Younger generations are generally less likely to own their own home and more likely to rent than the older ones. And while the age women first give birth has consistently risen over the past decade, many younger people seem to be taking a pass on having kids altogether. But if you consider the reality of our times, none of this is surprising.

Social expectations haven’t kept pace with the realities of the modern world. 

If you Google ‘millennials are’ or ‘Gen Z are’, some of the most searched-for words include lazy, toxic, entitled, self-centered, too sensitive and... not ok. Well, most of us are probably indeed not ok. But I’m not sure I agree with anything else. Many of us followed the blueprint and did everything we were told to do to be successful in society’s eyes. Millennials are, on average, better educated than previous generations. Gen Z are now on track to be the best-educated generation yet. Study after study also shows millennials work much harder and longer than our predecessors. According to one of them, one-fourth of millennials worldwide work more than 50 hours per week. That’s at least ten extra hours per week compared to the global average. Still, we lack stability on nearly all levels. We have smaller savings accounts than prior generations. We’re less likely to have benefits like paid sick leave. We have massive student debt loans. And we can’t afford to buy a home, get married or have kids—the cost of which all dramatically went up. (Unless we have a rich aunt who passes away or something.) It doesn’t matter that we got our degrees and are working our asses off because we’re constantly squeezed between not-so-once-in-a-lifetime events, vanishing jobs, suffocating inflation rates, eye-watering housing prices, and bleak economic outlook.

The socio political and economic landscape we live in has changed drastically over the last few decades. And yet the pressure to live up to our parents’ and grandparents’ norms and expectations remains even though those expectations are largely no longer attainable. Not only that, but many young people let their milestone anxiety get the best of them and succumb to these pressures, even if it means sacrificing their own happiness. I see it all the time with people I know, too. They accept offers for jobs they hate just because they pay well. They work extra long hours in hopes of getting a bonus or promotion. They buy into all sorts of murky side-hustle schemes. They rush into dating and moving in with people they hardly even know. Just so they aren’t the only ones ‘failing’ at life. It’s no wonder that burnout from workplace stress is now at an all-time high and that it’s Gen Z and young millennials who report the highest levels of burnout. Or that the so-called ‘deaths of despair’—caused by drugs, alcohol, and suicidal thoughts—have risen faster among millennials in recent years than any other age group. In our quest to live up to unrealistic expectations set by society to buy a house, get married, have a baby, and be all-around ‘successful’ adults—usually only measured by materialistic markers of success—we’re burning out and sacrificing our well-being. And all that for what, exactly?

You’re under no obligation to have it all figured out. 

The pressure to hit certain milestones on a strict timeline certainly isn’t new. But it’s definitely much more pronounced in the age of social media and reality TV that keep bombarding us with how everyone else lives their life and what life milestones they’re ticking off the ‘life achievement’ list. Still, none of this means these milestones are set in stone, and we have to reach them, or else we can never hope to live a happy life. Although I know that’s, unfortunately, easier said than done. I’m no stranger to that sinking feeling that time is slipping by, and I need to hurry up and figure everything out and work hard if I don’t want to be a failure. I rushed through my early and mid-20s and suffered burnout at the ripe age of 26, but here I am a few years later, definitely not interested in pushing myself too hard to reach arbitrary milestones set by other people ever again. And now, instead of speeding through life, I move at a glacial pace and make sure to stop on the way to wherever I’m going—no clue what that is—to enjoy the views. If I’m not considered a ‘successful’ adult by some, so be it. What does someone else’s opinion have to do with me? Besides, marriage, kids, a semi-detached house in the suburbs, and a Pinterest-worthy kitchen are far from being a one-size-fits-all dream. And you could do all of the things society expects you to do and still end up deeply miserable.

(Hell, perhaps doing all the right things and hoping it will magically cure whatever ails you is precisely the reason why so many people from the older generations don’t exactly seem happy either.) That’s why I wish more young people recognized that instead of clinging to outdated societal or parental expectations and navigating life with a rush, we should appreciate what we have now, celebrate the small wins, and focus on achievements that actually make us fulfilled. Because whether we like it or not, we inherited a world that makes it near impossible to be a human and not a machine. And until we fix it, we really shouldn’t be too hard on ourselves. That gap between what our generations think we ought to be achieving and what is possible given the current climate will likely only get more pronounced in the following years. And that will continue to have an impact on our mental health. But it’s ok not to have it all figured out. It’s ok to fall ‘behind.’ And most importantly, it’s ok to just slow down. This isn’t a competition. And there’s no award for running yourself to the ground in pursuit of attaining what has now become almost impossible to attain.

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