His "entire teenage experience"? Just because you say that, I bet he was a happier teenager than you, and maybe not only then. That is because I do not have reasons to question the secureness of his health, money or dignity, whereas about you I'd think differently.

The "teenage experience", as you say, has absolutely nothing to do with drinking, smoking, or doing drugs. There are many arguments besides the ones that are obvious, like it being obviously bad for your mental, emotional, and physical health, and that you obviously don't need any of those things to have fun, and that there are obviously more things to do, especially in your teenage years, than drinking, smoking, and doing drugs. Come on, there's obviously more to life - especially to the "teenage experience"; it's so much more complex and beautiful than anything approaching to partying hard.

But that, anyways, is still the obvious.
I say that the "teenage experience" has nothing to do with drinking, smoking, or doing drugs mainly from personal experience, and also because the "teenage experience" has existed ever since there are teenagers in the world, and that is way before it was even "cool" to get drunk or high on whatever.

For the ones, like me, who haven't been caught by the "just having fun" trap (that gets you into drinking, smoking, or doing drugs), everything the others do is sad and disgusting. If you can't see the problem, I assure you, we can; probably because we haven't been blinded by the mind-and-body-rottenning habits.

Yes, because, beaking news, if you think that the teenage years are about "finding" yourself, starting to know the world around you, and discovering your favorite ways of having fun, which they actually are and I agree with that, I guarantee you that drinking, smoking, and doing drugs is NOT the way to do it, and these things are completelly unnecessary, as much as you think otherwise. They don't need to be a part of your "teenage experience" to begin with, even less to be your "ENTIRE teenage experience".

It is especially because the "teenage experience" is about getting to know yourself and defining who you are, that those years - who you were/decided to be, what you did, who you were with - will remain with you your entire life. True happiness is not the one that gives you instant joy and makes you feel (physically or emotionally) bad afterwards, or even regret it in the future. Oh, and don't fool yourself into thinking you shouldn't regret or feel bad - because sometimes all you really need is to feel bad; if you make a mistake, it's OK to feel bad, and it's actually important and OK to regret it. And by that I don't mean feeling miserable for that one thing for the rest of your days. Regreting it not only feeling bad for the bad results: it is also learing from what happened and wanting to do it differently next time (don't expect different results if you just keep doing the same thing), so that means change and growth in your way of thinking (maybe even living); and that is a crucial part of the process of not repeating the same mistakes. Life really is short, don't waste it repeating mistakes - because it's the good things that you want to repeat in life.

If you think drinking, smoking, and doing drugs is the "entire teenage experience", you obviously have a very distorted vision on the "teenage experience", and you underestimate the value, importance and potential of people as teenagers. And for that I imagine you lived some very miserable teenage years, even if you only want to remember the fun parts.

To anyone who reads this, feel free to reply and/or ask whatever comes to your mind after reading and knowing what I think.