Being in the transitional period between adolescence and adulthood, I see the “problems” of each generation very differently than those old enough to make the cut as adults, and young enough to be considered a child still. I’m constantly being bombarded by messages of the media claiming “my generation” is doing this wrong, or needs to change that because of previous generations. It’s hard to jump on a bandwagon that’s constantly criticizing human nature, but that’s something that will never change.

I came across this ad from Nature Valley (although I didn’t even realize it was an ad until the very end), and it really made me think about the change from generation to generation. Take a look.

First of all, I want to commend Nature Valley for the subtlety of how they placed their brand within this ad. I really appreciated that I wasn’t constantly being reminded that buying a Nature Valley bar would solve all the problems– in fact, I didn’t even know I was watching an ad until the closing scene. It’s a video that makes people want to share it because there’s an important message, not one that you groan at and try to skip through.

Anyway, I think this video was great. It took a problem that everyone has full awareness of, but it spun it to make you feel responsible for changing that problem. You start off listening to these crazy adventures of an older generation– encounters with bears in the woods, the building of forts, and so many great stories. Things that sound exciting, and you can see the excitement in the storytellers face as if it was yesterday. This is what childhood looks like, this is what it means to live to the fullest.

But wait, now its a younger generation speaking– every answer is focused on the digital world. Video games, tablets, texting, even emailing (this one surprised me, I didn’t know kids had a reason to use email). What’s more than that, there responses were so desperate– one girl said she would even “die” without her tablet. How can such a young person claim to be so attached to a material item? There’s no imagination or physical activity involved in those video games he spends 5 hours in a row playing, or the 20 Netflix shows another boy watched in a span of 4 days. How can hearing these things not break someone who grew up so vastly different’s heart?

You can see it in the older generations face– their kids and grandkids have lost something that they cherished so much. I grew up in a time of transition–  I loved to play outside in my imaginary tree forts with my brothers, but I also loved my video games for an hour or two a week. It was a true hybrid of the generations we see featured in the video. That being said, I think back on my childhood and I think much more fondly of the days spent in the forest than those spent staring at a lit up screen in the den.

The video featured generations completely immersed in their own childhood experiences, so I thought it was saddening to see this as someone who can relate to both sides. Am I really one of the last people to grow up in a world that we could have fun outdoors in an active lifestyle?

All of this thinking comes from a simple 3 minute video published by Nature Valley– well played.