TEEN ANGST

~ NOVEMBER’S DISCUSSION TOPIC ~

TEEN ANGST

Yes, teenagers have it tough. What is keeping them from being happy?


    Teen angst is very much common among us teens. We can observe that fact in common places such as shopping malls, playgrounds and even schools. No doubt school is the most common place where teen angst exists. Research can be done to investigate how many schools go through this problem every year and most probably, the result would be that it happens every year without fail. We can rarely find a school that never has to deal with teen angst for at least a year. The message that we are trying to convey is that schools are usually one of the main reasons teen angst exists. As we all know, school can be really tough at times especially when we have major exams such as PMR, SPM and not forgetting the IBDP examinations. Therefore, students tend to go through a lot of stress and pressure from having tonnes of schoolwork plus tonnes of materials to read for their exams. Due to all this stress and pressure circling the students, they go through even more stress and pressure when at home.

    Talking about staying at home, parents can be hard on them at times. This would also depend on the family. Certain families that are closely bonded would not probably have this kind of stress and pressure as their parents would be a huge help when it comes to schoolwork. But for those families who see each other less, like having busy parents who are not able to see their children due to their busy schedule, the students might go through a lot of stress. This is because busy parents would not know the situation of their children, therefore they would not know what their children are going through in school. Basically, what we are trying to say is great relationships with parents decrease the degree of teen angst. When miscommunication happens, students will end up getting more frustrated and rebellious. This is when they will go to their friends for comfort. We feel that friends play a huge role in preventing the problem of teen angst from spreading.

Mr. Ong: Alright guys, class dismissed!
Yati: Finally, ESL is over. Now back to casual writing 

    What is keeping teenagers from being happy? I can really go on with this if you allow me to. But nah, I won’t. From my own experience, what is keeping teenagers from being happy is to not have enough freedom especially when having strict parents. Now that really blows. My answer would be not getting enough freedom; not being able to drive without drivers breathing down your neck, not being able to go out with whomever I want. It always has to be the people that my mum knows. It is hard for me to go out, let alone with someone that she does not know or does not like. Yes, it depends on whom she likes as well. For example, if my mum doesn’t like this certain person because of his/her behaviour/attitude, she won’t allow me to go out with him/her because she assumes that I would get influenced by him/her and become like him/her. I feel that it is ridiculous and unreasonable. I am freaking 19 years old and she does not have the right to choose whom I should be friends with regardless the age of that person or whether she knows that person or whether she likes that person or not. I am big enough to decide whom I should be friends with.

In my case, freedom plays a huge role in making me happy. I feel like I’m in a prison in my own house. I cannot drive alone therefore I cannot just simply go out and I would have to ask my parents’ permission for everything. I have to ask instead of letting them know. I really do not get my mum about not allowing me to drive alone. Her reason is that it is not safe out there. When will Malaysia ever be safe? This is what it is like in Malaysia. She just has to get over it. Instead of worrying about random people hurting me on the road, why not pray for me so that nothing will happen on the road yeah? If it is at night, I understand, but even going to school, I am not allowed to drive alone. I’ve got a best friend who was supposed to go to the US to continue studying. Her parents then suggested that they wanted to continue studying in the US as well and have the whole family emigrate there. She got worried as she would not be getting her freedom even when she’s in university. Mind you, having parents around equals to no freedom. You are like being watched 24/7. This only applies to those who have strict parents like moi. My best friend then suggested to her parents that she was interested in going to the UK instead. After a month telling them about it, the parents then thought about moving to the UK. How frustrating is that?

    Apart from freedom, not having a good relationship with parents keeps teenagers from being happy. I know I’m not happy when I’m not on good terms with mum or dad. I would either be really pissed off, annoyed or you’ll see me ranting to my friends about it. I get annoyed by them really easily as they would always have something bad to say about everything especially when it comes to my education. I can say that I do not have a good relationship with my parents. Yes, I admit it. It’s true. And because of that, I hate talking to my parents about anything important especially when it comes to education. I can tell you that if I do go talk to them about it, I would end up crying even before I can say anything. I just feel that it is a sensitive issue to me to be talking to them about it. I think it is because of how they respond to it and what they say to me about it. I tried talking to them about education a lot of times before this; when changing my course from SAM in Taylor’s College to IB in Sri KDU. It was hell for me to go through all the conversations. I remember crying about it when talking to them about it or at least I felt like crying. I would hold back my tears most of the time when I’m strong enough. I usually breakdown after talking to them anyway.

