Some people say that the posts here are out of touch with most people – and they’re right. Of all the people on the web, very few are looking for healing or enlightenment. Most people are just looking for a thrill or the weirdest things, connecting with their friends and doing whatever constitutes research.
This is especially true of kids; they only know what their parents, teachers, friends tell them. They especially adhere to the ideas of whomever they happen to admire at the time. Kids tend to latch onto others who resonate with their feelings. A lot of kids feel rebellion against the establishment, so they latch onto rebellion figures like heavy metal bands or worse.
“Why are kids rebellious?” you might ask. If you are asking this question, then I’m glad you’re here. I personally knew a boy who rebelled. He came from a prolific home and parents who did the best they could with what they knew. Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough. He’s gone now.
In the little time that he was with us, I made a few observations of his friends, his family – including me. From what I observed, kids up to a certain age, can see right through people into their real intentions; they have that intuition.
Allow me to share the following post with you from Destiny Image Communique:
Philosophical Chaos: Postmoderism
Most young people in every generation have at least once sacrificed who they are for acceptance. However, today’s youth also have to contend with the philosophical chaos that characterizes our world. It is easier for youth to navigate the questions of identity when things are clearly marked or settled. No doubt, one can get lost in a “building” with boundaries: walls, doors, windows, stairs, and exits. In today’s world the building is more like a boundless ocean where youth cannot tell which way is up and which way is down! In fact, youth cannot even ask the question, “Who am I,” because they are just trying to keep their head above water.
MySpace and sites like it facilitate chameleon-like behavior. A member can upload images that may not be a true likeness, but perhaps one that he or she thinks will attract attention. A young woman, for example, may upload a scantily dressed photo or post a picture of a model in a bikini to represent her. Everyone, man, woman, boy, or girl, can pick and choose the images and wording about themselves that they want others to read. They can paint a picture of themselves that is constantly changing, even a distorted representation of themselves. MySpace allows young people talk about themselves in inauthentic ways. I am dumbfounded at how many of the 13-year-old young men in my youth group pretend that they are ladies men or pimps on MySpace.
Youth can be who they want to be, even when the picture they paint of themselves is far from the truth. Their identity is not rooted or grounded, but situational.
If young people are not comfortable with themselves, they will try to be someone else, someone they think others will accept. Youth are supposed to try on different roles in their search for who they are, but in this philosophical climate, they do not have to settle on one role. They flounder around trying to figure out what is desirable, not trying to figure out who their authentic self is. Despite all of the chaos around them, youth can still have an identity in postmodern culture. But in order to do so, youth need to embrace a truth, a foundation on which they can base their identity.
In case you’re wondering, that “youth group” supposedly belongs to a minister. Technology today offers people the anonymity to “cut loose” and “have fun.” I guess that’s why the web is sometimes referred to as the “sinternet.”
Guess what? These 13 year olds are only emulating the culture around them. They know that the adults around them are being fake, so they see nothing wrong with emulating the same attitude. They also see nothing wrong with emulating the same perversions because they are also products of modern day decadent culture.
Don’t bother arguing with me about the above points. You don’t have the ammunition. All the troubled youth throughout history are my ammunition – and they know the truth; they can see straight through to the crux of decadent culture: A life-negative attitude.
Here’s a further post from Destiny Image Communique to help you understand what is missing:
Make God the Center
All of us, youth and adults, need to find our identity rooted and grounded in Christ. The pressure of marketing tells us to live for ourselves, get whatever we want, when we want it. Social networking sites like MySpace allow us to live out relationships with people when we want, how we want. A self-centered worldview leads to a self-centered identity, but God calls us to look beyond ourselves, to see life through a different set of lenses. God beckons us to find ourselves not in ourselves but in Him.
When we find our identity in Christ, we realize that God made us “to live for so much more.” God has a plan and purpose for us that far exceed living for ourselves. God’s greatness and glory are infinite, and He has a very big purpose for our lives. Created in His image with the potential to do “greater things” than those that Jesus did, Paul is truly right in saying that we can do all things through Him who strengthens us.
We want our young people to be safe, but we also want them to thrive in all that they aspire to be. As parents, youth pastors, and educators in the United States, (and perhaps the entire Western world) especially, we are attune to encouraging children and young people that they can be anything they want to be. We constantly encourage them to see the possibilities that are available because we want them to reach their full potential. Why else do we care so much about education? We cringe at high school dropout rates, teen pregnancies, and drug abuse, in large part because we lament the potential that our youth squander.
