Life skills are values that every individual needs to develop in order to become useful to themselves and to all the people around them. Skills of knowing oneself are some of the life skills that young people ought to develop so as to achieve their full potential and deal with the challenges that they may face.

Many young people do not know who they are and what they are capable of doing in life. They always mess up their lives. What are the skills of knowing oneself?

Self-awareness

Young people should know who they are by carrying out self-evaluation to determine their strengths and weaknesses. They have to sustain their strengths and work on their weak areas to be able to achieve their goals.

It is ridiculous for someone to know that they have certain weaknesses and they just sit back and relax. Weaknesses cannot go away by themselves. The individuals have to lay strategies of dealing with their challenges in order to become successful in what they do.

Young people should know that they have a lot of energy that they need to use constructively to be able to transform their lives and the lives of the other people around them. For instance, one who is good at certain subjects but weak in the others is expected to use all his energy to address his challenges and be able to excel. Therefore, self-awareness is vital for the young generation.

Self-esteem

There is need for the young ones to attach value to themselves. This helps them a lot in becoming assertive and being able to resist any form of temptation. They should consider themselves as people who are precious, unique and capable of doing a lot of good things that make society a better place for everyone to live in.

They have to develop positive opinions about themselves and even if other people make damaging remarks about them, they should remain strong. There are individuals who do not appreciate their physical outlook and they are not confident enough to express themselves in public.  

People who do not appreciate themselves tend to be impolite, arrogant and disobedient. They may also develop self-pity and pessimism. This explains the reason why some boys are insolent at school and some girls are easily taken advantage of by lustful men who abuse them sexually. They have low self-esteem and consequently they succumb to peer pressure and manipulation which endanger their lives.

We should help the young fellows to develop self-esteem by involving them in counselling sessions and group activities like debates, drama, sports and class discussions. 

Coping with stress

Some psychologists define adolescence as a period of storm and stress and indeed many young people get stressed as a result of experiencing difficult situations. They do not know how to cope with stress. There are those who come from families of divorced parents and they do not accept their situations.

Others are orphans and they do not have people around them who are like foster parents. Some have parents who work very far from them whereby they take long to see them. There is also a category of students who persistently score low grades at school and they get stressed in the process. Stress manifests itself in many ways which include drug abuse, depression, disobedience, excessive anger and suicidal tendencies.

We should help young people to cope with stress by designing exciting group activities that relax their minds and bodies. Such activities may include music, dance and drama, sports and debate. We should also sensitize them about the dangers associated with one trying to escape from reality by taking drugs and being disobedient.

If we focus on the skills of knowing oneself, we shall be able to groom individuals who are self-directed and vibrant.

The writer is a teacher of English Language and Literature