Signs You Grew Up Spoiled - Page 4

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did i grow up spoiled?

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If you grew up with parents who gave you everything you could have ever dreamed of, you may feel you had the best parents in the world. Even your parents may believe they were the best parents in the world. You wanted horse riding lessons, you got them. You wanted to study abroad in Switzerland for a summer during high school, and off you went. You wanted the same designer handbag you saw on a celebrity, and you were wearing it within the week. You didn’t clean your room—a housekeeper did that for you. You didn’t have to help take care of your brothers and sisters because that’s what the live-in nanny was for. Unfortunately, this type of upbringing fails to do something rather important: it doesn’t encourage a go-getter mentality. So, unless you were given a trust fund and don’t need to work, once you’re an adult and expected to fully cover your own expenses and lead a more, well, simple life, it can be a nasty wake-up call. Here are signs you grew up spoiled.

You assume everyone has a housekeeper

You’ve asked a friend, quite casually, on which days her housekeeper comes or if she needs a referral for a new housekeeper since it appears her current one isn’t doing a great job. Then you were met with the shocking answer that she doesn’t have a housekeeper. She is her own housekeeper. Your brain couldn’t compute.

Thrift stores make you nauseous

When friends ask you to go thrift shopping, you laugh because that must be a joke. Oh, it’s not a joke. Well, you’re not going thrift shopping unless you can wear a hazmat suit and wash everything in acid before you take it home. You didn’t realize that your peers shopped at thrift stores.

You immediately ask for an assistant at new jobs

When you get a new job, you immediately ask for an assistant. Or, rather, you assume an assistant already exists for you and ask where he is. But, um, you are an assistant—or at the very least, lower on the chain of command.

The salary you asked for got a laugh

Most of the time you’ve discussed salary with a new employer, the first number you threw out there received a laugh. A big laugh. They thought you were joking. You just asked to make more money than the CEO makes. And you’re applying for an administrator position.

You get defensive about feedback

When a boss gives you feedback or even criticism, you become offended. You immediately let your face show disdain. You make excuses. You make her feel like she’s dumb for not understanding your choices. You’re just not used to someone A) telling you what to do and then B) telling you that you did it incorrectly.

Your boss has checked your attitude

You’ve had several bosses check your attitude. They often say something like, “Who do you think is the boss around here?” or “Don’t forget whom you’re speaking to.” You clearly aren’t used to having someone be your superior. Not even your parents were.

You don’t know how to make eggs

You don’t know how to make eggs, or other very simple food. Your refrigerator is empty, except for some leftovers from the delivery you ordered. You never had to learn to cook growing up. You always had a chef or ordered in.

You’ve never said, “I can’t afford that”

When people tell you they can’t go with you to a concert or on a trip because they can’t afford it, you don’t really understand. You assumed everyone made enough money to afford things like concerts whenever they wanted. You saw concerts and dining at restaurants as rather simple expenditures.

You quit when things get difficult in work

You walk out on jobs the moment they become difficult. If your parents let you change schools whenever you didn’t like one school, have your room renovated whenever you were sick of it, or quit a chore if you threw a tantrum, you don’t understand the concept of pushing through.

You quit when things get difficult in relationships

You also walk out on relationships when they become difficult. You want your relationships to be mostly easy and superficial. You don’t want to, for example, nurse someone who is sick or going through a depression.

Not traveling each month feels inhumane

You assume everyone goes on very nice trips every month. When you get a job, you are absolutely shocked by the idea that you have to earn vacation days, one day per month, and may wait months to go on a trip. You used to go on trips every month at least.

You have never worked for minimum wage

You have never had a minimum wage job. You didn’t wait tables, bartend, walk dogs, or run delivery for a pizza restaurant. In high school and college, you were instantly given rather well-paying apprenticeships with some friend of the family.

You scoff at being an assistant or intern

It’s very hard for you to understand that, as someone brand new to an industry, you’ll have to start from the bottom. If you, for example, went to the best fashion design school in the country, you assume you’ll be hired as the top designer at a major brand right away. You don’t understand that you’ll have to run coffee and dress sets for several years.

You turn down good jobs

When you turn down jobs, believing the pay or conditions aren’t good, other people look shocked. Friends will say, “I’ll take that job!” People have to explain to you that a job that pays 60K with benefits is a great job. You never heard of a salary below 200K growing up so you thought 60K was pennies.

You don’t understand how others are happy

You see others who have far less than you and don’t understand how they’re so happy. But they are—they’re happy. They’re happy in their tiny, rent-controlled studios buying groceries at the 99-cent store. Maybe they didn’t grow up spoiled, and it turned out to be a good thing.

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