When people tell you to get a stable job, ignore them. They want stability so they don’t have to feel scared. Opportunity comes with risk.
Explore your body and appreciate it for all that it is. Because it is going to carry you through this life. Don’t let anyone put it down and especially not yourself. You can be so cruel to yourself. It doesn’t help. Don’t ignore it either, though. Stop and listen. Get active and breathe.
Friends, family and love are the most important things in life. Shoot for the stars, but never forget those three things, because without them, the dream is empty.
Greg Champion is a songwriter, guitarist and radio personality who was born in Benalla, Victoria. He is most recognised for his work as part of the Coodabeen Champions as a songwriter and guitarist. Greg often writes songs about both Aussie rules football and cricket, and he’s a multi-awarded country/folk singer.
Hello and pleased to meet you, 13-yr-old self. :-)
The one dominant thing that I wish to say to you is: you know what? – I have no advice.
That is because: I didn’t learn anything particularly special that will help your journey!
And that is because: you are on your journey – and you’re already going about it the right way! That is the major thought that arrives, when asking myself what I can share with you.
And that is because I trust you to know what you’re doing, instinctively. Looking back at you from here, I reckon you had it pretty well sorted, for the most part – definitely not all of it – even though you certainly didn’t know that at the time.
There is not a lot you could have changed, or should have. ‘The journey is the journey.’ You’re on it. It’s so true that it’s more about the journey than the destination – in many ways if not all. Just do what you’re doing. Without necessarily knowing it, you, my former 13-yr-old self, are on the right path already.
‘There are no mistakes.’ ‘Everything happens for a reason.’ I dearly like those two aphorisms, looking back from here – 47 years later (!) What happens will happen; cruise; ‘go with the flow’; don’t waste any time planning, worrying, stressing about the future: ‘you only have now’. These are all somewhat Buddhist concepts that I’m quoting. I have found them to be the best ones for your journey, 47 years on.
Would I change a thing? Any mistakes I regret? Barely. And if there are one, two or five things I wish I could go back and do differently, arguably it’s pointless to wish that, AND obviously they can’t be undone now anyway. Because the journey – was the journey …
I don’t know if it’s useful for us to revisit that time, my 13-yr-old friend. Single parent Housing Trust home in a rough suburb, sponsored to private school [Pulteney Grammar, sister school of CGS], 12 months younger than the rest of your year, bullied a bit and, sadly, guilty of bullying a bit yourself. I do know that making the top sport teams earned you more esteem from others and consequently, more self-esteem. But the brainboxes who didn’t fancy sport usually had sufficient self-esteem to start with anyway.
Whatever challenges you/we may have had – being bullied, crowded, small humble home, heavy parent and sibling conflict, distinct lack of success with the opposite sex – with hindsight it was a pretty charmed ride, eh?
You, my 13-yr-old self, and I can laugh now about how well things have gone; we certainly had no idea back then, did we, that things would go half as well as they have! You had no inkling of this fantastic adventure life became; you – are a lucky duck.
If you had known then what a joyful journey life would be, you would have been walking around with a huge, mysterious grin on your face as a 13-yr-old, eh!
Lovely to meet you again, my 13-yr-old pal. You are bringing tears of emotion to my eyes.
Sir Gustav Nossal is a research biologist who has written seven books and more than 530 scientific articles. Nossal has served as president or chairman of many prominent organisations, including the Australian Academy of Science and the Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation. He was knighted in 1977, made a Companion of the Order of Australia in 1989 and has received honours from sixteen countries. In 2000 he was appointed Australian of the Year.
Dear teenage Gus Nossal,
I am sending you this letter from my 84-year-old self with a few bits of advice as you buckle down to your second year of secondary school in case these few bits of wisdom can smooth the path of your next few years.
First, strive to learn rather than to shine. I know how ambitious you are and how annoyed you get if anyone beats you in an exam, no matter how trivial. But school shouldn’t be about coming first, it should be about learning, remembering and growing. What you cram for the exam goes in quickly, is forgotten just as quickly. When you learn the right way, reading beyond the immediate subject matter, enquiring of others their opinions in the area, this rounds you out as a person and forms part of your continuing upbringing.
Second, try to be a little less arrogant. I know often your arrogance is just part of showing off a bit, but it can be hurtful. OK, some people are not as bright as you, but they are people nevertheless, with feelings and sensitivities. Your thoughtlessness might hurt them much more than you think. Also, your parents don’t like it when you dismiss the views of their friends as silly or superficial. Learn to be open to all views: some of them might be more valuable than you think.
Thirdly, try to be a bit less untidy. Your handwriting is shocking, if you would just slow down a bit, there would be fewer smudges and it wouldn’t be so terribly hard to read. There’s no need to go around with spots all over your school uniform, and remember your long socks are supposed to come up to just below your knees, not to slump around your ankles. And making your bed in the morning wouldn’t hurt either. Gus, I know you are basically a good person, and life will gradually smooth off some of these rough edges, but being a bit less self-satisfied and a bit more conscious of the needs and desires of others will really help you. Good luck for your next few years, your final school examinations, and the university course that clearly lies ahead.
