7 life lessons for teenagers in 2025 – YouTube Dictation Transcript & Vocabulary

1.when I was 18 I was scared scared of going out my comfort zone scared of meeting new people scared of what it would take to become successful scared of not reaching my goals and becoming a failure scared of being stuck in the same small town scared of settling for a life where I couldn't make my dreams a reality it wasn't until things changed that I finally stopped living in fear at 18 I was applying to medical school my lifelong dream i' sacrificed a lot of my very introverted not so social very hermit teenage years just so that I could get the grades to get in and then August 15th 2019 I got the news everything had paid off I'd gotten into medical school I thought it was the very start of my life and I was finally going to be happy but I was very very wrong the social anxiety that I had got 10 times worse and the little confidence that I did have hit rock bottom when I met hundreds if not thousands of other people who were just as intelligent if not more intelligent than I was everything that made me so special became into significant so I did what we all do I turned to self-improvement I was promised to become you how to be confident I will show you how to look Max every part of your appearance a high value woman of how to become more beautiful being more attractive more appealing more charismatic and after scouring the internet for literally years and doing a lot of tough self-discovery and really discovering who I actually am I've learned a lot and I'm quite surprised by what I learn because it's probably not what you expect hey if you're new I'm Christina and I make videos people who are feeling lonely if you're a people pleaser overachiever overthinker over anything then you're in the right place I recently read a diary entry from 18-year-old Christina and I was teleported back to the life I used to live the life of crippling anxiety every day the life of I stress about every single social interaction I stress about what I'm going to say to this person and to that person I stress about does this guy like or does you just think I'm a weirdo I stress about am I going to get into medical school and I am I going to become anything in life am I just going to be a failure if this doesn't work out I struggled so much with my self-esteem like I never really thought I had value unless I was working unless I had the best grades like I didn't have a sense of self and I didn't see myself as worthy of anything and I was so desperate to achieve to give me some sense of worthiness if that resonates I have some messages for you the first thing every 18-year-old needs to understand is the difference between motiv versus self-criticism if you've just started your self-improvement journey or maybe you're in it you've been in it for a while you've tried out 75 hard you've read all the books you've done Atomic habits like all this stuff you might be motivating yourself with really toxic selft talk Christina why can't you just get up the first time your alarm goes off because you're so lazy why can't you be more outgoing like everyone else why can't you just speak up and put your hand up in lessons why can't you be more organized or late to the appointment again why can't you be consistent with the gym why can't you be more organized with your studying why can't you this why can't you that this is not motivation this is toxic selft talk this was really apparent for me with my social anxiety like any time I was out and given the opportunity to talk to new people or like mingle with people I've never met before I would be hyping myself up to try and give myself the confidence to do it but I'd be so so negative to myself if I couldn't do it like say things that day were a little bit more stressful and actually there's a group of girls all stood together they look quite intimidating they all look really stylish and cool and really popular and I I don't really feel like I can go up to them I would be saying things like OA you're doing the same thing again like you're never going to change you're always going to be a loner you're always going to be a weirdo why would anyone want to talk to you anyway let me just stand in the corner and sit my drink sit my drink by myself because no one's going to want to talk to me and without realizing you might slip into the pattern of doing this quite regularly not even just with social interactions but with your work or with your job with your gym with your side hustle with anything you're going to be motivating yourself with very toxic Fuel and it's only later on in life after I've graduated medal School I've realized one of the most productive things you can do is to be kind to yourself and it might sound really counterintuitive because all the all the motivation porn that's out there or on Tik Tok all these little short motivational videos are telling you to be disciplined and grind and focus and David gogins is on every single one of these videos telling you to like just get done negative selft talk isn't a requirement for Success it actually hinders it you being so hard on yourself is getting in the way of you actually getting to where you want to be because when I think back to all those toxic things I was saying to myself you're such a loser you're such a weirdo like why would anyone like you anyway you're so boring you're so ugly all of these things they make you doubt your ability and they make you doubt yourself and if you're doubting yourself you won't even realize but subconsciously it's going to affect how you actually perform like next time I I would go out and meet new people I'd be doubting myself because of all things I've said I know chances are if you're watching this you're a very ambitious person you have big dreams of where you want to go please understand that this negative selft talk is