My Life Advice for Teenagers

At this part in your life, you physically and mentally change so that you become an independent adult. At least you want to become an independent adult. And so, you have to recognize that, where in the past maybe your relationship with your parents and relationship with others was more of a, you know, a pal and their role model, and so on, that you're making a transition.

Sometimes as the hormones and the physical and the mental changes take place, and along those lines, recognize though that you think you know everything, you probably really know nothing, almost hardly anything. Try to avoid the arrogance of that stage. Understand you're trying to make yourself strong and independent and work well with others.

The key is really discovery because this is your first step into adulthood. So this phase of your life, discover if you can, if you can control yourself to be more open-minded, more accepting, more curious, more experimental—safely, ideally—but experimental in terms of your process of making those discoveries. You know, that's the most important thing.

And so, recognize also that you're setting yourself up for the next phase of your life.