“How long has she been going to school!” “Why doesn’t he think about his future at all?” Parents are often annoyed by children’s incoherence, slowness, inability to properly prioritize. It seems to them that the child spends his free hours in the wrong way and for the wrong things. How to help children harmonize relationships with time? Report from the training for teenagers.
The ability to independently plan time appears at about 9 years old, and only by the age of 12-13 the child’s brain matures so much that he can mentally correlate the past, present and future. And this is the best time to start consciously building relationships with time.
“Crossroads of Opportunities” is the name of the training program for teenagers, which is conducted by Olga Kardashina, a gestalt therapist and psychodramatherapist. The task of the training is to help high school students to normalize and harmonize relationships with the time of their lives. And also – to be aware of and express feelings associated with difficulties in relations with the past, present or future. The psychologist uses elements of the Gestalt approach, psychodrama and future practice. I managed to visit one of the 12 classes, which was called “Touching the Future.”
In a spacious room, chairs are arranged in a circle. 17-year-old Dima and Oleg, 15-year-old Anya and five other boys and girls of this age quickly exchange remarks – they laugh, make jokes, flirt. They have time to discuss politics, school affairs, relationships with parents. This is the sixth lesson in the group, so everyone already knows each other quite well. There is only one newcomer to the company – me. But teenagers diligently pretend that the presence of a stranger is not a hindrance to them. The psychologist sits in a circle with everyone, and the hum quickly subsides.
It is difficult for a teenager to talk about the future, because he has not figured out his past well, it has not yet been sorted out
“Today we will talk about the time of our life,” Olga Kardashina begins the lesson. “Everyone has their own time, and everyone experiences it in their own way. There are, for example, chronophile people – they have a good relationship with time, they like to think about it. They start weeklies, make to-do lists, and then meticulously cross off what is done. And there are chronophages – people who do not hesitate to take someone else’s time and enjoy it. They can talk to you for a long time on the phone, although you said three times that you were late. There are also chronophobes – they are afraid of the troubles associated with time.
What is your relationship with time? I suggest you show with both hands that:
- you respect and value time, you have a good relationship with it (stretch your hand palm up),
- you are rather a chronophage (show fist),
- you are more of a chronophobe (hold out your hand, palm down).
You can show two options: for example, if you know how to plan your time, you can interrupt the conversation if the interlocutor distracts you, but the topic of time still causes you tension. Or you yourself are on good terms with time, but other people “eat” it from you. Or you yourself eat it from others. You can be both a chronophage and a victim of a chronophage at the same time. Imagine a beautiful clock as a memorial to the time of your life. Show how you perceive it.
Teenagers are focused. You can see how difficult this exercise is for them. Finally, everyone completes the task. Most stretch out two arms at once.
Psychologist’s comment
Teenagers are either afraid of time or overestimate their capabilities. They say that everyone will have time – and they do not. We are sure that they will finish the game and do everything. Therefore, the first task of the training is to show that time is interesting, that it is subjective and how differently we perceive it. The first exercise develops reflection: who am I? What kind of people surround me, how do I deal with them? Am I giving my time to others or am I protecting it, keeping it? It can be difficult for teenagers to formulate, to find the right words, so I ask them to listen to their feelings: on which word of these three (chronophobes, chronophages, chronophiles) do you have an internal tremor? I teach them to feel with the body.
“I am glad that many of you have a good relationship with time,” Olga continues. What comes to your mind when you hear the phrase “time flies”?
– Lessons. You sit in class and wait for everything to be over.
– When I’m late and someone is pulling my time, but I have everything calculated to the minute.
– It’s a very long road.
The children continue the discussion.
“While you were listing, I marked one minute on the clock, and now it is over,” the coach explains. Was it a long or short minute? What do you think?
— Short!
— Long!
And this is the subjectivity of the experience of time. For some it was a short minute, for others it was a long one. It happens. And time is irreversible. I can’t go back ten minutes when I entered this room.
