Authority Always Wins

Authority is another prickly issue. As a young kid you want to do anything that an authority figure tells you to do, but as you move into adolescence you want to do more of what you want to do. You used to have no idea what the rules were and so you wanted to learn them no matter what it took. On the other hand, you now want to find them out on your own.

Bad news for you, kid: This is normal. As an adolescent you are expected to find your own way, and to feel angsty about it. You are expected to be angry, feel depressed, and to basically shift from fun to annoying in the space of a heartbeat. If you didn’t people would begin to worry about you.

You have a changing role to worry about. You are changing from one of the followers of the tribe to one of the leaders, and as such you are beginning to question the authority that already exists. Strangely enough, this is something that you should embrace as well. You have an expectation to buck the system whenever possible. You should revel in rebellion; you can’t find your place if you don’t explore all perspectives, and sometimes that means you need to ask questions in ways that may not always be polite. So feel free to rebel. Revel in it even. The teenage years are your ticket to rebel and get away with it.

To a degree. There is a time to rebel and a time to toe the line. One of your problems as a teenager is to determine when you should rebel and when you should listen. You still need to respect authority; your rebellion should be something you carry on for your personal exploration, but you are doing it at a time when you also need to laying the groundwork for your future. The better you can balance the need to follow authority with the need to rebel the more people will respect you.

And respect is one of those weird things at this age. Your peers want someone that can lead them while at the same time that is going to be part of them, and you can’t always lead while following their rules. The adults want someone that is going to follow their rules while taking charge, and sometimes you need to ignore the rules in order to get ahead. How you deal with those problems will gain or lose you respect, and no one can tell you exactly how to do it.

So…you need to find a path that works for you. You just need to figure out what it is, and that’s what makes life fun.

Stifling the Competition

It’s easy to go after people on Call of Duty. You have the advantage of anonymity, making it easy to say the absolute worst things online. When some people go online, they suffer a major change of personality, like from Jekyll to Hyde. The nicest guy offline becomes the biggest jerk online, becoming a sociopath that will say things that would make him blush if he heard himself saying the same things. This is an issue that needs to be addressed.

I’ll be the first to say that some people need to grow a thick skin before you go online. People need to expect to be insulted and an ego bruised; it’s just part of the experience. Personally, if someone attacks you while playing an FPS, you should shoot them down. Seriously; you’re in a game that features high-caliber weapons, you have a gang that also has high-caliber weapons, and your reaction is to cry about the verbal abuse? I say that the easiest way to shut someone up is too shoot them down, literally. Nothing kills someone’s ability to talk trash like taking him out like trash.

That side, it’s easy to see why it happens. Some people take advantage of the anonymity that shields them from any enemies they may develop, and others figure that by verbally attacking someone they can create an easier target. You also have those that have a truly sucky life offline and take it out on those online. It’s weird how many people become different people when they go online; it’s weird how many shy kids become ultra-aggressive when they don’t have to worry about someone beating them up.

Although that’s not likely to change any time soon, steps do need to be taken about that. It’s easy to see it as cheap therapy and back it with the excuse that you aren’t hurting anything. The problem is that you are hurting someone, and you need real therapy. This is behavior that should be discussed with a counselor; there are some anger management issues that need to be discussed and dealt with. You have some serious issues that need to be dealt with, and the sooner the better.

I’m not saying that you have serious issues by any stretch, just that you have some issues that need to be dealt with. Odds are it’s just anger issues, and you think that taking advantage of your online anonymity is the easiest way of dealing with things. Eventually someone will want to take you down a notch, and that can lead to you getting banned if you are lucky, real-life violence if you aren’t. You need to talk things out with someone, and preferably someone who can help you work through those issues, even if it’s just a great friend, a cousin, or even…shudder…an adult.

At any rate, if you are one of those that virtually yell at others online, you need to take it down a notch. Life is full enough of jerks as it is without being a jerk yourself.

The Importance of Staying in School

This is the obligatory “Why You Should Stay In School” post, where we discuss the advantages of the classes you can take. Keep in mind that most junior highs (roughly 7^th and 8^th grades, sometimes 9^th) allow the taking of electives, usually woodshop and the like. I’m only in the core classes here in order to simplify the conversation. Obviously taking them is a great idea, as they expand your skillset, and you never really know when those extra skills will come in handy, especially electronics, woodcraft, and home economics. That said, let’s look at math, English, foreign languages, gym, and science.

English: You may think you know how to talk, but you can always get better at it. Any language class is going to let you talk in that language, but with English you also gain an upgrade in your language skill. The better you can communicate the more likely you can get your point across to someone else, and are therefore are wasting time just talking. This also allows you to understand the rules and regs a lot better, allowing you to avoid trouble if you can read up on the laws ahead of time, as well as communicating why it was necessary to do whatever it was that you just did. Better communication and the ability to get away with more: This is not a bad combination.

Foreign Languages: The same as English, but with people who don’t speak English. There is the added advantage that you also get a glimpse into another culture, broadening your people skills a bit. Just don’t cheat; try to avoid taking a class for a language you don’t already know. Admittedly you can sharpen the language skills you have if you take the class and pay attention to it, but there is an advantage to adding a language you don’t have, especially if you are looking for more cultural awareness.

