"Why teens Need a Sense of Purpose" - WSJ Article

[Templar 331]

As measured by results and psychological health, the authoritative parenting style has better outcomes than either authoritarian or laissez faire.

And that is because kids need to know where the lines are before they can color outside of them.

There needs to be some structure, some line, which teaches things like respect, boundaries and responsibility.

Totally agree with you. My aunt and grandmother believe in guilt tripping children, and really adults too, into doing what they think people are supposed to do. My uncle isn't a bad guy, he's just not as strict because my aunt and grandma would swoop in and try to control the situation. For the longest time I knew their way of parenting would fail in one form or another. Before my mom married my step-dad they did the same thing with me and my brother. We were spoiled, hyperactive little shits that didn't listen at all. Thankfully my cousin turned out to be an alright guy so it isn't a total failure.

[Grimbold21]

Why them though?

Its not like there is a desperate shortage of philosophers and psycho-analysts, both contempory and historic, that people could be reading.


The problem here is that 'purpose' will be an Interpreted by the puritanical right to support their work is good for it's own sakes .message to force the young, poor and unemployed into what is essentially forced labour.

Their mention doesn't suggest that there aren't others to choose from. If we're talking about individuals or ideologies that provide some meaning and structure to one's life, then I personally read and recommend the Stoic authors. I've read Marcus Aurelius' Medidations, Seneca's Letters and Musonius Rufus.

Plan on reading John S. Mill's On Liberty, Thomas Sowell, Peterson's most recent book

[Grimbold21]

I agree, I also follow Stoic philosophy; I have Marcus Aurelius' Meditations, but if any are interested in a more systematic approach, there is also this:

How to Be a Stoic: Using Ancient Philosophy to Live a Modern Life Kindle Edition
https://www.amazon.com/How-Be-Stoic-.../dp/B01K3WN1BY

The author also has a few youtube videos that are worth watching.

Yep, I'm finishing his book right now. Quite a succinct account of stoicism. Additionally, I have others to read like: Wisdom of the Stoics, Epictetus Discourses and - not necessarily stoic(ism) - Cicero's Select Orations & On Moral Ends

Before that, I need to finish Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago that I paused mid way to read Pigliucci's book

Point is, there are plant of authors and books out there from which you can extract valuable lessons that help you structure yourself and your life.

[Theodarzna]

No I disagree teens like everyone else are told too much who they need to be from others. If people focused on themselves it would be better lead by example or don’t.

Teens are also told they need to be somebody and that its possible despite all evidence to the contrary.

[Techno-Druid]

Man, I've been saying, the kids lack that discipline that was whipped into me when I was a kid.

Now they are just spoiled brats.

Literally every generation complains about the next with the mindset that this new generation is significantly worse than theirs.

[Deleted]

To play devil's advocate - maths is fun once you start getting into the Monte Carlo model, general financial analysis/data analysis and programming. School and university make it a chore.

Subjective views are subjective, I'm a physicist and maths is easily the coolest part, financial mathematics and monte carlo is fucking tedious, however.

[Triks]

In High School, if any teacher told me what to do during my free time, I would literally have done the opposite.

As an actual teacher now, I wouldn't simply because it's not my job, nor business to parent the child. If they asked me, I'd happily suggest, but I'm not going to lecture them on what they should and shouldn't do away from school.



The thing is, a lot of that support needs to come from home. Help the kids with homework. Get them a tutor. Read to them. Often many parents don't want to do this and then wonder why their kid isn't doing as great as they'd like.



...seriously go fuck yourself. Infraction's be damned, but we have not been 'getting off easy'. Teacher's have been put under more and more stress, more and more demands, with less and less funds (outside of private schools, of course). Weekends marking, holiday periods planning, parents (and students!) being rude and abusive and absolving themselves of all blame because it must be the teacher's fault.

I do weekend work on a consistent basis and I have to deal with people's money and life savings. Excuse me for not taking you seriously (and I never will).

[RobertoCarlos]

Hey buddy its not just kids that need a sense of purpose, its everyone

[Powerogue]

like ir or not
teens need disciple, community, whole family unit

Religion doesnt look that stupid and dated now doesnt it? it had a point

Everyone can see how it appeals to people who are emotionally weak and desperate, yes. It's a tool, but we can invent better tools.

As for a revamp of educational culture, I'm not sure. It's always been difficult to do this because everyone is differently motivated yet we're trying to push a standardized curriculum on them, which will inevitably leave everyone with topics they couldn't care less about, with apathetic teachers making it worse.

I would think a push for more personalized education, making it clear how what they're learning now will be applied later, would help immensely. I've had the best education experiences at my technical college as I'm actually directly learning things that will be used in my career path instead of random unrelated subjects to fill requirements.

Would it be possible to give kids more choice, and earlier, as to what sort of classes they take?

[Stonecloak]

like ir or not
teens need disciple, community, whole family unit

Religion doesnt look that stupid and dated now doesnt it? it had a point

It did, but it forgot about progress in many ways. It was too splintered, and conservative. Also wild interpretations, and high magic stories that aren’t grounded in science. It still has a lot right, but the West has pretty much abandoned it. So we’ll see what’s next.

[Molis]

Hey buddy its not just kids that need a sense of purpose, its everyone

I have many employees that need a sense of purpose, and their teen years are long gone.

[RobertoCarlos]

I have many employees that need a sense of purpose, and their teen years are long gone.

