Millennials are accused of being entitled and lazy. It’s a super fun stereotype to live with. As a millennial, most of the less than loving stereotypes I have heard do one thing to us… kill our confidence. We are already unsure of ourselves as we enter into adulthood, especially when we learn that #adulting is hard. Don’t believe me? Go search #adulting or #adultingishard anywhere you can search hashtags (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc.).

What you will probably see is a bunch of people who are legally adults struggling to figure out what it means to be all grown up. Life is hard… It gets hard when you have an audience quick to critique…

This is the video above description pulled from YouTube: “This video was a parody that opened a talk at the Church Leaders Conference encouraging people to see past the stereotypes and recognizing the unique potential that millennials have!”

I like the intent, but I’m not sure of the execution. I get it though. I’m a millennial and I think this is funny, but all comedy has truth to it, and the truth kinda hurts. I hope this conference really followed through in equipping people to encourage looking past these stereotypes they poked fun at. I hope the leaders of these churches truly recognized the unique potential that millennials have. Most importantly though, I hope that these people took the time to build the confidence of a generation who needs some extra love.

Boomers, you’ve been here before. Gen Xers and Traditionalists, so have you. At some point, you guys were all the young underdogs and felt like the deck was stacked against you. Some of you fought wars, others fought against the establishment and even more fight for equality and social justice. You all have experiences that made you the people you have become, but you most certainly didn’t do any of this on your own. You had help, and most likely from someone older than yourself.

Maybe try doing that for a millennial sometime…

If you ever happen to read my book you will see how much I struggled with being confident in myself. I regularly found myself doubting whether or not I would fail. People would joke and tell me not to burn the church down because of my age and inexperience, and I would laugh in response, but deep inside my lack of confidence continued to grow.

If it wasn’t for a myriad of mentors ranging from 10 to 50 years older than me, I’m not sure how I would have fared. These people took the time to speak into my life. They listened, loved, and guided me. They also did so without judgment, without pretense. They did it because they cared and because they were invested in my success. They did it because they wanted to overlook stereotypes and help a millennial like me utilize the unique potential that I have… even if I didn’t realize I had it in the first place.

That and God had something going on in my current church and I had the privilege of being along for the ride.

So millennials… there are people out there who care and want you to succeed… start looking…

Everyone else… invest in one of us… look past the stereotypes… instill confidence in our unique potential… see who God wants us to be and help us get there…

The world will thank you for it…

If you are already doing that, then thank you. Sincerely. We are all in this together.

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