Gym: This is a class avoided generally because weaker boys hate the abuse and most boys hate the showers. However, the physical exercise and chance to get out some aggression are not bad options, so take advantage of it being offered for free.

Math: This is arguably one of the least favorite classes, and it doesn’t help that its effects are often invisible. The obvious effect is that you gain better skills at math, giving you more options later on. The more invisible effect is that you get better at solving problems, and that’s the really important part here; the more math you do, the more tools you have to solve problems. Also, because taking math classes teaches you logic, and that logic can help you solve problems, it helps with problem-solving. The more math you take, the better at problem-solving you become, and that’s a major advantage; if nothing else, it allows you get work done faster giving you more time to hang or have fun.

Science and History: Another least favorite, mostly because they is no short-term benefit. However, the advantage here is the long-term; eventually those facts and figures you accumulate from the boring academic classes will give you an advantage down the road. For those into doom-prepping or survival you learn which plants have medicinal value, how hydrolysis works, and how leverage works, all major survival skills. For athletes, you get a better sense of how your body works, giving an advantage over your competition. Just bear in mind that there are some decent long-term results and the classes are bearable.

The bottom line is that there are some advantages to those boring classes that you would prefer to avoid. Just stick with them and you should be able find out the advantages on your own.

Keep in class in mind

I’m not going to dwell too much on looking ahead to college. You have enough to worry about without needed to worry about something that is years in the future. However, your high school guidance counselor is going to bring it up, and there are some details you do need to worry about, so…

Classes: You need to take the hardest classes you can find. You tend to rise to the challenge you put yourself to; if you take harder classes, you will be able to deal with harder challenges outside of school. If you can qualify for advanced placement classes, take them; they not only look good on a transcript, but they also help give you a cushion when it comes to grades. The last consideration is that you need to take the hardest schedule of classes you can handle: In California, for example, there is the standard schedule to graduate, one for the California State University, and one for the University of California; the one for the UC needs to be really debated as it’s the hardest of the three schedules, but gives you the most options later on.

Activities: Something else that looks great on a resume is being active after-school. This is in terms of sports, academic-related activities, or even holding down a job. The idea is that you have interests outside of school, and that you do well at them. There are a number of different activities you can participate in; just find something. Also, remember that they are supplementary to an academic career; if you grades go down too far, you need to cut back on the extra-curricular activities and buckle down on your classes.

Although there is a good reason to resent having to worry about your future now, you do need to start laying down the tracks for it. Even if you are planning to be a musician, and therefore think you don’t college, it is nice to allow for as many options as possible later on down the road. This is just more of accepting more responsibility as your role changes; you need to make plans for when you get older, and part of that is to gve yourself as many options as possible, to allow for plans that may change for one reason or another. This is probably one of the best ways to get used to it, so embrace it fully and see what the best you can do with it. Besides, you may like some of the classes…

The Naked Teenager

One of the fun parts about being a guy is that when you get a new car, you want to show it off. You want others to see it, to give you a few compliments on it, and to basically show it off a little. You have spent time setting things up to get the car, and so want to enjoy it; part of enjoying it is fishing for compliments on it. There is nothing wrong with this, as long as you aren’t too much of a douche about it.

Well, the same thing applies a teenager’s body. It may sound a little weird, but the adolescent body is an improvement over the pre-teen’s body; it runs longer, is stronger and more agile, and is capable of so much more than the body of the pre-teen. It is hardly that of Greek god, admittedly, but it is so much better than the previous body. There is also a normalization issue; you want to make sure that there is nothing wrong with it, and nothing beats comparing it to other guys of your same age. There is also that new interest in girls, and nothing says that you are on the market like showing off what you have.

In short, between pride, lust, and good old-fashioned wanting to make sure that you aren’t a freak, most adolescent boys develop an exhibitionistic streak. There is a simultaneous modesty issue, as the boy is unsure about the changes and fears he may be a freak, so gym showers all of a sudden are a special dislike of the kid, but it’s just a part of being a boy.

There is a reason that rites of passage have a nudity component. Besides the symbolic rebirth aspect, there is also that it helps the kid recognize that others are going through the same process; they maybe going through it faster or slower than the kid in question, but seeing where others are in the process helps establish that the kid is not a freak. As the first step to accepting your new body is knowing that you are not that different, this is not a bad thing.

At the same time, stripping down is seen as the cost for seeing someone else without clothes. Specifically, we’re referring to girls. Pool parties are seen as the perfect compromise; the water hides what he has while at the same time allowing him to see what the girl has. He can also show off some of his skills while not having to show everything he has. It also provides access to a large amount of cold water, which can be a relief for certain uncontrollable aspects of being a boy. A hot tub also works as it hides what the boy would prefer to remain hidden. At least, until it develops a little more of its potential.

There is a also some temperature control. A teenage boy is more likely to feel the effects of heat, especially at night. This just means that he’s unlikely to want to sleep in his pajamas as much as a smaller kid, and more likely to want to sleep with as few clothes as possible at night. As such, this is the time to make sure that the boys have a separate room, and knocking before entering needs to really be enforced on all sides to prevent embarrassing episodes. The whole “I’m your mother and I’ve seen it before” will not help anyone’s case.

So be advised that a little exhibitionism is par for the course, and should be seen as normal. It should still be punished when it is inappropriate, but try to keep an open mind.