WEB CHUTNEY

Teenage years are the most outrageous time of your life and this is the time you tend to shape most of your identity. This is the age in which you make lots and lots of mistakes and you only realise them once your enter your twenties.

Here’s what we all wish we knew as a teenager:

1. Your parents are not “un-cool”, they are just different

2. Your parents and siblings do not hate you. They are not your enemies!

3. Don’t do something just because all the “cool kids” are doing it

4. It’s okay to not conform sometimes

5. Trying to be “popular” is just a waste of time

6. Those butterflies you feel in your tummy – that’s not love!

7. You will not die without someone or something!

8. Your life won’t end if you don’t go to that concert/event/party. There will always be more of them in the future

9. Heartbreak is not even a real thing at that age!

10. People will always try to bring you down because that’s what they always do – it’s not you it’s just their insecurities standing out.

11. People will always have an opinion about you no matter what you do.

12. You won’t be liked by everyone and that’s okay.

13. Your friends are not always right.

14. All your school and college buds, will not be in your life forever!

15. Being rude to your teachers just to seem cool is not fair. Or cool.

16. Thinking you’re the smartest person around is a mistake. There is ALWAYS room for improvement.

17. Good grades are not everything but hard work always pays off.

18. Smoking or doing drugs doesn’t make you cool!

19. You don’t want everyone on social media to know the details of your personal life - there is a whole life outside social media!

20. A bad day is not the end of your life – THIS TOO SHALL PASS.

21. Give yourself time, slow down.

22. Everything is not about “YOU”.

23. Love yourself!

24. Everything is going to be okay.

All of us know that things would have been much better if we realised a few things a little earlier but that’s okay, just don’t screw up your adult life!