not a requirement if anything I really do believe it gets in the way motivation should really feel like encouragement it should feel like you've got your own mini cheerleader in the corner of your mind like even when you do slip up or even when you do make mistakes you're still cheering yourself on like it's okay I'll do better next time you should feel supported by the voice in your head not threatened by it some things are a bigger deal in your head than they are in reality this was a very tough thing I had to learn when it comes to a lot of Big Dreams or dream jobs University applications University admissions relationship ships friendships vacations your first job a lot of things that you want to get for Christmas things you want to get for your birthday A lot of these things will seem so much more amazing and like transformational in your head versus when you actually get them in reality a classic one is if you think about your first ever job or you think about the first ever like thing that you wanted so badly for your birthday like you literally told your parents told your siblings like I want this like I just want this pair of shoes like don't get me anything else just this pair of shoes this is the only thing I want sometimes when you want something something so badly and you really dream it up in your head you don't realize but you're building up a fantasy of what reality won't be able to live up to and I don't mean this to scare anyone I'm not seeing this I'm not saying this to like put you off of aspiring for things or having dreams like that's a good thing that that's a very healthy thing what I'm saying is more when you're leaning into like fantasizing about it all hours of the day you give this thing so much value you think it will cure like your unhappiness you think this will stop you from having anxiety you think this job will stop you from being depressed you think this relationship will stop you from having really low self-esteem you think this outfit or this pair of shoes will finally make you feel more confident and more popular when you start giving these things like internal values confidence self-esteem happiness fixture anxiety like when you start to say oh this external thing will fix this internal thing that's how you know you're probably on route to be disappointed by it because the harsh reality of Life the very very harsh reality that I've had so many times now is like there's nothing that you can get externally that will fix those things internally like I said in my introduction like medical school was my life long dream I don't want to say it was an anticlimax getting into medical school and being in med school but it definitely did not live up to the hype in my head med school was 5 years altogether so it's hard to it's hard to say exactly like oh it was an anticlimax cuz there were so many highs and lows in medical school there were so many amazing moments there were so many like awful moments I got diagnosed with anxiety and depression in medical school so there were there were definitely some lows and the one thing I think looking back the 16 17 18y old Christina that was like dreaming of this so much I think she had so much of her own struggles and crap that she was going with like this was her Escape in a way dreaming of med school dreaming of her life as a medical student that's what got me through and I wouldn't change anything about my journey I just I would change maybe how much I thought that would fix my problems and how much that would make me happier because I know I know I just said like there's a lot of highs and lows in medical school honestly when I think about the high moments they weren't even like medical school specific they were more just out me doing my own thing me like making more friends and being more confident putting myself out there more like some of my highest moments and moments where I was like so so proud of myself and so happy were just moments when I did something so brave and like only I would know how Brave that was of me like I remember there was one time I was on the Metro just like mind my own business and I don't know what came over me but I basically just started a conversation with a stranger who was sat next to me on the Metro and thankfully they were in a good mood they passed the vibe chair we basically just had like the nicest wholesome most genuine conversation and before they got off to leave the Metro they were like oh it was so lovely talking to you and on that moment stuck with me because I up until that point I never had the confidence to talk to strangers like I never had the confidence to just speak to a random woman on the train but like knowing that I did that and knowing I had the confidence to do it and it worked out well like it was it was such a high moment for me some of your high moments won't be what you expect them to be there'll be much smaller moments when you're just living like a regular day they won't be like when you had that big milestone at the end some friends are just temporary lessons depending on if you relate to the social anxiety struggles or whether you actually just have a really good group of friends and you can't really relate regardless if you're under 20 and watching this one some of your biggest dramas and frustrations and like difficulties some of them some of the most unhappy moments you'll have will be to do with friends or maybe family as well that was definitely the case for me and as a people pleaser like one of those people that could never say no and always felt like I had to be I had to say yes I had to be there for you all the time I was never allowed to say no to you like I always have to be available I always have to agree whatever you say it just goes when I was this sort of person at 18 at 19 I didn't realize that I could have a choice when it comes to friends it it was so beyond