November was my women´s month: I met with several childhood pals , did several events women only, and went to a women’s empowerment event in a millenial startup.
I have to confess something here: I felt a little jealous of these millenials, you see? Not just their glowing skin or wrinkle free eyes, something more deep.
It was an event designed to inspire 10- to 15-year-old girls from public schools to aspire to leadership positions in technology companies (www.inspiring-girls.com.br) and who organized it was a young woman in her mid-20s.
I spent all afternoon with them, all these cute, funny, very articulate (in their own way) and pro-active millenials girls, and from what I could feel, they most likely won’t have the same existential problems and anxieties as we, the new forties of today we have.
It seems to me a more powerful minded generation indeed ahead of labels, brands and the need for social acceptance even if we live now in social media. Okay, there is Supreme, there is the horrible Gucci sneakers, there is Van, but not so harsh in our youth. It´s okay now in same group some use Uniclo and others using Prada.
I’ll call them girls because they are girls to me. After all, we have a gap of about 20 years.
But look how crazy it is: we have the same slangs, and in political and economics topics they speak toe to toe. In others like technology, they win by a landslide. Unless of course the difference of skin youth and freshness, there is no gap in age and culture like my mother and I use to have, for example.
Maybe in their generation there is no prejudice about the woman who will have no children, because this decision for them is as natural as having children.
Perhaps in their generation the ostentation is not about having the newest car of the year, the most luxurious apartment and the black card, but about the legacy they are leaving to the world. They trully promote effective volunteer actions in their twenties, while let’s face it, the forties are still in baby steps into volunteering.
Maybe because in our youth, volunteering seemed to be actions by retired people.
Perhaps in their generation negative gossip about other women is something to be avoided and censored, as is bullying, judgment, unnecessary competition just for the ego.
There is a friend of mine who says that this generation sucks and that in fact this is detachment for laziness and lack of personality.
I have my doubts. I know I can’t go back in time and be the millennial they are, for I come from a family raising and a time where intrigue between us is normal and not aberration, where full bliss lies in arranging the prince of your life and not fraternal friendships for life.Take a women magazine from the 80s and 90s like Elle and Cosmopolitan and look at the subjects that the forties of that time that were pertinent to their reality.I say that my generation is in the gaps: we are kind of hard because we do not accept the standards and prejudices imposed by the past generation.
At the same time, we are still bound by these standards, more than we would like to admit. I see in myself and most of my friends my age that what we preach on Face and Insta and whatsapp groups as gratitude, namaste blablabla and united we are stronger, but it does not apply in reality or very little! It is we who say behind the scenes that we “hate working with women.”
On the other hand, when I have contact with the millenials, I feel that the reality we crave is in them! I hope I am right. I think the world they are building and the environment of greater camaraderie and unity will in fact be much better than the current one and not just manipulative cosmetic advertising (hello Dove?)
Kisses for my forty pals, that we may have the light to see the new generation as the door-opener of a fairer, more united society, and to turn away from all the envy we may have of their youth, their wrinkle-free skin and their easyness in dealing with technology.
Kisses for the millenial girls, that they have patience with their forty pals to teach us how to use the new and coolest apps we take centuries to learn, and teach us the real path to fraternity between women.
os 40 são os novos 20 