With best wishes
Your future self
Gus Nossal
Guy Sebastian is a singer–songwriter and the first winner of Australian Idol. Guy was born in Malaysia in 1981 and moved with his family to Australia at the age of six. Over the course of his career, Guy has received 22 ARIA Award Nominations and has been part of The X Factor’s judging panel.
Dear Little Guy,
I realise that at your age you believe that you know everything about everything, but please believe me, you have a lot to learn. Firstly, and most importantly, this letter is not about asking you to change. Yes, your actions and attitudes are what define the outcomes of your life, however it’s not about getting it all ‘right’. You’re going to make mistakes. Get over that. It’s okay. Mistakes are the only way to learn.
Sometimes people will let you down. Sometimes you will let yourself down. Sometimes things won’t go your way. Sometimes your heart will get broken. Here’s the big one … Sometimes, actually often, your trust will be broken and people will take advantage of you. HOWEVER, don’t ever let this change you. Don’t let the negative things in your life shape your behavioural patterns and the way you interact with people. Remain trusting, loving and positive because there are people who love you and believe in you. If you let the bad experiences close you up, you won’t be able to receive these things from the positive people.
All that time you’re spending on music, keep doing it. People will tell you it’s not a possibility, that you don’t have the right ‘look’, that you’re not good enough etc. They don’t have a crystal ball.
University might seem like a hindrance from the dream; however, your degree will lead you to work with people much less fortunate than you and this will teach you invaluable lessons about appreciation.
With success comes temptation. Situations will present themselves that can alter the course of your life forever. Have some foresight and choose wisely. Try to discern the diff
erence between what is fleeting and what is eternal. The latter will soothe your heart, the former only your physical needs. In other words, hold on to what matters with a tightly clenched fist.
Lastly, always put love first. Don’t lose your love for people. It will be easy to at times. There are always multiple sides to every situation. Try to understand perspectives other than your own, because you are hard-headed and will often be wrong.
Guy
PS. Don’t steal those lollies because Paul dared you to. You will get banned for life from Foodland.
Copyright Kelly Sturgiss
Jackie French’s writing career spans twenty-five years, thirty-six languages, more than 140 books and more than sixty awards in Australia and overseas. Her books include Diary of a Wombat and Hitler’s Daughter. She was the Australian Children’s Laureate for 2014–2015 and the 2015 Senior Australian of the Year.
Dear Jackie,
I can’t tell you what comes next. If you fail to squish a caterpillar tomorrow on the oleanders its resultant butterfly may change the world by the flap of its wings and I might not be sitting here writing you this. (This is part of an exciting theory involving Mandelbrot sets but it hasn’t been formulated yet in your time. But you’ll have fun later with its implications.)
I can tell you that nearly all your dreams will come true. Not all of them – you must admit that starring in La Traviata at La Scala is not compatible with writing books on a headland surrounded by bush and owning a hundred dogs. Nor do your dreams come true in exactly the way you envisage. But then, you know extraordinarily little of the vast complexity of possibilities that is life. But if today you could choose where you’d be at 61, which is how old I am as I write this to you, I think you’d choose it all – every second of the life that has led you to here.
Which is not to say it has been easy. There will be bumps and some great slashes. But they will pass. They are also minuscule compared to all the good.
The years you are in now are the worst in your life: the most isolated, socially and intellectually, with no family comfort and your experiences too foreign to your friends for them to even accept what is happening to you, much less support you. Besides, you will learn, many, many decades later, your school friends too have hard walls to climb just now, and you too will have failed to support them.
But you must believe this: IT IS NOT YOUR FAULT. Nothing of the past few years or now or the few years to come – is your fault. Despite what you now think and feel, you are still a child and it is the duty of others to protect you. Do not feel guilty, because for many years guilt tore or nibbled you. No matter how long our life will be, it will be too short to waste on guilt that you did not deserve.
Believe this too: you are lovable and will be loved, even if there is no one to love you now. Once you get to university you will find a growing network of people with minds that match your own. You will also find that similar minds were with you at school, all the time, but partly because you were focused, mostly, on surviving, but also because of the low intellectual expectations of girls back when you were thirteen, you won’t see them.
Believe this, most of all: that no matter what hard things happen in your life, at the same time there will be happiness and beauty around you too. Mostly, you will find these yourself, but it’s worth advising you to look a little harder for the glorious bits and enjoy them all the more, knowing that, yes, it’s all okay. It works out. Time and again, all your life – until today, at least, and I hope for a long while still to come – it all works out.
What else? Forget those diagrams for that perpetual motion machine. It won’t succeed. But don’t narrow the breadth of your thinking either: you will have some major insights, though you will give them to specialists in the appropriate fields, which will not be yours, to refine and publish.
And maybe I need to tell you this too: the best that is yet to come is far beyond your daydreams, with a richness you could never have imagined. But the deepest joys have come from the mundane things that you are slightly scornful of now – as wife, mother, friend, part of the bush around you and a few other everyday fulfilments I won’t spoil for you by foretelling them.
I wish I could comfort you now. I can’t. But there is comfort and joy around you, even now, if you look.
