Need of Life Skill and Mental health education to achieve Youth empowerment

    Need of Life Skill and Mental health education to achieve Youth empowerment      

 Dr. P.Kolandasamy,  Associate Professor of  Tamil,  KMGIRSR, Puducherry, Cell: 094863 66572.

Introduction:

     In recent years, the theme EMPOWERMENT  is getting predominance in political scenario due to democratic utilization. We have to think on real empowerment which should be sustainable and ever useful in nature. This paper attempts to put forth some ideas to achieve real ‘Youth Empowerment’.

Youth Empowerment:

The concept of ‘Youth Empowerment’ has been defined and applied in a variety of contexts.  Dictionaries say that ‘empower’ is,

1.   Inspire somebody with confidence to give somebody a sense of confidence or Self-esteem.

            2. Makeable to give somebody the strength and confidence to act on their own

               Initiative.

Wikipedia explains that,

             Youth empowerment is an attitudinal, structural and cultural process whereby  

              young people gain the ability, authority and agency to make decisions and  

              Implement change in their lives and the lives of other people, including 

              youth and adults. Youth empowerment is often addressed as a gateway to

              intergenerational equity, civic engagement and democracy building.

Yet, there is no consensus definition; and Youth Empowerment can be defined as ‘power inhering in experiencing oneself as an effective and capable person’. Here more should be focused on personal enrichment i.e. attitudinal, rather than political and social power. We can say that empowerment includes prevention as well as community-connectedness. Self-development, Improved quality of life, Self-reliance, Personal responsibility, and Self-care are the points to be strongly emphasized in youth empowerment. If it is achieved by the spiritual way in India, a real, positive, and sustainable youth empowerment is possible. India has a rich heritage of Life skill education and mental health practices. The Vedas, Puranas, Thirukkural, Bhagavad-Gita and many other literary pieces have envisaged and recommended these points. We have to club these concepts with modern Psychological, social , and political theories and try to make authentic policies on youth empowerment. For example, the World Health Organization (WHO) has posited life skills such as Problem-solving, Decision making, Creative thinking, Critical thinking, Communication skills, Interpersonal relationship, Empathy, Self-awareness, Control of emotions and Control of stress to be useful for good living. A skill is a learned ability to do something well; life skills are abilities individuals can learn that will help them to be successful (also useful) in living a productive and satisfying life. The ideas put forth by WHO have been propounded in indigenous works in another form. We have to coalesce them to frame an Indian concept of life skills to impart to the youth for their good living. The saying ‘You become as you want’ is to be implemented through life skill education for want of empowerment. Similarly, simplified and specified Yoga \ mental health practices are to be applied in order to make the youth a healthy community. Many systems of physical\ mental exercises are available and they are to be practiced simultaneously. If youth are imparted life skill education and mental health practices, our youth will definitely prove that goodness is their forte, and they will be future assets and efficient leaders of our country and the whole world as well. The power should be built inside the youth as mental and physical power. Since an empowered person is able to be in control of him and of the influences\ agencies which influence his life, youth who are imparted mental health will prove their humanness. Psychological studies have proved this. Some of the notable findings are given as follows: Personality is life. Personality only determines one’s happiness, achievement and imprint in history. Towering personalities have made history and take the world in the right direction only due to their gifted personality makeup. Modeling these wonderful personalities will make us live a quality life. Personality makes human beings happy, productive, and contributes to others welfare. Student youth are to be given proper training in personality development with multiple measurements. Personality development follows a definite sequence. The first stage of development is

                                                                                      

                                                  

self-development based on emotional development. The second stage is social skills development. Social skills constitute assertiveness, communication skills, and interpersonal relationship or significant dimensions of personality. Happiness and productivity of human life depend on improving this personality characteristic. Training on assertiveness and interpersonal relationship improves social skills. Training in spoken English is seen as the best program for personality development. Social behavior is a very important aspect in the life of adolescents, as it affects their later adjustment and happy life. Only when an adolescent is able to get along well with others, he becomes popular among his peers, teachers, and parents. Lack of social skills in children results in dropping out of school, mental ill-health, delinquency, etc.

Social skill is defined as “the complex ability both to emit behaviors which are positively or negatively reinforced and not emit behavior which is punished or extinguished by others” (Libet and Lewinson, 1973). In social skills, Eisler (1976) includes the abilities to (1) express contrary opinions of those of peers and instructors, (2) ask favors of someone (3) initiate conversation with peers and strangers (4) refuse reasonable requests from strangers and friends (5) compliment others (6) ask for help in solving problems and (7) resist pressure from others to behave in a manner contrary to one’s belief.

The art of social skill training is of recent development. Social educators in this field have become active in recent years. They assess and train students. Social skill training directly focuses on behavior rather than causative factors or distress. The social skill program aims at eliminating behavioral deficits and strengthening effective behavior. It aims at improving how people think and solve problems and thereby they learn new skills. It aims to develop the study habits of the children, avoid conflicts with others, and improve academic performance.

The social skill training is applicable to aggressive students, poor academic performance, disturbed students, less assertive, students, with fear and anxiety and those with conflict in human interaction. The methods in social skills training are instruction, modeling, behavioral rehearsal (role-play), reinforcement, and homework assignments (Kannappan. 1992).

Assertiveness improved due to training but not communication skills. There is also improvement in interpersonal relationships. Total personality can be improved by training in spoken English. Communication training should be intensive for obtaining significant improvement. Social skills development in terms of communication skills, assertiveness, and the interpersonalship could be developed by proper personality development training. Foreign language training seems to be an effective method for personality development. (S. Mohan Babu, Journal Page 10-11)

Evolved personality motivates to human service. Service orientation requires social concern leadership and values. Service-oriented personality development precedes self-development and social skills development. If the student youth are given repeated training in personality development, all the ten personality dimensions namely social concern, emotional adjustment, assertiveness, value system and culture, leadership qualities, communication skills, self-awareness, self-confidence, interpersonal relationship, and stress- coping ability will be improved.

