While advancing technology should reduce stress in our lives, today, it is increasing stress in many ways. Is it any wonder that so many people struggle with their mental and emotional health these days?

Parents need to look up from their smartphones and realize that “normal” and “healthy” are not synonymous. Negative influences in our culture can be enticing and distracting, and parents need to be wise and discerning if they want to raise healthy kids.
How American Culture Can Be Damaging to Mental and Emotional Health
I was in the room with Dr. Robert Foltz when he discussed studies that show that a safe place, in and of itself, will positively affect emotional health and behavior in children—or adults for that matter. By “safe place” he was not talking about the “safe spaces” we have been hearing so much about in the news lately—those places to which college-aged students can now retreat when someone dares to disagree with them. He was talking about living-environments that are free of routine clear and present danger and undue stress—whether it is moral, physical, emotional, or psychological stress. Shepherds Hill Academy is one of those safe places.
We know that when you surround kids with consistent truth, love, and wise and moral guidelines from responsible adults who exemplify godly character, healing and healthy emotions begin to return to kids who have been previously behaviorally defiant and/or diagnosed with any number of emotional and psychological disorders. But here is the more interesting thing: We have noticed that this healing is accelerated even more when you expose, confront, and unravel all the culturally-induced moving parts that actually contributed to the so-called “disorders” in the first place. I am talking about the unscientific diagnoses from the mental health industry, unwarranted meds, tech abuses, media lies, distorted worldviews, false premises, sexual perversions, violent video games, unwarranted peer pressure, TV shows, movies, and music—just to name a few. These are things that can promote a matrix of lies and perversions of reality and morality. Bottom line: our kids begin to realize they have been a commodity—used, abused, and “lied to” by all of the above for virtually all their lives.
Everything I’ve just mentioned is how and why 70% of the kids coming to Shepherds Hill Academy on boat-loads of medications are leaving med-free. It is also how and why so many Shepherds Hill Academy graduates go on to good colleges, careers, and futures when, before they arrived, their only future was jail or the grave. They are given hope that there actually might be something out there worth living and dying for—and it’s not just the next carnal pleasure!
Shepherds Hill Academy provides evidence that godly stimulus is a healing balm for mental and moral stability—and the kids themselves will tell you that! Our experience at Shepherds Hill Academy is an indicator that maybe our culture, alone, really is a systemic breeding ground for mental illness. In other words, growing up in America can be hazardous to your health. I don’t care how financially well-off we think we are.
So why do so many Christian parents fail to heed our cries for a wiser and more biblical protocol when it comes to their kids’ entertainment habits? Well, my experience tells me that parents themselves are enmeshed in the same activities, attitudes, appetites, habits, and addictions as their kids. Generally speaking, we have become a nation of idolaters. We are addicted to self, amusement, entertainment, and pleasure—whether it’s sex, drugs, rock and roll, or whatever. Then there is digital technology, particularly smartphones. These are huge idols that help proliferate all these things exponentially. We have all been brainwashed—to one extent or another—to believe that, “This is just how things are.” Without parents realizing it, smartphones have become steroids for our human sin nature. And they are even more dangerous and insidious in the hands of kids.
Picture provided by: Wokandapix