Money trumps self-actualization and anyone who tells you otherwise obviously has no trouble paying their bills or can no longer remember a time when they did. It's hard to save the world while living under a bridge or being consumed with anxiety about whether the phone will ever ring for another job interview. And I see damn few guru/thought leader types in the personal development field who are willing to acknowledge that you can't pay this month's rent with the prosperity doctrine.

It should come as no surprise to anyone who's been on the job search in the last two or three years that networking is now being held up as the be all and end all of job hunting strategies. Normally, I simply skim this ubiquitous and rather facile advice (it's on par with Cosmo beauty tips when it comes to regurgitating the same ol' same ol'), but this piece from the Wall Street Journal was effectively the straw that broke the camel's back. I think it was the use of voila. It's a recession, lady. There ain't a whole lotta voila-ing going on, ya dig?

Lately, there's been a lot of talk (recession-driven in large part) about the real value of a college education, both in the media and that I've been privy to in my own circles. The youth unemployment rate hovers at 17% and even as the economy recovers, the specter of long-term effects on those who launch their careers during the downturn looms.

Of all of the downsides associated with the can-do attitude Gen Y was ostensibly raised with (the inability to handle failure or criticism, a purported bafflement at not having the world handed to us on a silver platter, etc.), the most subtle and rarely acknowledged would have to be the fact that we weren’t educated to the fact that not all of our peers were being indoctrinated with the same overweening sense of self-esteem that we were.  Not everyone grew up believing that that they could be a marine biologist-ambassador- heavy metal drummer.

I've hesitated about tackling this particular topic, but with the recent proximity of Mother's Day and the 50th anniversary of The Pill, I figured there was never going to be a better time to address it. My hesitation stems from a reluctance to drag biology into the equation and to bring up some unpleasant home truths that can't be advocated or educated away.

An interesting question was raised in the comments section of my recent Model Behavior column on the Bitch Magazine website and it's one that I'm no stranger to contemplating: Where is all of the research on and dialogue around the non-white, non-middle class Gen Y experience? Why do we only ever hear about student debt load and the plight of college grads who are moving back to the safe haven of Mom and Dad's suburban oasis? What about those who never made it to college in the first place?

Spurred by Raina Kelly's recent Newsweek piece about turning 40 and adopting Madonna as her role model, I've been pondering the idea of life stage role models, particularly as it relates to those of us at the quarter-life. Just who is out there for Gen Y women to look up to or to emulate?

Last week, a reader sent a link to a Slate article on the new wave of sexual judgment-mongering among Gen Y and suggested I might want to address the issue here. I wasn't sure I was the one to write this because A) I spent my college years (undergrad and grad) at schools and/or in programs that lacked the traditional qualities necessary to foster a thriving campus hook-up culture - no Greek systems, significantly unequal male/female enrollment stats, nose-to-the-grindstone academic focus, etc. and B) wherever there's a loop, I'm guaranteed to be out of it.

I hate to break it to you, but we have a sell-by date. We're perishable, dude. Highly perishable.

I spoke these words to a friend as we meandered down the street engaged in another one of our snarky, rapid-fire dialogues about how we ended up here. Here being the waning years of our twenties without being firmly established on solid career paths and without appropriate grown-up milestones (marriage, kids, home ownership) in our cross-hairs.

One thing you'll notice if you spend any time following youth issues in the media is that coverage comes in waves. The Pew releases a report, new employment stats for the quarter come out, etc. and all of the mainstream outlets take a turn at reinventing the wheel via their own spins on the story du jour. In the last few days, the illegal and, in some quarters, unethical nature of unpaid internships has been on the front burner.