I wonder what it is like to inherit an Earth and a life that you are not promised. What do I mean by that? Millennials and Gen Z were told to go to school, go to college and you’ll get a good job. This good job will make you good money.

It didn’t matter what type of degree you got; sure, some degrees earned you more money than others, but if you just went to college, you’d do well. This advice was coming from a generation that scarcely had the opportunity to go to college. In addition, a job that required only a high school diploma was enough to live like a fully functioning adult; imagine what a job with a degree paid.

That was the dream sold to many Millennials and Gen Z. Come time to get those six-figure jobs after graduating college, many of those new grads found themselves in entry-level positions or having to go back to school, racking up more debt to get another degree in hopes of increasing their potential salary. That’s not even to mention recessions and pandemics.

The dating and marriage landscape changed as well. The baby boomer generation was married with 2-3 kids, owned a home, and taking annual trips to Disney World for vacation by the age of 25. Now, if you can simply afford to move out of your parent’s house into a studio apartment before the age of 30, you’re doing well for yourself. The average age of first marriage today is around 28 and it’s probably still creeping up.

How about climate change? Climate change is literally reshaping the world into one that will be noticeably different from past generations. There will be certain parts of the world that, within our lifetime, may no longer be inhabitable. These places could be underwater, actual Atlantis’s, or too unbearably hot to live in.

That’s not the world you thought you were going to inherit so many years ago, right? Obviously, we’ll have to adapt, but what are the consequences of being blind-sighted? Maybe blindsight is too strong a word. What does that do to one psychologically? Either way, work needs to be done and we’ll be the only ones around to do it.