The Downfall of Self-Esteem

As a 21st century teenager, I believe that true self-esteem is on the downfall and we are turning into powerless victims in our own lives.

In this day and age, the media has become a dangerously manipulative force in the lives of teenagers. It thrives on the insecurities it instills in our minds and ultimately turns us into a reflection of its own materialistic image.

We are constantly surrounded by unrealistic ideas of beauty that we feel we’re expected to live up to, when the truth is that it is impossible to live up to something that was never real to begin with. As a result, our self-esteem plummets. Celebrities are subconsciously becoming our idols and unlikely role models during a time when a real foundation is so essential.

Meanwhile, most of the people who we see around us are equally as lost as us, when what we need are role models who have decided to pave the road to change. Drugs, alcohol and sex are only a few of the temptations we are faced with on a daily basis, and it takes an extremely confident person to be able to make the right decision.

Because of the expectations presented to us courtesy of the media, we find ourselves attempting to transform, but instead merely evolving into unappealing models of each other. Independence is becoming extinct, when true independence is one important way to boost a person’s self-esteem.

We are also slowly being haunted by the tragedies that dwell in the news, yet are rarely given the resources to use ourselves in transforming ways to ultimately breed change and gain a priceless sense of self-worth. Half of the media tells us that our world is slowly breaking down while we sit there numb to reality, while the other half of media persuades us to think about the vacuous, which triggers that part of us that is just a little unsure about where we stand in life. There has never been a more crucial time to change and essentially decipher fact from fiction.

Lastly, we are suffering from a lack of spirituality in our lives. There needs to be something other than the mistakes of others to learn from. We are presented with a mysterious emptiness that lurks inside of us; it may be nothing more than a spiritual void that holds us back from the fullness of life we were meant to experience, but we do not have enough self-esteem to stand up and say that something is missing in our lives.

The unfortunate truth is that we are all slowly losing self-esteem as we engage in the materialistic and superficial ideas promoted by our society today. We are going to have to get off this road we have been traveling on for far too long before it’s too late.