She spent her own early twentysomething years as an Outward Bound instructor. Revised and reissued for a new generation, The Defining Decade has changed the way millions of twentysomethings think about their twenties - and themselv. She is a clinical psychologist at the University of Virginia and maintains a private practice in Charlottesville. Jay is a clinical psychologist who specializes in adult development and in twentysomethings in particular. Your twenties are a time when the things you do - and the things you don't do - will have an enormous effect across years and even generations to come. The result is a provocative, poignant read that shows why, far from being an irrelevant downtime, your twenties are a developmental sweetspot that comes only once. The result is a provocative read that provides the tools necessary to take the most of your twenties, and shows us how work, relationships, personality, identity and even the brain can change more during this decade than at any other time in adulthood-if we use the time well.In her psychology practice and her book, The Defining Decade, clinical psychologist Meg Jay suggests that many twentysomethings have been caught in a swirl of hype and misinformation about what Time magazine calls the ' Me Me Me Generation.' The rhetoric that '30 is the new 20,' she suggests, trivializes what is actually the most transformative period of adult life.ĭrawing from more than twenty years of work with thousands of twentysomething clients and students, Jay weaves science together with compelling, behind-closed-doors stories. In The Defining Decade, Meg Jay argues that twentysomethings have been caught in a swirl of hype and misunderstanding, much of which has trivialized the most transformative time of our lives.ĭrawing from more than two decades of work with thousands of clients and students, Jay weaves the latest science of the twentysomething years with behind-closed-doors stories from twentysomethings themselves. Some say they are an extended adolescence. Our “thirty-is-the-new-twenty” culture tells us the twentysomething years don’t matter.

Revised and reissued for a new generation, let it change how you think about you and yours. The Defining Decade has changed the way millions of twentysomethings think about their twenties-and themselves.

Defining the decade book