– You said about the beginning of classes, and I immediately got a picture of how everything went …
Flashbacks, huh? Memory takes us back to the past. We understand that we cannot return to childhood. But do you remember your childhood photos?
– Me not. I don’t think I even saw them.
“I only remember that I look fat on them.
I remember quite vividly.
“I don’t remember anything at all.
Psychologist’s comment
It is difficult for a teenager to talk about the future, because he has not figured out his past well, it has not yet been assimilated, not sorted out. This happens a little later, in adolescence. Adolescents have not yet lived, have not “digested” the past. And if there was a traumatic experience in their history, there is a strong tendency to repress, and then the teenager says that he does not remember his childhood, his childhood photos, some periods in the past. I often ask the child to draw what his feelings look like, or describe a safe place in his past or present. The teenager does not say: “I am afraid of the future,” but the images are quite eloquent. Someone draws a nuclear mushroom, someone, talking about trial tests in grades 10-11, describes their experience as follows: “It feels like I was walking on green grass, and now I am in the desert.” The use of metaphors helps relieve tension and painlessly approach the traumatic experience.
The training continues.
“Time either gives strength and drives us on, or vice versa, takes away strength,” says Olga Kardashina. “And then we start to get nervous. There are endless and boring days, and there are happy days when we “do not watch the clock.” Imagine that your hands are scales. What days have you had more in the last couple of months: happy (left hand) or gray-boring (right)? By the way, between them there can be a balance.
teenagers show. Many people raise their right hand.
– So, there was time that “ran”, and that which “stretched”. In these months, what depended more on you, and what – on the circumstances: the weather, school, family? Perhaps your time is managed not only by yourself, but also by something else – for example, school or family affairs?
“It all depends on my family and circumstances.
– Probably from myself and from the circumstances. Family and school are not particularly influential.
– I depend on the school – 100%!
From family and circumstances.
“Okay, now imagine what will happen in the near future. What will happen to humanity, and what will happen to you as an individual?
The apocalypse will happen.
– Legalize marijuana.
Robots will take over the world.
What about you as an individual?
“I will create resistance to put down the robot uprising.
I’ll get an A in social studies.
“They’ll put me on record for fighting at school.
– And they generally called me antisocial and said that a prison awaits me.
Anxiety related to studies, illness, bad behavior, clearly come to the fore. Adolescents, together with a psychologist, reproduce chains of past events and construct future situations. Pay attention to those circumstances that preceded the troubles, and those that may follow them with one or another probability.
Next is a new exercise: sheets of paper appear in the hands of the participants, which represent three times. One leaf – the “future” – can cover the “present”, cast a shadow on it. The “present” can serve as a support for the “future”, and the “past” can pull the “present” back, making it difficult to move on. Teenagers, together with a psychologist, analyze how these temporary spaces are connected in their lives, how they influence decisions and actions, creating a single stream of time as a result.
Psychologist’s comment
Rise of the robots, apocalypse, nuclear explosion – teenagers really think so, they live in it. They “globalize” what they have to do: “Exams are a horror and a nightmare, but soon they will end, I will go to college, and then I will go to Australia, become a financial director, and everything will be super.” At the same time, the future “director” may have big problems with mathematics. A teenager, as a rule, does not rely on real resources.
And therefore, my task is to help high school students set goals and predict possible difficulties and obstacles associated with their achievement. Difficulties are a kind of “guardians” on the way to the goal. For example, poor health or paid education are guardians on the way to the desired profession. We do exercises that help identify these guardians and find ways to defeat them, and then look for the resources needed to do so.
I hope that at the end of the training, these teenagers will talk about goals like this: “When I turn 20, I would like to live separately from my parents. After graduation, I would like to go to another city as a regional representative of my company, but after a few years I will still return to Moscow.” This means thinking more concretely and realistically.
About expert
Olga Kardashina – Gestalt therapist, psychodramatherapist, MIGIP trainer, author of training programs for children and adolescents, trainer of the Federation of European Psychodramatic Training Organizations, teacher-psychologist of the City Psychological and Pedagogical Center of the Moscow Department of Education.