What can I do to assist college students put their worries into perspective?
You possibly can ask them to do a values-affirmation exercise. Right here’s one thing I wrote in regards to the matter for Character Lab as a Tip of the Week:
“Younger individuals,” noticed Viktor Frankl in 1966, “shouldn’t be overdemanded. Nevertheless, we have now additionally to think about the truth that a minimum of at present, within the age of an prosperous society, most individuals are underdemanded reasonably than overdemanded.”
In Frankl’s view, there’s no motive to defer the duty of discovering function and which means in life.
However youngsters at present are significantly extra stressed than they have been in Frankl’s time. After I consider the variety of mornings I’ve come downstairs to seek out each of my teenage ladies awake, learning, and on their second cup of espresso, I ponder if it’s a good suggestion to demand much more.
Have been he alive at present, I’m positive Frankl would have been sympathetic to the very actual struggling of so many younger individuals. However reasonably than subtracting duties from their busy schedules, my guess is that Frankl would recommend, gently, a reevaluation of priorities.
As an example, for those who’re waking up earlier than daybreak to review for a check so that you could get a greater grade so that you could finish the 12 months with the next GPA so that you could get right into a extra prestigious school so that you could have a extra nice life, you aren’t, in Frankl’s view, doing your self any favors: “The extra one goals at pleasure, the extra his purpose is missed.”
What, then?
I like to recommend a 15-minute exercise that begins with selecting, from a brief checklist, values which can be particularly essential to you. Subsequent, you write about why these values are essential to you.
Most younger individuals select empathetic values like “relationships with family and friends” and “kindness and generosity” over self-directed values like “success in my profession.”
In different phrases, upon reflection, most younger individuals notice that they care extra about their connections to the world at giant than their very own trials and tribulations.
In a research of two totally different samples of youngsters, finishing the values affirmation led to feeling and appearing extra attuned to others’ wants over the subsequent three months, notably amongst those that, previous to the intervention, have been particularly self-centered. Neuroscience analysis means that this train prompts reward facilities within the mind, permitting us to focus much less on our personal private wants and extra on the individuals round us.
Don’t assume that being a great instructor or father or mother means being much less demanding. Asking our children to do extra for others could, in reality, profit them enormously.
Do ask your self, and the younger individuals you care about, to mirror on what actually issues. It might put Friday’s check, school functions, and lots of different worries into perspective.
