They need to be able to trust themselves versus solely trusting established structures or a partner. They need to trade some of the control in their lives for mystery, to let go

She was seeing herself with compassion and humor versus stress and shame.

The result for each individual is a nuanced and empowered person who knows themselves with increasing specificity, and is also comfortably engaged in the outer world.

True psychological adulthood is a kind of maturity that is about balance, a dynamic play between being part of a community and a conscious individual too. It is about finding one’s way toward both stability and meaning, like a union between order and chaos, civilization and nature, or one’s humanness and one’s divinity. It is a symbiotic relationsh

He needed to practice coming back to the self-awareness and rigor of self-care when he forgot, to work on communication with his parents and partners, and to allow himself to pursue true joy, even when it seemed scary, put him at odds with his folks, or made him an outsider for a time.

Saint Augustine’s Confessions, published around 1600 years ago, is considered the first Western autobiography, but it might most accurately be described as the first Quarterlife memoir. In it, Saint Augustine—then Aurelius Augustinus Hipponensis—wrote: “I found much to bewilder me in my memories of the long time which had

lopsidedness

states, learning what may have triggered a dangerous emotional collapse or an inflation, the more we can attend to psychological well-being as a practice, something to exercise and improve at, not simply something to fall victim to and about which to depend upon others for answers.

For Quarterlifers, life changes tend to be constant, and experiences are often overwhelming. The result can be all sorts of emotional ups and downs that may be expressions of mental illness, and may benefit from medications. But they also may be indicative of a person sorting out existence and dealing with life events.