Quarter-life crisis: the struggle to balance dreams and reality
Niamh Jimenez: "In my life, I can’t seem to escape the feeling that I am a whole decade behind where I was meant to be. Right on the cusp of 30, I find myself child-free, car-free, and a perpetual student." Picture: Moya Nolan
A lot happens in quarter-life, those less talked about though no less turbulent years that stretch from the end of adolescence to the beginning of midlife. This is when, having been thrown into the deep end of the pool without armbands, the rest of the world expects you to swim gracefully—like a proper 'adult'. In the eyes of many, swimming gracefully in your 20s and 30s means building a stable career, saving for a house with good plumbing, and finding a suitable forever partner.
Just as all of these ‘properly adult’ goals come to the fore, a bunch of seemingly less rational fantasies—like launching a new creative project or working abroad—get tucked away like disobedient children. This is the perfect recipe for what Satya Doyle Byock, US-based psychotherapist and author of the new book calls a “quarter-life crisis”.
In the scramble to move from dependence to independence, quarter-lifers will recognise that distinct moment when you realise you have no idea who you are or what you want to do with the rest of your life.
In Byock’s view, this crisis often arises from a tug-of-war between what she calls the 'meaning self' and the 'stability self'. The ‘meaning self’ is the part of you that craves adventure, spirituality, and soul projects, even if it means bending the rules a little. The ‘stability self’, by contrast, is the part that demands stable income, a place to put down roots, and a compatible partner.
When the 'stability self' becomes fixated on paying the bills and planning for the future, the 'meaning self' has a habit of stopping you in your tracks with proclamations like: 'I have to go find out who I am before I die.'
“On the one hand, there's this move to find oneself and create oneself in the world and so that impulse is very strong,” Byock explains. “On the other, harsh economic realities dictate the need to make a living and pay for rent and buy food.
In quarter-life, we see this confluence of different needs as we search for meaning and stability at the same time. In searching for meaning, we want to truly deeply find ourselves as individuals, while in searching for stability, we need to face the realities and responsibilities of taking care of ourselves.”
For many quarterlifers, the harsh realities of becoming an adult in the midst of a housing and cost-of-living crisis can feel stifling. In my life, I can’t seem to escape the feeling that I am a whole decade behind where I was meant to be. Right on the cusp of 30, I find myself child-free, car-free, and a perpetual student. Having had to leave the world of academic science due to illness and the false promise that more degrees equal future job security and a higher wage, I find myself sandwiched between the house I grew up in and my boyfriend’s pad. This he shares, in the manner of most high-earning Dublin-dwelling professionals, with three other 30-something software developers.
“Financial survival becomes so pressing so quickly that we’re not supporting people to try projects they’re excited about, to date, to travel, and to work in different areas,” says Byock.
“There’s such huge pressure on quarter-lifers to ‘join the real world’ and get a job. Sometimes, we forget the importance of the call to adventure and letting young people find themselves.”
Byock is hardly surprised when I tell her that the money I earn from writing won’t fund travel adventures but will instead contribute to my retraining for entry into her field of work. Only then will I have the means to start saving for a mortgage.
The very notion of taking time out to “find oneself’ sounds wildly impractical, even whimsical, in a country where 68% of people aged between 25 and 29 cannot afford to move out of the family home. Many millennials are faced with the financial impossibility of saving for a mortgage and paying exorbitant rents, which averaged €2,344 in Dublin last year — nearly 60% of the national median monthly income.
Under such circumstances, how can we achieve independence without slipping back into the gawkish dance of early parent-child dynamics?
Byock responds with a volley of questions: “A key question is how does the quarter-lifer become psychologically independent, and how can parents support and encourage this process?
“If the parents are paying for the rent or mortgage, how does the quarter-lifer contribute as an adult in the household? How are they managing -cooking responsibilities? How are they making sure to clean up for themselves, even if the parents used to do that?”
Contrary to popular belief, psychological independence does not have to mean trading in your vibrant, adventurous spirit for a sedate grown-up. From Byock’s perspective, transitioning into maturity has a lot to do with negotiating with the 'meaning self' and 'stability self'— “twins trying to go in opposite directions".
Being able to hear this internal dialogue is no small feat amid the backdrop of a global crisis of meaning, where “climate change, social revolution and war” threaten to unravel our society. I tell her that, in these uncertain times, I am far more in touch with my stability self, who waits obediently for the green man at crosswalks, plans a spontaneous getaway two years in advance, and saves cash in little brown envelopes for future emergencies. How can I coax my overactive 'stability self' into giving my 'meaning self', with its lust for adventure, a much-needed pep talk?
First, she advises being wary of that inner voice who, desperate for personal meaning, says things like, “I’m going to work for that non-profit” or “I’m going to save the world in some way.” While these are noble ambitions, she believes that “becoming whole” is less of a psychological self-improvement project and more of an “existential” one.
“It’s about asking deeper questions like, ‘Who am I within the context of existence versus just what am I building in this life?” she says. “It’s also about learning how to honour our instinct, dreams and intuition — all sources of wisdom that can give us a clearer picture of what we need to feel satisfied and fulfilled. This is hard to do from just a straight logic or left-brain perspective, especially when most of us were raised to have a much more extroverted focus,” she says.
Practices like mindfulness and yoga can help quieten our internal chatter, says Byock.
“I think the social narrative needs to shift so it’s not just about carving out a brand and being distinctive, but rather about deeper self-exploration. That might mean disappearing from view on some level to go travelling for a couple of years or to try things you haven’t done before. Either way, you're not posting it [on social media] constantly because you're actually sorting out who you really are,” she says.
Byock, who has recently deleted her social media apps from her phone, says that “going dark like that requires moral courage.” “[Disappearing from social media] can mean that somebody's making a very wise choice to deepen their relationship with themselves as opposed to being constantly mirrored or bombarded with information,” she says. “It's hard to deeply know what we think on a moral, ethical, creative level when we are receiving so much input."
Finally, I ask her about that burning anxiety that crept into my life at about the age of 26, awakened in part by the arrival of a set of stubborn forehead lines. How do we deal with ageing in quarter-life?
“This one I hear all the time from clients,” says Byock, who, despite remembering the initial angst, has settled into her age to the extent that it almost feels irrelevant now.
“It's important to step off that vertical ladder and embrace a more horizontal, almost circular, plane of life that we can truly enjoy. The world is burning, people are suffering, and that is a tremendous reality. But the more we get to know ourselves, the more we can build a life that we want to be living.”
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