Mr. Mark Ruffalo's words of wisdom for our students...

Life seems impossible sometimes when you are young. The world seems so vast and challenging and it’s hard to imagine how one can find the way. I was always deathly afraid that I would be homeless. I was so frightened that I would not find a calling, a respectable profession or a way of making a living. These fears tormented me when I was young. Secretly, I wanted to act, perform or create somehow but that seemed silly and everyone around me told me so. I was a mediocre student. 

The fact is; we can only do as much as our gifts and capabilities. Being a mediocre student does not bar you from doing great things in the future, so don’t get too hung up on that. Certainly don’t let it be the deciding factor on what you will become, just realise that it is only one part of successful life. There is much that is out of your control. The one thing we have in control is the direction we set for ourselves and how we approach difficulties. Your life will end where you point it. 

If you point your life toward destructive behaviour, I can assure you will end in a destroyed life. Addiction, early pregnancy and violence are the fruits of destructive behaviour. 

There was a quote I heard when I was young that meant so much to me. It was said by a great man named Joseph Campbell. He dropped out of college and moved to a cabin in the woods and did what he loved to do more than anything. Read… He spent a decade reading all the books that interested him: mythology, religion, poetry, philosophy, fiction and anthropology. After a decade of reading, he came out of his cabin and became one of our greatest thinkers and teachers. He used all his knowledge and came up with whole new way of looking at the world called ‘Comparative Mythology’.  He inspired movies and teachers and story tellers as well as the culture of the world. He did this vast amount of study on his own simply by following his curiosity and interests. Much of his work centred on the ‘Hero’s Journey’. He had one key thing he would repeat again and again. That one thing was music to my ears and remains that way to me even today. He said to me and anyone who had the spark of their heart’s joy still intact and to those who had lost and longed for their heart’s joy: “Follow your Bliss!”

That’s what I would say to my teenage self if I came upon that squirrelly, insecure kid covered with pimples and half-caved in on himself. I would say “Even though so little of how you feel or what the world seems to be saying to you at this point gives you confidence in yourself or the future, within you, within the depths of you, lies everything you need to sustain an authentic and well lived life.  There will be difficulty no matter what. There will be pain, sadness and loss but if you follow the part of you that quietly leads you to your joy; if you can drown out the unceasing noise of what people think you “should” be doing, and sometimes that includes your parents, teachers, even people you trust and admire; follow your curiosity, your interests and what makes you feel alive and joy, then you will always be safe. You’ll be shielded from much of the stifling grief that the world has to offer. You will become a master of that thing that gives you joy. In the end dear one, it is not about money, nor fame, nor popularity and not even love for that matter; all those things are secondary and will naturally bloom out of following the golden thread your soul has laid for you.

Follow that which presents you a challenge, hold on to it and follow it onto the treasure that lies at the end of that thread. That is who you ultimately are and what you are ultimately meant to do.”     

So, ‘Follow Your Bliss’ young people!

Mark Ruffalo