No one truly knows how much they are affecting the world, and the lives of the people who know them. (and sometimes, actually more often than not, even the people who don’t!)
I don’t want to get to political but have a look at that Gorge Floyd guy, do you think he knew that he was going to be such an influential person. When he was lying there with that cops knee on his neck I can guarantee he wasn’t thinking this is going to change the world and this is going to be a pivotal point in history, he was probably thinking ‘dude get off me. I can’t breath.’ Of course this is an extreme example and not all of us are going to have such massive role in history but here are a few other places I have seen our ripples start to be felt.
I will never forget this one guy in a shopping center made a passing comment to me that shifted my mind dramatically and he probably didn’t give it a second thought. I was sitting outside a shop having a really tough time with stopping walking and adapting to the wheelchair and stuff and he rolled past (also a wheelchair user) and said ‘don’t look so sad mate, life is actually quite good. It just depends on how you look at it. ‘ I have thought back to this man’s words time and time again, and he probably doesn’t have a clue he had any affect on me or how I try look at things.
Then I look at my friend Lara who died of Fred’s related complications 10ish years ago and I think she must have thought her life was pointless (we chatted, in an online chat room about this once or twice) but her life and then subsequently her death had a massive impact on me and has given me such a different way to look at what I find important. I think about her, and her brother more often than I would have ever imagined because they lived such stunted cut off lives and I have lived an incredible life (compared to theirs or hers) I truly have so much to be grateful for.
Another person I wrote about was a girl who saw me battling to walk with my crutch and instead of ignoring me, like many people do (I do understand, maybe they can’t relate or I’m to far out of their comfort zone. And it would suck if everyone kept on highlighting my diversity) she got up and came over and gave me a hug (pity she was having dinner with her boyfriend ). That girl and many other people who just come over and say hi or make eye contact with me and smile or something like that have often made me feel like there is a point for me living this mad, stupid and sometimes I’ve felt pointless existence.
The last three paragraphs are some of the things that I wrote about in Dissecting Wobbles and I know I’m exceptionally privileged to have been able to get to do this but I saw it with this too. The amount of e mails and messages I got from people on the other side of the planet saying that I changed their perspective was truly astonishing. I know not everyone is going to be in a position like mine to be able to do this but here’s a little story that illustrates how everyone, regardless of how much money or who they know can make a difference too.
My best friend sent me a blog/story? Of an Indian woman who wanted to give back to her community and just generally make an impact. (I’ll share the link below) She didn’t have lots of money because she had a menial job sweeping classrooms, but made her impact on the world by collecting all the discarded pencils and erasers and stuff and giving them to children who could not afford them. Maybe one of them would be the next literary star or great artist, who knows? She probably would never know though.
This all reminds me of the chaos theory, part of it, the butterfly effect , says if a butterfly flaps its wings in one part of the world, it could cause a hurricane in another because all of us and everything in the world is somehow linked. If we are aware that every single action we carry out, every word spoken and at the risk of being a bit plinky plonkyish, every thought we think (both positive and negative) have a bearing on the world around us, I think it would change the way a lot of us do things, interact with each other and even think. So whoever is reading this and maybe feels like they haven’t made much of a difference in life or ask yourself what is the point of going through the often mundane process of living (I’ve been in these places before) just think about this for a while. I guarantee you, your life has more of an impact on those around you and maybe even people you don’t know, than you may think…
Here’s the link I was talking about.
