PARENTING October 9, 2006 Issue

THE POPULARITY QUESTION

JANET CLEMENTS

At some point, kids eventually think about what they can do to be more popular. Along with this, they sometimes face the challenges and pressures of conforming to group norms in order to be accepted. As a parent of a teenager, I've found that rather than feeling totally helpless in offering advice in these kinds of situations, I can use prayer to help break through the popularity issue and promote a deeper sense of value and friendship.

Recently, my husband and I got a call from our son, who boards at a prep school in New England. He mentioned that he'd seen a website displaying pictures of several of his classmates attending an off-campus weekend drinking party. He also was lamenting the fact that many of the popular kids drank and were promiscuous. He wondered if adhering to his own standards was worth the impact it might be having on his social life.

His father and I pointed out that qualities of a good friend, such as integrity and sincerity, were the foundation for lasting relationships, and that following what one considers to be good principles can never result in a loss or limitation of true friendship. Proactively seeing the good in others and bringing it out was a much more powerful approach to making friends than conforming to the herd mentality and simply trying to fit in. We also offered that one way to handle the anxiety about our son's place in the social pecking order was to see everyone as worthy of his friendship, not just those who, for the moment, seemed to be popular. In fact, one definition I later found of popular was "beloved." We are all beloved, since God's love is all-inclusive. Expressing His love to evervone else is natural.

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