What The Young Folks Want Sounds Familiar

Fifty years ago Barb and I were pursuing our dream. We had been married less than a year and were living in a “small” one bedroom apartment in Cape Girardeau, Missouri.  We were both in our first year at new jobs; Barb as a 2^nd grade teacher and I as a youth director.  One of our goals was to own a home.  We managed to live off my salary and put her paychecks in a savings account.  That allowed us to purchase our own house after just a year of apartment living.  We stayed in Cape Girardeau three years and moved to the Chicago area with the plan to start a family.  Within a year we checked that goal off when we welcomed Peter into the family.  I can add some other achieved aspirations to that list; I earned my Master’s in Education and wrote a book.

I thought of the dreams of our youth last week when I read a new report from The Barna Group.  The study looked at the aspirations of the current generation of young adults ages 18-35.  Surprisingly, fifty years has not made a lot of difference in terms of what young people want.  The top two priorities were “buying a house” (53%) and “getting married” (41%).  “Becoming a parent” was fifth (33%) on the list.  Sandwiched in between were “following my dream” (38%) and “starting a business” (33%).    Interestingly, while I did not originally intend to, I was a partner in a publishing business for a few years.  I guess you could say I was just “following my dream,” so I can check that one off as well. 

The truth is the ambitions of the current generation are not much different than from previous generations.  So much has changed in the way we communicate, travel and seek entertainment.  While dating, Barb and I walked miles to get to a movie theater, today couples stream movies on a laptop.  We sent daily letters to each other during those times when we were apart, today couples text and facetime. 

In the end, today’s young folks just want to become financially independent, find someone to share their lives with and then start a family.  Kind of refreshing to think that in a time of such change, somethings remain the same.