Personality development follows a definite sequence. The first stage of development is self-development based on emotional development. The second stage is social skills development. The next higher stage is service-oriented personality development. Proper training in personality development will make more insight of their social concern leadership skills including their value systems (S.Ganapathiraman, Journal 12-13)

Personality development leading to academic improvement has been supported by many studies. Self-confidence and human relationship are important dimensions of personality, which could contribute to academic performance. Every higher education institution may conduct personality development training for improving the performance of students in addition to paving way for better life with high prosperity. (A. Hemalatha, Journal 14-16)

Rich environments provide support for personality development. Parents, teachers, friends, religious leaders shine as models for personality development. Environmental factors such as courses of study, religion, caste, gender, rural , and urban areas influence personality development.

Apart from heredity, various environments play a significant role in shaping the personality of the individual. Family, the school, workplace, clubs, such as Lions provide various environments. (K. Chandrasekaran, Journal 17-18)

Parents’ role: parents can play a significant role by providing a meaningful rich child-rearing and effective role model. If teachers and students are given training in personality development, the improvement will be still better. If study skills training is added with personality development the improvement in academic achievement will be still better. The present educational curriculum does not care much for the parent’s involvement in their children’s problem behaviors. Parent’s involvement or parents training could help the students to improve their socialization and academic performance. Individual success does not rely on academic degrees or marks, which he attains in the institution, but on his success in his life. Hence, personality development should be more emphasized for the individual to become a successful man. (Ravi, journal 20)

Adolescence is described as ‘upsetting, full of turmoil, intense, troubling or difficult.’ It provides an important life transition as young people move from the security of the simpler world of childhood to social vocational and athletic functions of high school. The term adolescent come from the Latin word ‘adolescere’ meaning to grow to adulthood. Hall spoke of adolescents as one of the sturm and drang’ (translated as storm and stress), a time of powerful, unstable emotions, passionate and political idealism.

Nearly half of all adolescents today report difficulty in coping with stressful situations at home or at school. For some teenagers, stress can lead to internalized disorders such as anxiety, depression, headache or indigestion. For others the consequences of stress are externalized in behavior and conduct problems, manifested in smoking, alcohol and drag abuse. The links between stress and psychological problems have been documented in studies of youngsters from all ethnic groups and family background. Positive therapy is a package for this. It is the combination of the eastern techniques of yoga and the western techniques of cognitive behavior therapy. It has four strategies; relaxation therapy, counseling, exercises and behavioral assignment. Many researches have been conducted using positive therapy on various samples and it was found to be very effective in managing stress in enhancing positive thinking and positive traits. (S. Rajakumari, Journal, 22-23)

The development of a nation depends on the maximum utilization of human resources. Countries are respected because of their citizens who practice high values such as exemplary patriotism, worshipping hard work and national integration. India should develop personalities who could lead the nation to greater heights. “Build the youth to build the nation” should be our aim.

         Bhagavad-Gita said that (6:6) to him who has conquered his lower self (mind, senses and body) by the higher self, his own self is the friend; but to him who has not subdued the lower self, his own self acts as his foe. It further said that (6:7) the self-controlled man whose mind is perfectly calm amidst pairs of opposites like cold and heat, joy and sorrow, honor and dishonor, is constantly in communion with the supreme spirit. (a self controlled man, the lord says, is he who controls sense objects) . he, who regards well-wishers, friends, foes, relatives the hateful, the virtuous and sinful alike, stands supreme. (6:10). A yogi should constantly engage his mind in meditation, living in seclusion, with a subdued mind and body and with having got rid of desires and possessions. It guided that sitting on the seat, concentrating the mind and controlling the thinking process and senses, he should practice yoga for self-purification. (6:12).

 Thirukkural says,

    ‘Righteousness will confer heaven & wealth’ (31)

    ‘There is no greater good than Righteousness,

       nor no greater ill than forgetting of it’ (32)

   ‘As much as possible, in every way, incessantly practice virtue’ (33)

  ‘Because evil produces evil, it should be feared more than fire’ (202)

  ‘Abstain from those deeds which the wise have condemned’ (280)

 ‘Whatever is done with a spotless mind is virtue; all else is vain show’ ( 34)

Youth may be made to know these points to lead a useful life. Otherwise, they will create social problems. In the present situation, many youth have been involving themselves in public nuisance, terrorism thus inviting trouble to themselves and to others. Because of their wrong notions of sexuality, they are affected by HIV and dangerous diseases. They abuse drugs, smoke and spoil their health. They are the high-risk group for many other vulnerable diseases. By their immaturity, they are weak and fall easy prey to crimes.  If they are trained properly they shall avoid these risk behaviors, they become good citizens and grow as leaders. By the practices youth are to be equipped to take participate in the development process as subjects rather than objects.

Conclusion

   Youth are important citizens and the future of the world depends on them. To create a peaceful and developed human life, youth shall be given importance and to be trained properly. For this purpose, we have to formulate an indigenous personality development module by involving all good ideas and mental health practices prevailing in this country.

                                                      Bibliography

S.Karunanidhi (Ed.), Journal of Psychological Researches, Vol.52 No.1, Jan.2008,

  The Madras Psychology Society; Chennai.

Ram Ahuja, Social Problems in India, Rawat publications; New Delhi,2003. (reprint)

Srimad Bhagawadgita, Sahni Publications; Delhi, 2002.

Thirukkural, Madurai Kamaraj University, 1972.

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