Ian pretended that not knowing what to do was the hard part. But, somewhere inside, I think Ian knew that making a choice about something is when the real uncertainty begins. The more terrifying kind of uncertainty is wanting something but not knowing how to get it. It is working toward something even though there is no sure thing. When we make cho

While there, he said, his experiences—and those of others around him—taught him that our attitudes and reactions are the last of our human freedoms.

Without a doubt, then, friends play a crucial role for many twentysomethings, and they provide lots of good times. With all the attention paid to the urban tribe, however, many twentysomethings have limited themselves to huddling together with the same few people. This is a problem because, while the urban tribe may be the most supportive figures i

Our twenties can be like living beyond time. When we graduate from school, we leave behind the only lives we have ever known, ones that have been manageably organized into semester-sized chunks with microgoals nestled within. There are syllabi and tests and papers and assignments that keep us on track. There are teachers (or parents) to tell us wha

Identity capital is our stock of personal assets. It is how we add value to who we are, and it is what we have to show for how we have spent our time. These are the investments we make in ourselves, or the things we do well enough or long enough that they become a part of who we are.

Ian was on a sneaky search for glory. He suffered less from the tyranny of the should than he did from the tyranny of the should-not. Unlike Talia, his life wasn’t about getting A’s or even the need to realize his potential, at least not in any mainstream way. Conventionality wasn’t his niche. Ian’s search for glory was the lure of being different,

The fastest route to something new is one phone call, one email, one box of books, one favor, one thirtieth birthday party, one chance meeting, one weak tie.

When Danielle called her mother, she was doing what therapists call “borrowing an ego.” She was reaching out in a moment of need and letting someone else’s frontal lobe do the work.

“I want to be reaching my potential.”