Teenager Years Essay, Research Paper

People who are nostalgic about childhood, were obviously never children.

Few people can remember the truth about adolescence. Their minds “censor”

their memories; and have them believe that being a teenager was was one big

party, free of cares and responsibilities. Well let me say this, you couldn+

t be more wrong if you had a lobotomy. There aren’t that many adults around

who realise what adolescence was really like. The anguish, the fear, the

anxiety, the stress. People don’t remember those problems because they want

to forget them.

The truth of the matter is, is that being a teenager is hard, right from

the beginning, and it doesn’t get any easier. We are such easy prey for big

name companies who advertise using the pressure of popularity, looks and

sex to force us to buy their product that, as it turns out, we never wanted

or needed in the first place. Our lives are filled with stress. One of the

greatest sources of pressure is school. Where we are herded like cattle

from room to room, chewing on our cud, while the hay of knowledge is force

fed to us as we are trying our hardest to gulp it down as more and more is

shovelled in. Another great source of pressure is ourselves. We try our

hardest to be accepted among a certain group or circle. Whereas most of the

time we are rejected and we become depressed. Depression, another problem,

along with ignorance and apathy that thwarts our lives. A wise man when

questioned about his view on ignorance and apathy, said “I don’t know, and

I don’t give a damn.

We find outlets for our emotions through either art, poetry or music, being

the three most common. There are thousands of poems floating around written

by bitter or depressed teenagers that are never recognised as works of art.

Another form of escape for teenagers is, unfortunately, suicide. It is

alarming how high the teen suicide rates have risen over the past decade.

Yet, it is comforting that there are support groups and counsellors

available now to aid teens through their troubles. Because no one wants to

see a life full of promise and potential end abruptly because of a little

sorrow in one kid’s life. Another reason for teen suicide is their home

life. The teenager gets caught in the middle of an argument between their

parents, and they take the blame personally. This is not right. Sometimes

the child is beaten or abused and is forced to run away into the streets,

where they become homeless, and sometimes abducted. Sometimes they just die

in a back alley during a cold winter+s night, and they are never missed. At

sixteen, a teenager knows about suffering, because he himself has suffered,

but he barely knows that other beings also suffer.

Although, some teenagers face their problems. They plod along through

school. Some of them get after-school or weekend jobs. They learn

responsibility. Eventually, they enter adulthood and the work force.

Successful, confident, and eager to work. They lead their lives using the

knowledge they swallowed throughout their education and the power they

gained. But not long after, they forget about the dips and drops of their

adolescence and become somewhat hypocritical when they go up to teenagers

and say “These are the best years of your life”, or “What responsibility?

You’ve got it easy”. These lines are heard much too often.

Hopefully, it can only get easier for teenagers to cope with the world and

to live to their full potential. Where a teenager can wade through the jaws

of advertisers, the popularity contest, their parents, and most of all,

depression+s cold claws. For, up until now, it never occurred to anyone

anywhere that the teenager was a captive in a hostile world of adults.