An Ordinary Age: Finding Your Way in a World that Expects the Exceptional

In this middling work, journalist Stauffer covers predicaments and obstacles facing those in "emerging adulthood." The gig economy, school and medical debt, social media, and the prospect of an uncertain future, she writes, have led younger generations to believe they must be extra accomplished and rack up extraordinary experiences in order to live their "best life." The author convincingly connects economic instability with the feeling that every moment has to be productive and the burnout that inevitably results. These arguments are supported by research from experts, such as professor Mona Abo-Zena's findings on the prefrontal cortex and the "elaborative state" of early childhood when perfectionist notions are formed, as well as quotes from mostly 20-somethings, and the author's anecdotes about her social media obsession in her late teens and early 20s. The main solution offered is to find community with chosen families or focusing on the betterment of one's neighborhood. However, the writing becomes repetitive and something of a litany of grievance and despair: "So much of our hyperfocus on being exceptional, individualistic, and extraordinary was built on a foundation of lies: that all this would save us; that it would all be enough someday." Early adulthood may indeed be a grind, but reading about it shouldn't be. (May)