The world has such low expectations as a whole in this continent. And you can't argue with me there. The media tells us that our teen years are our years to have fun and relax and graduate from high school. Even senior adults tell us that, for pity's sake. "You just enjoy yourself while you're young." But what people fail to tell us is that our teen years are the years in which we are supposed to grow and learn things that we will need to know in order to live good and well adult lives.This world has become very fast paced. Teens just expect that once they hit a certain point in their life they will suddenly gain all of the knowledge they will need to be able to live out in the real world and be adults. But that's all just a lie that society tells us. We need to learn these things. Have you ever heard the term "kidult?" This is what young adults are being called that never grow up. They do the same thing they did as teens. They party and hang out and skip from job to job and live with their parents. What kind of life does that sound like?
Really, what are the expectaion that people have for us? Don't do drugs, don't have sex, get good grades, graduate, go to university, have fun... What will that teach us for our long life ahead of us? To do exactly what I said. Don't do drugs, don't have sex, get good grades, graduate, go to university, have fun...
Personally, what fun is there in partying and hanging out for the rest of your life? You'll never know what you could have become, who's life you could have changed, learn about the world around you, inspire someone to attain great heights, the possibilities for what life have to offer are endless. You just have to be able to want to fight for them. But the world thinks of us as lazy teens that only think of ourselves. It's a lie that has been decked up really pretty.
Alot of teens that I go to school with are lazy and slack in class. There's no real expectation in the classes. Teachers hardly expect people to do anything. They don't push their class and then wonder why the class average is so low. Teens aren't pushed to do their best; they do what they can to get by. I took two classes second semester last year that I failed to learn a single thing. In one class I got a 92% and the other was an 86% as final marks. I hardly did anything. I never studied. I talked with my friends or listened to music for most of the classes. There was also a lot of movies in those classes. And no one in my class really cared to do their best. But is our best, really our best? Or is it "just enough" to get an A. Yes, it's an A, but in most cases it's not good quality and it's n-o-t g-o-o-d e-n-o-u-g-h to be the best.
But do some teachers see that? No, they will do what they can to get students to pass so they can graduate, instead of everything being the student's ability and desire to do well. Why? Why do teachers do that to us? It really hurts us as people in so many ways.
At home, what do you do? Make your bed, walk the dog, take out the trash? Something simple along those lines? Well, why don't you cut the grass, rake the lawn, cook supper, dust, vaccum, mop, do the dishes, clean your clean, clean the toilets? Why don't you have a list of about 20 things to do after school? Alot of people probably don't even know how to do half of those things poperly. Which is terribly sad.
In your community, what do you do? Go to the movies, the park, the mall? How does that help you in any way? I would say atleast 90% of teens do NOT do any volunteer work. It's [vital as I believe to grow and learn] a very important part of life. Helping others, learning whilst helping and showing the world that "Yes, I can do something worthwhile!"
We're in our teen years. We have the time, the ambition, and the ability to do so many things that we don't. These are the times in which things are supposed to happen. This is the time where we're supposed to grow into our maturity. It doesn't just snap into us as MANY people belive. I used to be one of them. We need to prove the what society has become wrong. We are more than what they think we are.
Who's in?
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Jessi... mere words cannot express how much I agree and said "hell yeah" so many times during the course of reading this post.
ReplyDeleteYou made so many excellent points here, I'm pretty sure the truthfulness would overload a lie detector, somehow. 'cause it's just that awesome.
I don't know if I can say anything that you didn't already cover, but.
I really wish I had've read this post when I was just entering my teen years. Because in reading this post, so many of the things you said resonated with me in things that I did... or rather, did not do. Striving for mediocrity, just crawling over the bar instead of leaping over it with a twenty-foot pole (yay Olympic-themed metaphors!).
We're taught how to live our life by the bare necessities. Just what to do to survive, but not to be nourished, heart and soul, into being better people. Not why we're living our lives - and what we should be doing to give back to the world, and make it a better place.
Sure, you could in theory just go through life by working with whatever you took in university... but would you be happy? Would you have evolved as a person, learned anything?
Stuff like that... it's not something you can just learn from getting good grades.
And I think in this face-paced world, we can forget that there's more to life than just getting good grades as a goal to get a high-paying job. And then what? Work that for your entire life and thrive in material, material, material.
We're too materialistic - we can forget to love, to care, to take care of others, and those not as fortunate as us. To support our friends, and to come together as a community.
After all, money can't buy happiness - but love can.
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It's sad when I have to use dividers or something to break up my COMMENT into seperate parts. xD
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I agree that in being typecast as lazy, party-hardy types... some teenagers have automatically gravitated to becoming just that.
Because it's the 'cool' thing to do.
I think if people continue to break out of the mold and contribute and become more than what they have to be... maybe someday you'll see a societal shift. Hopefully.
And I totally agree with you about teachers... ultimately, I think looking back, the teacher's that were the hardest on me and pushed me to the limits are the teachers I learned the most from. Whereas in classes like Reynold's, I didn't learn a single thing.
Because I think, like the students, some teachers have begun to think in terms of 'bare minimum'. And in addition... I think they get graded based on their class averages, though I'm not sure.
And you're also right about the expectation that teens have about suddenly learning all there is to know in life. There's a huge step from living at home with your parents and doing everything yourself... and that's something you can learn through experience and good habit, rather than just being told "do the dishes" "mow the lawn" "do the laundry". Although I think with growing older, or it should at least, comes a desire for independence, to spread your wings and actually start doing things on your own, and naturally start moving away from your parents and discover the world on your own.
That's what I'm kinda discovering now, myself. In a way. =3
Thank you for this awesome and inspirational post, Jessi. =3
(about your point on teens learning to live in the real world)
ReplyDeleteThe first day I got my paycheck I didn't really know what to do with it. I had to take out the section that was the check and put it in the bank. Not complicated but if I hadn't asked I probably would have messed it up. Before that day I had no thoughts about what I had to do with a paycheck, the question had never popped into my head. How was it supposed to? I think a big part of growing is getting to that place where we need to ask. How are we supposed to grow and learn if we don't even know the questions? "part of life is making mistakes and learning from them" what if it's not about making mistakes? what if we're supposed to learn to correct the mistakes before we make them? Maybe it's just that no one gives the answers when we need them.
How do we grow up without asking questions? But how are we to ask the questions we don't know?
ReplyDeleteI really like it. It is very interesting. Because, now I want to know how to answer that question.
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Aaron, I don't even know that I will be able to say anything back to what you have said because it's all so true.