The Time Ahead is the Past Played Over

In many ways the time ahead is nothing more than the past played over again in a new key. The notes look new and sound out of the ordinary. Is it not delightful to usher in the first quarter of a new year and all the hope that it holds? As the calendar scrolls through the new year’s first quarter, traces of another story already under way from a previous year begin to surface. Relationship issues, perhaps. Financial difficulties. Lies coming to light. Personal security concerns. Employment problems. It’s not that this new story wasn’t there all along; it’s just that those of us in the midst of our own story didn’t notice it. Writers sometimes call these the threads of a larger story. These threads unfold alongside of or even inside the story promised in the book’s title. Is not history really just a series of novellas or short stories that includes all of us as characters? We’ve each got our role to play in the story – the story we know about and the ones we don’t. It may turn out that we know nothing about a story in which we actually play a very important role. Such was the case with the generation that fought in both World Wars. They didn’t know they were part of that story until it surfaced and they found themselves on the battlefields of Europe and in the case of WW II, also the Pacific.

Let us examine the Millennial or generation Y story. I contend it is similar tale for the Millennials.  I selected them because they followed both the baby Boomer Generation, of which I am one and Generation X. They see in front of them the story of their own generation as it unfolds before them. Yet their story is surrounded by and interwoven with the stories of previous generations and those yet to come. Generation Y grew up in an electronics-filled and increasingly online and socially-networked world. They are the generation that has received the most marketing attention. Having been raised under the pitch "follow your dreams" and being told they were special, they tend to be confident. While largely a positive trait, Y Generation's self-confidence has been argued to spill over into the spheres of entitlement and narcissism.  They are often seen as slightly more optimistic about the future of America than other generations -- despite the fact that they are the first generation since the Silent Generation that is expected to be less economically successful than their parents. One might even label Generation Y as the Sacrificial Generation. If so, why?

The tyranny of the past and the future affects us all. The decisions of past generations still exert their pull on the Millennials – the national decision, for instance, to force everyone to go to college by shifting manufacturing jobs overseas, where they could be done, at least for a time, cheaper. Not everyone wanted to go to college. Not everyone was suited to go to college. But by the Generation Y's time on stage the decent-paying alternative of manufacturing jobs was no longer an option. How did that happen? This thread in our national story was never discussed. It was not voted on by Congress. No president ever signed it into law. The Supreme Court never considered its constitutionality. But it happened, and it impacted everyone.

Sometimes threads from the future emerge within the current generation’s story as well. Every generation since the 1960s has had their research and development priorities altered by specific event(s). Are there storylines still to emerge within the Generation Y story? To the thoughtful reader clues are beginning to surface. The singularity. Human genomic alteration. Artificial intelligence. Machine designed mechanisms (Androids) replacing workers. All-pervading surveillance by those in power designed to “keep us all safe.” Yet that surveillance subtly controls our thoughts, which in turn controls our actions. The digital world has a memory that never forgets. A record of our thoughts and actions can be stored … forever. Will it one day be used against us by a more “enlightened” generation yet to come? Are there no national debates on these deeper threads in the Generation Y story? Nevertheless, these threads continue forward, interlinking themselves into our future. Then they will be the story of the Millennial or Y Generation … those coming after, and those after them.

The most ancient and secreted thread bound into humanity’s novel, which encompasses us all, remains unseen, yet is woven through all the generations. It is the supernatural conflict between the Creator and the creation. God. Man. The angelic realm, the created universe, humanity’s fall from oneness with God, and God’s extraordinary efforts to set the relationship aright once again. The threads are all in place; the stories within the story moving forward as one. The Y generation will see the end of that story unfold before their eyes. Few will understand that the story of humanity, like all books or stories has a beginning and an end, an Alpha and Omega. Yet the clues are everywhere around us for those with ears to hear and eyes to see.

 

.