You make the call, you have control over your mind and body. Do you really want to do it or are you too scared to decide for yourself? You must stand up for yourself, and be confident about your decision no matter what the situation and the consequences are. What if you say yes? What if you say no? This is the moment where you decide what you want.
The simple yes and no will determine if you are left with regrets or a moment of pride. Is what you are doing going to make you feel proud when you later think about it or make you feel as if you could have made another decision? The choice you make will establish are you a leader or a follower. “ A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way and shows the way” Today, I am going to talk about why you should fight back to peer pressure and try your best to stop it.
There are two sorts of peer pressure, the positive sort, and the negative sort. The positive pressure is when you are being pressured into doing a task or activity that you didn’t have the courage or confidence to complete. Another example of positive peer pressure is when friends and family convince you not to do something that may not have been in your best interest or may harm you. This sort of peer pressure is good because it stops you from doing something that may not have a good impact on you.
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Negative peer pressure is just what it sounds like. Friends forcing you to do something that will have a dismissive impact on you. Negative peer pressure is even when peers try to make you do something that they think is right, they think that just because they are doing it you should be doing it too.
They try to alter your way of thinking to make you believe that they are right. They try to direct you down a path, the wrong path. They push you to just have one drink. To smoke just one cigarette… but the choice you can make for yourself easily is not always the right one. Saying no may not or maybe the end of the problem.
What it means is that you have to be certain and confident with your choice, and know that the choice you are making is right and most honest to yourself. It has to be one that uses your inner strength. Being accepted by people who want you to be a follower, and to go down what may be the wrong path. Being accepted by people is a good thing but, being accepted by people by doing something that you don’t want to do is dishonest to your true-self. And people who force you to do something that is untrue to you are not your friends.
Many people forget what the true definition of a friend is. Why are people willing to give in to peer pressure? Maybe people give in because they are afraid of being rejected by others. Maybe they give in because they don’t want to be the ‘ Baby’ of their group and appear grown-up.
Maybe they don’t want to be made fun of, they don’t want to hurt someone’s feelings, they aren’t sure of what they want, They don’t know how to get out of the troubling situation. We all feel it? We all sometimes pressure others? We have all been victims of peer pressure, it is not something that happens only to kids but to youths as well. It happens across all ages. And it should stop.
Unfortunately, negative peer pressure might never disappear but we could minimize it. Research shows that 20% of the world’s population suffers from negative peer pressure and 10% of that have committed suicide or thought about committing it. Now you know it is such a huge problem.
There will always be someone who will try to tempt you by something. Such as, “If you take this drink then I will give you money”. “If you smoke this cigarette then I will be your friend”. You know that they won’t give you what they say to give you but these temptations might take over your mind and you say yes. But they will always use you for something.
While we can’t change the others, we can change ourselves, we can change how we react to peer pressure. It takes a lot of courage to stand up and walk away but you can do it. When other people do something you don’t want to do. It really takes leadership to show the right path. It is super difficult to take the lead when ‘everyone’ is drinking. When ‘everyone’ is smoking.
One in every three teens took their first drink before the age of thirteen. It is so easy to be a follower and so much harder to be a leader. We have all heard about teen drug use since middle school. A pretty heavy topic right. We have all experienced that middle school was a really hard time.
As we were trying to be so mature, while we were actually still so young. We thought that being over-mature was the only way to find an identity. Again, peer pressure comes, you get told to do this or that and you will be so popular so amazing. And the weird thing is that we all nearly fall for it. That is a fact. Peer pressure affects the lives of so many young teens that it has almost turned into an everyday thing. That needs to be changed. When the young teens got pressured they would start listening to their peers and start taking drugs. Drug addiction has become a severe problem with youth and it can lead to depression and/or even suicide.
One out of every three kids have taken or been offered drugs, in high school and middle school. And one in every four 17 to 18-year-olds, smoke regularly. You don’t need me to tell you that. It is a written fact or might be. Here’s the thing you will never be able to stop peer pressure and neither will I. But as I said before it can and it has to be minimized. People will always want someone to be like them, someone they could drag along. But hopefully, there will always be someone out there who will pressure you to do something good instead of bad.
Imagine this: You are at a party, and you see a kid from your school, and it seems he is not getting much social. What if you go up to him and start harassing him about how he isn’t drinking and how he is such a weakling. Can you understand the impact it would have on him? Such small impacts can build up to a huge effect and you know what I am talking about. That is another reason to stop peer pressure unless it is good.
If everyone were to succumb to peer pressure then everyone would be the same. Imagine two me’s or two you’s. You won’t have the chance anymore to be original, to have your own identity, to be who you are. Peer pressure even restricts that. For example, let’s talk about the clothes we wear if everyone wore only clothes from Nike and only shoes from Adidas. It would be like wearing a uniform even outside of school. I think that uniforms in school are enough we don’t need anymore. Peer pressure even limits that. Even freedom of identity would be lost.
Although that is taking it to an extreme level, and it may seem silly. That is precisely what peer pressure is. If peer pressure was to carry on the freedom of identity and a lot of young teens would fall victim to it. And I have said before that it can’t be stopped completely but it can be reduced. And if you can’t stop it, then you take the lead. Be a leader, not a follower. “ Do not follow where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail “ Freedom of choice is for everyone and peer pressure needs to be over.
