*This article is free from all forms of artificial intelligence chatbot utilization*

The decision to not have children is rapidly trending in popularity.

In fact, the most recent data from our generation says that around 25% of American adults have chosen to not reproduce.

And that’s just one society’s statistic out of 195 total countries.

For myself, I spent several years contemplating the pros and cons of creating my own children before ultimately deciding to make that a hard “no” and get fixed. Hopefully the accurate reasoning listed below will help you find peace in stringent birth control or proactive sterilization as it did for me.

And if you already have children and are on the fence about having more, please thoroughly consider these modern realities.

Here are 5 reasons why it’s becoming normal and okay to not have children:

 

1) The need to breed is long behind us

Our primitive ancestors battled unforgiving weather patterns/climate change, natural disasters, disease, and large prehistoric predators without the modern equipment, shelter, and defensive abilities that we have today. War would eliminate many, sometimes all, of the males within different tribes around the world.

In addition, without the advanced medicine and treatment solutions that we have today, scores of women and babies died during childbirth (and soon after childbirth) due to complications like infection and disease.

Our early existence was truly “survival of the fittest”.

We had no choice but to constantly reproduce to ensure our species’ survival.

Males would shoot their seed within multiple females in their community (even neighboring tribes) to increase the chances of a successful impregnation and hopefully counter the frequent loss of life.

Even interbreeding would be the only survival option for many of the isolated societies.

Several of our ape-like family like the homo naledi, homo erectus, and homo neanderthalensis couldn’t keep up with the onslaught of death and climate change and were wiped away for good.

Today, homo sapian are the only human species to have managed to successfully breed just enough and at the right time periods to stay in existence.

But today, with nearly 10 billion of us around, that desperate urgency to breed for survival is no more.

At a certain point in our socio-evolution, reproduction changed from a being a necessary survival action to becoming a default “this is just what we do next” selfish mindset (we’ll cover more of the selfish aspect later).

Today, our collective world is undeniably overpopulated. Our resources are rapidly diminishing. The pollution and waste is stressing out the planet to an alarming degree.

For this particular period of our species’ existence, every creature being brought in only adds to the problem instead of bringing a solution.

 

 

2) Personal journey is not quite out of the cocoon

Most humans will blow past the big picture truth we covered in reason #1 and keep fucking like rabbits, so let’s get more into the day-to-day realizations.

Did you know that our homo sapien brains do not fully develop until our mid to late 20’s?

This awareness is beginning to completely shift our life choices.

Our generation is putting the brakes on early marriages/partnerships, or even serious commitment at all. We are traveling more, learning more, experiencing more. We are analyzing educational paths differently with our changing world.

We are waiting much longer to reproduce in most developed societies around the world.

In the past, we made these major life decisions in our late teens and in our twenties, with only 50-75% of our operating engine fully functioning!

The results have been soaring divorce rates, missed educational/career opportunities, lack of travel/world knowledge, limited personal awareness, and children stuck with unfulfilled parents or inadequate/immature parents or even completely absent parents.

It can be a disservice to oneself to even consider life partnership (or seasonal/serious partnerships), reproduction, or major career commitments until a minimum of 30 years of age.

Instead, it should be encouraged to allow our brain to grow into its full operating efficiency.

Until that point, start pushing out of the cocoon- go travel, go find love, go lose love, try a few different jobs, live in a few different places, get counseling, make friends, lose friends, strengthen your mental health and exercise your autonomy.

Once we reach that point of exiting the cocoon with fully developed wings (brain), we then have a much different perception of the world around us.

We are more equipped to make adult choices and dial in on what we want out of the remainder of life.

And many of us, like myself, get out of that cocoon and realize that having children is not wanted in our gameplan going forward.

 

 

3) Societal umbrella isn’t strong enough

With our economical world fluctuating and the cost of living increasing, urban life is getting very hard for much of the middle and lower class.

For many of us, multiple jobs and several income sources are a must. More people are having to move in with one another (even back in with their parents) just to get by.

A strong social umbrella for an individual or partnership would include:

• Comfortable income (not just getting by)
• Savings or asset ownership for unpredictable events
• Employer that provides health insurance, life insurance, maternity leave, paternity leave and other necessary benefits
• Solid community- be it relationship with family, friends, coworkers or neighbors

 

Just one child (a healthy one at that) will cost an individual or couple roughly $20,000-25,000 for each of the first few years of life, and around $300,000 by the time the child reaches 16 years of age.

Then comes the car, college, and whatever else they might need/want.

I’m certainly not saying that everyone must have all their ducks in a row because that is not realistic. But today, it is imperative to have a strong social umbrella before choosing to bring a child into our collective existence.

