Post by Nkeiruka Nzekwe (@NikkyNzekwe)

If you’re a parent 👨‍👩‍👧‍👦, please pay attention because I want to talk to you about something that is keeping me up at night as a parent👩‍👧and an adolescents coach.

And I believe, if you are honest with yourself, it is keeping you up too.

You see, we are raising our children in the most extraordinary window of opportunity in human history.

Think about that for a moment 🤔.

Now, a 15-year-old teenager in Enugu, Aba, Lagos or Kano today has access to tools, platforms and audiences that the most powerful businessman or businesswoman of the previous generation could only dream of.

In fact, my 12 year old daughter and some of her friends are presently learning foreign languages on Duo Lingo. I didn’t suggest that. They came up with the idea.

Again, Social media platforms like Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, WhatsApp, LinkedIn allow young people to reach broad audiences, promote their ideas, build their brands and grow their influence without high financial costs.

A teenage girl with a phone, a voice and a point of view can today build a following, launch a business, get noticed by universities abroad, attract mentors, secure collaborations and create income all before she finishes secondary school.

Dear parent, this is not fiction. This is the world your child is growing up in. So wake up!

Nigeria alone has over 103 million active social media users, and that number grows every single year.

The internet is not coming; it is already here, already in your daughter’s hands, already shaping her every single day.

So, the question is not whether she will engage with this world. She already is.

The real question; the one most parents are not asking loudly enough is this: Who is she, before this world I’m talking about tells her who to be?

Because here is what the research is telling us, and what I see confirmed daily in my work with teenage girls 👧👇🏾

In Nigeria, a nationally representative survey showed that 93% of children aged 11–16 go online with their own mobile phones; often without parental guidance.

A whooping Ninety-three percent !!

That means nearly every girl in your daughter's class is navigating one of the most powerful, complex and identity-shaping environments ever created, largely alone, largely unsupervised, and largely without the tools to protect herself from what she encounters there.

And before you ask me what she encounters there, I’ll quickly tell you.

👉🏾 She encounters a world that is selling her an identity before she has found her own.

👉🏾 Influencer-driven content is driving an inauthentic culture of consumerism and materialism, where young people increasingly derive identity from what they wear, how they celebrate milestones, and what lifestyle they portray online; a significant departure from traditional Nigerian values which emphasise community, modesty and a purpose-driven lifestyle.

👉🏾 Instead of leaning into her own story, she is borrowing someone else's and paying for it with her self-worth, her values and her future credibility.

👉🏾 Highly visual platforms such as TikTok, Instagram and Snapchat intensify self-presentation and social comparison among young people, and girls experience stronger psychological effects linked to appearance and performance; including anxiety, stress and reduced self-esteem.

Here is the unfortunate irony 👇🏾

• The same platform that could launch your child’s career is; (without IDENTITY as a foundation), quietly dismantling her sense of self 😭.

• The same phone that could connect her to a global audience is; (without VALUES as a compass), connecting her to comparison, insecurity and confusion instead.

The opportunity is real. The danger ⚠️ is equally real.

And the difference between a girl who uses social media to rise and a girl who is consumed by it comes down to one thing 👇🏾

Does she know who she is before she logs on?

Truth is, a girl with a strong identity uses the platform while a girl without one becomes the platform's content.

This is why I do what I do.

And this is why the conversation we are not having loudly enough, about Identity, Values, Purpose, and Personal Branding for Teenage girls is the Most Urgent conversation of our time.

Your child does not need to be kept away from the internet with with its opportunities .

She just needs to be prepared for it.

The IDENTITY, INFLUENCE & PURPOSE (IiP) Summer Bootcamp is designed to do exactly that.

Details coming soon.

💜

#CoachNikky
#IdentityInfluenceAndPurpose
#IIPSummerProgram

0 likes · 0 comments · 0 shares