Meraki Musings

  Let's be honest, as crucial as school is, it's not always the best for our mental health. And this holds especially true during the pandemic, where online school has become the new norm for most of us. While I understand that it's the only alternative for now, it's no secret that online school has become a burden of sorts, with most of us feeling more unenthusiastic for classes than we ever were when school was taking place physically. And let's not even pretend that online learning is even comparable to "normal" school (is it even accurate to call physical school, "normal" at this point") because it's really not. And staring at our laptop screens for 6 hours straight for school, followed by us either consuming some form of media through our devices or trying to study/complete our assignments (with the help of our laptops usually) isn't at all healthy either.  It seems as though our parents (and teachers) are under the belief that...

We all must have heard of peer pressure and a lot of us seem to have faced it too.  First let's understand what peer pressure is. It means how the behaviour of a person is influenced by someone with similar abilities or someone of similar age, social status, or belonging to the same group of friends.  Most of us have a strong desire to fit in, to follow the in-trend, and - especially as teenagers - we’re extremely sensitive to being picked on, made fun of or being called out because of our “differences”. It is for that reason we have a strong desire to follow what our peers tell us to do. There is the constant fear of being called out for not being “skinny'', “cool” or for being “nerds”, or not following trends, even when we don’t realise it.  Peer pressure plays a big role in our lives and it influences almost every choice we make - the kind of music we like, the clothes we wear, what we eat and, sometimes, it also influences our lifestyle. This is seen, for instance, ...