Were we as tough as we thought?

Picture created by my AMAZINGLY talented brother Eric Housel

“We have tried so hard to give our kids what we didn’t have, that we failed to give them what we did. “

- Unknown Author (at least to me)

Have you ever wondered if your walk to school was really two miles uphill both ways or if that's even geographically possible?  And were you really walking through 3 feet of snow while carrying your sister on your back with holes in your shoes?   

Us adults like to tell stories, just like our parents did.  Our brains like to draw connections between the past and the present to try to make sense of it all.  So, we tell stories of how tough we used to be and how tough we “had it”.  It always seems to circle back to how weak the current generation is.  

Maybe some of the stories that we hold true about our childhood are just that, stories!  It was obviously a different time. We were outside exploring our world constantly.  I remember getting up early, leaving the house, and not coming home all day.  We rode our bikes or walked everywhere.  We played games in the neighborhood like manhunt, soccer, football, and street hockey.  When we were bored, we invented games.  We used our imaginations.  We had no cell phones, no computers, no tracking devices.  My parents thought they had a general idea where we were most of the time, and that was good enough.   

Why did we do all that?  Because were tough?  I am going to attempt to shed some light on the fact that maybe (just maybe) we were not as tough as we thought.  If that's even remotely true, then maybe this generation is not as weak as they seem.  

Reasons that we might not have been as tough as we thought

• There was no central air for us; If we had it, perhaps we would have not been so eager to get out into the world.

For me, growing up in the 80’s, the only place more unbearable than being outside in the heat of the summer was being inside our family home.  If your house was like mine and most that I knew, you had no central air conditioning.  In fact, most people I knew had one space air-conditioner that did one room of their house.  (Usually a parent's bedroom) Our space air conditioner was in our 100 square-foot den.  The more time you spent in the cool air of that room the harder it became to leave it.  Conversely the more time I spent with all four of us cramped in one room, the more insane I would become and the more I would need to get outside.  I remember vividly wanting to beat a new Atari game so bad that I sat in my room playing it with sweat pouring down my face until I couldn’t stand it anymore, gave up and went outside.   

• Our video game technology was better outside of the house.

Our generation invented playing video games.  I remember when Pong came out.  I couldn’t BELIEVE that I could hold a controller in my hand that would allow me to control something on my TV screen.  It was absolutely mind blowing!  As the technology grew from Pong to Atari to Intellivison to ColecoVision to Nintendo, my playtime with devices grew as well.  Early in the video game craze, the best games were ALWAYS at the arcades, pizza places, and burger joints.  Our games at home paled in comparison.  We would beg, borrow, and steal as many quarters as we could and head off on our bikes in search of our favorite video games.  (Do you remember lining the machine with quarters?) Were we addicted to video games like this generation?  I know I was at times and it seemed a lot of my friends were as well.  Eventually the quarters would run out, as would our interest in the games.  Then it would be time to find something new to do which usually was a sport or active game of some sort.

• Even watching TV is easier today than when we were kids.

Remember how we used to watch TV?  We had a big channel changing box attached by a wire to the back of the TV.  There were 13 choices in each of 3 rows of channels which gave us a maximum of 39 channels.  If we wanted to change the channel we had to get up and walk over to the TV.  Some kids could stretch the wire of the box to where they were sitting.  We weren’t allowed to do that in my house because of some unfounded parental threat that we would somehow break the box or the TV.  (kind of like, “you’re gonna shoot your eye out!”)  Today we have 900 or more channels.  Most of us probably only watch ten of them but we do have 890 others just in case.  When we want to change the channel, we not only can use our remote, but now we can even use our phones or our voices.  Does the fact that we had to get up to change the channel make us inherently tougher?  Probably not!

• The safety of our world was not broadcast on every TV, computer, device, and social media outlet. 

When we were kids, we didn’t even lock our doors!  We had the freedom to get out and explore our world and figure out who we were.  We were equipped with some basic safety tips such as don't; talk to strangers, take anything from strangers, accept rides from strangers, and when in doubt, RUN!  The biggest safety tip in my house was you better be home by the time the street lights came on or you better somehow avoid my Dad on your way into the house!    

Did we do all our exploring because we were tough or because we could?  

Looking back and connecting the dots, it was never clearer for me how much the news and information about our world had changed than watching OJ's White Bronco speed down the Los Angeles Freeways.  24-hour news stations helped to scare a lot of parents into keeping their kids as close as possible.  Then you add the internet, smart devices, social media and the constant bombardment of negative images of our world and it's no wonder these kids are no longer free to explore. 

My thinking is that the safety of our world hasn't changed as much as we think.  This world is a crazy place where crazy things happen, have always happened, and will always happen.  Crazy things were happening every day in the 80's.  One of the biggest differences in my opinion was something terrible could have happened in Minnesota and we might have never heard about it in New Jersey.  In today's world, not only will we hear about it almost instantly, but we get to see live footage of the incident at the scene and if we are lucky, we may even get to see the getaway car being chased by police.  

