Why Your Teen Might Ask ‘Do People Really Find Life Worth Living?’ And What To Do Next
It’s 7:30 on a Tuesday, I’m folding mismatched socks in the laundry room, and the Great British Baking Show is humming low on the TV when my 16-year-old Lila leans in the doorway. She’s just closed her math notebook, nails chipped from painting her bike last weekend, and she says, out of nowhere, “Do people really find life worth living?”
My hand freezes mid-reach for a navy sock. I was expecting her to ask for a ride to the skate park or extra screen time, not that. I remember asking my mom the same question when I was 16, sitting at our kitchen table after school. She dropped the spoon she was washing, got all teary, and asked if I was planning to hurt myself. I shut down immediately, never asked again, never told her what I actually meant: I just noticed how much she complained about work, how tired she was every night, how she only talked about happy times when they were 10 years in the past. I didn’t want to die, I just wanted to know if this was all there was.
So I don’t do that. I sit down on the empty laundry basket, pat the top of the dryer for her to sit. “What made you think of that?” I ask. She says it’s just all the adults she knows. Her math teacher complains about grading and parent-teacher conferences every single day. My husband grumbles about his commute and the leaky roof for 10 minutes every night. Her aunt posts on Facebook about counting down the days to retirement. All the influencers she follows talk about how you have to love your life and your job, but they’re always selling something to fix your life, so it doesn’t feel real. “It seems like everyone’s just waiting for the weekend, or for vacation, or for retirement,” she says. “No one actually likes the part they’re in right now.”
As a part-time 10th grade English teacher, I hear this all the time. Three months ago, a quiet kid named Marcus turned in a journal entry with the same exact question. He wrote that he didn’t see the point of working hard to get a job if all you do is work to pay bills until you’re too old to enjoy the free time. I’ve had at least four kids ask me that question in one form or another this school year. This isn’t just teen moodiness, or something wrong with one kid. It’s a question that pops up right when kids start to think abstractly, when they stop taking everything adults say at face value. They see the gaps between what we tell them (“follow your passion and you’ll be happy”) and what they actually see: most of us are just getting by most days.
I didn’t give Lila a big speech about how life is beautiful. I just said, “You’re right. A lot of it sucks. I hate folding laundry. I hate waking up at 6 a.m. when it’s dark out. I hate paying $3 for a bottle of water at the gas station. Most days aren’t some big amazing adventure everyone pretends they are.” She blinked, like she was expecting me to argue. Then I told her three small things I’d liked that day, just that morning. I told her about drinking my coffee on the porch before any alarms went off, how it was warm and the cream was just the right amount, and it was quiet enough to hear the cardinals. I told her the stray cat that hangs around our yard sat on my foot while I pulled dandelions, and her fur was soft and she purred really loud. I told her that when she was watching TikTok earlier, she laughed so hard she snort-laughed, and I stood in the hall listening for 10 seconds because it’s my favorite sound. “None of that fixes the bad stuff,” I said. “But that’s the stuff that makes it worth it for me. It’s just small, most of the time.”
When other parents ask me what to do when their kid asks this question, I tell them three specific things. First, start with a straight check-in: “Are you feeling so bad right now that you’re hurting yourself or thinking about hurting yourself?” It’s not scary to ask straight, and it rules out an actual emergency. If they say yes, you get help, that’s clear. If they say no, they’re just wondering, you don’t have to panic. This isn’t always a cry for help—it’s often just a kid thinking through what adulthood actually is. Second, don’t lie and say everything is great. They know that’s not true, and it just makes them stop talking. Agree with the part they got right: most of adult life is boring, hard, and full of stuff you don’t want to do. Third, don’t give them a 30-minute lecture. Just name a couple of small good things you’ve noticed lately. That’s it. You don’t have to fix the question for them.
After I talked, Lila sat there for a minute, then said the mango boba she got after school yesterday was so good it made waiting 15 minutes in line worth it. And she likes when our golden retriever greets us at the door even if we’ve only been gone 10 minutes. Then she said she wanted pizza for dinner tomorrow, and asked if I could order her favorite pepperoni, and walked back to her room. No big hug, no epiphany. Just that.
Last week, Marcus, my student, turned in a journal entry about how he stopped to watch a squirrel steal a whole french fry off a picnic table at lunch, and it was so silly he smiled for 15 minutes. He didn’t answer the big question, just mentioned that.
Last night I walked the dog around the block, and Lila came with me. We didn’t talk about the question again. We saw a single firefly glow low in the brush by the sidewalk, and she pointed it out to me. I nodded, and we stood there for a minute watching it blink on and off. I still don’t know if she’s got a solid answer to that question. Some nights, I don’t either. But I think it’s okay to let it be a question, most days, instead of a problem we have to fix fast. We just keep pointing out the fireflies and the good boba and the thieving squirrels, one small thing at a time.
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