I’ve ordered at least 20 books in the past 2 weeks that I plan to read throughout this year. The first one I’ve read is Meg Jay’s The Defining Decade: Why Your Twenties Matter–And How to Make the Most of Them Now. As a early 20-something, I was fairly excited to read this book based on the 4.5/5 stars reviews on Amazon.
Overall, it was an OK read. However, I couldn’t quite relate to a lot of the stories and I was a little disappointed that the author did not have concrete action steps or exercises for readers to think about as they read through her material. It was kind of the same 20-something zeitgeist phenomenon that’s been rehashed in the media recently and I found she did not really offer any new insights. Perhaps I had too high expectations going into reading this book — without trying to offend anyone, how many Starbucks-barista-type, college-educated, living-at-home-with-parents, saddled with student loan debt stories can people talk about?
Not that surprising that this book is definitely for a certain demographic: mid to upper middle class, college educated, predominantly white, with a touch of naïveté. If you are thinking of working at a coffee shop because that seems non-corporate, or going backpacking in Europe in order to “find yourself,” or putting off marriage or children until you’ve finished grad school, then this book is probably for you.
However, what did I find interesting?
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