Main heads Trumpet An alarming trend: American teenagers are in the middle of a crisis. Their rates of fear and depression have been rising for years. And many of the factors that contribute to this accident-the psychological toll of the COVID-19 Pandemie, school practices, climate change, being social media underway.
In the midst of all this gloom I became curious about how teenagers maintained themselves. I remember how extreme the emotions of adolescence can feel; Fear and hopelessness may seem intense, but that also applies to joy and euphoria. Teenagers learn who they want to be experienced the full range of their feelings and look for the good. When trying to find all that, the youngest among us can actually be the experts in looking beyond challenging circumstances to find happiness.
So I asked dozens of young people from all over the country to explain in their own words how they do that. They told me about enjoying everything, from downy pom-pom pens to white-noise playlists to ice cream from cotton-Candy. Yes, sometimes these teenagers feel disillusioned and overwhelmed. But they also have routines that reliably delight them.
These interviews are condensed and edited for clarity.
Talk aloud with a rubber duck
In the past year I taught myself how to cod. For teenagers, many things in the world feel outside of our control at the moment. The way from that is to really make something yourself.
It is satisfactory when my code works, but my favorite part is actually when it doesn’t work, because that is when I talk to my rubber duck. “Rubber Duck Debugging” was a concept invented by engineers. In short, when I coder, I have a literal rubber duck next to me. When I come across problems, I get used to the duck and explain what I did step by step.
My household is really loud, so I usually code in a panera in my neighborhood. I like to get a sweet tea and sit at a certain rectangular table, a close to the sockets. I have set up my iPad, my computer, my apple pencil and my rubber duck. (I have about 10. Lately I use my watermelon print duck, but I will probably switch to my duck in the pool for the summer.) Then I start to cod. At the moment I am building a puzzle game.
Every time I get a mistake on my screen, I look around to see if anyone looks. Then I whisper to my duck.
By talking to a rubber duck, I don’t feel happy, but finding out what to do with the help of the duck. If I finally solve the problem, I am so happy that I have the feeling that I could kiss the duck. I often crave breath. When I cod at home, my mother hears me screaming with excitement and asks if something is wrong. It is a feeling of overwhelming joy, because I discovered it and got a sense of control. – Reem Khalifa, 17, Queens, NY
Fall asleep on the phone with my best friend
One of my two best friends, Georgia, is a Yapper. She talks so much. I am already a big talker, and she brings it to me. I can have a chill conversation with some people, but not with her.
We started talking at the end of ninth grade, but once I came to the football team in 10th grade, we got super close. We talk a lot with each other at school, both in the classroom and catch up what happened when we were not together. After I get home from school, we don’t talk for two or three hours. But we talk again around 7 or 8 hours. Or I call her because I work on homework and I need motivation, or she calls me. Most nights end our conversation by falling asleep, and I wake up the next morning to see that she is no longer on the phone and that she sent me an SMS.
I like to have someone with whom I can talk about any random thing. If something happens – as a fight with another friend, or experience a microgression – I can feel alone. If I have a person, I feel more justified in what happened. The most common question I ask Georgia is: “Am I crazy, or is this logical for you?”
It also gives me the feeling that I am a small child again. Now that I am older, there are so many important things to think about – such as how you can go to university, or how I will afford to pay for it. Georgia and I talk about serious things, but sometimes you get tired of talking about the important things. Then you just have to rage for an hour about how Billie Eilish Album of the Year earned about Beyoncé. – Destynee Younger, 17, Jackson, Miss.
Go fishing yourself
I can immediately tell you what makes me happy: it is fishing. I like to consider it an escape from reality. Every time I go fishing, everything else disappears.
Many things in my life are structured for me. I wake up, have school, sports exercise and homework. Fishing is a way for me to break the loop.
Usually I only fish when I can. If I have a few hours after football or track training, I might go to my local pond and enjoy a little bit. During the weekend or during school breaks I am often dropped off in the morning at the lake and at night. Over time, by trial and error, I have found a number of places where I like to go: a lake that I like for carp, one for catfish and two for Bas. Once you have met a place, you have a deeper relationship with it. You know where to go, where you want to sit and where the fish stacks. I would say that 95 percent of the time I do catch and release. You feel the cold wind of the lake blowing and seeing which birds fly around and where they nest. It is peaceful and it is gratifying because you discover it yourself.