Social media and seeing how billionaires live every day is only going to make it worse.

Identity is getting replaced with efficiency and the human brain cant always handle it.

[Deleted]

You guys keep trying to assign the full blame to a specific group, parents, teachers, or teens themselves, which I don't believe will lead you anywhere productive. Teens struggle with sense of purpose among many other issues as a cumulative result of their environment, economic-class, those around them and society as a whole. I think the most important thing for them is a stable living situation where they are fed, have healthcare and are not at risk of violence. I agree that the education system needs retooling, but that would require a rethinking of our economy as well. Teachers deal with a lot of their own problems and, in the US, are woefully under-payed and stigmatized as being unable to have a "real career" related to their degree. Parents often see idealized versions of themselves in their child and then set them down paths they never asked for, or didn't understand what they were getting into. Parents also struggle to recognize norms of newer generations, or what the world may look like for their child in the future. There's a lot of problems that will take a long time to solve, but the only the way to move the ball is by creating stronger means of communication between teens, parents, and teachers alike.

Very good post. Teachers often receive a lot of shit, which for some teachers I can understand. I had my fair share of them. But overall the issue is identity and purpose. School does not teach or encourage these things. It teaches you to fit in and study shit you don't care about for 18 odd years and then you're finally asked "What do you want to do?"...it's natural that some people aren't able to answer that question. I'm 21 and still can't answer it!

[Dontrike]

Purpose needs (should be) yoked with drive. Of course that still does not guarantee you will benefit, but it greatly increases your odds.

From my experiences that's not the case. You can have all the drive you want, but sometimes it's still not going to get you anywhere close to what you want.

From my life, as a kid of 13, my "purpose" was gaining knowledge/truth... and I loved computers... so I would sit, after school, or at school after hours, on a computer terminal learning Linux, the commands, how to compile my own kernel, how to create a LAMP server, etc, etc...

Along with that I also researched philosophy, biology, religion, psychology, etc... because those were all interesting subjects.

See when I was 13 I was interested in math, art, drawing, computers, programming, and all sorts of things like that, but unfortunately my mother turned sick and from then I surrendered myself to always taking care of her. I made sure my brother's could choose to live their life while I did that. I gave up on any chance as the oldest is responsible for such things. For 13 years I knew I couldn't do much of anything and relinquished trying as I was sure she'd live to be 82 and I'd be doing it forever. She died slightly over a year ago and now being 30 it's too late to learn that stuff or make anything of myself in those interests. Hell, right now I can't even get into lowest level of any job.

It's rough to finally start living your own life when you tried your best to take care of others. That was my purpose and unfortunately it's gone.

If you have a purpose but just rest on your laurels, that won't get you far.

Problem is that I have no laurels to rest on.

[Deleted]

This is why you should take an entire weekend for yourself and really think about what you want out of life, write it all down, attach concrete goals to them (think in reverse - what do you need to get there and repeat for every step) and progress towards this every day!

For some people it takes a lot longer than one weekend to decide what do they want from their lives.

I envy people who manage to define their goals early and clearly, as long as they leave room for some flexibility and don't become obsessed with it.

But as the joke goes... how do you make God laugh? Just tell him about your plans.

[Nazrark]

I really don't like the lecturing aspect of school. I have always had a difficult time with just listening to someone drone on about something they don't care for.

Yet I was always top of the class for test/exams. Constant remarks on report cards saying I am brilliant yet need to apply myself.

Most other class mates did the work to avoid the trouble of not doing it. It all sucked, we knew it. There were people who did it and still didn't understand it.

Schools seem to be more interested in pushing people through to keep up graduation rates. Even if some of those people aren't qualified for graduating.

[Super Kami Dende]

Would you look at that, it's the exact thing people like Jordan Peterson has been talking about for years. But I guess now that WSJ has brought it up people might actually listen instead of being fucking idiots.

[Aqua]

Maybe teachers wouldn't be so apathetic if you paid them what they were worth. I've experienced both low paid and higher paid teachers, the higher paid ones always taught the subject well and in ways that would engage students. The lower paid ones were only focused on getting a statistic out of the kids.

Education is important. Is the bottom line of this, but we're completely content investing less and less, scrimping and saving and cutting costs on education of our youth wherever possible.

Take like 2% of the military budget and shove it into education I reckon you'd see something magic happen. As it is, I don't blame the kids. Or the teachers. Neither one is getting anything fulfilling out the system. It's a conveyer belt for dumb people into even dumber jobs now. And I'm sure that benefits some people somewhere.

[Mic_128]

I do weekend work on a consistent basis and I have to deal with people's money and life savings. Excuse me for not taking you seriously (and I never will).

Thank you for proving my point.

[Blamblam41]

like ir or not
teens need disciple, community, whole family unit

Religion doesnt look that stupid and dated now doesnt it? it had a point

Right, religion has a point. Brainwashing people into the belief they must be productive in the right ways or they are a sinner.

Next time on why Religion doesn't matter: apologists looking to spread the false narrative that belief is sustenance.

Oh and to piggyback off another epic quote from this thread: Religion is not about networks or social fluidity. Religion is far more about keeping those lesser in line with a fear of absolution. Belief or not, there's a reason the big 3 are as popular as they are and it has nothing to do with how great they make the world and everything to do with the self-superiority bred into their psyche.

But hey, we live in a world where being a "religious scholar" is a legitimate career path. And people bitch about scientists wasting time making glow int he dark jellyfish.