The Key, A Social Emotional Toolkit for Teens is a teaching tool for teenagers. Under the umbrella of emotional intelligence, The Key addresses various life skills and coping mechanisms to help teens better understand themselves and deal with the day to day pressures of school, peers and family. At every step there are self-enquiry exercises, explanations and ‘things you can do’. Through self-awareness, writing therapy, Youtube and discussion, this book addresses a range of topics and themes we should have learnt as young people, but often didn’t.

In psychological development, adolescence is the period of self-discovery and identity - discovering who they are as they make the sometimes difficult transition from childhood to adulthood. This is a vital time in their lives to learn life skills and coping strategies as they move forward to becoming young adults.

As a professional social worker, I have worked in the areas of homelessness, drug and alcohol and mental and emotional health across Australia, Romania, Spain, United Kingdom, Vietnam, India, Cambodia and Thailand, working with locals and international teenagers and adults. Working with teenagers I noticed they were often ill-equipped to self soothe and define what was wrong, exploding or withdrawing due to lack of coping skills. Working with adults from all over the world in holistic counselling I discovered that our issues often boiled down to one thing - we never learnt the skills to cope with daily stresses or major life crisis. The Key aims to address this gap and go back to basics to help us learn about ourselves and our place in the world in order to live a full and emotionally healthy life. This book is for everyone.

The Key, A Social Emotional Toolkit for Teens is both a book and a course. The book is thorough and offers Youtube videos to help with some of the more tricky topics such as anxiety, understanding negative thoughts and three different types of basic breathing and meditations. Any teenger or parent could read it without additional guidance. Teen counsellors and school counsellors can use it is a resource and schools or community groups can teach it as a course.

In 2017 and 2018 The Key was taught by the author as a 10 week curriculum in the top school in the State of Victoria, Australia. It is appropriate to be taught to 12-20 year olds. The author’s aim is for every teenager in the world to have access to a set of skills that will help them navigate smoothly through life’s journey and lead socially, emotionally and mentallly healthy lives.

The author is also available for additional support with individuals, group workshops or to teach the course.