The Adolescence Crisis

Teenage is tender. Parents, school and environment have crucial responsibilities.

We all go through our teenage years to grow up into adults. Many of us experience a lot of internal disturbance, turbulence and confusion during our adolescence. Very few teenagers are so lucky as to get the best from their environment to grow up as confident and strong adults by early twenties. Most teenagers in the world face identity crisis also known as “adolescence crisis”. It’s a struggle a teenager faces to gain a self-image, self esteem and ultimately “find themselves”.

Teenagers can be vulnerable and may be affected for life. This period requires careful guidance from parents, elders, school and the society at large.

Adolescence is no doubt a tender age. Besides rapidly physical changes like height, bodily development, hormonal and sexual growth known as puberty, a teenager also experiences lot of mental and emotional development. It’s a time when the individual prepares themselves to function as a grown adult in the society after a few years. The individual starts to think on their own and their maturity will depend immensely on their social circle and environment. As a coherent sense of ‘self’ is necessary for functioning productively in society, adolescents ask a crucial psychosocial question: Who am I ? At about the same time society begins to ask them related questions. Parents have a very responsible role to play for their children at this age and it directly affects their children emotionally and intellectually. Orphans or teenagers whose parents are negligent can have a really rough time and might be affected for their entire lives.

Thus, a teenager is required to work on it, in order to arrive at an “identity achievement” by the age of 20. If in the age group of 15 to 19, an individual doesn’t ask serious questions about life, roles of men and women, career, society or politics etc., then it means they are going through an identity crisis.

Environment, needless to say, plays a crucial role. A good environment makes an adolescent into a successful adult. Adolescents in average like environments show tendencies of excessive indulgence into movies, video games or binging. A bad environment leads them towards drug and alcohol abuse or sexual confusions.

One must carefully introspect themselves about their future roles, career, cultural or ideological preferences. Failure to do so will cause the identity crisis to haunt them again in their lives.