the gen z resilience drought

the "omg you people can't do anything" of it all

Resilience is a complicated word. It feels inherently aggresive and gaslighty. For many it conjurs images such as that of an emotionally repressed father that never sheds a tear, or a bitter high school teacher that won’t take “mental health stuff” as an excuse for late homework. But, I think herein lies the problem. Whilst previous generations may have had an unhealthy excess of resilience, the pendulum has swung so far that current generations have landed in deficiency. “Resilience” has indeed been weaponised against victims of the system for centuries, but resilience itself is not bad.

Too much resilience, that is never advocating for yourself or demanding autonomy, is traumatising. It has produced a generation (Gen X) that is teeming with emotionally unregulated parents that cannot keep up with the pendulum. This emotional dysregulation has left a mess in its wake. A mess of exasperated children (Millenials/Gen Z) that carry the burden of healing generational trauma and ignorance. However, much as we roll our eyes at their subbornness and confusion, it isn’t wholly unwarranted. When individual autonomy becomes a blanket aversion to doing hard things and experiencing the discomfort that comes with struggle and growth it is, in my opinion, a resilience deficiency. Life isn’t meant to be constantly laborious, but it isn’t meant to be easy. The assumption that it is meant to be easy will make it feel laborious. When boundary setting and self-advocacy goes so far that we develop an allergy to the chaos of human existence, we have lost our resilience. We have become unregulated in the opposite sense.

Let’s start with “neurodivergence” and minorly othered white people

The tweet above went viral and I believe it’s because the bulletproof defence of “but I have ADHD” is exhausting. It’s not that ADHD is not a real problem, it’s that having problems does not absolve you from responsiblity. When are you asking too much of someone, and when are you asking someone to reasonably sacrifice their comfort? To be there for you even though they are not without hardship? An impossible question.

Before you throw hands, I am speaking from experience. I have been diagnosed with over 10 chronic illnesses, have sensory issues up the wazoo and fit perfectly into the category of minorly othered (also queer) white person. Yes, I see these things as minor otherness. The conversation of white people and autism is an essay in and of itself, but what it comes down to is entitlement to comfort. It’s a hard conversation to navigate because the lines are blurry. Neurodivergence is a very encompassing word. When is it concerning high needs disability, and when is it mild executive dysfunction? Someone can say they are “non verbal” just because they don’t feel like talking. Someone can sayt that they are “overstimulated” because they are not comfortable. Pain and suffering are hard to quantify.

All I know is that minorly othered white people seem to be the most demanding of having their needs met of any othered group. Are people with “low needs” (not sure how else to say it) neurodivergence entitled to having their needs met and examined? Of course. Should we demand systematic change in response to changing needs? Of course. But the assumptions that a) those that don’t wear their hardship or otherness on their sleeve don’t also experience discomfort, and b) to live in total comfort at all times is a human right are problematic.

Very few of us get ideal conditions

When I became suddenly very ill at 17 and experienced serious hardship for the first time, I demanded pity. I embodied the identity of a sufferer as I was too young to see that to be misunderstood and overestimated is better than to be pitied. Pity was freeing. Nobody asked anything of me. In fact, I lost all of my friends. In defence of my teenage self, I didn’t know any better. Now, when I open up about my “struggles” with my health both past and present, I don’t enjoy being met with pity. Empathy and sympathy are natural human responses, I understand this, but I always find myself saying “it’s just life”. Because it IS just life. It doesn’t even begin to outweigh my privilege. I don’t say this as a martyr. Too much resilience is harmful and I have advocated for myself and restructured my life as best as I can. But I see no point in pausing my life in want of perfection.

Two things can be true at once. We can advocate for ourselves and sacrifice for others. We can both demand change to alleviate our suffering, and adapt to what is for others. I can answer my phone at 2am because my friend needs me even though I am tired from work and chronically fatigued. I’ll sleep more the next night and skip my yoga class. It is not perfect. It is uncomfortable at times. Sometimes I have to say no, of course. But we cannot wait for ideal conditions to be there for each other. Societal change is birthed from uncomfortable togetherness.

“I’m not made for this world” — nor is it made for you (or many of us)

Look at it this way — your problems are not necessarily your fault, but they are unfortunately your responsibility. Nobody expects you to walk if you were born without legs. If, however, you want to get from A to B and you only have one leg due to a freak helicopter accident, you have two choices. You can sit at point A and demand that anyone who wants to be in community with you come join you. You can wait until the systems around you hear you and carry you to point B. Or, you can hop. The people who really love you will even hop with you at times. You may hop slower for your slower friends too, but they don’t demand it of you. Community isn’t about demands, it’s about empathy and selflessness. One could say that nobody should have to hop. Hopping is exhausting. Yes, this is true. But why yell from point A when you can yell on your way to point B? I know this analogy will not make sense to everyone, but stick with me.

What I find the most frustrating is when people see someone move from A to B and B to C and assume that they must have two healthy legs, for why are they in motion? As someone who has been limping along for a while now, I never assume this, yet people assume it of me. This is the result of the resilience drought. Those that expect comfort cannot fathom those that continue in discomfort.

