The Defining Decade by Meg Jay
"The best is the enemy of the good." - Voltaire
Trying to make the best decision is too paralyzing, it's much better just to make a decent decision and respond to the consequences.
Identity capital is the term she uses for the set of experiences and skills that you acquire over time, that serves as a currency for all sorts of relationships -- romantic and work-wise. Kind of a cool concept that tries to pin down what you are building up over time as you gain experiences.
Six jams vs 24 jams Stanford psych study -- a taste test area was set up in a supermarket where 6 or 24 jams were displayed. The 24 jams got more attention on the days they were out due to the huge array of choices, but only 3% of the people who sampled actually went on to buy jam. When there were only 6 jams laid out, 30% went on to buy a jam. Less choice made making a decision easier.
Weak ties -- this is the idea that the people closest to you are often the most similar, and the ones you'll learn the most from and expand your horizons with are generally the ones you have only a "weak tie" with. They can help you network and get your foot in the door when it would otherwise be more difficult. This chapter seemed to bash having a close friend group as it stifles growth, which I found myself a bit repelled by. Maybe this is true, but I think just maintaining a diverse set of friends who don't overlap can be just as good for growth. This may just be me clinging to a romantic notion of the value in a strong bond with another person, although looking to weak ties for help doesn't rule out the need for close relationships. She just seemed to bash these relationships quite a bit. Anyway, I like this idea, and feel like I had the same close friend group in Berkeley for most of the time there, but they were nice and diverse enough that I still learned a lot. Here in Chicago I feel my friend group is more diverse but generally at the expense of closeness; I also feel like Pearl and I have a good mix of growth-inducing differences and empathy-encouraging similarities.
Work should be crappy sometimes. She was saying how, at this stage in life, you want to feel like what you're doing for work is pushing you really hard because that's how you find your potential. An "easy" job where you don't have to worry about meeting expectations doesn't make you grow nearly as much as one where you regularly feel anxious or lost.
To go with this, a lot changes in the brain in your twenties. Supposedly it's a time where the brain is really plastic, comparable to the way a baby's is in the first few years of life. Afterwards it sounds like character traits are more locked in. She also wrote that people in their thirties and beyond become more accepting of things and more optimistic, and the ups and downs in emotions mellow out, which may both signal an end to a (volatile?) plastic brain and make you less eager to change yourself. Anyway, it seems to place a lot of importance on laying some good groundwork down in your twenties.
Don't move in with a girl before proposing! Supposedly the cohabitation effect is when you shlide into living together because it's convenient and fun, then get some furniture together, get used to sharing bills and cleaning the bathroom for each other, then shlide into getting married because it's easier than splitting up all your stuff again, and the whole time you're sort of just taking little steps toward a big thing which places less emphasis on each one. You don't go into it asking yourself if this is someone you want to spend the rest of your life with; it's more just that it could be fun and convenient, but that's not the way to look at seeing if a partner is right for you. So, supposedly this leads to higher divorce rates than if you ask yourself those big questions before choosing to live together (so get engaged first).
Trips are good. People often view living together as a good test for compatibility, but how does that mesh with the cohabitation effect? I'm glad you ask: trips to third world countries are good ways to put some stressors on a relationship and see how you both react. They come with opportunities to have a lot of fun together as well as encounter and deal with new and unknown settings together. Woo! Go Asia Trip 2015!
Take home message: There is this ubiquitous view that life doesn't need to start until you're 30. While many of the big decisions (marriage, starting a family, choosing a career and where to live, etc.) may not happen until then, the time to start thinking about them is definitely in your 20s. Also, this time of little responsibility and attachment will go by fast, so keep in mind the mantra:
Yesterday is history; tomorrow is a mystery; but today is a gift. That is why they call it the present.
