\nWhen we are children, we don\u2019t really worry about what others think. We are just ourselves, with our own personality, without caring about comparisons. But as we grow up, especially during pre-adolescence, things start to change. Between sixth and seventh grade, around 12 or 13 years old, this phase can be quite challenging. It\u2019s a transition into adolescence, and everything feels more intense. The environment becomes more toxic because there is immense pressure to achieve a kind of perfection, an ideal that doesn\u2019t exist.<\/p>\n
Estela:<\/strong> Helo\u00edsa:<\/strong> Helo\u00edsa:<\/strong> Over time, I realized it was making me feel bad. Instead of being something that made me happy, it just made me more exhausted and sad. I felt overwhelmed. Even the simplest daily tasks became difficult because my mind was always stuck in that routine.<\/p>\n I kept thinking too much. “Tomorrow, I have ballet class, I need to prepare, I need to do well\u2026” And it consumed me. The competition only made this pressure worse because it felt like I could never make mistakes, never be anything less than perfect. In the end, it was just too much pressure for someone my age. Dancing should be something fun and light, but for me, it had become a burden.<\/p>\n Estela:<\/strong> \"All of this really affects our mental health because comparison and pressure become unavoidable. When we were kids, none of this mattered. We were just ourselves without worrying about what others thought.\"<\/p> - Estela Ruiz is a 12-year-old, from S\u00e3o Jos\u00e9 dos Campos, Brazil. She loves reading romance stories, writing about her thoughts and days, and listening to music.<\/p><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n Helo\u00edsa<\/strong> Estela<\/strong> Helo\u00edsa<\/strong> Estela<\/strong> In the end, a lot of people end up forcing themselves to change\u2014not because they want to, but because they\u2019re afraid of being judged. It\u2019s like there\u2019s this unspoken rule that you have to grow up fast, act a certain way, dress a certain way\u2026 But what if you just want to be yourself? It\u2019s like everyone is pretending to have grown up when, deep down, they still just want to play.<\/p>\n Helo\u00edsa<\/strong> Estela<\/strong> Like you said, it happens all the time, in everything\u2014it\u2019s not just about school grades, but also about lifestyle, appearance\u2026 basically, anything. It feels like we\u2019re always trying to reach a standard that, most of the time, isn\u2019t even real. And I think social media plays a huge role in that. We have access to so much all the time that we end up comparing ourselves without even realizing it.<\/p>\n Helo\u00edsa<\/strong> Estela<\/strong> Helo\u00edsa<\/strong> \"In the end, the key is to accept who we are without fear of judgment. Everyone has their own time, their own phase, and there\u2019s nothing wrong with being different.\"<\/p> - Helo\u00edsa Ruiz is a 14-year-old who lives in S\u00e3o Jos\u00e9 dos Campos, Brazil. She enjoys spending time with friends, loves playing volleyball and reading romance and adventure books.<\/p><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Growing up isn\u2019t always easy. From balancing mental health care, reflections on identity, comparison, to stress, social media and conformity \u2013 the path through adolescence brings real challenges for today\u2019s youth. For sisters Helo\u00edsa (14 years-old) and Estela Ruiz (12 years-old) from S\u00e3o Jos\u00e9 dos Campos, southeast Brazil, learning to navigate these changes has revealed […]","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":55,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-190","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nossas-vozes"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/caleidosdev.com.br\/junto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/190","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/caleidosdev.com.br\/junto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/caleidosdev.com.br\/junto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/caleidosdev.com.br\/junto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/caleidosdev.com.br\/junto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=190"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/caleidosdev.com.br\/junto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/190\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":238,"href":"https:\/\/caleidosdev.com.br\/junto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/190\/revisions\/238"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/caleidosdev.com.br\/junto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/caleidosdev.com.br\/junto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=190"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/caleidosdev.com.br\/junto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=190"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/caleidosdev.com.br\/junto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=190"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nWe feel a bit lost, trying to understand what we need to be to fit in as teenagers while realizing that we are no longer children. This creates a huge mental burden. Some people try to appear older by changing the way they dress and behave, while others still hold on to their childhood spirit, wanting to play and have fun as they used to.<\/p>\n
