Generation Y

Lucy is part of Generation Y, the generation born between the late 1970s and the mid 1990s. She's also part of a yuppie culture that makes up a large portion of Gen Y.

I have a term for yuppies in the Gen Y age group—I call them Gen Y Protagonists & Special Yuppies, or GYPSYs. A GYPSY is a unique brand of yuppie, one who thinks they are the main character of a very special story.

Before we talk more about Lucy, let's quickly figure out if you, the reader, are a Gen Y Protagonist & Special Yuppie. The Gen Y part is easy—you have to have been born sometime between the late 1970s and the mid 1990s (there are various opinions on the exact range of time, but this is the most common). As for the Protagonist & Special Yuppie part, let's lay out some guidelines. You're probably a GYPSY if:

- you went to sleep-away summer camp during your youth.

- you've won a number of meaningless awards.

- you studied abroad during college.

- you, after graduating college, considered (or will consider) big, famous cities like New York, San Francisco, LA, or DC, or small, fancy cities like Boulder or Santa Barbara as the only acceptable places to move (i.e. you feel like too special of a person to move to somewhere like Cleveland).

- you have disdain for a restaurant like The Olive Garden or Red Lobster.

- you need to have an iPhone and wouldn't consider an Android phone.

- foodie is a word you've ever called yourself or anyone else.

- you've been to a therapist without any severe mental illness.

- you have started your own business or have plans to do so.

- you regularly talk or think about your passions.

- you've ever had a blog. Shit.

Now that you know where you fit into all this, let's get back to Lucy. Lucy's enjoying her GYPSY life, and she's very pleased to be Lucy. Only issue is this one thing:

Lucy's kind of unhappy.

To get to the bottom of why, we need to define what makes someone happy or unhappy in the first place. It comes down to a simple formula:

It's pretty straightforward—when the reality of someone's life is better than they had expected, they're happy. When reality turns out to be worse than the expectations, they're unhappy.

To provide some context, let's start by bringing Lucy's parents into the discussion:

Lucy's parents were born in the 50s—they're Baby Boomers. They were raised by Lucy's grandparents, members of the G.I. Generation, or "the Greatest Generation," who grew up during the Great Depression and fought in World War II, and were most definitely not GYPSYs.

Lucy's Depression Era grandparents were obsessed with economic security and raised her parents to build practical, secure careers. They wanted her parents' careers to have greener grass