Do look.
Love (even if it took me decades to be able to say this),
Jackie
James O’Loghlin is one of Australia’s most respected corporate speakers, corporate comedians and media personalities, best known as the host of more than 300 episodes of The New Inventors on ABC TV, and for his programs on ABC Local Radio. His novel for children, The Adventures of Sir Roderick, the Not-Very Brave, won the Speech Pathology Australia award for the best novel for 8 to 10 year olds.
James,
Listen. You spend way too much time worrying about what people think about you. You think that whatever you do is assessed and analysed, and that if you do anything silly, stupid, clumsy or awkward, they’ll be onto you.
Guess what? No one is watching your every move. They really aren’t. In fact, apart from your family, no one thinks about you much at all. I’ll prove it. Think of someone in your class. How long do you spend thinking about them every day? Hardly any time at all, right? And that’s how long they, and everyone else, spend thinking about you. They’re all too busy thinking about themselves. And that’s a good thing, because it means that you don’t have to worry so much about trying to live up to their expectations.
So try to relax. In your teens you become self-conscious. You get scared of making a fool of yourself, but that fear can stop you having new experiences and throwing yourself into things. Whether it’s footy or cricket or drama, you sometimes think that the safest thing is not to have a go at all because you’re scared of looking stupid.
Have a go! Don’t miss out. There’s lots on offer, so jump into it. If you find you’re no good at something, that’s okay. You can either practise and get better at it, or try something else.
Remember this. Mostly, if someone is good at something, it just means they have done it a lot. With practice, you can get good at almost anything.
Try to think less and do more. When you catch yourself worrying about stuff, distract yourself. Read a book, talk to a friend, do some exercise, write, whatever. But don’t sit there endlessly analysing yourself.
Hassle your parents to get you a guitar and either get lessons, or a book you can teach yourself from. Get a yoga book and do 20 minutes of yoga every day. Just do. It’s good for everything – fitness, discipline and feeling good about yourself.
Do more sport. Don’t worry about whether you’re good at it, or whether you’re going to get hurt, just stop thinking and throw yourself into it.
If something goes wrong or you do something stupid, don’t panic. In a week no one will remember it. Even adults can’t tell you what was on the front page of the paper a week ago.
To be honest, you’re not going to really feel that you know what you should be doing until you discover stand-up comedy in about 11 years’ time, so until then you might as well just be nice to people, do your homework, throw yourself into things and find as many things as you can that you enjoy.
And don’t watch too much television! Seriously, you might think Dallas is good, but in 30 years Breaking Bad will blow your mind!
All the best,
Older James
Jen Cloher is a singer–songwriter currently based in Melbourne. Originally from Adelaide, Cloher moved to Sydney to pursue a degree at NIDA. In 2006 she released her debut album Dead Wood Falls as Jen Cloher & The Endless Sea, garnering an ARIA nomination for Best Female Artist. Her third album, In Blood Memory, was nominated for the Australian Music Prize in 2013.
Dear Twelve-Year-Old Me,
It’s 1986, in Adelaide. An only child, you’ve spent most of your life at Loreto Ladies Convent, a rather stuffy Catholic girls’ school. Your look would best be described as ‘androgynous’. When not dresse
d in school uniform, you frequently get mistaken for a boy. In fact, you have a pinball-playing alter ego who passes at the local takeaway as John – until your mum walks in one day and yells, ‘Jennifer! Come home at once!’
You’re a colourful, creative individual, drawn to the arts like a magnet. You even get to play the lead role of Jesus in the end-of-year drama production. Desperate to fit in, you’re a student representative for your class, head of the debating team and a consistent B-grade student. From the outside, things look okay.
But secretly you hate it there. There in the prison of scary old nuns, academic achievement and regulation blue underwear.
Don’t worry – in a year’s time everything will have changed. You’ll have been expelled from Loreto, smoked your first bucket bong, and changed from ra-ra skirts and Duran Duran to twelve-hole Doc Martens and The Dead Kennedys. But, for now, let’s address your current situation.
You are in love. Absolutely, positively besotted with Caroline Clark – a bronzed goddess with piercing blue eyes and perfect caramel curls that cascade effortlessly down her back. Caroline is the definition of ‘natural beauty’. She’s a country boarder at Loreto with exceptional athletic ability. Over the course of year eight you strike up a friendship, and when mid-term holidays arrive you spend them at her farm in Mildura. Here you learn how to drive a car, go to your first bush dance, sleep out in a caravan and smoke Escort Reds. You long to kiss Caroline but know that such a move would be unwise – humiliating, even. And so you set in motion many years of unrequited crushes – your secret heart.
1986 is the year of Halley’s Comet. The year, like the comet, is a bit of a fizzer. It’s the year Farnsy releases his career-defining album Whispering Jack. But you’re listening to The Boys Next Door. The girl responsible for this change in your musical palate is Danielle Henderson, a mousy, quiet, unassuming soul. She arrives at Loreto in a shroud of mystery. Rumours fly that she was expelled from her last school, although no one seems to know why. You are immediately drawn to her.
Letter to My Teenage Self Page 4