Allow me to try and drive home the point that this pastor is making because a lot of this church talk is dull, dry and vague, so it tends go in one ear and out the other. You see, unless a person has been through the posts at this site and disciplined their minds with some of the mental exercises herein, then “reaching your full potential” just doesn’t mean much.
By the same token, “reaching your full potential” probably also has not much meaning to the adults who is say it – especially if the kids listening can see right through you. Kids judge by action – not words. Kids judge by heart knowledge – not head knowledge (As I discussed at How do You Choose to Believe).
Let me state this clearly for you: “Do as I say, Don’t do as I do,” doesn’t cut it. If this is your philosophy, then you’re a failure as a parent; you should never have kids. In fact, kids are more interested in the fruits of your labor rather than whatever decadent judgemental heuristics you might be spouting.
In that sense, we are all born with our intuition much closer to Holy Scripture: “The labour of the righteous tendeth to life: The fruit of the wicked to sin.” [Proverbs 10:16] Therefore, our kids are more likely to emulate the fruits that we bear outside and within ourselves rather than whatever “words of wisdom” come to mind.
Am I reaching you yet? OK. Let me take you a step further. Bishop Fulton J. Sheen shared his philosophy on life in the 1950’s and 60’s on his own TV program. (I was mesmerised by this guy when I was 2 or 3 years old.) One piece of philosophy stuck with me, and should stick with every parent, and every person with intention of becoming a parent: Kids emulate their parents’ true intentions towards authority.
Don’t fool yourself about that last statement. Remember, your kids can see right through you. If you have a secret hatred or loathing, sadness or despair of authority, then your kids are going to emulate that and make YOU completely miserable. They can sense YOUR rebellion – especially when you take shortcuts here and there driving on the highway, cheat at financial matters, partake of recreational drugs, or whatever teenage idiosyncracy you’ve carried into parenthood.
In fact, let me share an extract with you from Spiritual Health vs. Depression. Below please examine left brain versus right brain behavior and emotions. See for yourself which attitudes you follow:
| Insert your mind Here: |
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Each of us can have any of these qualities listed, left and right brain depending on where we root our emotions. The point is, which qualities do you celebrate? Which qualities do you lament, gossip, or dwell upon every waking moment? Which qualities haunt you during your sleeping moments? I’m willing to bet that the first behaviors and emotions that you want to talk about everyday are from the left brain.
Why? They are the first qualities that people want to talk about on the television, on the radio, in the newspapers, in the magazines, mainstream fiction, at work, in school, ad infinitum… We are constantly deluged by emotions rooted in fear which are products of decadent culture.
The best we can do when we experience those life-negative emotions is seek redemption through a healthy balance. For example, where you had pessimism also show optimism to be a healthy balanced example for your child.
Let me ask you something before I continue: Do you know that you are completely responsible for child when you are a parent? You do? What does that mean to you? Does it mean you get to take cut rate vacations while your kid goes to school? Does it mean you get to have wild parties at your house while your child observes how “it’s done” by adults?
Let’s assume that you’re not a trouble maker with intentions of becoming a parent. How are you going to raise your kid?
Start with you. Since you know that your kid will emulate your true intentions (and most likely magnify them to the power of 10), what is the best way to be a true authority figure to your kid and not a fake? Since decadent society produces fakes and perversions, you have to provide a respect of authority yourself that’s outside of decadent society.
Since troubled youth is a problem of spirit, then your higher authority should be of spirit. Since I’m Christian, I recommend the Lord, Yehovah; this is another reason I set up the site, Holy Life, HealingMindN. The Holy Spirit and God’s Word, for me, are the only true authority.
When your child observes your true, unswerving intention of love and respect towards God as Your Perfect Authority Figure, then your child will want to emulate this same love and respect towards you. By the same token, you have to explain to your child that authority figures of decadent society are simply jobs being filled in decadent society; that we adhere to laws of society as long as they are extentions of the God’s Laws.
You have to remember that your child will hear information that will counter yours from his peer group or even his teachers. You have to remember that your true intentions as a parent is what really counts – because this is what your child sees.
You child should be allowed to question the true intention of others who attempt to counter your wisdom. Remember, true intention and feeling is what really counts. This means that a child of a heretic who claims there is no such spiritual authority figure ends up dead in the water without a paddle once his true intentions are discovered – that his parents respect noone.
Your intention is to provide strength of spirit to your child who is a powerful Aspect of God according to Holy Scripture. First, live this fact for yourself, then your child will live it.
Now, how to live it for yourself; it’s all up to How You Choose to Believe.
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