The Defining Decade: Why Your Twenties Matter--And How to Make the Most of Them Now

Confidence doesn’t come from the inside out. It comes from the outside in. People feel less anxious—and more confident—on the inside when they can point to things they have done well on the outside.

“Right now, you’re spending a lot of time hyping the negative emotions,”

Twentysomethings who don’t feel anxious and incompetent at work are usually overconfident or underemployed.

memento vivi—

If we only wanted to be happy, it would be easy; but we want to be happier than other people, which is almost always difficult, since we think them happier than they are. —Charles de Montesquieu, writer/philosopher

Many of these things are incompatible and, as research is just starting to show, simply harder to do all at the same time in our thirties.

those who are underemployed for as little as nine months tend to be more depressed and less motivated than their peers—than even their unemployed peers.

But some underemployment doesn’t pay off. Sometimes it is just a way to pretend we aren’t working,

A more expansive sense of interconnectedness rests not on texting best friends at one in the morning, but on reaching out to people that make a difference in our lives even though they don’t have to.

Not knowing what you want to do with your life—or not at least having some ideas about what to do next—is a defense against that terror. It is a reluctance to admit that the possibilities are not endless. It is a way of pretending there is nothing you can do to improve your situation. It is a resistance against accepting that there are no right ans