And what are we left with?  A generation of kids that are “free” to explore their world from behind a 6-foot vinyl fence in their backyard, but only if their parents are watching.     

• We were a product of our generation and circumstances.

“I recognize that I have no way of knowing that had I lived another person’s life I might talk and act exactly the same way”.  
- Hal Elrod, Author of Miracle Morning

My best friend is the 9^th of 9 kids in his family.  He was the kind of kid that was lugging around cinder blocks and firewood from the time he was old enough to walk.  Before school he would have to milk cows and chase chickens.  I remember him telling me a story about the time he asked, “what’s for lunch” and his mom replied, “there’s a tomato in the garden, get out there and make it yourself!”  We were born 3 weeks apart and lived 5 miles away.  Did I have to grow up being cinder block carrying-tomato in the garden-milk the cows before school-tough?  Not even close.  He used to joke with me about how easy I had it growing up and he was right in most ways.  He was a product of his circumstances, as much as he was a product of his generation.      

I was just a kid from Toms River, NJ trying to figure it all out.  I was no more a product of my circumstances and generation than our kids are of theirs.  Did we have things easier than our parent’s generation?  In my opinion, MOST DEFINITELY!  Did we have it better than our parent’s generation?  I truly believe that we did.  

So what about this generation? 

I wonder if this generation will look back on their lives and think that they “had it” better than us.  Sadly, I doubt it.  My 17-year-old son has said on many occasions that he wished he grew up in my era before all the technology that he has.   

I truly feel sorry for this generation and the cards that they have been dealt.  They have traded in a bike and a ball for a device and an Xbox.

• Their houses are bigger.
• Their air conditioning is better. 
• Their video games blow away any games that we could have ever imagined at the time.
• Their devices can pull up any image or information they choose at any time.  These devices can play music, turn on lights, and answer any question they can think of just by talking to them.  (Captain Kirk was the only person I knew of that could do that!)
• And OF COURSE, they don't even have to stand up and walk over to the TV to change the channel.

Imagine it’s 1983 – you wake up at 12:35pm - It’s 95 degrees out – It’s 68 degrees in your house – Your iPhone is sitting next to your bed – your TV remote and video game controller are sitting there too – You have access to 900+ channels and the best video games known to man - Every friend that you have ever known is one snap, facetime chat, or text away – You can see what your friends did and who they were with last night without even speaking to them.  Are you going to be in a big rush to find your friends, stay out all day and come home when the street lights come on?  I don’t think I would be.  In fact, I’m certain I wouldn’t.       

I think “our toughness” that we allude to so often had a lot more to do with the cards we were dealt than how tough we were.  I think it had a lot more to do with having no other choices and not knowing any other way.  Did we have to be tougher because of some of our circumstances, I guess.  Did we live that way because our intent was to be tough?  I don’t think so. 

We have questioned their teachers and yelled at their coaches and set up their play dates.  We tell them that they’re always safe at first base, no one ever loses, and everyone gets a trophy no matter what.  We get out in front of any kind of possible failure we can perceive and remove it before it happens.  We have shielded them from taking responsibility for their actions.  We have micromanaged every second of their day and then we wonder why they can’t solve problems on their own.  We’ve bailed them out every chance we get, and we wonder why it’s so easy for them to quit.  And then…AND THEN…we wonder why they are not as tough as we would like them to be.

Everyone I speak with seems to be accusing this generation of kids for not being tough enough, yet not as many seem to be questioning the toughness of our generation of parents.  If we don’t think this generation is tough enough it’s because we haven’t pushed them to be!  We have given them everything they will ever need to stay at home and live a secluded, sedentary lifestyle.  We have enabled this generation to become exactly what they are and then we have THE NERVE to call them weak.  

I have two wonders, a HUGE HOPE, and one final thought;

I wonder if there was ever a generation in American history that was brought up so differently than that of their parent's generation. 

I wonder if there were adults in every generation that wondered the same thing as me.

My HUGE HOPE is that at some point we look back on this time, and we will wonder how we got it so wrong, and we will have a society that is ready and willing to fix it.

My final thought is, if we are looking to place blame on why our kids are not tough enough, then the first place we need to look is in the mirror!

Thanks so much for taking the time to read this.  I would LOVE to hear your comments.  If you are interested in receiving our blog in your email PLEASE SUBSCRIBE!

Make today GREAT and KEEP MOVING!  

If you are interested in examining more on this topic, please check out Simon Sinek’s talk on “Millennials in the Workplace”.  I think he is brilliant, and he is my absolute FAVORITE motivational speaker!  His connection between smoking, drinking, gambling, and social media is both scary and fascinating.  His insights go along with a lot of the points that I tried to make in my blog.