It Is What It Is

I’m going to be real with you right now. I am a lazy Gen Z that thinks the internet is the future of jobs. We’re advocates for “self-care” and then we continue to spend hours upon hours on electronic devices. We bring back trends that should’ve been peacefully laid to rest in their era. We’re so creative that we’re unoriginal and have no authenticity.

But, we’re fire starters. We speak up for what we believe in while we’re too anxiety-stricken to ask for ketchup at a restaurant. We’re stressed and lost but can confidently strut around in oversized clothes and confusing styles. We’re bold and we’re strong but we’re timid and scared.

Growing up, we were taught to treat others the way we wanted to be treated but never got the same respect from adults. We were forced to grow up but never learned how to do taxes, buy a house, or handle money. We’re so smart though but it hides away and is masked by a mental illness. We go to bed late because our world is so much quieter in the moonlight, but complain about being tired in the sunlight.

Schools thrive off of our idiocy. We believe them when they tell us we need them to be free. We bury ourselves so deep in books that we forget how to swim back out. We collect debts that will never be payed until we’re old and grey. We work to pay them back, for a wage that will never compensate. And we work for someone else until we’re allowed to retire. Only then can we chase what we really desire.

Our phones are safe spaces that takes the awkward out of uncomfortable situations. We live in artificial worlds right in front of our eyes, spacing out our real lives. We drive cars that automatically start. Because it’s a burden to twist a key. We can’t afford to live alone. So, we hustle away under our parents roof as we drip into our 20s.

The problem isn’t us. It’s society’s standards of us and what we have to live up to or lack thereof. Life is less transparent. Greed is riding high. I’m being suffocated by a pillow of dread and regret. Yes, I am a Gen Z but I am not labeled under who we were thought to be.