These days, peers, teachers and parents pound students with different pressures. What many of these stresses have in common are decisions — ones that aren’t made by high school students but by other people in their lives.

This problem has gone so far that it is as though students’ lives are being completely programmed by outside sources. What classes they take, what activities they do and even what friends they have are all decisions too heavily influenced by others.

Many friends that I know choose classes based on what parents and school counselors want rather than what is best suited to himself. Often times, students sign up for classes or schedules that are much too rigorous for them and end up not getting the results that they want.

Here’s just one example of what I am talking about: I have a friend I met in elementary school. His entire life was bombarded with work from his parents, even when he was in third grade. He played the piano and violin for three hours each a day and did math competitions. Even at such an early age, he went to sleep near midnight on many days.

He could not choose what activities he wanted, and he never attended birthday parties or went trick or treating with us. I knew that he wanted to come to all of our fun events, but his parents’ insistence that he practice his instrument all the time meant he couldn’t..

Situations like these could be avoided if adults and other influences loosened their hold on their kids and allowed them to think independently. It’s best to let teenagers make mistakes and figure out matters for themselves, as making decisions for them only worsens the impact of future problems.

For example, many activities, such as math competitions and piano lessons, are forced upon kids despite their having little or no interest in these fields. Because they must spend time studying math or practicing their instruments, they lose time that they could have invested into more genuine interests or passions.

I myself have faced some of these problems. I was first signed up for piano class in the second grade, and was forced to play the instrument until the end of my freshman year. I never really found any real interest in piano and felt that I wasn’t learning much at all, yet I couldn’t break loose of it.

It was definitely a chore for the first few years, and when I reached high school, it became worse. Each month I practiced less and less, until a broken wrist was my ticket out of it for good.

Other times, parents even try to choose friends for their children through parent collaborations. The preference of friends are usually those who would be the most “beneficial.” The concept in itself is already extremely wrong; if nothing else, a teenager should have complete control over who he is friends with. This freedom is essential to development of normal social skills.

The best option is for parents to give more freedom to their kids, as  they aren’t objects to be maneuvered through school and into college — they are future adults who need to learn to think for themselves. In the end, giving teens the freedom to make decisions on their own will bring them the most success in life, and they will be able to do better in school, find genuine interests and develop loyal friendships.