WHEN WE WERE IN OUR ADOLESCENCE or even younger, we were aware of our peers, those more or less of the same age, going through the same process of assimilating this strange new world we were cast into at birth. Although we were encountering the same reality as everyone else alive at the time, we were doing so from a peculiar angle — that of being a child, physically smaller, more helpless, and dependent on adults.

From this point of view, the world of the adults seemed rather alien, as we did not understand so well what motivated them, or their adult cares or concerns. What our parents took as serious we often saw as comical or odd. We watched the same forms of entertainment as they did, but we saw them from the angle of a child, with little LIFE experience. We did not have the power yet to affect this world, but we started to interpret it in our own way, and we shared this with our peers.

SEVEN therapeautic tonics to loftily LOCATE your LIFE’s BASIC BEARING:

1. BECOMING aware that we are part of a generation of Young Adults (focusing more on those around our age) with whom we can identify, is a very critical developmental milestone.
2. ENDEAVOURING to feel entitled, and being part of a sound social system, we bond over our particular way of seeing things and the similar sense of humour we have developed.
3. AT the adolescence developmental stage in our LIFE, we inevitably went through a period of rebellion (pronounced or subtle), struggling to find our own identity, separate from our parents.
4. RADICALLY, what our parents diligently told or taught us did not seem so relevant, and we hungered for scintillating ideas and values that were more related to our adolescence experience.
5. IN that phase of LIFE, we shaped a generational perspective. It was a kind of collective mind-set, as we absorbed the prevailing culture at the same time as our peers, from our point of view.
6. NOW, because we were too young to understand or analyse this perspective, we were generally ignorant of its formation and how it influenced what we saw and how we interpreted events.
7. GOING into our twenties and into our thirties, we enter a new phase of LIFE and experience a shift. Now we are in a position to actually alter this world according to our own values and ideals.

As we progress in our work, we begin to influence the culture and its politics. We inevitably clash with the older generation that has held power for some time, as they insist on their own way of acting and evaluating events. Many of them often view us as immature, unsophisticated, soft, undisciplined, pampered, unenlightened, and certainly not ready to assume power.

As you brace yourself to lock horn with the OLDS, what is most important at this AGE is really being concerned with looking COOL. Moreover, you need higher doses of risk to feel the same amount of rush adults do. As you become better at thinking abstractly, your social anxiety increases. Abstract reasoning makes it possible to consider yourself from the eyes of another. You may use this new skill to ruminate about what others are thinking of you. In particular, peer approval has been shown to be highly rewarding to your YOUTH brain, which may be why you are more likely to take risks when other YOUTHS are around.

This means that you are very susceptible to outside influences. Your parents and teachers may be worrying a lot about it, and with good reason. There are so many ways for today’s youth to get into trouble. Alcohol and drugs are readily available, the pressure to be sexually active is strong, pornography and hate group propaganda are available on the Internet, and having fun sometimes lurches consciously or unconsciously into hurting other people.

You should learn to use restraint and good judgment when you are tempted to do inappropriate or illegal things, but this can be very difficult in as much your craving for acceptance is very high. Therefore you have to take an active role in helping yourself to develop a tough skin toward peer pressure or comrade influence. Your parents will not always supervise you on every hour of the day, so you have to prepare yourself to making decisions on your own.

Try to seek out information on all risks, instill unto yourself a sense of pride, and build up a solid set of values. Armed in this way you will be more likely to withstand the pressures you will face and more likely to choose friends who are positive influences. You might even be better off for the experience of resisting or overcoming challenges.

Here is BEYONDISM FORMIDABLE FORMULA for SELF-ACTUALIZATION
(The ‘head’ and ‘tail’ of Activating your SELFHOOD) in regard to:
Navigating the tides of your relationship with your comrades.

1. FINDING out the deep characteristic of the comrades you are attracted to, is to know more about yourself.
   Core Choice #28: Friends goes along way, in defining whom you really are.
   Sure Score #28: An outsider will know you well, by the company you keep.
2. OF all the heavenly gifts that mortals commend, what trusty treasure in the world can replace a friend?
   Solid Stance #28: A friendship from which the everyday disappears, becomes an allegory (spiritual).
   Catalysing Consideration #28: A bad friend, is as great a misfortune, as a good one is a great blessing.
3. REAL, as well as true bond of friendship, is usually only possible between people of roughly equal status.
   Mighty Mission #28: This equality is demonstrated in many indirect ways, in all areas of social alertness.
   Vivid Vision #28: It is reinforced in face-to-face encounters, by a matching of the posture of relaxation.
4. MOTIVATE yourself to set a high value on spontaneous kindness, alloyed to uninhibited soulful affection.
   Gaining Ground #28: Unselfish inclinations, prompts one to cultivate the friendship of one’s own accord.
   Capturing Clouds #28: This person will love you, more than one whom you have been at pains to attach to.
5. UNINFLUENCED, count yourself in nothing else so happy, as in a soul remembering your good friends.
   Lofty Leap #28: A faithful friend, should bear his or her friend’s infirmities.
   Merry Momentum #28: But a hypocritical friend, will lead you to a pit of hell.
6. LIFE makes it easy to forgive your enemies; but it makes it extremely hard to forgive a betraying friend.
   Holy Hearken #28: After pouring your heart onto someone, it becomes so painful upon sensing treachery.
   Divine Distinction #28: Like treason in politics whose condemnation is death, so is in matters of friendship.
7. A crowd is not company, faces are but a gallery of pictures, talk but a tinkling cymbal, devoid of love.
   Prudent Planting #28: A generous friendship no cold medium knows.
   Hoped Harvest #28: Burns with one love, with one resentment glows.

#28. To the extent I aspire to be COOL in a productive manner,
Which are the essentials of acquiring the best EDUCATION?

As a student who is a growing individual you should be fully self-stimulated.
Motivate yourself to ‘appropriate’ unto yourself any knowledge you study.
Make it your own, thinking out TRUTHS for yourself, divorced from abstractness.
In the process of learning, as a learner you must be sovereign over the textbook.
To you, school subjects should become tools for your individual self-realisation.
Abhor all generalised impersonal disciplines to which all must submit alike.
Never act like a horse being drilled to perform a generalised task in a circus.

#28. I, ___________________________, stimulating myself in the direction of being a good student, do DECISIVELY DECLARE that, I will cultivate a deep commitment to leave no stone unturned in the direction of acquiring the necessary information and knowledge in order to be at peace with myself and consequently through creative effort make an indelible mark on the world, and perhaps leave a lasting legacy.

In this reference, as a BLESSED BEYONDIST, I hereby, make an ABSOLUTE AFFIRMATION that, I will be a high achiever, who has a high standard of intellectual achievement and an exceedingly admirable level of knowledge-of-acquaintance of actual human situation, thus being equiped with the ability of bringing order into persoanal and social chaos. As such, I will seriously endeavour to self-uplift myself using the levers of EDUCATION, to acquire all the relevant intellectual resources, in order to be able in my adulthood to ‘curve a niche’ by participating in the productive affairs of my society.