From Z to Boom

What Gen Z and Boomers Have in Common

As the grandmother of a 19-year-old young man who is entering adulthood just as I’m starting a new chapter in my own life (that is, working for myself rather than for an employer), we’re both going through a period of significant change. I’ve worked with young people for a very long time, and now I’m doing it in a different way, though I still have a deep interest in intergenerational relationships. Since Tristan is an artist too and lives in the same house as me with his family, we might have a head start when it comes to communication.

I’ve long been concerned that many young people in North American societies spend their entire lives without any real contact with older adults, whether they’re close relatives or not. How can we better understand the challenges each generation faces if we don’t interact with one another? Today, I’ve decided to highlight the common ground that, in my opinion, Gen Z and baby boomers share, and I hope this might help someone open doors...

• Both generations are often misunderstood. Gen Z is reduced to stereotypes about being fragile, distracted, too anxious or sensitive, superficial. Boomers and older adults are too often reduced to stereotypes about being outdated, irrelevant, or resistant to change.

• Both are tired of being turned into clichés. Neither young people nor older people can be fully explained by labels, headlines, memes, etc. They long to be seen as complex human beings with stories, contradictions, values, fears and purpose.

• Both need recognition. Gen Z want their ideas, struggles, creativity, and future to be taken seriously. Older adults want their experience, presence, and ongoing relevance to be respected.

• Both want to feel useful. Young people want to know they can contribute to a world that often feels broken. Older adults want to know they still matter in a world that too often pushes them aside.

• Both are asking the same deep question: “Where do I belong?” Gen Z is trying to define who they are and what place they can take in the world. Older adults are often redefining identity, purpose, visibility, and legacy.

• Both live with a gap between how society sees them and what they actually experience. Young people are often judged without their realities being understood. Older people are often dismissed without anyone asking what their lives are really like.

• Both challenge society to look where it hurts. Gen Z forces conversations about mental health, climate anxiety, identity, justice, and the future. Older adults force conversations about aging, invisibility, usefulness, care, and mortality.

• Both are caught between traditional norms and modern approaches. Gen Z questions old systems. Boomers have lived through massive change and have to adapt to the new world.

• Both benefit when knowledge flows both ways. Experience meets curiosity. Energy meets perspective. Memory meets imagination. That exchange strengthens families, communities, workplaces, and society.

• Both know what it feels like to be underestimated. Young people are told they are not ready yet. Older people are told their time has passed. Both need someone who will listen without judgment.

• Both are navigating uncertainty. Gen Z faces an unstable future. Older adults face changing roles, bodies, families, technologies, and social expectations. Both are adapting in real time.

• Both can help dismantle ageism. When younger and older people know each other personally, it becomes harder to believe the cheap stereotypes sold about either group.

• Both are not finished becoming. Gen Z is still becoming. Seniors are navigating a new territory, adapting, becoming too.

• Both deserve to be part of the conversation. Not as symbols. Not as problems. Not as marketing categories. As people.

Instead of asking what separates Gen Z and their Boomer grandparents, maybe we should ask what happens when two misunderstood generations finally sit at the same table. But real connection happens when generations share more than opinions. They need shared meals, shared projects, shared humor, shared memories...