Time of life when youth leader has listeners (5)
I believe the answer is:
years
'time of life' is the definition.
(years is a kind of time of life)
'youth leader has listeners' is the wordplay.
'youth leader' becomes 'y' (I've seen this in other clues).
'has' says to put letters next to each other.
'listeners' becomes 'ears' (body parts which listen).
'y'+'ears'='YEARS'
'when' is the link.
(Other definitions for years that I've seen before include "long period" , "Units of time" , "Measures of time" , "Very long time (colloq.)" , "Ages" .)