From Tim Elmore:
Charles Sykes wrote an op-ed piece that’s been quoted several times. In it, he lays out eleven rules that students from Generation iY do not typically learn in high school or college. He argues that our feel-good, politically correct teachings have created a generation of kids with no concept of reality, kids who are set up for failure in the real world. You might be interested in his list — which effectively pinpoints the kind of cultural shift that has created Generation iY:
Rules for the Real World
Rule 1: Life is not fair. Get used to it.
Rule 2: The world won’t care about your self-esteem. The world will expect you to accomplish something before you feel good about yourself.
Rule 3: You will not make forty thousand dollars a year right out of high school. You won’t be a vice president with a car phone until you earn both.
Rule 4: Think your teacher is tough? Wait till you get a boss. He doesn’t have tenure.
Rule 5: Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Your grandparents had a different word for burger-flipping; they called it opportunity.
Rule 6: If you mess up, it’s not your parents’ fault, so don’t whine about your mistakes; learn from them.
Rule 7: Before you were born, your parents weren’t as boring as they are now. They got that way from paying your bills, cleaning your clothes and listening to you talk about how cool you are. So before you save the rain forest from the parasites of your parents’ generation, try “delousing” the closet in your own room.
Rule 8: Your school may have done away with winners and losers, but life has not. In some schools they have abolished failing grades; they’ll give you as many times as you want to get the right answer. This doesn’t bear the slightest resemblance to anything in real life.
Rule 9: Life is not divided into semesters. You don’t get summers off, and very few employers are interested in helping you find yourself. Do that on your own time.
Rule 10: Television is not real life. In real life people actually have to leave the coffee shop and go to jobs.
Rule 11: Be nice to nerds. Chances are you’ll end up working for one.
HT: Tim Elmore via blog.growingleaders.com
