‘Living Tomorrow Today’: The Woe Of Today’s Youth

While a youthful stage is supposed to be a preparatory stage for adulthood and life as a whole, many youth are often guilty of pushing life. Parents and adults who are supposed to provide guidance are often to blame for exacerbating this issue by misleading the young ones into maturity before they are actually ready for it.

Even though life is short and must be lived fully if one is given the opportunity, the order of timing cannot be pushed aside either. Remember for everything there is time. Time in turn comes with choices. A choice between today and tomorrow is always stirring at the face of mankind. Present pleasures could spell tomorrow’s doom while some sacrifices today may hold the key to tomorrow’s fulfillment. However, is it worth sacrificing today’s gratification for the unknown future? For many youth of today the answer is absolutely NO. I, however, urge you to think on the other side, for a farmer in expectation of a good harvest must plant a good seed and spend time and effort in maintaining his farm.

A youth in expectation of a sound prosperity should spend time today to build a career, work hard and save. A die hard foot soldier of a political party, who uses his physical build up to make a living today, though may get immediate reward for his adventure, may be denied of a more lucrative future opportunities when positions come up in his own party due to lack of qualification. Unfortunately, age will catch up with him and the order of timing will thereby deny him of his earlier money making strength. Likewise, a youth in expectation of a fulfilling marriage life should be mindful not to take pleasure in wrecking the marriage of others today. Neither should he/she indulge or take delight in muddy fornication. Clearly, it worths preparing for the future instead of being blinded by today’s comfort and pleasures for patience is bitter, but it bears sweet fruit.

The problem of today’s youth is that many are as a matter of fact eating their eggs before they are hatched leaving no hope for the future. It is sad to say that today’s youth are in so much hurry for life. Too much pleasure, gratification, comfort and short cuts to riches are surely preparing many youth for frustrating adulthood. Despite the challenges the youth face, it must be well noted that youthsm remains an opportune time that will not last forever. Even though life is not limited to youthful stage, many young people end up building ceiling over their heads that they are not able to penetrate for the rest of their lives. This is because they do not devote time to prepare themselves in education, career as well as a holistic social, mental and spiritual development. The youth of today are simply jumping the order of timing and coveting for elusive riches and pleasure that is simply preparing them for hell on earth. It is, therefore, common for the youth to say to themselves let me have fun, I am old enough, everyone does it and I can also do it. The youth of today want to acquire what their parents have toiled to obtain over years of work. The idea of riches is everything is simply denying many youth from developing themselves and have instead resorted to diverse vices including armed robbery and fraud.

The educated are not free either. Many young professionals of today are not patient in life. As soon as they start work they start living luxury lifestyles and be ‘mobile’ that is own a car at all cost. As a young man, it feels and looks good to own and drive your own car if the means so be. For your information, being mobile is the first yardstick some ladies look out for when they are proposed to. Many youth of today are simply perpetrating fraud in an attempt to live beyond their means. Just look through the newspapers and see the increasing trend of disclaimers and fraud perpetrated by young people against their employers especially financial institutions.

While the youth are caught up in this web of deception and elusive search of riches, some adults are also culpable of pushing the young into maturity before they are ready for it. The modern trend in parenting is that of grooming children into youth by encouraging early dating, immodest lifestyle and over exposure to other adult privileges. The order of parenting has deteriorated into treating children like small adults. Children in this age are dressed and decorated fashionably for whatever reason, only parents can tell. However, it must be noted that children are children and not small adults. Wrong parenting is succeeding in embedding erroneous adult mindset in the youth ahead of adulthood. It is not surprising that some youth are simply tired of adult life because they have been forced to live it all before their time. It must be noted that one cannot eat his cake and have it. Take care of your today and tomorrow will be well catered for. Long live the future leaders of the world.

Emmanuel Kwasi Mawuena

Kdarkwa2002@yahoo.co.uk

Accra