Repeat Your own View

By Jacob Forton 

 Sonder

Sonder is defined as, the profound feeling that everyone, including strangers passed in the street, has a life as complex as one's own, which they are constantly living despite one' personal lack of awareness by it. 

   

As I took on this weeks challenge this was the only way to describe the constant feeling that I felt. It is easy for us to become unaware of the lives of others especially since we live in such a self centered world.  Ever since we are born, we immediately are crying. As toddlers we cry when ever we are hungry or angry, and it doesn't just end there. We as humans live our lives only caring about ourselves because let's face it we can only control what we do. 

The Art Of Noticing:

The Challenge I chose to do was called "repeat your own view" it was from The Art Of Noticing where Walker had a student who it states noticed an unoccupied bench and decided to sit on the bench for 15 min everyday without his phone in hopes that the view will review that its really not the same after all. 

I attempted this challenge however, my own variation of it where I chose to sit outside on my apartment balcony for 20 min for 3 days. I never really sat on my balcony often but I figured why not especially since I am paying for rent. Below I am gonna tell you what this view had revealed to me....

Day One 

What day one revealed to me was my childhood, I saw matador stadium in the distance, I noticed streetlights as well as a daycare. These each represented a part of my childhood where I grew up playing on the playgrounds and football and basketball in the streets. The street lights represented how my mom would want me back into the house however I often would stay late. My childhood was fun, I identified as an athlete and grew up hating my highschool town as it was hard for me to find friends. I think the message for others learned that day was that we often times are stuck living in our past or worried about past judgements made on us that we let our past define us. 

Day Two 

On day two, I noticed my future. I saw parents picking up their kids from daycare, which demonstrated that one day I want to have kids and a family. Then I saw the apartments I was staying in vs the run down apartments all the way to my right. This showed me that the future is all up to me and in this world my choices will reflect whether I want to live a better life or struggle and make my life hell. Eventually we all must mature and that comes with knowing our responsibilities and choosing to take risks for the things that we love. 

 Day Three

During day three, this was the most important lesson I learned which tied back to sonder as defined above. I saw a homeless man walking down the street and so obviously I felt bad for the guy. I began to notice parents telling their kids at the daycare to hurry up and get in their car. They obviously felt threatened in some type of way and so they wanted to protect their children. I began to question, why do we whenever we pass a homeless man we want to offer money and sometimes we do, but most the time as they get closer we begin to turn our head and avoid them. I came to the conclusion that we are so self centered that we sometimes don't have time for others. We also don't understand what other people go through and the silent battles that they face everyday. 

The Questions

Obviously sitting on my balcony without my phone allowed me to get deep into my thoughts, therefore I wanted to share the questions that raced my mind in my experiences: 

-Are we doing all that we can to be successful in a world where it doesn't care if we make it out?

-How quickly are we to judge others even when we have our own flaws that aren't any better?

-Are you doing what you truly want to do in  life? 

-Are you making it a point to love others 

-Why do we care so much about what people think about us? 

-Why do we continue to let our past define us? 

Lessons Learned

What I learned by doing this challenge is that when we put our phones down we can learn a lot about the world as often times our device has all of our attention now a days. We must try our hardest to love others as well as appreciate your past as you have grown and changed for the better. I believe we also must have hope as my hope was in seeing my future as I know life is truly what I make it. 

What this challenge taught me about others was that we as humans each fight silent and personal battles that not even our parents or closest friends know about. We must look in the mirror before we judge others. Also we can't expect happiness if we don't love and appreciate the blessings we already have.