Teens Meet Outreach

I remember my church friend who introduced me to porn and thinking about it now, I see how much influence peers can exert on a teenager. She was fiddling with her phone that night in the church after vigil and I peeped to know what she was doing and alas, she was watching porn. At first, I was reluctant to watch but as time passed, I started watching and before I could say Jack Robinson, addiction set in. We would look forward to when we would be able to watch it and that almost destroyed me.

I have met teenagers who went into sexual relationships because of their friends, in order to feel among and not be rejected. Recently, I met a teenager who told me that he feels intimidated whenever his friends came around with their girlfriends and I could totally relate. Peer pressure is something every teenager in the world go through and to admit it and seek help is to get your own liberty and a definition of your own personality. As a teenager, you have to be careful when choosing your friends, you should choose people who would encourage you in positive things and not in the negative aspect, fill your heart with love and not intimidate you, respect you and the values you uphold and bring you closer to God.

Here, I outlined certain tips to help you control the influence your peer has on you, leggo…!

1. Know your God

Don’t let anyone take you away from God, whether friends or whosoever, your relationship with God as a teenager is one that would sustain you in life and make you grow. Daniel said, those who know their God shall be strong and do exploits. As a teenager, if you do not know your God that would make you weak and automatically, you would be exploited.

2. Define your values and stick by them:

Know who you are, the things you can and cannot accept and stick by these values. This will determine the type of friends that you will attract or that will be attracted to you.

3. Keep a small and reasonable circle of friends

This will help you handle influences coming from them.
Stay away from unprofitable friends who have nothing to offer asides negativity.

The teenage period is key in a person’s life. Endeavour to live a productive teenage life free from negativity and evil influence.

Now, if you already have toxic friends who constantly put you down and exert negative influence on you, It is not too late to cut off from them. You can’t afford to keep toxic friends around you on the basis of not wanting to offend them because if you do, you will end up losing your self esteem and become like them.

Here are some things to do to free your self from toxic friends:

Be truthful to yourself and admit that you do not want them around you. If you just sentimentalize about cutting off the friendship without admitting your hurts, you will soon find yourself running back to them later.

4. Cut relations with them

To be frank with you, this is not easy to do but taking that courageous step would liberate you. Cut off from your social outings, social media and other things that connect you with them.

Come out straight with them and make sure you let them know you are no longer part of them. This is important, in order to avoid leaving them in the dark when you start behaving strange.

Don’t be intimidated if you hear sly comments made about you by them, after you leave them. They only want to put you in their drama. Resist the feeling to respond.

Make efforts to embrace new friends and define your values when doing this. This is to avoid making another mistake of choosing negative friends.

I hope this post was helpful? You can leave a comment below and don’t forget to subscribe to this blog to not miss a post.