Love the
Community.

The waiting room

As I grow further as a man in the 20xx, I found myself reading a few pages of a Dalai Lama book whilst waiting for my psychologist to be ready. About 30 to 40 pages of a fairly small book — the kind you finish in a sitting if life ever gives you that kind of stillness.

The thing is — it does annoy me to see laziness or a laid-back attitude treated as the norm. Living in Australia my whole life, I've watched people feel better staying calm and relaxed even as things get harder. We live in a growing and increasingly expensive economy, shaped by global markets and trends that most people never consented to. I understand why people go quiet.

It is genuinely hard to make progress when life hits you with a ton of bricks — responsibilities piling up, bad relationships, environments that make no sense. The cortisol and histamine levels spike beyond what any normal person can comfortably absorb. The body is running an emergency protocol just to get through Tuesday.

The people holding it together

We are human beings. We hyperadapt to struggle. And as long as we have enough to get by, seeing another day still holds something — it counts. That quiet endurance is real.

The last thing anyone needs is a stick-up-their-arse boss or a neglective family member that doesn't acknowledge the daily effort required to sustain life in this growing economy. Fuck it. We are still the greatest country on planet Earth by a bloody long shot.

Sunday morning

Being able to go about my life and support local businesses that are genuinely making the neighbourhood better — that means something to me. This Sunday was a good one.

Big Dad's Pies is now run by an awesome Chinese bloke who took over from the former Aussie gran that held down that neighbourhood for fifteen-plus years. Two amazing sausage rolls after a morning like that. Super rewarding. That handover of a local business from one generation to another, from one culture to another — that is exactly what community looks like in practice.

Growing through the past

This is truly a growing point for me as I navigate my understanding and processing of environments. I'll be honest: I was formerly a stupid and neglective stoner for over ten years of my twenties.

I don't take it too seriously to think I wasted all of that time. I experienced many genuine moments with friends from that era — fun and stupid things that you only do at that age. Those experiences came at the cost of finances and some burned bridges. But we move forward like chapters in a book. Each thing or experience just adds to the life points we can learn from, rather than carry as permanent regret.

What is enough

I don't mind not having many friends in person. I have a loving and forgiving family. My closest mate lives 15,000 kilometres away, but we can still communicate online and that is enough to get me through these seasons of growth.

I live in this Digital Renaissance. I humbly step away from the noise of social media and the so-called "normal" life — in exchange for full control over my creativity and my capacity to learn more about what this universe has to offer.

To wherever you are

To all the people in Australia or wherever you may be living: learn to love the community and make the most of it.

Things are never perfect — nor are they meant to be. There is always some stupid shit you cannot control. But you should not let that shit dictate your daily life. People are people. Places sometimes change. The world is changing every single day whether we like it or not — with technology, with trends, with everything moving faster than any of us agreed to.

We are in a much better place than we were a thousand years ago. That is worth sitting with for a moment.