Kids, Parents, and Appearance Pressure

Remember the amount of time you spent looking in the mirror when you were going through your teenage years? We wondered what was happening, wondered where it was all going, and usually lamented the fact that we weren’t “shaping up” the way we thought we should. It’s still the same for today’s teens, but also very different. When they look in the mirror, they’re also looking over their shoulders at the images of the perfect people the media throws at them thousands of times a day – actors, actresses, supermodels, sports stars, and their photo-shopped peers on social media. Somewhere along the way, our kids believe the lie that if you want to be valuable, worthwhile, lovable, and acceptable then that’s what you’ve got to look like. By being loving, sensitive, and resistant to these pressures in your own life, you can serve as a buffer in the midst of a pressure-filled media and peer culture that relentlessly hammers your kid with these dangerous and impossible to achieve standards.