I mean, of course you’re lonely if you choose comfort over connection

I fear that many young people (my 17-year-old self included) in the throes of executive dysfunction, fists in the air saying “fuck capitalism”, are demanding change that they aren’t willing to contribute to. Community requires sacrifice to your autonomy. Revolution requires sacrificing comfort. If you aren’t willing to go outside of your comfort bubble for someone, no government-mandated third spaces are going to magically gift you with a sense of community. If you can’t do some research on world events here, or go to a protest there, no instagram repost is going to illicit change. The tricky part is quantifying what is discomfort and what is unbearable suffering, for we all have varying levels of resilience and capacity. When do we set a boundary, and when do we sacrifice our energy? I’m not at all sure, but I have some ideas.

Listening to someone talk about their problems even though you also have problems is not suffering. That is the mild discomfort that simply comes with being a friend. That is not a time to set a boundary (unless it happens constantly, duh). Picking someone up from the airport even though you have to wake up at 5am instead of 8am and have plans that weekend is mild discomfort. Your communal work place having bright lights that make you uneasy due to mild sensory issues is, I fear, mild discomfort. The thing about mild discomfort is not that you can never address it, it’s that you are not entitled to be without it in all situations. Especially communal ones.

I am not saying that we should not set boundaries. I am not saying that we should not advocate for ourselves. I am not saying that we should all hop along in silence and demand nothing from the systems in power or from those around us. There is always someone hopping behind us that needs our voice. What I am saying, is that there is a wave of intolerance to discomfort that is stifling political action and perpetuating individualism. If you genuinely value your autonomy over community, you are free to “protect your peace” as you please. If you genuinely value your own comfort over social change, you are free to pursue it. Again, if you are disabled to a point where you can only talk the talk and are unable to even hop the walk, this does not apply to you. If you are tired of hopping, that is also okay. But we must not give ourselves so much grace that we infantalise ourselves as a generation. Too much resilience - too much hopping - is truly harmful. You don’t want to break your good leg. However, giving yourself too much grace is self abandonment. Only you can truly know what this balance is for yourself, so explore it. Be real with yourself. Swing the pendulum of your own resilience and see what happens.

Executive dysfunction or laziness?

Last year I read a book called Stolen Focus by Johann Hari about ADHD, excutive dysfunction and the epidemic of lost attention. If you’re picking up anything I’ve been putting down, I highly recommend reading it. In this book, he talks about how many scientists believe that ADHD and executive dysfunction is as environmental as it is genetic. That is, a chaotic and stressful childhood leaves you on edge, dysregulated and with attention issues. If you must always pay attention to your surroundings for your own safety, how are you supposed to focus deeply and calmly on the task at hand? Makes sense, then, why (genetics aside) we are so unmotivated as a generation. Our parents were stressed and overworked and more and more kids are growing up with screens - the metropolis of chaos and dysregulation.

What I find curious about learning this, is that my parents did have insanely difficult and chaotic childhoods, but don’t seem to struggle remotely with executive dysfunction. When I put off paying a fine or booking an appointment because “I just can’t bring myself to do it” my parents can’t even begin to understand. I’ve discussed this with my friends and it seems that my parents and my friends parents, emotionally dysregulated and traumatised as they may be, somehow have their shit together. The parking fines are instantly attended to and the dentist is booked as soon as the tooth ache appears.

It comes back to the pendulum. When you should do something, it’s easy to get in the habit of not doing it. When you must do something, this tendency goes under the radar. In other words, the era of convenience perpetuates executive dysfunction. My parents may very well have the same genetic and environmental predispositions as me, but with the modern acceptance of executive dysfunction comes the erasure of laziness as a concept. This is a good thing, as it comes hand-in-hand with critiquing hustle culture and capitalism. However, it goes to show that resilience brings with it a level of discipline that younger generations are struggling to maintain. I asked my mum about this and she basically said with a giggle “if we had this many demands we would have just been sent down the mines”. Obviously, things have changed for the better. However, the ever increasing death of drive and discipline is concerning.

Please, take this with a grain of salt. If you think what I am saying is ableist, you are missing my point. We cannot complain about capitalism and call it a day. We must be in as much motion as we can muster.

The pendulum will be flung back if we are not careful

We shouldn’t have to hop and the systems are flawed and unfair. However, we should be asking ourselves if we underestimate our capacity purely because we are no longer forced to overestimate it. The resilience drought has played a necessary part in the balancing of the scales, but I feel it may be time to find our centre. We don’t have time to wait until we are comfortable to move. We never really did have time, but now more than ever it is imperative that we begin to once again favour community and action over peace and autonomy. The political repurcussions of the resilience drought are complex, but let’s just say that people like Donald Trump and Elon Musk are preying on those that are exhausted and desperate for the pendulum to move back. I promise you, it will not rest in the middle if they are the ones left to push it.

Take care of yourself, but don’t forget to challenge yourself xx