Being a teenager is like walking a tightrope. You try to balance everything and keep it all together while trying to get to the other side. The scariest part of being a teenager, however, is when you look down. A lot of adults don’t really realize what it is like to be a teen in today’s society.

The best example of the pressure from other people is social media. Social media is constantly telling you how to act, talk, dress, behave, and much more. With all of that, teens start to compare themselves to the people around them. Most kids these days look at themselves and tend to ignore the good, focusing instead on what they think is bad.

It’s not just appearances that teens worry about, though. The teenage years are a transition from being a kid to being an adult. One of the things this includes is kids finally being able to see the world, not just look at it. They begin to understand the world around them and what the people in it mean. This is both good and bad.

On the good side, for the first time, kids can step back and appreciate the small, important moments and things in life. On the bad side, they step back and see just how horrible the world is. Sometimes teens get caught up in the bad until they start drowning in it.

One effect of seeing the bad in the world is depression. Adults don’t always realize that a kid is depressed because so many kids have gotten so good at hiding it. Teens tend to feel like they have to push it all down and act like they are doing just fine. Depression is like watching your life crack slowly, each crack becoming more noticeable. You try to hold the pieces together, but they just keep cracking.

I think eventually we all need to understand that in order to glue something back together, it has to fall apart. It’s scary when you finally let the pieces fall. You watch everything shatter around you, feeling completely helpless. But then you walk back over, and you pick up a piece. Then another one. And another one. It takes a long time.

It is also a loop. Just when you think you're done, you’ll watch as another thing comes along and shatters a piece. Every time something breaks, it breaks into more pieces, causing it to take longer to put back together. But it’s not impossible.

In the process of picking up the pieces, something changes. No matter how hard you try, nothing will ever be the same after it gets broken. But sometimes, it’s better. Life isn’t about hurrying to pick up shattered pieces, nor is it about rushing to reach the other side of the tightrope. Life is about stopping and enjoying the time it takes to walk the tightrope or gather the pieces.

Someday, light will shine through the cracks in the broken pieces. Every broken piece and every shaky step on the rope is a part of something much more important. I hope every teen realizes this.