Life isn't about getting and having it's about living and being. 

I think it's important to give: to yourself, to the people directly around you and to people all over the world. Starting off with the littlest of things we can make the biggest of differences. 

To give to myself I have to work out what my priorities are. How to make myself happy so that I can share that feeling with the people around me. I truly believe that if you surround yourself with positive and happy people then that will reflect on how you are and how well you treat other people. I, like many other people, enjoy having a pamper evening: running a bath, popping on a face mask and watching a film or good Netflix series because it puts me in a good mood and I can share that with my friends.

I also volunteered at a nursery for 8 months for my Duke of Edinburgh and, although, the main aim was to help out and give my services to the community, I also learned so much about and for myself. Towards to end of the time, I was volunteering, the nursery experienced a flood and had to relocate for a few weeks. They eventually moved back in but are still having to work in portable cabins and the whole experience showed me how positive to be in difficult situations and most importantly when the whole town sent in new children's toys and money for the rebuild so that it meant that everyone's lives could get back to normal as soon as possible, it showed how if you give to the people around you then their lives can improve and you'll positive as a result.

We have to live with the consequences of our actions and how we treat the planet is what future generations are going to have to live with. I'm going to Ecuador for 4 weeks in July next year and I can't wait. It's going to be a totally new experience and I'm going to be introduced to a culture that is very different to my own. However, one of the things I'm going to take from the trip is that I'm hopefully going to be making a difference to people's lives by building homes, schools, and medical centres as well as visiting the amazon and trying to cover my school's carbon footprint.

Each of these three ways of giving makes me feel more positive in my day to day life. For myself, those around me and the world. Keep giving and remember to always show love and compassion to everyone.