‘So many voices cry out across the globe and every passer by blocks their ears, for they too know the cry. Perhaps not for themselves, but for a friend or a colleague and they feel helpless at the tragedy that took so many lives. One teen – one school.’

As we move through a delicate adolescence and into young adulthood, we are supposed to have used the roaring hormones to scrap all those wonderful beliefs that our parents and mentors gave us. Then, we are supposed to make decisions regarding who we want to be as adults and pick up the beliefs again that fit that notion of ourselves, in early adulthood.
This may mean that for a time, we lose all sense of who we are . . . for a moment.

What?

You thought hormones, body hair and bad moods were because your body was changing and some god mistakenly cursed you with pimples? There are no mistakes and we have been made perfectly, but so much of us is still to be understood. Puberty is the marking of the change of the guards and we are supposed to . . . supposed to . . . scrap all the thickly applied beliefs and choose from them and others, what we wish to take forward into life as a newly formed hairy, bulging and hormonal person.

And then, we can safely say that we create our own life!

But it does not work out that way, as most parents would die of horror if their precious and pampered little angels tossed their beliefs out of the window.

Why?

Because that is the way the parents are validated and that is the way that the parents feel better about their own choices – even the ones that didn’t work out.

We see this in every society and these youngsters are called ‘rebels’ or have Oppositional Defiance Disorder (ODD) or any number of alphabetical names. Teens who scrap the beliefs of their childhood are tolerated, mocked, bullied and thrown out of the house.

But they have to . . .

They have to choose the beliefs that they want to carry with them, the ones that they believe will work for them and if they choose one that is wrong, they get rid of it and try another.

Most teens have some sort of idea of what they want to become, even if it does not fit the standard issue of educated, married, settled and this includes ice-fishing and slumming it around the globe for a year.

They need to leave behind the beliefs that cradled them and breastfed them and take on ones that stretch them and define them in a unique way.

Each and every teen has an inner map and a fair idea of who their super hero is.

They know if they like to break the rules or keep them.

They know if they like boys or girls.

They know if they like solitude or crowds.

They know if they like studying or love being creative.

They even know which parent they are closer to.

They know if they are respected or loved.

They know what their ideal self-image is and what they dislike about themselves.

They are constantly developing themselves and trying on new attitudes.

They also try on different shoes, and not the kind you are thinking of!

They try shoes on that they will be able to wear in the future. Shoes that carry them wherever they need to go and will not necessarily fit the outing.

Trust your child to wear the shoes they need.

Beliefs are like shoes . . .

They will outgrow the shoes that you would choose,for they have an internal mirror that you cannot see and in that mirror, they see themselves through eyes that you cannot see.

Before them, in the mirror, is a person destined for a future that you cannot save them from, choose for them, in a landscape that seems foreign to you as a parent and has challenges for them to face.

They know intrinsically what they need for that journey and this may not make sense to you –

but that doesn’t matter.

Because, no matter how far they go, no matter what journey they take and no matter what they choose to take with them, they will always remember home.

This won’t change.

They may scrap all your beliefs, but they will pick up again the ones that mattered most,

At the most crucial time,

In the most crucial place,

When they need it.

When they are stopped from re-organising their beliefs into a healthy, future-orientated inner self image . . .

tragedy and chaos result.

Allow them to form themselves and become who they see in their internal mirror!