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There’s No Point… But There Actually May Be A Point.

 

{Photo credit: Kate Mullinger}

{Photo credit: Kate Mullinger}

I lived on an Island of 4,000 people for two years, and because it was so small I became very aware of my effect on it.

I understood my role in the community and life felt easy. You could see how every word you said and every action you took rippled into the tiny community. Eventually I became bored, and felt I needed to expand my knowledge of the world and meet more people, so I moved to Sydney, Australia.

Transitioning from 4,000 people to 4 million is a shock, and roaming around passing by thousands of people a day made me reach sensory overload faster than the average city dweller. I realized how small I was to the world and felt like an ant/nothing. I kept wondering what the point of it all was.

What was the point to being in Sydney and to working and meeting people?

It’s easy to evaluate everything and ask what’s the point to anything we do. You can argue there’s no point for a lot of things, and then you eventually get to what’s the point of life. What’s the point of making money and working and having kids and any of it… if life just ends and there wasn’t a point anyway?

You can say there is no point unless you succeed and have something to show for it. You can say there is no point unless someone is watching. What’s the point in being healthy? If you don’t have anyone to be healthy for, why look after yourself?

Or you can argue there is a point to every single action. And that’s how I think of it. What’s the point in saying Good Morning as happily as I can to my best friend every morning even if I’m not happy? Because I know it’ll make her feel a bit happier and maybe in a better mood. What’s the point in her being happy?

So she can go to work and pass on that good attitude to the people she is caring for and working with. So then they can go home and have feel good attitude.

There’s a point to every word, to every look, to every action. It ripples into the world.

What makes a happy city a happy city? Maybe it’s merely the fact that everyone smiles when they walk past each other. When you check out at the grocery store and the person looks at you genuinely you can feel it.

You can feel the difference between a person who is just going through the motions of life with no point vs. someone who knows it’s important to smile and pass that good feeling around.

A city’s behavior is just a reflection of how the people are interacting. So if you wonder what’s the point to stopping and looking around and appreciating… realize that when you do it ripples out. Something as simple as smiling at someone changes how they feel. And changing how they feel may change how they interact with everyone else that day.

This changes the place where you live. We are born to appreciate the creatures around us and the point is to notice, interact and be alive.

The point is to connect even on minor scales, not to just pass through the motions aimlessly or wondering what anything could possibly mean in such a big world.

 

*****

KateMullingerKate Mullinger is a traveler, writer, health advocate, and photographer. She was raised in Portland, Oregon, and spent the last few years working in the Caribbean as a wedding photographer. She is now in Australia, traveling and writing. Her work can be viewed on her website.

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