INSIGHT
Life in the flow
Life is a wild, exotic, colourful, kaleidoscopic thing... Flow with it. by Peter Walker
PHOTOGRAPHY:
WWW.PAULWENNERHOLM.COM
“CAN WE TAKE A BIT OF A WALK TOGETHER?” I was at a festival in Byron Bay when my friend Huw Rodgers, a young man I’ve known since he was about 18 (he’s 30 now) approached me and asked that question. I agreed immediately. We set out the day after the festival
from Byron Bay beach to walk the lighthouse loop. It’s only about five kilometres but it was to be a pretty decisive wander... Just to get a little clearer; when Huw
and I catch up it’s never about the lighter subjects of life. We go deep and we go there quickly. As we walked, Huw shared that, while
life in Melbourne was passably good, it really didn’t feel like it was going anywhere in particular. He was keen to take steps to shift that and to experience more of life, to take some risks, to meet some new people, to shake off inertia and to witness more of the world. I can’t be quite sure how that went
from a discussion to a plan, but within the space of that slow walk – with many
stops along the way to gaze at the magnificent turquoise blue of the ocean on this eastern-most point of Australia, the pods of dancing dolphins playing in the waves, the three teenagers bravely (or foolishly) swimming from Wategos Beach to The Pass and lurking stingrays the size of small cars drifting with the currents – we took a decision to go to Europe to share a walking journey together. Neither of us has the wherewithal
even to buy the plane tickets. And we are going in May.
IT WASN’T ALWAYS THIS WAY I was trained in the world of corporate media which, in my experience, has become one of the most manipulative and soulless industries in our modern world. It became all about pushing people around, manipulating attitudes, shaping opinions and influencing business people to buy buy buy more advertising that was cleverly designed to influence listeners and viewers to feel like they needed more and more stuff in order to fill up their empty meaningless
lives. Perhaps that sounds a little harsh, but
that is how it felt to me. Get this thing before stocks run out! Listen to this well known public figure tell you how their life has vastly improved by buying this widget. Buy and consume this fast food that has slightly less nutritional value than the plastic toy we’ll give to your children for free – because we know that your children can nag and harp on about something like no-one else and they know less about discerning something of genuine worth from instant gratification than you do. Manipulative, soul destroying and seemingly devoid of ethics. I was taught in that environment that
if I set my ‘goals’ for anything up to ten years I could make it happen; get anything I wanted. I became really good at it too. Climbed the corporate ladder, met with the approval of those higher up than me. Wore expensive suits, drove expensive cars. Dated expensive women and drank expensive scotch. Lots of it. Too much of it. It numbed me really effectively. After the scotch drunk in
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