Thursday, September 25, 2008

The Happiness Sale – Happy Revolution.

A Google search on Happiness gives me lacs of pages which one can read to find happiness and ways of finding happiness. How to be happy? How to find happiness? Key to real happiness, the pursuit of happiness etc etc. The list is endless. Still most of them are still in the process of searching, searching just like a treasure hunt. Search is on!! A couple of them search happiness and land up in the malls, movie theatres, a few to temple festivals, few on a happiness marathon. There is a Happiness Sale which runs at the central mall in the city and there is a Happy price menu at the Mc Donald’s. I don’t know if the customers are really happy, but I am sure with the happiness sale the retailers are making loads of money and disposing off their excess inventories. The Happy ice cream parlour close to my home makes good money by selling an ice cream with a Happy Flavour (don’t know the ingredients of the flavor yet). There are Happy Hours at workplaces to entice employees and managers at work and to feel one with their workplace. The Health and Happiness workshop over the weekend by many spiritual gurus and the self proclaimed enlightened one’s , whole lot of posters in the roads, garden lampposts and handbills. The latest Happy Singh in the movie Singh is King trying to make people around him happy and guiding them to the path of happiness. A travel company promoting happiness tours for all its clients this Diwali. I switch on the television, there is a happiness preaching going on in the early morning. The other day I went to buy a T – Shirt, it says Forgotten to be Happy. Most of us have forgotten to be happy that is the reason why we get so many reminders on the way home, on the way to work, while we eat, while we shop, in the movies and of course in the temple gods also remind us to be happy with all the workshop posters when you are about to leave as you wear your footwear.

Happy, Happy everywhere. Then what is everyone searching for?
Why do these two guys happy and happiness keep popping up in our lives? Have we really forgotten to be happy that we require these pop ups often not only on our systems, media , but in our life in general. If the answer is a YES, then read on..

The main purpose of life is to be happy. But most of us forget it in the process. We are so busy accumulating our wealth thinking that some day we can afford that palatial apartment, costly dinner at a seven star hotel or planning for a world tour. But life is so uncertain. A few of my friends who thought that they could buy happiness with a superb investment bankers job crashed recently. That uncertain is the situation and circumstances around us as each day passes. So why not live every moment with fullness and in the state of happiness. It is very practical but most of us do not want to go with the flow of life. We resist change, we try to control things around us, we want things to be the way we want them to be, we want people to behave like we want them to behave, we don’t express and therefore we are in distress. So the conflict of happiness begins within us only. Mind is a monkey and so it keeps jumping from one thought to another thought. If we can be a little aware of it, we have made our first step towards being happy.

This weekend try to contemplate and do some soul searching on happiness and for all you know nature will give its answers. These answers lie within you somewhere hidden. Try not to search happiness in a mall, movie theatre, but yes you can go to a nearby park or a garden, gaze at the sky, look at yourself in the mirror, paint, write and rest.

The happiness revolution just waits to explode. The process has already begun. People are going to turn inwards in their pursuit of happiness in the decades to come. This will give a real tough time for the marketing guys to market their products be it any category.

Don’t forget ‘’Happiness is a state of mind’’. The mind is all over you, you just need to be constantly aware.

"If you want happiness for an hour -- take a nap.
If you want happiness for a day -- go fishing.
If you want happiness for a month -- get married.
If you want happiness for a year -- inherit a fortune.
If you want happiness for a lifetime -- help someone else. ''
-- Chinese proverb

6 comments:

  1. i can't believe this..it is really superb...keep writing...such great things..

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  2. