Staying Sane While Raising Your Teens

If Peer Pressure Is Your Child’s Only Worry

October 28, 2021 at 5:00 pm Leave a comment

This is an interesting time of change that we’re living in:

⁃ social justice

⁃ police injustice

⁃ gender biases

⁃ sexual identity

⁃ violence

⁃ global pandemic

While they are unrelated issues, they are connected because many of these issues are happening all at the same time. 😫

Many inequities like crimes against minorities, which are not new, are now shown publicly as a result of the power of videos and social media. Since they are happening all over the world, new attention is being called to them.

As a result of seeing how crimes are evaluated differently by the courts and society, based on a person’s ethnicity or economic status, some people are no longer observing basic laws that keep us safe as a society. People run red lights, smash & grab (what what they want), or disrespect each other.

This week I posted my thoughts on teen peer pressure and how parents can reinforce their family values and mores with their children to help circumvent this issue. That’s not the real issue here. Is it?

When I think about atrocities like:

⁃ Bombing a city to keep a group of people from being successful (Tulsa Massacre)

⁃ Stepping on the neck of a man until he no longer breathed (George Floyd)

⁃ Storming and destroying the White House because the leader disagreed (with election results) with the Constitution and doesn’t follow the rules (Storm the Capitol 2021)

⁃ Allowing people from Afghanistan into the country’s borders while pushing others out (Haitian & Mexican people)

⁃ Disallowing interaction with family members who express different political, religious or sexual viewpoints

These are just some of the issues facing people today. Imagine trying to explain any of these issues with your child, who may have an entirely different view from you?

And, remember that we are living in a socially distanced world because of the Covid-19 pandemic. Many of our children are growing up isolated from their friends and activities that would normally shape and fill out their lives. This is a time for individual reflection, honest realizations and deep conversations with our children and family members.

So maybe peer pressure isn’t the highest concern of parents today. Perhaps it’s the other concern: don’t do as I say… do what’s right. Especially if I (your parent) am not the best role model for you.

Well, I started thinking about all of the other shit that has been taking place over the last two – three years and I realized that in the whole scheme of things, peer pressure isn’t really the issue. It’s the messages that we are sending each other and as a result our children to seeing them.

Building character happens daily.

Interested in learning more about your family’s dynamics? Contact me – Ms. Parent Guru to receive information about my inspiring parenting programs for Aging Parents, Mothers and Daughters, Mothers and their Sons, Fathers and Daughters or Fathers and their Sons.

Click Here to become a part of my parenting community.

C. Lynn Williams, #MsParentguru

www.clynnwilliams.com

Entry filed under: Parenting.