Why Your Parents Don't Get It

The Generational Myth

You think you’re fighting with your parents about politics, money, or your career choices? You’re wrong. You’re fighting about the goddamn arrow of time.

We’ve all been there. The holiday dinner that turns into a screaming match. The phone call that ends with you slamming the receiver down (or, let’s be real, angrily tapping the “end call” button). You’re trying to explain your life, your choices, your worldview, and they’re looking at you like you’ve grown a second head. They just don’t get it.

And you’ve probably chalked it up to the “generation gap.” A quaint, almost comforting idea that suggests this is all a normal part of life. Kids rebel, parents disapprove, and eventually, everyone comes around. It’s a narrative we’ve been fed for decades.

Bullshit.

It’s not a gap. It’s a chasm. And it’s not about age. It’s about orientation. It’s about whether you’re facing the future or clinging to the past. It’s about being a Forward-Looking Person (FLP) in a world still dominated by Backward-Looking People (BLPs).

The Problem: Equilibrium is a Lie

The fundamental disconnect between you and your parents, and frankly, between most people in this world, is a misunderstanding of how reality works. We’re taught to seek balance, stability, and equilibrium. We’re told to find a safe, predictable path and stick to it. Get a good job, buy a house, save for retirement, and die peacefully in your sleep. It’s a nice, neat little package. And it’s a complete and utter fantasy.

Life isn’t about equilibrium. Life exists at the edge of chaos. It’s a seething, roiling, unpredictable mess of constant change. This isn’t some new-agey, philosophical woo-woo. This is hard science. It’s called far-from-equilibrium thermodynamics, and it’s the key to understanding everything from the origin of life to why your dad still thinks a college degree is a golden ticket.

My mentor, the late, great Dr. Bob Melamede, a man who looked like a stoned-out hippie and had the PhD to back it up, drilled this into my head. He’d say, “Life is a dissipative structure. It’s a process of constantly taking in energy, creating order, and shitting out entropy.” In other words, we’re not meant to be static. We’re meant to be in a constant state of flux, of becoming.

BLPs, through no real fault of their own, have been conditioned to resist this fundamental truth. They’re trying to build a dam in the middle of a raging river. They’re trying to hold onto a world that no longer exists. And when you, the FLP, come along and tell them you’re going to build a raft and ride the rapids, they look at you like you’re insane.

> “The greatest illusion of the modern age is the concept of security. There is no security. There is only adaptation.”

The Application: Your Life at the Edge of Chaos

So how does this all play out in the real world? It’s the reason you and your parents are constantly at odds. They’re operating from a BLP framework, and you’re (hopefully) operating from an FLP framework.

They tell you to get a safe, secure job with a good pension. You tell them you’re starting an online business that you can run from anywhere in the world. They see risk, instability, and foolishness. You see freedom, opportunity, and adaptation.

They tell you to buy a house with a white picket fence in a nice, quiet suburb. You tell them you’re moving to a new city every year because you want to experience the world. They see rootlessness and irresponsibility. You see growth, exploration, and a life lived to the fullest.

Along the way, I encountered experiences that challenged my preconceived notions—like the time I spent an evening with a group of people who didn’t fit the stereotypes I’d been taught about drug use. They were successful, thoughtful, and balanced individuals, which made me realize how much of what I believed was shaped by fear rather than understanding. This moment was just one part of a larger journey, showing me that life doesn’t have to follow a single, predictable path to be meaningful or fulfilling.

It took years for them to come around. And it wasn’t because I convinced them with facts and figures. It was because they saw me living my life, and they saw that I was happy, fulfilled, and successful. They saw that my “risky” path was actually a path of passion and purpose.

This is the core of the issue. BLPs are playing a finite game. They see a world of limited resources, of winners and losers. They believe that the only way to win is to accumulate as much as possible and then hold on for dear life. FLPs, on the other hand, are playing an infinite game. We see a world of abundance, of collaboration, of endless possibility. We understand that the only way to win is to keep the game going, to keep evolving, to keep creating.

The Takeaway: How to Bridge the Chasm

So what do you do? How do you bridge this chasm between you and the BLPs in your life? The first step is to understand that you’re not going to convert them. You’re not going to suddenly convince them that far-from-equilibrium thermodynamics is the key to a happy life. That’s not the goal.

The goal is to communicate. The goal is to find a common language. And the way you do that is by focusing on values, not beliefs.

Your parents value security? Great. Show them how your “risky” career path is actually creating a more resilient, adaptable form of security than a traditional job.

They value family? Awesome. Show them how your nomadic lifestyle is allowing you to build a global family of like-minded people.

Don’t argue with them. Don’t try to prove them wrong. Just live your life. Be the example. Show them what’s possible when you stop fighting the current and start flowing with it.

And here’s the most important part: have compassion. It’s easy to get angry and frustrated with BLPs. It’s easy to see them as obstacles, as relics of a bygone era. But remember, they are a product of their environment. They were raised in a world where stability was the ultimate prize. They were taught that the rules were fixed and that success meant playing by those rules. They’re not bad people. They’re just scared. They’re scared of a world they no longer understand. And when people are scared, they lash out.

So, instead of meeting their fear with anger, meet it with empathy. Instead of trying to drag them into your reality, build a bridge to theirs. It won’t be easy. It will be frustrating as hell at times. But it’s the only way. You can’t go back. The arrow of time only moves in one direction.

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Dr. Bob Melamede* | A pioneer in the field of cannabinoid science and a key figure in connecting far-from-equilibrium thermodynamics to the endocannabinoid system. |