Teenagers find themselves in a variety of dangerous situations. It’s nothing new. Drugs, alcohol, sexual promiscuity — and now Tide Pods! The teen years are notorious for risky behavior, experimentation, and as a result, accidents. Quite often, those accidents lead to death.
The saving grace is that more and more teenagers are deciding to break out of this stereotype of risky behaviors. The problem with this is that excusing yourself from the activities of friends can cause social ridicule. The last thing a kid wants is to be outcast from his or her only social group for saying “no.”
X Plan
The X Plan provides a way out of that social ridicule. Teacher, speaker, and lay minister Bert Fulks has devised a plan to help kids save face while also saving their lives.
If you are a teenager, and you find yourself in a sticky situation, you simply send a text.
Text your parents with the letter X, and your parents then know to call you. You simply answer the phone, and your parents will say that they need you home immediately for some family emergency, and that they’ll be over to pick you up in five minutes.
Apologize to your friends, let them know a family emergency has arisen, and get the heck outta there.
Why It Works
The X plan is a life-saving strategy not only for the obvious reason – that you get to save face and get out of a scary situation at the same time. This is of course the face of the situation. The real genius behind the plan is that it gets inside of a teenage head.
Here’s the thing: the social pressure placed on kids is enormous. It can be debilitating to the point of convincing kids that what their friends want is what they want too. In fact, kids may find themselves encouraging and reinforcing bad behavior just because they think it is what the entire group wants.
Mob Mentality
Individuals become emboldened in a group. One person may come up with a crazy plan he or she never would have acted out on alone. But because he or she is in a group setting, the idea becomes a spoken thought, the thought becomes an action, and the action leads to a reality, which leads to… accidents.
The X Plan provides a release valve for the mob. Over time, kids can feel safer and safer using an exit strategy like the X Plan. If teenagers believe they have options, if that becomes the reality in their heads, then they are less likely to give in to the mob. In the end, this can prevent many harsh tragedies from occurring.
Use It
So if you are a teenager, all you have to do is know the X Plan exists, and be sure you tell your parents about it. And if you are a parent, talk to your kid about this. It could save lives.
The above was guest post from Aron James, founder of StubblePatrol.com. Stubble Patrol is a site on male grooming. He loves to write about his personal experiences. He feels that his tips and tactics will help his readers to enhance their level of self-confidence and their overall appeal. Changing your overall look can do wonders for anyone, so be sure to visit his site soon.