My belief is that the crux of all of those neuroses is the transition to a state where everything's optional. When your kids are all grown up and off to college, there's no need anymore for that 4-bedroom house. When you graduate from college, there's no one who's going to slap you with an F if you don't show up for Finals Week. There's no one forcing you to not live for $200/mo. by sleeping on your friend's couch. When you become a young adult, you are all of a sudden confronted with choice. It starts to hit you that you have the power to disobey your parents, your teachers, and society in general.

Handling that transition from need-based motivations to want-based motivations is probably a second rite-of-passage that many of us struggle to pass through. The first rite-of-passage is simply achieving sexual and physical maturity. The second rite-of-passage, as created by modern society, is leading a life based on self-created motivations, independent of external motivators.