Often in our day, we get bogged down with the aspects of our lives and our daily tasks. Because of this, we end up slowing down our journey towards a future goal – usually in an area we view as self-improvement. After we slow down, we get to a point where we stop pursing our task all together. We often tell ourselves that it is just for a little bit, perhaps a week, a month, a year etc… and that we will pick up where we left off later on.
I have often heard sayings from a financial / business perspective such as “If you aren’t moving forward you end up going backwards”, referring to a business becoming stagnate and getting past by its competitors. This concept applies to us and our daily lives as well. Just because we aren’t moving forward with our goals does not stop others from changing around us; and it doesn’t stop our lives from changing either.
If you are working on personal improvement keeping up your momentum is a vital item. Take an exercise program / outdoor activity as an example. You may decide to start walking to get in shape and be spurred to action. You keep up your activity for a bit and notice improvement but then something else comes along and you stop your activity. Since you no longer keep your activity going you start to lose all that you have gained … in a sense going backwards. This simple example is viewed in almost all our actions on a daily basis. With no movement on our part, things often fall behind, get old, decay etc… even if it just from the passing of time.
Standing still is an action in itself; making no decision, is a decision in its own right.
My quote for the day:
All change is not growth, as all movement is not forward.
Ellen Glasgow
Teen behavior often fluctuates during adolescent years, at times teenagers are described as bright, funny, well-liked in school etc… but there are times when they skip school, get suspended for stunts, and the like. In truth, teenagers today are not performing well. You only have to look at the statistics to realize they are not performing up to their potential.
As a group, U.S. teens are 17th in the world for science and 25th in the world for math, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), in terms of college graduation they come in 12th among other countries. This is far below what we have historically achieved.
One thing to note is the increasing influence that media, internet, video games etc… have on adolescents, some research even suggesting this influence is increasing risky behavior in teens. Is it the increase in the risky behavior or perhaps simply access to things that provide a very convenient and easy distraction that is causing a decline in academic performance? Perhaps it is a combination of both.
I will take a recent example from the other day. I was helping a teen with their homework – part of the assignment involved doing research via the internet. Now there is tons of information available and the internet is a worthwhile tool for learning. Unfortunately, it is full of distractions, advertisements, blog posts etc…. and trying to keep a teen on task is more work than the actual assignment itself it seems. Add in the various influences from video games, YouTube videos, cable TV etc… and it doesn’t take much to realize what teens would rather be spending their time on.
While it is clear that all this technology is a useful resource and it is not going away – and I am fine with it staying – it is not clear how much impact technology is having on academic achievement, or the lack of, in today’s society. In addition, I cannot help but think that as we become more mobile and more used to a virtual society, academics’ within our country are declining.