If the components of a strong social umbrella are ignored, the entrance of a child (or multiple children) can be a breaking point for some individuals or couples.

This then ignites a chain reaction of unmerited strain on others and a burden on society as whole.

 

 

4) Control the trajectory of your quality of life

For those reading this that have children, young or old, let me begin with this:

I know that you love your children with a burning internal fire, would do anything for them, and without hesitation would say that they have improved your own life. I understand all of this.

However, we have to also be able to acknowledge that creating life does immensely affect your and your partners quality of life (be it seasonal or long term):

• lack of sleep, which is essential to positive mental and physical health
• for women- major body changes, internally and outwardly (some women never fully recover from childbearing effects)
• loss of a consistent sex life- for some this fluctuates throughout parenting stages, but some never reclaim their eros love again (or never had a chance to find passion before children)
• financial stress (either on one or both working partners). Again, this can fluctuate throughout parenting stages, but for some couples this particular stress can end up being a relationship breaker
• travel dreams, hobby aspirations, and educational/career goals either get put on hold for several years or never end up coming to fruition at all (unfortunately, the latter is the most accurate)
• overall relationship jeopardy. Either some or all of the above can become the death knell to a partnership/marriage, which then creates a whole other list of complications that then affect the quality of life for all parties (including the children)

 

For myself, when I crossed into my 30’s and really contemplated creating my own children, I realized that I didn’t want to have to take on two jobs, I do want at least 6-8 hours of sleep a night, I want my sex life to evolve uninterrupted, I want to travel the world and pursue different hobbies, and I want to excel my physical and mental health.

Therefore, why would I choose anything that would hinder those goals?

If you find yourself in a similar position and wanting to control the trajectory of your quality of life, you have every right to do so.

It’s your life. One life at that.

This is a healthy selfishness, which we’ll cover more in our final reason.

 

 

5) Creating life is 100% selfish

As covered in reason #1, it is clearly evident that we do not need more of our species on this planet in this period of our existence.

Therefore the choice to bypass this fact and still create life falls into one or more of the following:

• you want to carry, nurture, and love your own human
• you want to be a parent or mentor and show/teach things to another
• you want to feel loved and wanted and needed by a child
• you want to create a purpose for your life
• you want to potentially fix a broken or failing relationship
• you and your partner want to create together and feel the emotions that follow
• you and/or your partner are receiving pressure from your parents because they want grandchildren

 

There’s really no angle around it- choosing to create life is 100% all about you and/or your partners own wants or desires.

Which then leads us into the dilemma of the different routes of selfishness. Either selfishly enjoy your life without children or selfishly create children.

Today, there is a “better” selfishness of the two routes and here’s why.

We are here as a product of our own parents’ selfish choice.

We didn’t ask to be here; we were unwillingly brought in. Therefore, our life is ours to do whatever we desire- to pursue pleasure and life experience until the last breath.

Are we still contributing to the universal problem of resource consumption, waste, and pollution? Unfortunately, yes, but we didn’t request to be here.

So to make the best of an existence that you did not request is a healthy, acceptable choice of selfish action.

On the contrary, creating life is a selfish route that ends up being much harder to justify as the more “positive” course of action.

Many parents will attempt to spin their decision to a “selfless” one by having a resolution that their kid(s) will be “nice loving humans, possibly even contribute to scientific advancements that will benefit humanity”.

Unfortunately, the reality is that as much as there may be good hopes and intentions from parents, there’s a 99% chance that your kid(s) will just be regular civilians.

Simply consuming and wasting creatures that will not create, invent, or contribute anything remotely close to benefiting humanity on a large scale.

But maybe you do hit the lottery and get “nice loving humans that end up contributing to humanity in a positive way”.

Regardless, any altruistic genius will still end up flushing a toilet multiple times a day, demanding diminishing resources to stay alive, adding trash to our dying oceans, pushing into overcrowded school classrooms, and eventually adding to air pollution once driving or needing transportation.

Bottom line is although we were brought into this world via selfishness, this does not mean that we have to continue the cycle. And just because we were born with reproductive parts and pieces does not mean that we have to use them for reproduction purposes.

With multiple birth control and preventative options available to us today, combined with our growing awareness of overpopulation and it’s terrifying effects, it is perfectly fine and increasingly normal to choose the more considerate, selfless of the selfish routes available.

Of course, if the urge to parent/mentor is still that strong within, there are plenty of neglected children needing a home. Choosing to love and nurture those that were unwillingly brought into this world and then abandoned is incredibly commendable.

Or we can continue to adopt and love our abandoned animal friends. Much cheaper nurturing option and they don’t talk back.