me because I was so socially anxious as well I just thought anyone that comes into my life that wants to spend time with me or gives me the time of day like okay I I'll just be your friend like I I have no choice and I've come to realize now some people are in your life and they should be in your life temporarily they should not be there forever you'll be able to judge whether or not a friend is like a genuine friend and I'm going to get onto this later on the video when I talk about like trusting your gut because that whenever you have a gut feeling about things it's just so so powerful you'll be able to tell whether or not some of the people in your life are adding to your life and you really want them there for a long period of time because they add so much or you'll be able to tell that I don't really know how I feel about this girl or I don't really know how I feel about this guy because each time I'm around them they make me feel like crap about myself or I feel like I can never do anything right they're always criticizing what I say there's always something wrong I'm trying to help them but they're always finding flaws in the help that I'm giving them some of these people aren't meant to be with you forever some friends are just temporary lessons and that's not to say you need to end the friendship now that's not to say you end the Friendship after this video what I'm saying is some of the pressure that you have on yourself can be released just by the fact that you now know you don't have to and you should not have to deal with this person forever like I feel like sometimes as a people pleaser I was talking about this in one of my other videos you feel like an obligation to just always keep the peace and to make everyone happy in some of these situations it's everyone else that benefits from you just being available and saying yes all the time and it's never actually you don't take being ignored personally I already know if you're an OG subscriber you probably know I had a terrible High School experience because I was the only black girl in my whole entire High School it was very very normal for me to walk around and just like be ignored by people it was either be ignored or be made fun of it was never anything in between feeling invisible and feeling like no one liked me feeling like the the ugly girl feeling like the girl that no one really wants to kind of like no one fancies no one has a crush on or the girl that no one is really friends with that was just a very normal experience for me and and what I did and maybe what some of you guys do is you if you are being ignored for any reason you take this very very personally and you make it mean something about you oh I'm I'm so like ugly that that's literally why no one wants to hang out with me I'm so boring that's why I have no friends I'm not very cool I'm not very interesting that's why I always have lunch by myself no one wants to sit with me you'll take your external experience and the things happening to you in the real world and you'll like take it internally and like tell yourself all these things I know that sounds obvious but the thing is sometimes what's happening in the external world does not reflect like your internal world what I mean by that is like feedback and some verbal comments say more about them than it does you if you have say you literally like have been bullied or you've literally had someone pick on you and they make fun of how you look and how big your nose is or how curly your hair is how you smell like all this stuff the tone of voice and what the person is saying it honestly says more about them it's such a reflection of their mental state and their empathy or lack of empathy towards someone else feedback says more about them than it does you this also goes for teachers and professors because I know some of them can have a huge impact on your self-esteem their feedback says more about them than it does to you if a teacher telling you oh you'd never be cut out to go to medical school you're not smart enough to go to law school who do you think you are like be realistic that says more about them than it does to you that reflects what they think is possible I still struggle with this to this day because the other day at work I was I'm only three months into my job one of the senior doctors was basically telling me that like I wasn't doing my job well enough and they were basically telling me like I'm I can't remember what they said but their tone of voice and the way they said it they were basically telling me like I'm I'm an idiot and like how did I get here sort of thing like they were basically saying that I was stupid and I don't know what I'm doing I remember on the day I struggled with that a lot because it was like a 12-hour shift and I i' I was like 10 hours into the 12-hour shift I was exhausted I had only one break I just it felt it felt like really offending and it was really hurtful to be told that like I'm not good enough and what I had to like when I came home I had a bit of like a like a moan about it to my mom and I was complaining and I was getting off my chest I like I realized feedback that feedback says more about that person than it does about me because at work I'm genuinely trying my best I actually got over the situation like a little bit quicker once I realized Christina don't internalize this don't take this situation personally this says a lot about them this says a lot about their mental State how they think they should talk to people half their age or how they should talk to people in the first few months of their job like so if that I'm G an ATT tangent but if that helps you guys with anything that you're going right now whether it's a teacher giving you a hard time or a professor telling you that you're not good enough someone that's like a loser at school and they're picking on you and they're