    So when it comes to education, which I am not good at at the moment, I always get lectured by parents every time they get my results. And every time they receive my results, they are never that good. My parents will then start making comments about it. Here is a famous quote from mum. Usually when she lectures me regarding education, this is what she would always say to me: “Lebih baik berhenti sekolah, lagi senang. Pergi kerja kilang and kahwin cepat. Tak payah membazir duit mak bapak (Might as well stop schooling. Go get a job in the factory and go get married young or something. Need not waste your dad’s money)”. How motivated do you think I would be to study harder after hearing those words? That’s her way of encouraging me, by saying those words... And my dad: “How are you going to expect people to respect you? You think your boyfriend wants to stay with a failure? He’ll leave you in the end. Who wants to be with a failure?” Tell me which part would encourage you to study even harder?

    Having my parents say those words to me really pisses me off. Honestly, I never fail to cry every single time they say those words to me. It’s not only discouraging but it hurts as well. And because of that, I tend to get really pissed off and annoyed. I would give my parents a hard time which leads to more scolding as I am considered rude to them. The usual thing I would do is to cry my heart out and to curse to myself about it. Then I would find a friend whom I can rant to about it and it will just go on for a while. I would also think about running away or leaving the house and being really rebellious. But I never get to run away nor leave the house just like that as I have got friends who really help me go through it. In the end, I would just ignore it and just try to forget about it.

    Sorry for the long story but the point that I’m trying to say here is that having a bad relationship with parents can lead to teen angst and it definitely keeps teenagers from being happy. To me, friends play a huge role in my life as they are the ones that I share my problems with no matter what the problem is about. I can say that my best friends know more stuff about me compared to my parents. Well, not to say about my life but about my feelings, thoughts and so on. Therefore, talking to friends helps. They help you forget about your problems and they make you happy when you’re stress and pressured back home. They make your problems go away and they are always there for you. In my case, all I need are my friends to make me happy.
p/s: I want to take this opportunity to thank all my friends; Amir Omar, Sharifah Athirah, Aiman Ahmad, Ain Aissa, Danil Izwan, Azlan Shah, Ezran Ezzaeddean, IB Five, Drunk on the Fruits of Love and to all who have been there for me throughout my miserable times. Thank you for putting up with all my ranting, thank you for listening to all my complaints, thank you for being patient with me. Thank you and I love you all.
Nurhayati Ishak (June 08)

Teen angst is not something new. More often than not, teenagers who blossom into adolescence are confronted with this torment, which engenders a deep depression. Hence, what are the factors which keep them from being happy? You don’t have to frown and blame other people, but be calm and reflect on yourselves.

Either we want to admit it or we don’t, we cannot run away from the fact that appearance makes teenagers feel depressed, tense, and upset. Since the mass media plays a vital role in our society, most teenagers are influenced by it because it coaxes teenagers to care too much about their appearance. This leads to fashion wars among teenagers. They will wear the latest designs and branded clothes, while having all the other branded accessories which also cost them a lot. It sounds exciting to wear all the beautiful dresses and to have the latest hairstyle, but this habit will cause them to feel depressed when they cannot afford it.

Our society is divided into a few classes of people such as the low income group, the middle income group and the higher income group. Of course, those teenagers who come from the low income group will feel discriminated against by their classmates when they cannot afford luxury goods. This is the situation where they are engulfed by unhappiness. Other than that, teenagers’ feelings are also affected by their own appearance when pimples bloom, like trees in a forest, on their faces.  Insecurity will haunt them as they are anxious of being teased by friends. 
Afandi Bin Suhaimi (June 09)

Teenagers spend most of their time gaming, hanging out with friends, not meeting parents’ expectations and going through drastic mood swings. Do we consider them being rebellious or is it just their way of expressing themselves due to depression? Teenagers go through a “natural transition stage” in their lives due to hormonal change and they indeed go through a paradigm shift in their thinking, or in other words, maturing in their mindset. The majority of the parents have high expectations for their children in academic or other areas that can make them proud. Some expectations are beyond reach as they are just unrealistic. Do all these expectations take into account of what these teenagers enjoy and do best? If not, they are simply forced to achieve something they do not dream of. They do not gain any satisfaction but force themselves to fit in most of the time, thus they undergo depression. Do parents see their children from this point of view (also known as window in TOK =P)? At the same time, teenagers MUST communicate with their parents to make them understand their hearts’ desires and not keep quiet and fret, “They would not understand, we are of two different generations”.
Eugene Leow (June 08)

    Adolescence is a stage where most of the people in this world will want to enjoy their lives to the fullest. It is a stage where we are not bound by any big responsibilities in life. However, most teenagers do not feel grateful for the freedom that they already have. They still think there are still some issues and concerns that will keep happiness away from them.

