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Moving On!
Her parents didn't understand. Her Dad told her she had to get a job. She couldn't. She tried two training schemes and they left her feeling even more useless. She left home after that, just got on the bus and went. A disappointment to herself and her family. Living in a bed-sit, with all her friends heading off to University, life began to look bleak and the dreams she had treasured at sixteen suddenly seemed empty and laughable. She lived like that for over seven years before the confidence and the dreams she held came back to life.
Mary made a mistake. She made her own choices. It was her decision. Her friends couldn't talk sense into her. Her parents were so worried and yet they couldn't help. She got into such a low state that she couldn't appreciate her own gifts
Mistakes made early in life can have a major impact on life direction. Mary did not get back onto an even keel for over seven years. Even now her self-confidence is more fragile than it would have been had someone been able to guide her. Arthur Miller once wrote "standing around with nothing coming up is as close to dying as you can get. Young people are drowning in boredom." Mary came close to dying in more ways than one before she dredged up enough desire from within to change the situation she had created. Youth ministry is challenged to address Mary's problem: a young person in a changing world wanting to establish their independence and yet lacking the experience to make balanced judgements. Youth ministers need to be available to support and guide such young adults from outside the authority structure that, until that point, had safely directed the young person in their development. But what can you say to someone like Mary that her parents have not already said? The "Moving On" project arose from a concern that young people were emerging from family, school and church structures with insufficient background and reflection to make healthy life choices in a changing world. Mary is not the only casualty. The problem seems to have become more urgent over recent years as society has changed its ways of training and working. Today a young person can expect to have at least 18 major life changes over the course of their seventy years. This would include changes in career, times of unemployment, gap years, retirement, part time work and volunteer work. There are increasing numbers of short-term contracts. So many relationships are also changeable, tentative or conditional and moving house away from friends and personal support is increasingly likely. It is hardly surprising that the number of Marys in our society is Increasing.
THE RESPONSE
Working with the vocations directors of the FMA and SDBs, a project team was launched to look at a practical response to this problem. The outcome was a training pack that addressed the issues of change and choice for young people. The team involved youth workers, teachers, parents and vocational guides. As the project progressed there was an increasing conviction about the value of the material that was emerging that might equip young people for a more complex world of choices. The pack focuses around the need to find meaning and energy from the discovery and use of personal giftedness. Around that core issue the pack also looks at strategies for coping with change, peer pressure, setbacks and problems and planning skills. As the work developed the team realised that much of it applied to adults as much as to young people. So many of us, young people and adults, get caught into a pattern of activities we don't really care about. We can all stay in situations we should change or get out of. We can all end up going to parties with people we don't like because it's the thing to do. In such small ways we can lose our souls, pouring out precious time on what does not build the dream we all have within us to be all that God wants us to become and build a better world. Don Bosco's motto was "give me souls, nothing else matters". This pack takes that motto seriously and tries to save souls in a very practical way. Putting young people in touch with the energy of their own inner vision is to put them in touch with the Spirit within, in a very practical way and it saves their soul. Too many youngsters are drowning in boredom because they cannot dredge up from within the desire to do something worthwhile, or as Joseph Campbell describes it "to follow their bliss". The "Moving On" pack helps the young person to dig deep into their hearts and find the dream that will direct their lives for more than just a few days or months. It uses the wisdom of discernment that the church has refined over many years and makes it available to young people on the verge of adult commitment. At present the pack is being tested in a number of schools around the province as well as in personal guidance and youth ministry settings. Feedback from the young people who use it will help refine what we hope will become a new way of saving souls in the tradition of Don Bosco.
Click here to find out more about the “Moving On” Pack |
