Awaken the Hero in You
The period of adolescence is full of challenges
Ana-Maria Cononovici, 22.07.2025, 14:00
The period of adolescence is full of challenges and, although the information that young people have access to today might seem like a plus, many of them are demotivated, disoriented and shy. Fortunately, there are extracurricular programs that can prepare them for life, increasing their self-confidence and helping them think about what they would like their life to look like later, where they will live, how much money they will make, what activity they will perform, or what car they will have.
One such program is Awaken the Hero in You!, created by Răzvan Cojocaru, a personal development counselor, from whom we learned the following:
“Awaken the Hero in You is a maturation experience for adolescents. Adolescence is a transitional age between childhood and adulthood, and there children really need support, to learn skills with which to easily manage in their daily lives. And then Awaken the Hero in You comes as an experience in which they can learn these skills. And when I talk about skills, I mean managing their emotions during tests, exams, project presentations, so that they remember what they need to say or write, and not let themselves be overcome by fear or anxiety, on the one hand. On the other hand, being able to make pertinent decisions for themselves and for what comes next in their lives, without always asking someone what they should do. Another skill is knowing how to respond to the meanness of their peers or bullying, as we call it, and which is present in almost every environment in which they, teenagers, operate. These are just a few examples of skills that teenage children learn in the course Awaken the Hero in You!.”
Who is the program aimed at? Răzvan Cojocaru:
“We are aiming at children between 13 and 17 years old. The program, coming as an experience, makes the children wake up a little, if I may use this term, to set some goals in their lives, to understand why they do what they do, and we even have a lesson in which we talk about the topic “Why do you go to school and learn?” And then we talk about the fact that we need some purposes for which we do things, including to learn. We talk specifically about this topic, and during the meetings we have a bunch of such topics that aim for the participants to gain some attention to their lives and the things they do, and to understand why they do it. Together with them we look for goals, we look for what is the purpose for which you go to school? I would like my life to look like this at some point, I would like to have this in my life, I would like to get here. And if we find the purpose, we also find the motivation.”
Our interlocutor told us that more and more parents complain about their children’s lack of interest in school, in reading, so that the parent-child relationship is one of “pushing from behind”. We asked Răzvan Cojocaru to tell us about a successful experience from the program:
“There are many examples of success. For example, a boy came to the course in the 9th grade. He came forced by his parents, because he didn’t want it. He entered the room with his head bowed, he was very shy, very emotional, anxious, almost trembling, he wouldn’t look me in the eyes. He came to a meeting the first time, he liked it, then he continued to come to meetings. He finished the whole course, all 12 months of the course, then he continued to come because he liked it. He came for about 2 years, and after 2 years, he effectively transformed. He had a metamorphosis process like that from a caterpillar into a butterfly. He managed to overcome his fears, to stop sitting with his head down, to be able to talk as an equal with anyone, even adults, to be able to express his opinion, to say what he thinks, to stand out, to stand out and no longer stay in the background.”
I asked Răzvan Cojocaru what he considers to be the biggest challenges for teenagers today? But also what are the advantages of being a teenager today?
“The biggest challenge for teenagers is a certain degree of insecurity that they have. Self-doubt, lack of confidence, which is normal and specific to adolescence, because they have not yet gained enough experience and have not gone through enough situations to learn how to manage them. That would be the biggest challenge for adolescence. The beautiful part of teenagers today and the opportunity, is that they have many places from which they can get information, from which they can learn how to manage the situations in their lives. We adults, parents, teachers, need to guide them to the correct information, so that they can learn it. I think that every teenager, in addition to math and Romanian classes and other subjects, should take a course like Awaken the Hero Within You, because it gives them a degree of maturity and makes it much easier to cope in everyday life.”
Notice to parents, because beyond formal education, emotional and social skills also need to be developed!
