No problems solved by “˜Quarterlife Crisis’

By Cuauhtemoc Ortega
Daily Bruin Senior Staff

If the authors of “Quarterlife Crisis: The Unique
Challenges of Life in Your Twenties” intended for the book
itself to be one of those “unique challenges,” then
they’re correct ““ the challenge is in trying to find
valuable substance in the book.

The authors, Alexandra Robbins and Abby Wilner, target the book
at college graduates and young adults attempting to formulate the
foundations of their career ““ the time when the quarterlife
crisis most frequently occurs.

The term “quarterlife crisis” is a derivative of the
more commonly known midlife crisis, which usually strikes sometime
between the late 40s and early 50s. It is characterized by an
onslaught of doubt and regret caused by the realization of
life’s shortness.

Adults going through the midlife crisis feel they need to use
the remainder of their lives to compensate for goals they
didn’t achieve in previous years ““ this results in
episodes that can vary in extremity, from purchasing expensive
material possessions to having extramarital affairs.

“The midlife crisis revolves around a doomed sense of
stagnancy of a life set on pause while the rest of the world
rattles on,” the authors write.

According to the authors, the quarterlife crisis occurs for the
opposite reason.

“The quarterlife crisis occurs precisely because there is
none of that predictable stability that drives middle-aged people
to do unpredictable things,” say Robbins and Wilner in the
book.

Robbins and Wilner explain that, while in college, young adults
have a clear idea of what needs to be done because it is outlined
for them by the university ““ that is, the requisites for
attaining a degree are definite and usually unvariable.

This sense of direction establishes the foundations for what the
authors called a real-world “culture shock” ““
namely, the realization that finding employment is not as automatic
a process as going through college.

Experiencing the culture shock creates “overwhelming
instability, constant change, too many choices, and a panicked
sense of helplessness,” according to the book.

The book attempts to justify the feelings people undergoing a
quarterlife crisis experience by explaining to readers why their
emotions are natural. The authors do this by presenting over a
hundred anecdotes of people who have undergone, or are undergoing,
their quarterlife crisis.

Most of the stories involve recent college graduates and their
struggle to find a career, something almost every student will
undergo.

However, what all the anecdotes really do is allow the reader to
commiserate with other people. Unless the reader considers it
valuable to peer into the lives of over a hundred people undergoing
one of the most miserable periods of their lives, the book
doesn’t provide much else.

Even when readers can sympathize with one of the people
interviewed in the book, the authors fail to make a substantive
link that provides information people don’t already know.
They connect the anecdotes with broad and obvious generalizations
such as, “But even if it seems like everyone knows what they
want to do at this point in their lives, there’s no guarantee
that what they want to do now will be what they always want to
do,” and, “A major factor of the quarterlife crisis is
that real life does not turn out to be what many twentysomethings
expect.”

It’s difficult to provide answers for a phenomenon that
has yet to be thoroughly researched or explained ““ the
book’s content demonstrates this well.

The book is ideal for someone seeking a basic explanation of
what the concept of the quarterlife crisis is, but young adults
already undergoing the crisis shouldn’t expect to learn much
from it.