HAPPINESS

Happiness.

What is happiness?

                                      If you want to be happy, be.

                                                          -Leo Tolstoy

Happiness is a feeling that sweeps past us at some point of time in a normal day. As soon as you get up, the first thing that comes to mind is what you have to do the whole day; the projects you have to complete, the presentations you have to do, the deadlines you have to meet and finally dodging some of the notorious persons in your life. It is not exactly a pleasant feeling and no one will look forward to a day like that. There is a reason that we like weekend!

In a life like this, where do we find happiness?

Happiness arises out of small things that can happen at any time of our life. 

When you sit back and relax after your retirement, some moments in life will remain the sweetest and they in turn form the happiest moments in life!

Usually the events that make you happy are the simple events in your life rather than the elaborate ones. These simple happenings amount to the happiness of a person in his simple daily life.

What are those simple events that will make me smile? Let me list those one by one.

If you have ever lived in a hostel, you will know that the most hated thing about the life in a hostel is its food! You might have been complaining about the home food before you entered hostel. But once you enter the hostel, you will know the difference the love and care brings to food.

When I go home from hostel for a day or two, I wouldn’t be surprised if a gain a kilo or two over those two days. On the day I go home, my home will smell of my favourite food. If you are a person who loves food, you will have a long list of favourite foods and as a person, for whom food is a religion, my mother makes sure I have had all of those in those two days! 

Just going back home will make me happy, but home food makes it extra special. Thus, the food especially home food occupies the top priority in my list.

The next in the list would have taken the top place, if not for the pathetic hostel situation. But I guess both places have a wonderful position in my heart.

“The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid.”

                                                                                                                     ― Jane Austen

Books are truly a blessing in a person’s life. A person who does not like to read have no idea what they are missing! Though books in general make me happy, a visit to a bookstore will keep me smiling at least for a month. I am not exaggerating when I say ‘a month’! It is true!

The books take me to a different world. You can travel to a very different place other than the one you are trapped in. Bookshops, even the smallest ones selling second hand ones are heavens on earth for a book lover. Though in the present world, online shopping seems wiser and better, it can never beat the ‘aura’ of a bookshop.

You enter a bookstore and when your eyes roam the different books stored in stacks, you feel a shiver going through you. The adrenaline rush that I get will last throughout the time I select my books and pay for them and till I complete reading them. Whenever I look at those books in my bookshelf, I remember the visit to the bookstore, the display of books and so on.

This is a feeling that only a true book lover knows and cherishes and this takes the second part in my list.

Having said about books and bookshops, how can I not say about writing!

The fictional world knows no boundaries; you don’t have to stay trapped in a world. You can write your heart out and when you create a new world, you feel the happiness of having created a new world and you feel the exhilaration of being the master of your own world. Though it is a fictional world, the power that it gives you is something that you can never find it in the real world.

After having written a story, when a reader gives good comments, that makes me even happier. Though I am not writing for anyone in particular, when an unknown face likes the story and when your work gets noticed, there is nothing more rewarding than that!

If, you are a person who commutes frequently or at if you are a person who has visited a bus station or a railway station or a beach, you would have noticed the number of small children selling petty things. They take huge pains in going to every customer in the station and try to sell their wares. Most of the people just ignore them. They will happily give alms to a beggar who will be healthy enough to work, but ignore a small child selling goods to have his life. Without spending their childhood in merry and without being pampered, some are left in the streets to fend for themselves. Whenever I come across one, I try my best to buy something from them and make it useful. Though a single person buying from them will not make much of a difference, when similar minded people like me do the same, it will really be helpful to them.

Once on shopping, I saw a boy of around ten years of age selling flowers nearby. I bought the flowers from him ignoring the other sellers. The little boy’s face was full of happiness and he thanked me for buying. I was touched. What we did was exchange of goods. I was given some flowers for some money, but that didn’t matter to him. 

That little doing in my part made a soul happy and it made me happy in turn. Though I did not do a million amount donations, I was happy beyond that. Helping others will always make us happy and I learned an important lesson that day. 

"True happiness... is not attained through self-gratification, but through fidelity to a worthy purpose."

-                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            --  Helen Keller