Chapter 23: Freedom from the Mall

This is a thinking chapter, as is chapter 23. Its time to look at a few things differently and what your children/teenagers are doing in their spare time is one of them. When we talked about self esteem in earlier chapters, we were referring to younger children and focusing on them achieving mastery over certain age appropriate skills in order to develop true self esteem. The same holds true as a child grows. We are grateful in North America that our children no longer have to work in the mines at the age of 10, but what do they do that can be considered of merit? Clean their rooms and do their homework. What if that’s just not enough? Our children are so highly educated by grade eight, that they would have bested most of the adult population from 100 years ago, yet what can they do with it. We educate them and make them into creative capable human beings and then tell them to sit on their hands and do nothing. In desperation, these keen inquiring minds seek relief from the unrelenting boredom at the mall. The biggest waste of intelligence, talent and skill in our society, is in the lack of using teenagers to their fullest potential.