Читать книгу A Head Full of Everything - Gavin Oattes - Страница 14

Let's be honest, the world isn't going to change to accommodate you. If you're waiting for everything to fall into place, for that perfect moment, and only then will you start living your best life – you'll die waiting.

‘Don’t ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive, and go do that, because what the world needs is people who have come alive.’

—Howard Thurman

The modern world is, on the whole, rather amazing. Yes, I know the news is bad, social media gets our back up and parents go on about everything being better back in the day. But I'm not convinced by that argument. I said the modern world was ‘amazing’, not ‘perfect’. Modern life throws up all sorts of obstacles to our wellbeing. We're not built to sit in our bedrooms all day, staring at screens. We're not built to be alone. We're not built to fill our bodies with junk food and energy drinks. We're not built to stay still.

We're built to move, run, jump and even dance. We're built for the outdoors. We're built to learn, to be creative. We're built for communities, togetherness and to be part of a movement. We're built to eat wholesome foodstuffs and drink water. We're built to grow and get better.

What's really cool, is that right now, at your age, you can start to build the world you want for you. Unfortunately, for many years, humans haven't always got this right. We have in so many ways got it very, very wrong.

And the result is a tiredness. An unhealthiness. A mental ill‐health.

But look closely at the world. The opposite is also true. There is an energy about it. A healthiness. A mental wellness. Sometimes we need to search hard to find it, but it's there. And you're allowed to be inspired by it, to learn from it, to absorb it, to contribute to it, to be a part of it, to lead it.

There's always time to chill. There's always time to scroll. There's always time to stop and do nothing, sometimes we need to! But it's too easy to do that all the time.

Sitting in your trackies, basking in the glow of your phone for hours on end won't get you to where you want to be. You've already worked out that the weeks are getting faster, time stops for no one.

Look, I'm pretty sure you're switched on to this stuff. You probably look after yourself more than the media would give you credit for.

But too many of us are tired. Bored. Fed up. Stressed. Angry.

I can assure you though, there is a solution and it's cheap.

No, it's not a Red Bull on the way to school. Or a Monster to get you through your studies. It's way more healthy than that. Your body and brain are not built for those drinks, hence the reason you would die if you drank too many of them. Literally, don't drink them, ever.

When I say the solution is cheap, it is. It doesn't cost any money, but it does cost time and energy. And better still, you're built to do it….

What if the secret was in our heads – more specifically our thinking – and we could maintain some of that youthful, carefree exuberance that we had when we were 4, but now, in your teens and for the rest of your life before society snaps you up and pops you on the treadmill to Grownupsville?

It was a different kind of energy at that age, never forced. You weren't fussed about the news. Life excited you. You had zero issues with Mondays and puddles were not to be avoided.

‘Only children believe they’re capable of everything.’

—Paulo Coelho