Live your Life to the Full

Jesus came to educate us on a topic we knew very little about - morality. This thing is what makes us happy. It is a fundamental human need, to be surrounded by people with moral values. Otherwise, we function in a way that is primitive to the point of animalistic.

Living life to the full stems from this. To live life to the full one needs to be able to make connection with other human beings, and that requires morality. Before his death and resurrection Jesus gave us the stepping stones towards morality and becoming a fulfilled human being.

A totally fulfilled human being is a rare thing. Few people manage this feat, namely Siddartha Gautama (the Budda) and a number of other religious. However, that doesn't mean that it's impossible to become fulfilled. All it requires is to follow the teachings of your respective religion (without going overboard) in following a peaceful and honest life. Jesus wanted this, Mohammed wanted this and Siddhartha Gautama wanted this.

The Christian pathway is Jesus's response to the problem of immoral life. It is simply that:

• A person should treat others as he/she wants to be treated.
• A person should have self respect.
• A person should be good to the poor.

By following these beliefs a person should become more fulfilled.

Two rules to live by.

#1) Nothing Comes from Nothing. Push yourself.

If you don't exercise, you don't get fit. If you don't study, you don't pass. Without pushing oneself, nothing will occur. This piece of wisdom can be seen in almost everything in life. Great buildings require hard work and perseverence to make, and-god forbid, the wars required a lot of personal courage to win for millions of people. If we as a society do not push ourselves we do not amount to anything.

#2) Help others in need.

This one has been repeated by almost every religious leader in the world in some form or other. Those in need may include the homeless, the disabled, the sick, the poor, the outcast. Go into your local community and provide help to everyone that needs it, irrellivent of who they are or "whether they deserve it".

Life Experiences

First off, I must tell readers that this post is from the view point of a 17 year old adolescent male. I am at what could be termed the start of my life journey.

Recently I visited a retirement home. I used to think of places like these as the end of the road - everyone inside being half-senile and therefore "stupid". How wrong I was. And I am ashamed of that juvenile approach to a place of care. Upon entering the home we were introduced to a kind elderly woman who was confined to a wheelchair. While she may not have been intellectually brilliant, she was extremely wise and had much to say on the subject of life.

One of her main points she wanted to impart on us was that we should live life to the fullest. It is something that most of us do not realise until the end of our lives, posing ourselves questions at that time such as "why didn't I do X" or "why didn't I help Y?". All of these things that we missed out upon would have left us feeling much more fulfilled. They would have changed our lives.

On that note, I'd like to describe two of my most life changing experiences. Lucky for me, they happened recently, so I have a good recollection of them.

The first is my first trip to the Rosies street van. Much like my trip to the retirement village, I went into the experience with views of those I would see as set by what I saw on TV. Meeting with those without shelter really opened up my mind to everything I took for granted, and how the other half of the world often lives. While one might expect such an experience to be a horrible one, it was not. I loved all of it, from giving out drinks to talking to people who had stories to share.

My second - my trip to France, which I did during December and January of 06/07. In particular, visiting Notre Dame L'Hermitage, the home of the Marist brothers. I was partly shocked about how people (the Marist brothers) can live such unmaterialstic lives. Obviously I have great respect for them for doing this. I sometimes now find myself pondering whether I would be happier in such an environment. Maybe.

Thanks for your attention. Until next time, this is me signing off.

-E