What’s Up With Young People Building Great Stuff and Ghosting the People They Love?

by Similoluwa Ifedayo

Hey, builder. 

Come closer, we need to talk.

I think I missed the group chat. The one where you were told that love and ambition cannot coexist. I’m glad I missed it though. Because if someone tried to convince me that building a startup, a brand, a career, a podcast, or a movement means you cannot love deeply or be in a romantic relationship, I would have politely disagreed. Yet here we are. We are building greatness everywhere, but emotionally, we are vanishing like smoke.

How do you explain someone who talked to you every day suddenly stop talking the next day? How do you make sense of a friend who runs away from conflict in private but holds board meetings, gives lectures on leadership, and teaches communication skills in public? How do we reconcile a generation that wants to be loved but fears accountability, fights for justice but flees from emotional responsibility, dreams of nation-building but avoids personal presence?

This is the paradox of our time. Young people are building tech startups, brands, podcasts, NGOs, ministries, political movements. They are getting degrees. Greatness is everywhere. But emotionally, we vanish. We fight for projects but cannot say, “I am overwhelmed, I will get back to you.” We publish essays on community and even build an online community but fail to sustain it in our private lives. We launch campaigns for democracy yet ghost the people who care about us as if relationships take less responsibility than governance. Something is not adding up.

Young people are not just ghosting because we are busy. We are ghosting because we are scared, because we are distracted, and sometimes because we are lazy. We are terrified of being seen beyond our curated potential. We are afraid that if someone sees us as anxious, confused, or imperfect, they will withdraw the affection we crave. We are exhausted from ambition and sometimes we just do not want to face the emotional work that presence demands. Ghosting becomes a pre-emptive strike. If I disappear before you discover my flaws, I protect myself. Except it is not protection. It is emotional avoidance dressed as self-preservation.

We have inherited a culture of silence from our parents and upgraded it with technology. Our parents did not model emotional communication; they modeled endurance. You do not complain. You do not cry. You do not ask for reassurance. You manage it. Gen Z combined inherited silence with social media and created something far more confusing. We disappear without leaving the room. We stop replying but keep posting. We withdraw affection but remain publicly cheerful. This kind of absence is worse because it is visible. You can literally watch someone ignoring you. Humans were not built for that kind of contradiction.

We are overstimulated and under-nurtured. We talk to many but confide in no one. We share content but not emotions. We laugh with strangers but cannot speak vulnerably to those we love. We have thousands of followers but no safe spaces. When someone gets too close, we panic. We pull away. We pretend we need space when what we actually need is courage.

And here is the part no one says: young people are terrified of getting hurt by the ones they love. We know that if we open ourselves fully and get hurt, it will distract us from building, from momentum, from focus, from the lives we are trying to create. Love is risky. Ambition is demanding. For many, the fear of emotional derailment outweighs the desire for intimacy.

We ghost because intimacy feels like potential danger. We ghost because showing vulnerability feels like a distraction we cannot afford. We ghost because the cost of love sometimes looks too high compared to the cost of building. And yet, isn’t that part of life? Risk, hurt, failure — all of it.

There is another layer. We live in a culture that prizes performance over presence. Social media constantly reminds us what everyone else is building, who everyone else is dating, who is achieving, who is thriving. Comparison and validation pressure make vulnerability feel dangerous. Showing emotion feels like weakness. Confessing uncertainty feels like defeat. We hide behind productivity, ambition, and curated personas. Ghosting becomes a coping mechanism, a way to manage the stress of being constantly on display.

Then we must ask ourselves: how do you explain talking to someone every day and suddenly stopping the next day? 

Ghosting is not just a relationship issue. It is a civic issue. The emotional habits we practice privately shape the communities and institutions we create publicly. A generation that cannot sustain connection in love is likely to struggle sustaining accountability in governance. If we disappear from relationships, how will we show up for democracy? If we cannot navigate conflict intimately, how will we navigate societal conflicts?

We see it already. We show up for activism when it goes viral but disappear when the momentum fades. We shout in election season, then vanish from governance conversations. Presence has become aesthetic, not responsibility. The habits we practice in private become the culture we build in public institutions.

We must learn the discipline of staying. Not just staying romantically but staying human. Staying present. Staying communicative. Staying accountable. Staying emotionally consistent. Learning to say, “I am overwhelmed.” “I need time.” “I did not mean to withdraw.” “I do not know how to handle this, but I am trying.” “I value you, I am just struggling.” “I love you but I’m really busy today and can’t talk.” These sentences can save relationships. They can also save communities. Emotional maturity is not separate from nation-building. It is the foundation of it.

Young people ghost because we have not fully healed from being ghosted ourselves. We mirror what hurt us. We avoid feelings we never processed. We repeat cycles we never questioned. But we can choose differently. 

Ambition and affection can coexist. Relationships are not always distractions. They can be stabilisers. We can build nations without abandoning the people who make life worth building for.

Greatness without emotional depth is performance. A generation that wants to redefine Africa and the world cannot afford to build externally and collapse internally. Presence, honesty, and accountability are as critical as ambition, innovation, and vision.

And here is the simplest truth of all: young people need to learn to talk about stuff. Real stuff. I am that person who wants to talk about stuff. You cannot use small talk to slip back into my life like nothing happened. Did I hurt you? Let us talk. Are you busy? Tell me. Am I struggling? I should be able to say it. Will I be absent? I should be able to name it. If something breaks, I will try to fix it until I truly cannot anymore.

We need to stop assuming that people know all things, especially the people closest to us. Conversations are not weaknesses, they are lifelines. They are bridges. They are the difference between people who stay and people who vanish.

Nothing builds a generation more than people who stay, who speak, who show up, and who refuse to disappear when things get hard. Ambition is important, but love, presence, and honesty are what sustain it.

Effort is god-damn attractive. I dare to say that it’s a love language. Say what you feel. Try again. Communicate like a grown adult, not a running app. Show up. Fix things. Be better. Nothing is sexier than emotional responsibility. Nothing is more stabilising than two people choosing to talk instead of vanish. Life becomes clearer, softer, richer when we actually try. Not perfectly. Not dramatically. Just consistently. Try — and everything else will try to meet you halfway.