Young people also get depressed. They also face stress and relationship issues they typically suppress because they don’t yet have the tools and maturity to deal with them. Some might show ADD/ADHD tendencies, which makes them more susceptible to sensory overstimulation, meltdown and burnout.
As we all know, it’s just not always easy to talk about things that are troubling us, regardless of stage in life. Feeling happier and more balanced can however be achieved on a physical level without the need for verbal communication. Reiki therapy removes blockages and harmonises energy excesses that cause emotional upset or imbalance.
I have worked with young people in an educational, mentoring and coaching capacity for over twenty years and witnessed the increasing pressure kids are under today, socially and academically. Childhoods are not only more hectic than ours were, but not enhanced in the same way by real human contact.
Trust and self-confidence are rooted in the body. But with modern lifestyles requiring us to communicate via robotic gadgets, never have we been so distanced from other human beings – not to mention our own bodies: seeing images of friends on social media rather than sitting in the same room. And this trend has nothing to do with the pandemic.
How often have you noticed your kids hanging out with their pals, all eyes fixed on each other’s phones, but not actually looking one another in the eye and really acknowledging the person in front of them? How often do your kids run about in the park instead?
And how much time, in contrast, do they spend trying to create flawless photos of themselves because anything less than perfect means fewer likes, less popularity and banishment from the community news feed? They take it to heart, don’t they?
It’s a new kind of failure – survival of the fittest gone bananas. How much are you worth when your Insta, Snapchat or TikTok posts get relegated, not celebrated? Because to be visible is to exist, to be alive, regardless of whether you are really displaying the true you. Main thing: you are seen.
It’s tough being a teenager these days.
It’s hard to know when to turn the phone off, switch the brain off and let the body rest.
The boundary between truth and fiction is also harder to differentiate. And it makes it harder for us to identify truth in ourselves. With so much fake news around us too, does it really matter whether we are being fake too and lying to ourselves?
Well, of course it does! And our bodies let us know very clearly whether we are tending to our specific, individual needs or ignoring them. When we feel both physically and emotionally at home in our own skin, and more attuned to what strengthens us – independent of phase in life – we open ourselves up to the chance of real happiness.
