What teens worry about?
There is something that has always struck me as lack of elegance or bad taste: Adults categorize our emotions and feelings in specific life circumstances. It is illogical to me that there are still people who try to prevent young people from traveling and flowing under emotions of worry or stress, under the unconsciousness of phrases or expressions such as: “But if you are young! How can you be worried?” Although it is true that Young people is one of the best stages of life (or at least that’s what I am often told … I aspire to attest to it or not over time) and my responsibilities are far from being those of an adult person, young people , feel, think and i look beyond.
It is not true that in our minds we have only land ideas about our next outfit, the party or go out with friends, the makeup on trend; on the contrary, at sixteen I consider that I’m a person with responsibilities according to my abilities and faculties, with thoughts that transcend the superficial. Seeing my colleagues repeatedly shows me: The young people of this last generation are enterprising, intelligent, critical, independent and dreamers. This is why when someone asked me if I wanted to write for my school blog, I accepted the invitation without even being completely clear about what I wanted to write; I only knew that I would be the first student to do so, is an honor to represent a significant group of restless young people just like me due to the changes in our daily lives so sudden, to them all my respect and affection my friends and classmates.
As I‘m writing this, all of us are under an indeterminate period of voluntary social distancing due to the Covid-19 pandemic. There are many changes to which we must change in the short term. It is impossible to deny the agreement to official sources that in our departments during the first days of social isolation recommended by the health authorities, people were indifference and extreme irresponsibility, taking measures such as the opportunity to vacation, socialize, attend shopping centers and large affluence, putting at risk not only your health but also that of an entire society, municipality, department and country. However, I write this while my mind is also busy with my tasks, I read things of personal interest perhaps that convincing myself of this is only a 14-day threat and that you can eliminate this “virus” that tries or avoids blocking my deepest aspirations immediate and I know that of many of my generation.
What do adolescents and young people worry us about in this decade that is just beginning?
Lack of empathy and kindness of our society; Yes, to see how people acquire goods and services excessively without thinking about what is left for the other; I am concerned about the most vulnerable, our grandparents and people with previous medical conditions. Above all, due to the negligence of many people (most of whom consider themselves younger and stronger) who believe they are immune to the lethality of this pandemic, not to think about the possibility of infecting someone who isn’t. I am extremely uneasy about the economic situation that we will have to face once the situation “normalizes”, unleashing the economic risks of great proportions and the risks to the States to take extreme measures, running the risk of a financial depression at the global level (because teenagers also think about economics. After all, in a few years we will be launched into the real life, where God don’t allow us become part of the exorbitant unemployment rate locally and globally) . I can’t stop thinking about the people who will lose their jobs due to the lack of activity in their companies, the informal workers who no longer find someone to sell their products to, the children who depend on going to their public schools to eat and even in the cultural minorities that are currently unprotected from reality.
I can’t help but empathize with those families who can’t afford to share their photo in their pajamas together with the hashtag #StayHome, because the business reality in Colombia is different. These things affects me as others are capable of labeling those who don’t #StayHome as irresponsible or unconscious, when in reality they began to be so since privilege clouded their empathy. I find it ironic the fact that it is those adults who criticize so much the “lack of office” of young people who record and share the audios that distort the reality of the pandemic in their wake creating unnecessary gossip. And in the end it all comes back to the expression of the opinion of some teenager ends in “you do your homework and now.”
We don’t think superficially. At the end of the day it is a stage of discovery, of outlining the identity of self-knowledge and growth that every human being must go through, we all have done it, we do it and we will continue doing it. For example, I still think about the cancellation of those traditional activities that have been part of my childhood, my adolescence, it is my identity, for example: Senior Trip, in my prom (that we do not know if it will be possible to carry out) or the annual play of the Sophomores and that will be of so many dreams woven in many passionate and dedicated hearts, it is because this is how we young people are. The important thing now my dear readers, young and non-young who are at a crucial and historical moment, the human mind is so powerful and so capable that it is not limited to a single thought, I know that together we can find the way out. We trust ourselves, our parents, our institutions, the government and God. Everything runs its course; This pandemic will be one more chapter in our life.
