For the past 20 years, the annual What Matters? Writing Competition has asked young Australians to write an answer to the question: what matters to you?
Inspired by the commitment of former Prime Minister Gough Whitlam to involving young people in shaping Australia's future, this national writing competition is open to students in years 5-12. It encourages young Australians to raise their voices and know that their perspectives are valuable, no matter their age, background or viewpoint.
The What Matters? Writing Competition is run by the Whitlam Institute within Western Sydney University. More about What Matters? can be found here.
Years 7 & 8 Category, Winner, Eliza Emerson, Bothwell District High School
I'm outside, it's the year 2024. I look around, the wind is strong and blowing my hair all over my face. Mum's washing is blowing around on the clothesline. I think it would be three times dry now! The wind makes the world seem extra busy and angry at the same time. The leaves are falling, it's Autumn, the colours of the leaves, yellow, brown are pretty but make a mess.
I hear a kookaburra laughing in the distance. Maybe laughing at me staring at my paper in front of me. There are sounds of a noisy machine down the road. Its loud and annoying I guess it's the council doing their work.
I'm thirteen years old and live in this old historic town, Bothwell, in the middle of Tasmania. It is full of stories but what is mine going to be? I stare at the questions in front of me, what matters to me? History is all around me, the sash on the old window of my old cottage, the broken pieces of two-hundred-year old pottery that are in the garden next to me, they all tell a story. I wonder if my air pods will be in the garden in many years to come, my laptop, my phone. I see a white butterfly, it comes closer to me, it's flapping its wings happy and free. Watching the butterfly makes me think more deeply what matters to me. Once a grub in a cocoon, now flying free. I don't think the butterfly's past or future would matter to now, its living in the present.
In that moment I realised that I was thinking way too hard about what matters to me. I have a list of ideas written on my paper, my family, my future, my dreams but I don't need any of them at all. History is what matters to me and the future matters too, but what really matters to me is now. With all the noises and movement of the world distracting me from focusing on now. This day and this time right now matters to me. I can never get back this time, back, this year, this moment.
The time is going fast, the world is spinning as I write, the butterfly is living now but may not be tomorrow, its enjoying time now. The clocks are ticking, my heart is beating, the wind is blowing all together in this moment of now. What matters to me is now in this very moment. I see history, I see nature. I breath, I am in the present now.
The butterfly lands on my paper. It looks at me, I watch it back. The town clock strikes and the church bell rings, they are the part of the moment. The butterfly doesn't move, it stays on my paper. The sound of the bells and wind do not distract it, reminding me to do the same and enjoy the moment now.
With a deep breath, I feel calm, I feel happy, I am in the present. My future and history will come and go. I watch the butterfly fly away, the wind stops and its so quiet. I am enjoying and appreciating now even though soon it will be the next moment, my new now. And that what matters to me.