\nThe problem is that the environment influences us a lot. The judgment from others makes many people feel pressured to change, even if that\u2019s not what they truly want. It\u2019s as if they have to fit into a mold to be accepted. But something I\u2019ve noticed is that after the age of 14, this pressure starts to fade. We begin to care less about this need for acceptance and realize that we don\u2019t have to follow an imposed standard. We look at older people and understand that, in the end, it wasn\u2019t as important as we once thought. And when we realize that younger kids look up to us the same way we used to look up to teenagers, we understand that this is all part of a cycle.<\/p>\nStriving for Perfection<\/h3>\n
\nOther forms of pressure for me came from ballet which at first, I thought was interesting, but at the same time, it wasn\u2019t something I did because I truly loved it. I trained from Monday to Friday, and at some point, it started to feel too overwhelming. There was so much to do that I felt like I was missing out on things a kid should be experiencing. I didn\u2019t have time to play or just enjoy school because everything revolved around ballet. And to make things worse, the environment wasn\u2019t great. Besides the pressure from training, there was a lot of competition among the students, which only made everything harder.<\/p>\nSelf-Image and Comparison<\/h3>\n
\nPeople create an ideal – how you should act, how you should dress, how your body should look, even how you should think. And if we stop to really analyze it, it doesn\u2019t even make that much sense. But still, everyone tries to fit into this mold. We compare ourselves all the time and put this huge weight on our shoulders, believing we have to be a certain way, just like someone else, as if that\u2019s the most important thing. But in reality, it\u2019s not. It\u2019s just that, in the moment, no one realizes it.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/caleidosdev.com.br\/junto\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/foto-estela.jpg\")
<\/div>
\nI think the biggest challenge for teenagers nowadays is comparison. At this stage of our lives, it feels like we\u2019re always being watched and judged. We care so much about our image, about what others think, that without even realizing it, we start changing ourselves just to avoid being criticized. And that becomes really toxic because no one can just be themselves without this constant pressure.<\/p>\n
\nI think, over time, we understand that we don\u2019t need to constantly change ourselves just to fit in. We can just be who we are, without all this pressure.<\/p>\n
\nThe environment becomes more toxic because everyone is trying to reach a level of perfection that doesn\u2019t even exist. The pressure is always there, but after 14, I think it starts to ease a little. We begin to realize that we don\u2019t need to prove anything to anyone and that, in the end, none of this was as important as we once thought. When we were kids, we used to look at teenagers as if they were amazing, the way they dressed, the way they talked\u2026 But when we finally reach this stage, we realize it\u2019s not really like that. And the funniest thing is that while we\u2019re trying so hard to reach this “ideal,” younger kids start looking up to us the same way we used to admire teenagers. In the end, it\u2019s just a cycle.<\/p>\nEnvironmental Pressures<\/h3>\n
\nAnd there are some people who just don\u2019t want to go along with all of this, you know? They\u2019re not worried about looking older, dressing differently, or trying to act like adults before their time. Some people still have that childlike spirit\u2014they still enjoy going outside to play, doing the things they\u2019ve always done. But the problem is that the people around them create so much pressure about how we\u2019re “supposed” to be that it becomes hard to just be ourselves.<\/p>\nSocial Media and Unrealistic Standards<\/h3>\n
\nWe\u2019re constantly able to see what other people are doing. We\u2019re always talking, always keeping up with each other\u2019s lives\u2026it\u2019s nonstop. Before, when there were no cell phones, things were different. Like, you\u2019d leave school on Friday, go home, do your own thing, and only on Monday would you tell your friends what you did over the weekend. It was more private, more personal.<\/p>\n
\nNow, anyone can know what I did\u2014even people who aren\u2019t my friends. And at the same time, I can also see what everyone else did, even complete strangers. So, it just turns into this never-ending cycle of comparison. I think, for me, that\u2019s the biggest pressure\u2014seeing all this all the time and constantly comparing myself.<\/p>\n
\nTake me and Stela, for example\u2014if someone looks at our Instagram and sees what we post, they\u2019re not actually seeing reality. There\u2019s nothing there about the times we feel sad, or the moments we think we look bad\u2026 only the best parts show up: pictures of the beautiful places we went to, the moments when everything seemed perfect.<\/p>\n
\nAnd the craziest part is, we know it\u2019s not real. We know that even what we post about our own lives isn\u2019t the full picture. But still, when we look at other people\u2019s profiles, it feels real. And then that thought comes: “Wow, my life isn\u2019t as good as theirs.”
\nI think that\u2019s what affects us the most. And our phones just make it worse because we\u2019re constantly looking at all of this without even realizing how much it impacts us.<\/p>\n
\nIn the end, the key is to accept who we are without fear of judgment. Everyone has their own time, their own phase, and there\u2019s nothing wrong with being different.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/caleidosdev.com.br\/junto\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/foto-heloisa.jpg\")
<\/div>