• “Why do I feel like I’m in a quarter-life crisis?”

• “I don’t seem to have a purpose after college.”

• “How do I properly adult? I feel like I’m just going through the motions. And I’m not even doing it well.”

• “It feels weird after going to school for 16 years of someone not telling me what to do. Then all of a sudden that’s gone.”

• “SMART goals are the best and only way to goal set.”

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I have felt more young people experience something along these lines an increasing amount the last few years. If you feel these things, I feel ya. I’ve been there.

Let’s understand what’s really going on here, at least by my estimation.

Have, Do, and Be Desires

This is one of the biggest pieces I’ve had to unlearn. I’ve grown up in a institutionalized education system — and overall linear, capitalistic life — that’s focused on means goals (they contain a “…so that I…”) rather than end goals (how you desire to feel). An example is “I want to get a good job so that I feel safe and comfortable.” The good job is the means goal; the feelings of safety and comfort are the end goal.

You grow up a few years and you’re supposed to be ready for 1st grade. Then every subsequent year, you’re supposed to learn the knowledge that’s supposedly going to make you intellectually ready for the next grade. And you basically keep doing that for 15 more years, if you go to a college for 4 years. Even more if you do graduate school.

Then you enter the “real world” by getting a job, or by going to more school so you can really do what you think you want to do. Then you get paid at a job you’re probably not super passionate about. Then you want to spend the rest of your day trying to not think about it.

Concurrently, you’re supposed to find a partner, buy a nice car, buy a spacious house, and start a family. Then you retire. And then that’s when you truly have the freedom to do what you want. When you’re 50. That’s if you’re still relatively healthy to travel the world, do the activities you want to do, and spend time with the ones you want to.

Do you notice the linearity of all this that I see? It’s “you do this one thing first, which then means you can do this second thing. When that second thing is done, that means you’re ready for the third thing.” And so on.

There’s a structure that has been created around us without us even noticing. That structure has taught us to desire the next thing in front of us. Not the feeling that we get from achieving that thing.

This is the main characteristic of a means goal vs an end goal. A means goal usually has a “so that I…” in them. Sometimes it’s implicit, sometimes it’s explicit.

An end goal, on the other hand, is the thing that is after the “so that I…”. It’s usually a feeling you want to have.

What are a couple of examples?

• I want to buy a fancy car…so that I can feel wealthy

• I want to go skydiving…so that I can feel the adrenaline

The buying of a car or wanting to experience skydiving are the means goals. They are conduits to you feeling wealthy and feeling the adrenaline.

But isn’t there more to life than just those means goals? YES! I definitely think so too. That question in and of itself indicates a desire.

The institutionalization of the majority of our lives (and dare I say the capitalistic society) has taught us a specific way to think about desires. But let’s rethink our relationship with it.

Every desire can be broken down into an intention and a feeling.

For the intention part, I call them Have Desires and Do Desires. These means goals are Have Desires and Do Desires.

Once we get into adult life where there is no explicit Have or Do Desires because we have exited the educational institutional system. We are at the whim of what we’ve consumed up to that point to dictate our desires.

Have and Do Desires are the products, services, and experiences we seek.

For example, buying a new laptop or the latest handbag are products you desire. Services you can avail are a pickup and delivery laundry service (try 2ULaundry 😉) so you save time or a mentor to help you achieve your goals. For experiences, you may want to experience what it’s like flying in first class to an exotic destination, or doing an escape room with your friends.

There is a bit of overlap across these areas as they’re not mutually exclusive.

In each of these cases though, there is what I call a Be Desire. These are the feelings that end goals define. It’s what is after the “so…” when you’re writing those desires.

Do you want to feel the wealth, the adrenaline, the relief of time-savings, the extravagance of flying first class, the thrill of an escape room, or the relaxation of a meditation retreat, or the bliss of a concert? These adjectives and emotions are really what we are after.

These adjectives and emotions are what the linearity of our institutionalized society has beaten out of us (perhaps some would say by design). But let’s reclaim the realest of our desires: Be Desires.

get down to the root

How do we do this? I’m sure you’ve heard of the 5 Why’s or the 7 Why’s exercise. You ask a question, and then you keep asking why until you get to the root cause of something. It can definitely be effective in many situations. But I’m going to modify it in this context of setting desires.

The goal of this exercise is to get to the feeling part of the desire and go beyond the intention of the desire.

What the ‘why’ question fails to do in going deeper is

1. Actually define the terms you’re using

2. What is important to us about what we desire

The best way to illustrate this is through my own example.

“I want to be a published book author so that I can have a platform for speaking on stages more reputably (Have and Do Desire / Means Goal / Intention) so I can feel successful (Be Desire / End Goal / Feeling).”

• What does successful mean to me?

  • Answer: Impacting others.

• What does impacting others mean?

  • Answer: Positively change their life for the better after they’ve encountered me or my message

• What about impact is important to me?

  • Answer: I believe I have the potential to impact others so I would like to put myself in positions to continue doing that with higher quality and / or higher quantity.

• What about that is important to me?

  • Answer: I want to feel like I’ve reached my potential in this life. Then I feel fulfilled.

Here’s my realization: What I’m going for is fulfillment. And a main way fulfillment is derived for me is through reaching my full potential through impacting others positively.

This is a modification that allows us to define terms along the way in addition to eliciting why something is important to us.

Let’s depict this as a visual - a tree where each time we ask a question we go deeper and deeper to its roots.

Armed with this framework and information, what can you do? Below are the steps for you to reframe your desires and overcome your Quarter-Life Crisis.

• Write out your desires in this format:

  • I want have or do desire so that I feel be desire

• Ask ‘What does that mean?’ and ‘What about that is important to me?’ until you get to a feeling.

  • Small note that even if / when you get to a feeling, ask yourself what does that feeling mean. In my example above, I wanted to feel successful. But what did actually mean? For me, that meant getting all the way down to fulfilled. ‘Fulfilled’ is defined as “I have actualized my potential.”

  • You’ll find yourself converging to a short list of a few feelings. These are your truest Be Desires.

• Work backwards from there. These are the primary feelings you want to experience. Inspect if those are truly the feelings you want to have.

• If those are the feelings you want, then brainstorm what else you think you can do or have to give you those feelings.

• Then do and have those things. Then you’ll have a better idea of if it actually gives you those feelings.

• If they’re not the ones you want to experience, then let’s unpack that. There’s probably something there to unlearn about your past experiences or beliefs.

• Constantly remind yourself of these feelings to recenter yourself. Maybe these shift over time, which is a good time to do this exercise again.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Sai is a Life Coach for Young Adults seeking to Live their Quarter Life on Easy Mode!