Question: The latest series of Netflix ‘Edolens’ has shown a harsh mirror to the mental health of our teenagers. Why do you think violence and mental illness is entering their lives at such a young age?
Sadhguru: Today, everywhere in the west and even in urban India, it has become common that you should have a boyfriend or girlfriend till the age of 12-13 years. It is being promoted in the name of freedom. To what extent they can go can vary to different people, but the child of that age cannot handle the body-based feelings in a mature way. It may be that their body matures a large extent, but you cannot say so about their mental and emotional stability or their maturity of others.
For a 13 -year -old boy, when a girl comes close to him and the body reacts, he is in his mind. You also see it in films. He says, “He is mine.” When this happens, if for some reason he is snatched away from it, he goes mad. Even for adults, when they are disappointed in such situations, their mind may come to mind that “I should ruin them.” It increases manifold with children under 15 years of age and a boy can not control it.
Above all, the children are growing up without the necessary attention of the parents. Humans are 90 percent of what is learned. Earlier, he learned the most from his parents, guru or any such person. Today, parents do not have time because they have to work during the day and they have to party in the evening. The teacher is with you for only 45 minutes before ringing in school. They rarely get the opportunity to join you and guide you.
Apart from social media and online sources, no one has time for a child. So the biggest impact on them is business forces, who do not care about what happens to children. Children are not in contact with such people who have any kind of love for them. If you leave them deprived of pampering, then you should not be surprised by the results.
Every 40 minutes in India, a child under 18 years of age commits suicide, it is still a country where children are generally well taken care of. Even though parents can sometimes be rigid, children know that they are cared for, but it is ending because the entire taunt of the society is changing. What is happening in India today, it took place 2-3 generations in the west. So, violence is more clear there. But this is also happening here.
The child is a 20 -year project. If you are not ready for this, then you do not need a child. But many religious people, politicians and social scientists are saying that everyone should have more children. Industries and market experts are also saying so because if there is no youth population, what will happen to the industry? In the early 20th century, we were 1.6 billion people. Today, we are about 8.5 billion people. Nevertheless, some people want more children to run industries. If you reduce the population, you can also reduce the industry. But the thinking of the people is that, “Right now my company costs $ 500 billion. If the population decreases, it will be $ 200 billion.”
It is madness to think about creating a structure of human life on the basis of economics. We run economics so that humans can live comfortably. We do not run humans to run economics comfortably. In this desire to earn profits, the next generation of man is getting a bad deal. So they will do their own things. What they do may shock you, surprise or hate them, but they will do this because you are ignoring them. It has to be changed.
Australia has taken a bold step that children below 16 years of age cannot have social media accounts. But people want their children to become social media influencers by the age of 12. As a society, we are still immature, get excited about every small technical step, and we make our whole life around this. I believe that in the next 30-40 years, people will mature and choose what to use and what not. But in these 30-40 years, how much damage will be done and how many people will die, it is a terrible possibility.
The basic responsibility that humanity will have to fulfill is to ensure that the next generation of human being is at least one step ahead of us. They should live with a little more enjoyment, with less fear, entangle and affliction. We should make it our goal.