Power for Brain, a brain training company organises the ‘Shyness workshop for Teenagers’ in Nungambakkam from the eight to the twenty-fifth of this month. The workshop aims at helping teenagers (12 years – 17 years) overcome different forms of social anxiety by training them in areas such as Public Speaking, Personality Development, Anxiety Management, Social Etiquettes & Presentation Skills.
The workshop is organised by Mathumitha Jayaraman, a certified brain trainer from the Singapore Brain Development Centre. Mathumitha has conducted over twenty workshops in the past that aimed at issues related to brain development among teenagers. It is her passion for this field of study that inspires her to initiate such workshops and make a change among growing children. “Children today are seen facing mind blocks because of various reasons like a failure, peer pressure etc,” says Mathumitha.
Through this initiative, Mathumitha attempts to instil self-confidence in the participants and facilitate them to think on their own and become efficient individuals. Madhumitha feels that in the current Indian cultural situation, parents are extremely pressurising and therefore restrict real growth for their children. As a result, children are becoming repressive and reluctant to open up about the many everyday problems that they face. So, when they arrive at the workshop, there is a challenge in hand for the trainer. The participants have to be turned into interactive people so that the workshop is effective. “Given that the participants are of a shy nature, I conduct the tongue-twister game to break the ice. This usually helps them become less inhibited towards each other and towards me”.
Mathumitha observes that the basic mark of a person being shy is when the person is evidently fearful of being judged. It is this fear that has to be dealt with, according to her. She says “I have often noticed that shyness and introverted-ness are substituted for each other. This is a wrong practice because being shy and being introverted are different altogether. I am an introverted person but I am not shy.” Mathumitha says that shyness is an obstacle while introverted-ness is a personal characteristic that does not hurdle a person’s functioning.”
According to Mathumitha, the ages between 12 and 17 years are very significant as far as the brain development of an individual is concerned. By targeting participation from such an age- group, Mathumitha believes that several types of negative factors that affect personality development can be detected and eliminated. “It is important to make sure that children gain a clear sense of identity as they grow. They should understand how to negate the external elements that are hazardous to their brain growth.” Mathumitha focuses on tackling the barriers posed by a lack of self- confidence among teenagers and hopes to orient the participants in becoming responsible and skilled individuals.
