Taking a Step Back

Life is a pretty crazy thing. I don't mean the scientific portion of biology that focuses on how life is created, I mean the human aspect of living that everyone of us experiences every day, well I hope you do. Living in todays world there are a lot of distractions that can take away from the joy of life, and if you don't try to see it you may be missing out. 

Every day, people are busy with school for us university students, maybe a job, a family, significant other, or other tasks that are considered vital to living a good life. With all these things putting stress on people and distracting them from enjoying living life. Im not trying to say that these things aren't important, of course you should have a job and a family and anything else like that to fulfill certain aspects of basics life, but these things should not BE your life.

Every day around the campus of uWaterloo, I see people rushing off to class, or stressing out over homework, and not enjoying where they are. University specifically is a great place, its a place for ideas, to collaborate with people interested in the same things as you, meet lifelong friends, and enjoy everything around them. But some people seem to always be concerned about only their studies. This is only part of the experience, just like a job is only one part of life. Sometimes you need to take a break from what you think is important and just relax.

A personal example of this happened to me yesterday. I was reading for my philosophy course and decided to take it outside to enjoy the nice fall day we were having on campus. I was getting distracted pretty easily with some people watching and admiring the setting I was in, looking at the buildings around me. This sounds like I was slacking off but it was really why I was out there, to enjoy it all. Then I looked over and saw a little squirrel just minding his business completely calm around all the bustling people around him. He was going through a garden just looking for some nuts, as squirrels do, but I had realized that even though I knew this is what squirrels do, I had never really seen one go about and find a nut. I spent about 10 minutes not even realizing what I was doing just staring at a squirrel, something everyone sees every day. This is what I mean by taking a step back and enjoying the little things life has to offer, because they're everywhere if you just take a look.

The point of all this is that life isn't about what is important to be successful. Being successful is being happy, and to be happy all you need to do is take everything for what it is, and enjoy everything you see. Don't get to overwhelmed with anything you're doing because it is only really important to you, and if you aren't enjoying what you're doing well the answer is simple: stop doing it. Life is anything but static so don't think change isn't an option. Most of all, do what you love and love everything you do. We only get one shot at life so why not have some fun with it whatever you end up doing.