seeing you as an easy target all of this says so much more about them than it does to you another lesson I think is super important for young people to know is to trust your gut you'll commonly hear this when it comes to exams and studying like when you're answering a question question go with the first thing that comes into your mind like trust your gut don't change your answer just put it down and forget about it and that is so true that was a common thing I spoke about in my Tik Tok days like sharing study advice like trust your gut like do not change your answer put the first thing down and just leave it however trusting your gut also applies to literally every other area of your life and sometimes trusting your gut is just like a funny feeling like that funny feeling you get when you make a new friend and they invite everyone to their birthday party except you or that funny feeling when you go on a date and it's going pretty well but then they make a weird comment about your looks that funny feeling when you're on a job interview and it's going pretty well but then the the interviewer makes a really weird joke and you think well do I want to work for these people whether it's good or bad your gut will always tell you what's the right thing to do and sometimes it's it's never like a clear distinct voice in your head it's just like a it's just like a funny feeling in your gut following your gut is definitely a skill and especially when you're a young person sometimes it might be tough to differentiate between what your what your gut instinct is and what anxiety is because anxiety will often feel like a clear voice anxiety will tell you don't apply there you've not got the grades you're not smart enough you're not going to get in it's a wasted application you're going to waste the money don't apply but your gut is telling you I but I it's my dream I just have a funny feeling like I just I kind of know I don't know how I don't know why but I just I kind of want to apply it's kind of like that stereotypical like head versus heart situation following your gut is a skill and it gets better with time and I feel like the more that you you trust your gut the stronger it gets like I don't have any problem now like following my gut I I I get a funny feeling and I go with it I don't question it I don't doubt it I don't listen to the voice in my head I just trust it something I really wish every young person would know is that achievement can happen through action but it can also happen through trust I make content for a very specific group of people people Pleasers who feel like they can never say no or high achieving academic smart intelligent people that feel like they constantly have to work and they can never take a break people who worry if they're on the right path and they're constantly doubting like what they're doing how they're planning their future that they're worrying about like if they're going in the right direction if they're doing the right thing I make content for a lot of these sorts of people and I often find a lot of us are very hardworking and we we have a lot of self-belief we know if I set my mind to this thing if I say I want to go to law school I want to go to this University I want to go to this college we know we can achieve it like if we work hard enough we know that if we work we will achieve a lot of these people are also very very ambitious like sometimes your dreams are so big they scare you I'm here to tell you that as someone who previously in your life you could work work work and make things happen you need to understand you could also make things happen just by trusting the process trusting your gut you literally just have to trust and it will all work out the thing you don't realize is you've achieved everything you have 100% of your chips on the table are in the actions department but you've not given any chips or any chances to just trusting like your gut like I don't know each time you've had a gut feeling and you've ignored it you've never you've never given that area like a chance to show you like if you just trust your girl if you just trust me it will all work out and it's interesting because a lot of these sorts of people that I that I am and that I make videos for I think some of us have really big goals that can only happen if you do trust like a lot of your aspirations May maybe the reason they scare you is because you're scared if I if I if I do this and I do that and I do all these actions that's still not going to be enough the reason it scares you is because you do need an element of trust in the equation it's almost why I was talking about it in the eldest um how to overcome eldest sibling syndrome sometimes when you are a high achiever it's your biggest blessing but it's also your biggest curse because sometimes you get in your own way you achieve so much by being an overachiever and a hard worker but then it's also the things that it's the thing that never lets you lean on like the unknown just trust the process see where things go and I'm so lucky that I've seen it in my own life so many times that like letting go and not knowing what's going to happen actually enhances your success it doesn't hinder it it's almost like a secret Source if you know what I mean like you don't know what the secret source does you don't even know what's in the secret Source it's just the secret source and you just you use it you sprinkle a bit on your food and it tastes amazing you're like oh my god wow what's a secret it's a secret Source if you enjoyed this video I'm sure you'll really enjoy the how to overcome eldest sibling syndrome where I was talking about as you can imagine some of the struggles of the pressure and responsibility and the expectations put on you as the Elder sibling so definitely check that video out if you enjoyed this one and I'll see you in the next one bye