The Art of Happiness

I think I have mentioned in this blog before that I am a morning person and get up normally in a happy disposition.  The growth rate is down, the economy has taken a beating, the job market is about but on its knees and the manufacturing sector hasn't fared too well either.  Yet every morning I wake up happy and blissful, continue to my journey of fighting life everyday and return home mostly a happy person.  Happiness for me is the sum total of my experiences.  My good memories are highlighted each day as the bad one get buried by them. I have loads of good memories and most of them relate to my childhood, do you think our childhood truly defines what we become ?  Otherwise I just can't fathom why am I happy ?

I have been talking and talking to friends for days now on this.  Grouchiness finds no place in my life right now.  Family is alright too, yet my inate honesty, and that is my honesty to myself betrays me with my family.  I find myself lying to them and hiding things from them.  I don't regret anything, not the reason which made me lie or hide something but the fact that I was not better able to hide it better.  Ofcourse and that does not make me happy so I just go about hiding it from them better.  I will tell you what makes me happy, its the thought of listening to a fiery speech, the thought of emotions rising high in my head, the dream that I have of being a winner is what takes precedence over everything else.  Did I say that when I left my last company there were atleast a three to four people that suggested that I was a misfit in the company.  I fought it for all of two months, me a misfit was a never never. Till I realised that what was being said might be correct after all.  Ofcourse i would be misfit amongst people with corrupted morals, people with dual standards.  And that is precisely what makes me angry, while I may have revelled in the company of these so called rich men with their fancy toys, they had this influence of corrupting me.  So, you may ask, how do we stop them from taking over our consciousness and even influencing our sub consciousness.  And thats a revelation that came to me today like a lightening in my head.  We do that by becoming them for a brief moment, by following their path and in that brief moment killing them and their ideas, subverting their system by infusing fresh ideas of idealism and revolution.  This thought really makes me very happy.  I have rediscovered the art of being happy.

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ALL IS WELL

Remember Three Idiots the movie, and what people thought of it as movie.  Everyone thought it was remarkable and I thought well, its remarkable alright because the whole movie is about "miracles do happen".  If you are an Indian then miracles happen almost everyday.  Remember that visit to the hospital when so many people came to visit the doctor, and you were like wondering where did all these people come from.  Well my dear friend, they came because they wanted to know if you were all OK.  Imagine a person in a hospital read overglorified five stars if nobody is around when you are ill.  People team around you like worker bees around a queen bee because they want to know if "All is Well".  I always remember the old hindi song " Jo bhi pyar sey milla, hum ussey key ho liye".  After all life is too short to search for old friends.  So whoever you meet with love is a friend, my dear friend.  I have turned a cynic towards the late half of my life.  Turned 40 two years back, and started to wonder if anyone even takes critical, cynical people too seriously.  A dreamer they love, somebody who gives them positivity and dreams to take back home.  The dream merchants are all there, where they churn out dreams after dreams, all so real, or should I say "reel".

I confess I am not much of a dreamer nowadays, I only dream while I am awake.  Logic would dictate that, that means I am sleeping soundly most of the times.  Another song that comes to my mind "Days are Passing quickly now, Nights are seldom long", does the signify another milestone in my life.  It turned when I got married at 22, then it turned again at 32 when I was certified a misfit and again at 42 it takes a turn, don't know for what, except the only thing I realise is "that my best days are yet to come".  Do you realise how intrinsic songs are in our life.  Absolute mood busters, you wanna feel good take the ones that play on local FM channels everyday and on the other hand if you want to bust your good mood look up some old classics on youtube.  Beatles played an enormous part in bringing up my generation, you can well imagine all boys and girls in large sized goggles and sporting wide hemmed bell bottoms and tight fitting T-shirts jiving to "She loves me Yea Yea Yea".  Can you believe it, I formed a part of this group too.  I laugh my head of when I realise that I could have been carried away by such things as attitude and thoughts of who wore what and talked what before I made friends.  Imagine, if you didn't have a cool set of sneakers I wouldn't be seen with you.  What a joke matey !! .. ain't it ?  I believe that we are ignorant when we are young and even more ignorant as we grow older .. best left unsaid what I feel about myself today except that if there is a way to change then that is the way we must choose.

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Its My Life

Have you ever had the experience of being told what to do by the absolutely most ignorant of people.  I don't want to sound judgemental yet that's what I felt when I was told how to manage my love life by somebody who was divorced, not connected with his kins and family and as few friends that I could count on my fingers.  There will be a lot of occasions when I have done exactly what I shouldn't have, despite knowing the suspicious antecedents of the people advising me I have gone ahead and followed their advice and nothing has accrued, I have only lost money, friends or face.  Take the instance of calling up people that I have had a falling with, why do I persist in thinking or calling them, they have played no significant role in my life yet I call them knowing fully well that either the call will not be picked up or there will be a another fight around the corner.  This is such a duh thing to do, and I think I am a reasonable intelligent person with enough intelligence to understand where I am not wanted.  Isn't it simple to understand, go where you are wanted !!

For so many years I have been following what people have wanted me to, their dreams, their desires, their advise and believe me even on what I should be wearing and eating.  You might say what "even eating and wearing" .. no ! I haven't done that ever.  Well, do you remember the gift that somebody gave you and you wore it so that the person wouldn't feel bad about it or the ill fitting clothes that I wore when I was a kid simply because there was no money for new branded clothing.  So clothes were inherited according to the sizes of the people who wanted to wear them.  My maternal uncles clothes were passed on to me in legacy.  Fabulous ain't it, imagine if my father hadn't told me about the incredible "softy ice cream" I might have grown up to eating home made "Ras Malai" and loving it.  Cultures are imbibed into us by our parents and family even teachers.  They make us into what we are and who we are as kids, and if we continue to live listening to their advise then that's who we are exactly, our parents/family/teachers. 

However if on the other hand we choose to cut off from them and choose to live our life on our terms then we surely are ourselves.  That of course is assuming that you will not be the first and you will not be the last in any endeavour.

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