Gen Z’s romantisization of suffering

I don’t know when we collectively decided that emotional stability was cringe, but somewhere between crying in bathroom stalls and glamorising mental illness with glitchcore edits, we made suffering… hot. Like, people-are-making-‘sad girl summer’ mood boards hot.

We’re the generation that drinks iced coffee with anxiety meds and calls it breakfast. We laugh about our trauma at brunch. We dissociate through a job interview, land it, and then spend the next six months wondering if HR made a clerical error. We look at A’s that we’ve worked so hard for and ‘blame’ our hard-earned success on the curves.

siren blares

sighs
Imposter Syndrome, Oh no! ‘What is it? Is it serious? Can I use it to seem more mysterious on Hinge?’

snaps selfie with hollow eyes and soft lighting

#SadGirl #TraumaDump #ImposterSyndrome

Devs, you’ve romanticised suffering so hard, your notes app is basically a graveyard of half-poetic trauma captions waiting to be posted with a black-and-white photo of your hand. Probably holding a latte (concerning caffeine intake). Probably shaking (because of the concerning caffeine intake).

Like, babe…we get it. You got a ‘B’, and suddenly you think you’re secretly dumb because you don’t cry in APA format? Relax. You’re not an impostor, you’re just tired and mildly (totally) delusional, like the rest of us. (definitely did not absolutely obliterate myself here, but okay)

OKAY YES, I’m getting to the point.

Impostor Syndrome: The Background Noise

That tiny, annoying voice in your head that consistently nags, saying, “You’re a fraud,” every time you do something remotely successful.

Gen Z doesn’t celebrate wins – we interrogate them. We feel relief when we achieve a goal that we basically sacrificed blood, sweat and tears for (guilty) and also, mental health (ahem). Did I really earn that position, or did the employer feel bad for me because I look like I haven’t slept since 2019?

Then there’s the other end of the spectrum: the Dunning-Kruger Effect, where people with zero qualifications strut around like they’re God’s gift to humanity. You know the type. The guy who read one article on crypto and now won’t shut up about his “portfolio.” Or that girl in your writing class who thinks “Nietzsche” is pronounced “Nice.”

Meanwhile, you, an actually competent person, question if you’re even qualified to breathe (please, PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, breathe).

It’s cute, really. The clueless are confident, and the competent are curled up in a fetal position, Googling “am I good enough?” at 3 AM.

It’s a constant cycle of complete collapse followed by a 15-minute productivity high because you answered one email and made your bed. You ride that wave like it’s a Nobel Prize moment, then spiral because someone on LinkedIn just became a CEO at 23 and you, apparently, forgot how to do basic math in public.

You start doubting your degree, your career path, your personality, and suddenly you’re taking an online quiz to figure out which niche childhood trauma is ruining your adult relationships (spoiler: it’s all of them).

And the worst part? You know this. You’re smart enough to recognize every bias, every self-sabotaging loop, every little emotional booby (why not titty?…I’m sorry) trap your brain sets for you. But knowledge doesn’t save you. It just gives your existential dread a PowerPoint presentation (cues clown music).

So here we are. Spiraling in HD. High-functioning. Hyper-aware. Hilarious.
And horrifically tired.

Sometimes you’re not a fraud. You’re just underqualified and overconfident. Which is fine. So is everyone on LinkedIn.

We’re hyper-aware. We have collected, analysed and even drawn a conclusion (if only we could do that in our research arti- WAIT NO, the self-depricating joke again, ah typical). We know our red flags. We can name every type of mental illness like they’re different colours that we memorised as toddlers. We make TikToks about our avoidant and anxious attachment styles, we will make reels about analysing behaviours that your boyfriends exhibit when they are starting to find you annoying (after which, the questions that the poor man will be subject to — oof) but will we actually go to therapy? Of course not. That’s expensive (and will actually get us out of this constant cycle of existential cynicism).

Instead, we romanticise being broken. Because if we package our pain well enough with mood lighting, curated playlists, and a cool font, then maybe, just maybe, it’ll feel less like drowning and more like art. (Because what is art without pain, suffering and betrayal? That’s an original btw HA).

You are constantly overstimulated, constantly anxious, constantly stressed and burnt out. You are detaching from reality, pushing people away and are irritated with your family. Why?

I’m not saying we don’t have it hard. We do. I do. You do. I’ve been there, drowning in deadlines and expectations (and honestly, in life as a whole), trying to breathe through the pressure of being brilliant, but also soft, but also productive, but also mentally unwell in a digestible way. I get the exhaustion of being a complex individual in a world that rewards you for being simpler, shinier, easier to explain.

But, and here’s the plot twist,

drum roll please

why are we making it harder on ourselves????

Why are we dissecting every feeling like it’s a thesis? Why are we so obsessed with proving our pain is valid, that we end up performing it?

And I mean that literally. We’re out here building entire identities around being “mentally ill and hot,” or “chronically dissociated but hilarious.” Ironic detachment is cute until it starts eating away at your actual presence. Until you don’t know the difference between processing your emotions and monetizing them.

I know the cynicism is comforting. The existential complex feels earned—especially when your thoughts aren’t just noise, but entire philosophical ecosystems. You’ve built a cathedral of inquiry in your mind and wander it daily, maybe because it’s the only place you feel honest. Maybe because it’s the only place you feel anything without doubting it. But even in that space, with all that mental machinery turning, I need to remind you:

You’re here. You’re human. You are literally breathing. You are not performing for anyone—not your parents, not your feed, not even yourself.

Not everything you feel is a glitch in your programming or a result of evolutionary trauma. Some feelings aren’t puzzles to solve or symptoms to decode. Some things just are. Pain, joy, confusion, hope—they’re not illusions. They’re just what happens when your mind and body are still, miraculously, alive (even after all that nicotine, caffeine, stress and substance you’ve put it threw. Phew!).

And no, being alive doesn’t need to be proven philosophically. It doesn’t need to earn its right to exist through productivity or purpose.
It just needs to be felt. And you are feeling it. Even if you’re busy arguing with yourself about whether the feeling is “real.”

That’s enough. That’s more than enough.

I know it’s exhausting to be this self-aware. I know you think no one sees how deep it goes because you don’t show it. But I see it. I see how you dig and dig and dig, like if you just find the root of everything, it’ll all finally make sense. But brother, this endless excavation? It’ll bury you if you’re not careful.

You are not just a mind orbiting meaning. You’re a human being. You’re becoming, just like the rest of us. Maybe that’s the only truth that doesn’t need to be questioned.

Okay yeah. I know I just said not everything needs to be proven, and then tried to prove that. But hey, refuting yourself mid-thought is part of life, right?

Balance. You can dance with the doubt. But don’t let it lead.

So yeah. Keep journaling. Keep questioning. But also, for the love of god, touch some grass. Or at least touch your laundry. It’s been on the chair for three days. We see it.

Cry without tweeting it. Feel something without narrating it.

Like, go stare at a pigeon and remember that it has no existential dread and still thrives. Be like the pigeon. Or at least stop arguing with your own brain in the group chat.

You don’t owe anyone a well-lit breakdown.

Stay weird. Stay feeling. Stay alive.

Go hit some tennis balls, play an instrument, idk man go fuck your boyfriend (like literally).

And maybe drink some water while you’re at it.
No hashtag needed.

Meeting an old friend today, getting my serotonin the old-fashioned, not-so-boring way.

Logging off.