No Straight Lines

[Music]

have you noticed

that there are no straight lines in

nature

well life doesn’t operate in straight

lines either

now you might imagine as you launch

yourselves into the world that

achieving your dreams might be as simple

as going from point a to point b

a nice straight line but

life doesn’t operate in straight lines

it tends to look

a bit more like a roller coaster and on

this ride

life will take you to places that you

might not

really want to go yourself now

these detours might come in the form of

a significant event

maybe an accident or illness

maybe loss maybe you screw up really

badly

or maybe just don’t seem to fit in with

the expectations of those around you

whatever form it takes it often involves

trauma and it always

involves pain now

no one asks for that but it’s something

that everyone

at some point will have to face no one

gets through life unscathed

we all have our scars

here are mine

all my life i wanted to become a safari

guide in africa

i dreamt of living and working in remote

and beautiful places teeming with

wildlife

i loved being in the wilds and looking

for animals as a kid

and more than anything i loved lions

i found them just magnetic they were the

main reason i wanted to be a safari

guide

but i also found them totally terrifying

when i began my life as a safari god my

greatest fear

was that i might one day get attacked by

lion

in my mind there was just there was

nothing more terrifying than that

so i’ve learned that life has a bit of a

twisted sense of humor

when i was 25 and living and working in

a beautiful

wild remote corner of botswana teeming

with wildlife

i i got attacked by lion

that morning i was guiding some very

important safari clients and and we were

in an open

safari vehicle and i’d found the tracks

of a female line with tiny baby cubs

now she’d been walking down a sandy road

for several miles

and the tracks were super fresh and i

was getting excited that

i might actually be able to show my

guests the sighting of a lifetime

but the tracks disappeared so i stopped

the car i got out and walked

back behind the car to look for the

tracks

not realizing that the lioness and her

cubs

were hiding behind a large termite mound

about 30 yards away

now she charged

and she didn’t stop she knocked me to

the ground

she raked my head with her claws

and she bit down hard on the back of my

head

now a couple of hours earlier when i’d

hopped out of bed that morning

my life was just full of hope and dreams

and

potential now i had a line biting me on

the head and my blood

and my life was seeping into the sand

your life can change very quickly

now i was incredibly lucky my life was

saved by my guests who

managed to drive the car at the line and

chase her off

and while i eventually recovered

physically i remained traumatized by the

event

for a long time this this was the worst

thing

that i could ever imagine made worse

by the pain and trauma that had been

inflicted on my family and friends

it looked for certain that my guiding

career was over and it just

felt like my life was falling apart

i certainly didn’t want any of that and

there was nothing

in that whole scenario that i could see

that was positive

i did eventually return to guiding

safaris

but early on i made a decision

not to talk about the lion it felt that

the best

thing for everyone including myself was

for me to just

try and wipe the experience from my life

so i avoided situations where someone

might ask me about it

and if a safari guest ever asked me

if i’d ever had a close call then i’d

give them pretty much

any other experience but i wouldn’t give

them that one

in my mind i didn’t want this to define

me

i wanted to be known as a great safari

guide or a great photographer or pretty

much

anything other than the dummy

he’d gotten attacked by a lion

so i popped the story in a box and i

shut the lid

tight and i carried it around with me in

my personal baggage

for about 15 years

you see i thought my life would be

better with the story locked away

but after all that time my life was

still a constant struggle and

that box was getting very very

heavy so i eventually made the decision

to accept the line attack as a part of

my life

i opened the box and had a good look

around inside and i started to share the

story willingly

you know allowing people to understand

the experience that i’d had

and the journey that it had taken for me

to be able to share it

and in doing so i discovered that the

box that i’d been carrying around with

me for so long

had everything that i needed

for a happy and fulfilling and

meaningful life

now when i spoke to people i found that

you know

a lot of them were moved and inspired by

what i said

not just by the story but also the

journey afterwards

some of them began to look at their

lives differently as a result

which was fantastic but the person

that benefited the most from me sharing

the story was

me every time i shared it i discovered

something new for myself

some new perspective or lesson

or just a big reminder on how to live my

life

when i opened the box one of the things

i rediscovered was the moment when

the lion bit me on the head when i felt

her teeth

biting down i knew without a shadow of a

doubt that i was going to die

but it wasn’t my life that flashed

before my eyes

it was instead i saw all the things that

i hadn’t done in my life

i could see with great clarity that i’d

taken for granted

all the love and care of the people that

i loved the most

and i’d never returned their love

anywhere near as much as i should have

and i saw how much time i’d wasted

and as the teeth bit down harder i could

see that

i’d never really given of myself and i

could see how much i actually had to

give but

now there was no more time

it was a moment of just indescribable

pain and regret but it was also

the most fundamentally powerful and

motivating moment of my life

and that moment had all but disappeared

when the story was sitting in a box

but it was probably the first thing that

came leaping out

after it had been opened and this moment

is now at the forefront of my mind when

i make plans and decisions around my

life

reminds me that i need to keep focus on

what’s really important

and i need to share my gifts i need to

let people see me and i need to not

waste any more time

that moment was just pure gold

but i never would have gone there

willingly

life however had other plans

now in fully accepting and embracing the

whole experience

and freely sharing the story that the

line attack went from being

the worst moment of my life to somehow

become the most valuable

and as you go through your life

you will at some stage face your own

metaphorical lines

and in the hardest of times it’s going

to feel like your world is falling apart

but it’s important to remember at these

moments that this is

just the beginning of a bigger story

this is chapter one

and in walking the journey through these

stories where there are no

straight lines you are going to need

help so don’t be shy to seek it out

and the experiences that you face

at very least they’re going to give you

depth

and perspective and empathy

and these moments are yours no one can

take them away from you and no one can

deny

how you felt when these things were

taking place

and if you want these experiences can

become a platform for you to share

and help others who might be walking

through a similar journey

and when you’re able to help others as a

result of your own pain

then you you begin to recognize that

these hard moments have not been in vain

and that they are actually helping you

to become the human that you really

want to be the harder the experiences

you face in your life

the more you will ultimately have to

offer the world on the flip side

but not not if you keep them in a box

so life is a roller coaster ride and

it’s scary and it’s thrilling

and there will be moments when you want

to get off

but these are the moments often that are

just before things get really amazing

and if you try and design a life without

those scary bits then you also

end up taking out the joy and

life becomes like being stuck on us on a

really suffocating

vanilla merry-go-round where there’s

just no freedom and no fun

so leap into life give as much as you

can

and when things get tough you got to

just keep going

because life will not throw anything at

you that you

can’t handle

thank you