Sometimes I catch nothing, but I still enjoy. I learned patience from fishing. It helps me to study for a test without going crazy and waiting for Christmas or on my birthday without turning the house inside out to find my presents. – Wren Kennedy, 14, Ridgewood, NJ
Listening to gospel music
When I feel tired or doubt, I listen to gospel music. It increases me. One of my favorite songs is “Deliver Me”, by Donald Lawrence and the Tri-City Singers, with Le’andria Johnson. Part of it is the energy of the beat. Part of it is how you can really feel the singers doing their thing. And part of it is spirituality. If you are wearing your headphones and closing your eyes, vib. You can leave everything behind.
I grew up in a household of the gospel. We go to church every week, and when we get home, my mother plays the gospel, such as Sunday-type Vibes.
When I listen, I feel the mind moving me. It’s not still something. I feel a sudden increase and it makes me positive, happy, energetic, focused. I like to do something that requires movement, such as my dog walking or doing the dishes.
I have suffered from problems with mental health care and the gospel helped me to return. When I feel a ball of stress, I turn on headphones and I am surrounded, like a shield of music. It helps you to be. – Isaiah Gregory, 17, Baltimore
View Jellyfish videos
Jellyfish are my favorite animals. They are one of the first animals that exists, and they are so simple. They have no brain, no bones and are usually made of water. Yet 500 million years later they are still here. Whatever happens in the world, they can still live through it and continue it.
When we were in Lockdown during the Pandemie, I started playing jellyfish in the background during the online school and when I was doing my homework. Since then I have built a collection of hundreds of jellyfish videos on Tiktok and YouTube. I especially like to look at livereams, such as the Monterey Bay Aquarium. I usually look at them in the evening, when I’m at the end. Looking live is especially relaxing because I know that at the moment that is where the jellyfish are.
It is so calm for me to see their tentacles dancing through the water. It gives me a relaxed, happy feeling. The lunar places are my favorite because they come across each other, which is so cute. It reminds me of many people on a busy road together, all on their own paths. When the jellyfish collide, they are gently diverted and continue. Even if something difficult happens, they remind me that this is not the end of the world. – Maren Gossard, 18, Minneapolis
Twinning with my friends
I would not call myself a fashionista, but bringing out outfits and expressing myself brings me joy. I love shopping or floating with my best friends, and plan our outfits together so that we match.
We usually text the night before. Then we will be facetime so that we can see what has each other. Sometimes we go to the shopping center specifically to get matching things. But we all have our own style, so we usually try to match colors in a fun way. Like, maybe I wear a purple top and white bottom, and my friend will wear a white shirt and purple bottoms. We like to wear our hair in matching ways and also wear similar jewelry. -Hazel Kereszi-Lynn, 13, Troy, NY
Wake up in the middle of the night to watch Australian football
Once every few months I put my alarm for 2 o’clock in the morning, I go downstairs in my pajama break and the sweater that I wore asleep and putting on a stream of the Australian women’s football game. I make myself a cup of Chai and my father comes down well when the game starts. Then we look out at our team, the Matildas, halfway through the world.
It is the most special thing to share a unique passion with someone like me with my father. It is another way to communicate our love for each other. Looking at the games in the middle of the night is extra special, because I think we are probably the only people who wake up within a radius of 10 miles. It feels like a special moment when we get a binding, without pressure then the pressure of our team that wins. We feel sorry when they lose very loudly and cheer when they score – although when we scream after an exciting goal, we scare my dog and wake my mother and sister.
My father and I have always loved football. It’s his sport, so I wanted to play it too. My father is Australian and I was born there. For me, looking at the Matildas playing as the best way to connect to my home country. It is also a way for my father to share Australia with me. Although I sometimes have to take a nap during the break. – Genevieve Henry, 18, Almont, Mich.
Drawing cards and blueprints
In the sixth grade I got a YouTube video about car dependence, and since then I really love walkability and city planning. I have lived in the suburbs all my life, and it has blown me away to learn about game cities and what happens when you build cities for cars instead of people. I was so used to it that it never happened to me that there are better ways to live.
Once I fell into this rabbit hole of city planning, I started drawing paving cards. I am currently working on a master plan that connects the one suburb to the other, and a map of how the tram in Portland could expand to reach where I live. I am also in leadership for my school, so one day in the Spanish lesson I started a concept of a new ultramodern football stadium for our school. I was just bored and it inspired me to think about how we could make the school better.
With climate change and politics can it feel, in which world do we grow up? It is so easy to see problems and more difficult to present a solution. But I would like to think that there are also eight billion people in the world who can help solve those problems. If the problems are too great to tackle, this can feel overwhelming. But small things can change the world. – Mario Welliver, 16, Lake Oswego, Ore.
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