LIVE Magazine TV June 2018

constantly hear, “Don’t worry. He’s out there.”, and you unconsciously accept that
somehow you aren’t complete or your life isn’t whole until the perfect person in
the perfect scenario completes you.
But it’s not like that. Things are just the way it’s supposed to be right here, Right
now. I won’t diminish one day while I wish for something else I don’t have.
So many people compromise their lives accepting things they shouldn’t- out
of fear of being alone. If things change tomorrow, that’s tomorrow. Today
is perfect just the way it is.
Juli: You say you have reached the point of ‘No fear’. Tell us how you
have reached that point?
Charissa: After losing loved ones, almost losing everything in the last
couple of recessions, and now watching my hard working friends get close
to retirement and get sick, I have grown accustomed to fear. It doesn’t go
away, it’s like the monster under the bed. It just isn’t as scary. Life is scary.
Bad things happen. Don’t act like you don’t know.
In the eternal words of my favorite scholar, Tim Minchin (Youtube, you’ll
thank me, UWA Graduation Speech, 9 Life’s Lessons)
“I said at the beginning of this ramble that life is meaningless. It was not a
flippant assertion. I think it’s absurd: the idea of seeking “meaning” in the
set of circumstances that happens to exist after 13.8 billion years worth of
unguided events. Leave it to humans to think the universe has a purpose
for them. However, I am no nihilist. I am not even a cynic. I am, actually,
rather romantic. And here’s my idea of romance:
You will soon be dead. Life will sometimes seem long and tough and,
god, it’s tiring. And you will sometimes be happy and sometimes sad.
And then you’ll be old. And then you’ll be dead.
There is only one sensible thing to do with this empty existence, and
that is: fill it. Not fillet. Fill. It. And in my opinion (until I change it), life
is best filled by learning as much as you can about as much as you
can, taking pride in whatever you’re doing, having compassion, sharing
ideas, running(!), being enthusiastic.
And then there’s love, and travel, and wine, and sex, and art, and kids, and
giving, and mountain climbing … but you know all that stuff already.
It’s an incredibly exciting thing, this one, meaningless life of yours. Good luck.
www.timminchin.com/2013/09/25/occasional-address
Juli: What advice would you give young women if they decide to go into the construction
business?
Charissa: Everything above. :-)
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