  In my opinion, being a teenager is great because the only thing that I have to worry about is my studies. I need to make sure my grades are not slipping and I have to come out with good results for each examination. Somehow, things changed when I decided to take the International Baccalaureate.
I am very sure that this diploma programme definitely can cause major damage to not only my teenage life, but also to all teenagers in this world. I am not exaggerating, but this is the fact that I have learned to accept after almost six months of studying at Sri KDU.

    There are many reasons why I chose the IB as the answer to this month’s topic. Firstly, the IB prevents its students from getting enough sleep almost every night. Based on what my seniors told me, sometimes they sleep for only 2 hours, just for the sake of completing all their Internal Assessments. Even though I still have not received any IAs, except for Chemistry, I found out that I also started to stay up late all night in order to complete all my assignments!

The second reason is that the IB makes our lives dull because of lack of a social life. When I told my friend that I am taking the IB, they will jeer at me, and call me a nerd. As far as what I have experienced, I think IB students do actually enjoy a little bit, but not as much as other pre-university students where they still have time to go clubbing or hang out at the mall every weekend. Because of the IB, I need to put all my efforts and spend all my time   studying so that I will not be left out behind; I am not a very smart student.

    My third reason is the IB makes me spend less quality time with my family, thus it prevents me from being happy. Apart from accepting the fact that I have to live on my own in an apartment, I also have to wash my own clothes, cook my own food and clean up my own bedroom, which are types of work done by my mother when I was at home. Actually, I was hoping to stay in my home throughout my pre-university years since I spent my whole last five years at my school, which is a boarding school. Eventually things did not go according to plan since I had to stay in Kota Damansara and all this happened because of the IB!

    When I think back, the IB is not the only item that can keep happiness away from teenagers. It actually depends on the teenagers themselves whether they want to make their teenage life interesting or the other way round. I have to admit that at the moment I still assume the IB is the only thing that is ruining my teenage life but as it turns out, I am sure a bright future is waiting ahead of me and that is because of the IB.
Sheril Emy Idayu Binti Abdul Latiff (June 09)

The most troublesome problem that teens face is themselves. Being a teen myself, I found out, through the hard way, that we, the so-called TEENS, think too much. But wait, I am not talking about education or study groups or even exams (even though next week is our finals and the seniors’ mocks).

Back to reality, teens often think that everyone is judging them. Petty and useless matters such as the clothes they wear, the lip gloss they use, and even how many pimples they have over a period of time. And if it is a she, she would think that every boy is watching her 24/7, which is fortunately so far from the truth.

So, that is what is keeping them from being happy. They cannot express themselves and be whoever they want to be. They always have to follow this ‘status quo’. And more to come: when they are mature enough to hunt for their partner/lover/crush, they will hunt for the most famous ones, the ones that all the other girls or boys have been after, just because it is the ‘trend’ and thus, you would feel you are at least with the ‘in crowd’.

And the other thing that keeps teens from being happy is the science courses. (^^) Well, it WAS fun during SPM. Well, it was as fun dating a math-nerd (most definitely not recommended to all) but now, emmmm, speechless... let’s just say, here in the IB,  the opportunity cost of gaining more knowledge is the foregone opportunity of calling your parents and speaking to them without using a word like ‘force.’
Zuraida binti Din (June 09)

