I have so many monkeys! Working with high achievers.

Yesterday’s ‘live Reverb thought’ began with me sharing some of my collection of stuffed monkeys. One of them in particular, Damien, was given to me by my youth worker (also called Damien!) back when I was a teenager.

It was about then as a young person that I realised I really wanted to go into ministry. This was quite a big deal for me because, as an academically high achiever, everyone wanted me to pursue something big and crazy. My English teacher wanted me to go into politics, my science teacher suggested research, my psychology teacher pushed psychiatry, and my geography teacher wanted me to pursue geology. All of these sounded fun and interesting but none of them brought my teenage heart alive like telling people about Jesus did. It came as a big shock to everyone then, when I withdrew from studying ‘PPE’ at Oxford and went instead to what my dad colourfully called ‘Vicar Factory.’

I sometimes wonder if a lot of youth work oddly sidesteps the ‘high achievers’, letting them just get on with it and work things out for themselves. I think if we do this then we will really let a lot of our young people down. They don’t need ‘leaving to it’, they need feeding, stimulating and challenging. They need to be held accountable to God’s calling on their lives so that they don’t just put all their confidence in their brain power or rely too much on their grades.

Being a high achiever doesn’t make you immune to anxiety, poor self-esteem, or immense amounts of stress (ask any university professor!). It can sometimes, however, make you incredibly lonely. Even saying ‘I’m a high achiever’ is enough for a teenager to draw bullying and resentment from both peers and adults alike. It’s also really difficult for a high achiever to distinguish between what they can do (in terms of their high ability) and what they should do (God’s calling on their lives). Because they get high grades, it’s too easy for leaders and parents to push them towards the former without much thought towards the latter. That’s called being trapped by achievement.

It’s so important that we engage a wide range of very different young people. At Youth for Christ we provide this through our growing variety of projects. However, as someone who was a high achiever myself when back at High School, I try hard to make sure that I’m keenly aware of those particular young people in our groups today.

Through one-to-ones, in depth studies, prayer times, Q&As, guidance counselling, and just through providing lots of opportunities to share, we have been able to offer real support to those young people who have the added stress and loneliness of doing well at school.

Youth for Christ is about reaching every young person. It’s strange how often we unknowingly leave some out because we think that they don’t need us. There are so many types of young people that need our attention and the high achievers are just one group who are often overlooked in youth groups.

So, what’s your area? Do you have experience with high achievement? What about sports, arts, additional needs? Are you naturally louder or quieter, loquacious or introspective? Do you love knitting, writing, cooking, reading, making videos, or playing the kazoo?

Not only is there room for all, we need a wide variety of volunteers to reach the enormous variety of young people who exist. Young people, after all, are just people – and they come in all the shapes and sizes that the rest of us do. Can you bring something unique to share with our young people? Get in touch and start a conversation with us about what you could add to those under our care today.

Can you help us out with YouTube?

Related to this, we have just started a YouTube channel for young people. This is being brilliant, but it’s very limited at the moment. We need 100 subscribers before we can advertise our own link to young people – which will make it far easier for them to see it and share it with their friends.

Can you subscribe to our new channel here and help us get there? You can find it here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCz295XuUp4GFgb-0qOYUU_w

Photo by Jared Rice on Unsplash