Life in the Eyes of Teens | Teen Ink

Life in the Eyes of Teens

December 19, 2013
By Robert1739 BRONZE, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Robert1739 BRONZE, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
3 articles 0 photos 1 comment

Favorite Quote:
“I believe the universe wants to be noticed. I think the universe is inprobably biased toward the consciousness, that it rewards intelligence in part because the universe enjoys its elegance being observed. And who am I, living in the middle of hist


I’ve been alive for 15 years, and I have learned many things about human nature. Human nature is everything that is inside someones heart, mind, and soul. Human nature is what drives a human to pursue the good or bad in life. Growing up in Philadelphia I have learned that there is more bad in human nature than good. Every person is driven to good or evil in life.

Many influences in a person’s life build their personality. Celebrities and songs written by rappers, and singers are something that people look up to. These are people who talk about nothing other than doing drugs such as smoking weed, getting money to spend on huge unnecessary houses, and getting power to gain respect. My own family member was influnced by all of those things. He started listening to "Tupac" praising him as a god, getting the same piercings and tattoos, and slowly becoming a "Thug life" person. He disrespected his parents, and even chose a girl from the street over them. There are also many violent and gruesome movies that people see and try to imitate. The man Pablo Escobar saw the movie "Scareface" and completely imatated it. He bacame one of the worlds biggest drug lord because he saw something that influenced him. This type of negative influence desensitizes people making them feel as though they have to do anything to gain power. These "Artist" degrade people in music videos, and in their songs. They say such things such as " When it come down to these hos I dont love em" this frase degrades women and is somethting that us teens are starting to say ourselves. All over social networks such as Facebook, twitter, and instagram people are posting things like "We dont love these ho's" and "I'm just gunna smoke drink and do me" . All things learned from media and adapted by what influences them.

I believe everyone is born with a certain fate and desire to do good, but gets lost in peer pressure and what society thinks is “cool” of them. There are news stories of kids killing, kids stealing, and kids knocking out a random person in the street because they are desensitized and just don't care. There is in fact a good and evil nature inside of us all, it is just who we watch and and what influences us to choose the path we want. For example, the teen who committed the Sandy Hooke elementary killings. He was practically crazy. But why? Because we have a society in which hurting is a good thing. Our society bullies and hurts teenagers because they aren't "cool" enough or they are just a little different. This pressure from people with a bad human nature influences those of us that are actually good . Humans are easily convinced and persuaded into bad actions in life.

Although there is more of the negative aspects of human nature in life, I am not like that. Growing up i was raised being told and believing that I can escape it all, and have the power to accomplish anything. I looked around at all of the drug dealing on the corner, and the killing on the next. That alone gave me my ambition, and influenced me as a person to have a good human nature. I used that negativity not as a fuel to do more bad, but as a fuel to reach for better and success. I saw the world in a way where drugs, money, and power didn't make me cool, but going to college and being successful in my way did. I became dedicated and the complete opposite of the evil human nature. There are times where frustrations kicks in but i just remind myself of all of the people who have a desire and ambition to do bad, and change my own views.

Even in the old time, theaters acted out the ambition for negative human nature. Shakespeare wrote about the ambition for the evil spirits, and bad morals in his play Macbeth. The main character Macbeth was given a look into the future by evil spirits, which gave him the drive for evil and for power. He stopped at nothing to get what he wanted, showing that humans can be influenced into evil .

Life only offers two pathways , the good and the bad. So why is it that we tend to pick the bad? Is it because we are afraid to make a difference or influence others? Or is it because in life its just easier to do wrong? Humans tend to take the easy way out, we do this to avoid all of the struggles and stress in life. But what we don’t realize is that in avoiding the work we hurt others. We are slowly tearing the world apart killing, stealing , and dying. This is our nature, it is only up to the strong and the wise to make a difference. We must look at the pain and let it lead us to justice and goodness.


The author's comments:
This piece was written and inspired after hours of thinking about society and what the urbanized youth acts like, and demands of each other. I always wonder what drives someone into the actions they make, and why everyone couldn't be a person with a good human nature

Similar Articles

JOIN THE DISCUSSION

This article has 0 comments.