Angst means fear or anxiety. It is used to describe a fear towards anything strange or unknown. Teenagers think that they have the rights and others should take into account their opinions as they mean something and they can do whatever they want. Lack of parental guidance is one of the reasons why this uncouth behaviour arises. Some teenagers feel offended with the usage of the term ‘TEEN ANGST’ because this term is used by those who do not know the effect of depression. The one applies this term should put themselves in the shoes of those who they criticize for a period of time. After I read a little bit about ‘Teen Angst’, I find out that depressed adults are totally different from depressed teenagers. These are some facts that I found from my reading. Let us think about them!!!
•    A depressed teen has the capability of perking up briefly in response to his environment. For example, depressed adults always look sad and morose. If you drag them to a party, they will bring everyone down. This means in most cases, they are sad all the time. But when you drag a depressed teen to a party, he will be OK! But when he gets home then only does he fall apart.
•    Depressed adults tend to sleep and eat too little. On the other hand, depressed teens usually eat and sleep too much. (I just realized that this is true based on my observation and past experience.)
•    Depression often robs adults of their sex drive but not for teenagers. Maybe it decreases but it does not turn off completely. They may not run after the pretty girl but if the pretty girl comes over and starts flirting, they respond. ;)
Hakim Bin Azman (June 08)

Teenagers are the next generation who will lead the world into the future. However, they are also related to many problems that have arisen: drugs, heavy metal music, smoking and drinking. Actually, most teenagers just want freedom in deciding what they want to do. That is the only way they can express their feelings. Parents often misunderstand their children, and they try to keep their children from socializing with problem teenagers.

Besides, becoming a teenager is not as easy as we think. Parents control the lives of their children in order to get them to do their best. They force them to go to tuition, provide them with private tutors to teach them, and it just makes the teenagers feel stressed. They are not given a chance to make their own decision. All their time has been scheduled by their parents. They are restricted in what they do. In the end, they will just end up being troublesome people.

    Other than that, teenagers also have problems with themselves. Their curiosity for what is happening around them is strong. They tend to try everything without knowing if it is right or wrong. It is easy to manipulate this group known as teenagers.

When they do not get permission from their family to do what they want, they will start to rebel. They will go against their family’s expectations for them.
Mohd Izzuddin Bin Nor Azminuddin (June 09)
   

Life as a teenager is really gruelling. There are lots of challenges and obstacles that need to be faced, as we now live in a modern era, where we have a bigger responsibility towards society. I have gone through many troubles and nuisances during my teen life. These hitches are bothering me over and over again. In other words, teen life is so complicated!
Here, I list some of my hassles that you might also have to face every day. 
1) Loads of assignments need to be done. This has something to do with Internal Assessments.
2) Pressure from parents. For instance, parents always complain that we spend more time on fun and less time on our studies.
3) Problems with friends. Matters like gossip and rumours sometimes can ruin people in a twinkling of an eye. In most schools (including Sri KDU), gossip spreads quicker than a disease.
4) Crises in relationship. At times she is in a bad mood, and sometimes I am.
And many more problems.  
No doubt that there are problems in a teenager’s life, but I think they are normal. Basically we need them as a part of evolution and becoming adult. It means that these matters are not real troubles, but it depends on how we deal with them. Regardless of how bad the problems are, we still need to smile and laugh as it is good for your heart. So guys, just be happy and live your life to the fullest. Boom Boom Pow!   
Akmal Ihwan (June 08)

The adolescent phase is the most important phase in which teenagers can actually think of the best things to do on their own without anyone’s advice. They should be independent in facing real life and be ready to face any consequences in deciding what they want to do.
However, there are many things that always keep teenagers from being happy. They think that being a teenager is the time which they should enjoy themselves without thinking of the penalty. Firstly, teenagers like to go out with their friends during school holidays and also free time. This scenario might create a big impact on the parents who are always worried about their children’s safety. Moreover, there are a large number of criminal cases that are being reported which involve teenagers nowadays.  To protect their children, parents might want to quarantine their children from going out and tell them to concentrate more on their studies.  The teenagers will start to rebel and this situation will keep them from being happy.
Other than that, teenagers will not be happy if there are family matters happening such as when the parents are always fighting and also when they have a money crisis. These situations will cause the teenagers to run from the house and cause vandalism to playgrounds, public transports and public toilets in an attempt to show that they are trying to be happy with their lives.
Therefore, everyone should take this matter seriously so that teenagers will appreciate their lives better. They should be educated well by the teachers on how to achieve their happiness so that they will not feel neglected. Furthermore, parents should advise their children and try to spend more time with them. Friends should also show and influence with good attitudes so that other teenagers could follow them.
Fatin Shazea (June 09)