I don’t know how many of you have seen Forrest Gump, and if you haven’t then you most definitely need to watch it on the ASAP because it is a classic. Apart from being one of the greatest movies of all time, it has a mass of take home messages that hit you right in the feels.

Forrest loved to run, and the movie spawned one of the most iconic and most recited quotes of all time, “Run Forest, Run”.

To this day, the general population will know the movie just based on that quote alone and the major scenes that go with it. One of which was when he decided to run across the country for three years, only stopping to sleep, eat and go to the bathroom.

 

Amongst it all, the background characters all asked the same question, they asked him why he was doing it, and he simply answered by saying that it was because he wanted to.

 

You see no one could quite fathom the concept of a man running across the country with barely any rest for no particular reason at all.

Besides the fact that he just wanted to.

 

I’ve spoken about making a decision based on your own want and desire to do so, but I think this time its more about keeping on going and following through with a decision because its what you’ve committed yourself to doing.

When I started writing, I didn’t have any intention to make it a weekly thing. Nor did I think it’d ever blow up at all. I had hope that it would help people get through anything in life, maybe inspire a couple of lost souls here and there. I was surprised, because it did exactly that. Not a massive crowd of people, but every now and then someone would message me, tell me how I made their lives a little better, how I was doing a great job and should keep it up.

 

I’m notoriously known for losing out on a lot of different things. 7 years of playing soccer and even longer playing a variety of different sports, I never won a final or earned a medal. It never really bothered me, some people win and some people just don’t. I never made it an excuse for my work ethic, and just because you win something, don’t mean that that something would ever make you great.

Look at Nathan Hindmarsh, one of the greatest forwards in NRL history, State of Origin Representative, Australian International player and a Parramatta Eels legend. But never laid his hands on a premiership victory, although coming close twice.

Granted, the fact that he has never won a grand final is the butt of every joke at his new job on the ‘Monday Night with Matty Johns‘ Show on FOX, no one will ever deny his greatness as his time as a player.

 

 

My point is that winning or having an uplifting experience like that, should not be the sole reason to do anything, if it is…then you’ve already lost. It shouldn’t ever be the only reason for success and it should never, ever be the reason for keeping true to your passion. Instead to keep on running,should be enough to keep you going because at the end of the day,  you are you’re own fuel.

 

No matter how many times you lose a grand final, no matter how many times you get questioned for whatever you’re doing and no matter how often people laugh and point out your shitty grammar skills instead of focusing on your overall message which is deeply inspiring and incredibly life altering, doing something because you love it, or just because you want to, that is what matters the most.

 

Forest Gump taught me to keep on running, regardless of what was ahead, and to stop and only stop when I felt like it was necessary. You may have lost a couple of battles, but when you learn so much, and help even just one person, it doesn’t seem all that bad at the finish line.

And thats all I have to say about that.