Humanutopia - another great experience!

(Photo credit: www.oasisacademyoldham.org)
On Wednesday we had an organisation come into our school called humanutopia as some of you may have guessed by the title!

As their message was said to be important, we missed all our lessons that day which was cool. 😎

There work was aimed at preparing students (around the teenagers years) for the future. At first, when I heard speculation of their visit to us, I didn't really know what to expect. In my opinion it can be quite hard to motivate and inspire an individual at times, never mind over 100 year 10 (9th grade) students!

Despite all of the unknowns, the whole of my year group (grade) were so surprised at how well they had a connection and understanding of school life for school students of our age group.

The Morning consisted of finding yourself and boosting self-esteem. I never thought I'd say this but at times it did get quite emotional.

We got talking about bullying and one of the people from the organisation told us to stand up if we had ever been bullied before. I would have said 95% of the people in the room stood up. Firstly that proves that bullying happens way more than it should do. Then secondly, she said "the people that are brave enough to share their experience, remain standing." I would say 90% of people (who were originally standing) sat down. That included me! I sat down probably for the same reason as most people in the room...
We are conscious of the fact that we are surrounded by a bunch of individuals that may laugh or make fun of the situation.

I've got to admire the bravery of the few that remained standing. They may have got upset (which upset a lot of other people in the room) whilst they spoke but it shows how badly bullying can play with people's emotions sometimes. Seeing people, who you don't usually see, get upset really hit home that bullying happens to the most of us and that it doesn't really matter how popular you may be! Also, seeing the desperation on some of the students faces showed how badly they wanted their bullying situation to be resolved.

Whilst people were telling of their experiences of being bullied, one of the people from the organisation kept reinforcing that bullying really does destroy ones confidence and without it, school would be so much more of a welcoming place to attend.

What was so true in what they said was that people will bully you for anything and everything! No matter how perfect you try to make yourself appear to be, there will always be someone who will want to put you down. If your skinny they'll call you anorexic but if you gain wait they'll start calling you fat! It seems like there is just no escape from verbal abuse nowadays!

(Photo credit: www.flickr.com)
Your probably thinking, why have included a picture of a bin but you'll soon understand why. The organisation showed how bullying effected the mind by the process in which a bin was filled. This was really interesting because it showed a person to be like a bin. Not literally but more metaphorically. People who are suffering themselves will offload some of their litter (meaning abuse) into your bin (meaning mind). The more people who do this means the more litter/garbage that fills your bin. Instead of you offloading your garbage the way many others do by putting it in someone else's bin, try and reject it and refuse to accept the garbage that people are trying put into your bin. This way, you are training your mind to ignore the insignificant comments from others that are trying to change who you are!

The afternoon was spent playing games that were meant to promote teamwork and encourage us to socialise with people we wouldn't normally talk to. It may sound boring me just talking about it but the games we played made me laugh!

We ended on talking about the owner who originally set up the company. His name was Graham and apparently he grew up in Liverpool (UK) and (throughout his teenage life) hung around with a gang. We'd heard that his home life wasn't all that good so that was the reason he decided to seek attention from this gang. We were told that the night before his GCSE's he was sat at a pub with this gang where they offered him this substance. Graham asked what it was but they refused to tell him but told him to take it. He repeatedly asked them what it was until they gave into him and told him it was heroin.

(Photo credit: www.heroinaddictionusa.org)
If some of you don't know, heroin is a class A drug which (like most drugs) can have serious effects on your health and can be lethal. As soon as he was told what it was, he refused it. Receiving lots of abuse from his fellow gang members, he left the pub feeling really upset. Since Graham was pretty clever, he ended doing quite well in his GCSE exams despite not revising as much as he could of. Graham went onto to set up the business which is now Humanutopia! Graham went on to have a nice house with a family of his own.

However, that is not the end of the story!
One day, Graham along with the co-creator Carlo were driving around in their van and then suddenly Graham saw a face that looked familiar but thought nothing of it. Then when he saw the man again on a later date, he told Carlo to stop the van. Graham got out and approached the man. It turned out it was one of his friends from the same gang he was apart of when he was younger! The only difference was that he continued to hang around with the gang after Graham stopped and ended up taking the heroin. He then became addicted to it.

Although they both were in the same position once, they both came to lead very different lives. Graham's friend's job was to try and sell news papers and when he wasn't doing this, he was trying to find some place to live. When he couldn't find anywhere, he would be forced to sleep on the streets. Graham on the other hand, lived in a great house, in a great area with a family of his own.

It shows how extremely different Graham's life could have been if he'd proceed to take heroin.

It really was a great experience and it brings me great joy to be able to share this with the steemit community!

Thanks for taking the time out to read this post and I hope you enjoyed it. ;)

Here's a link to the website if anyone is interested in looking more deeply into what Humanutopia are all about: http://www.humanutopia.com/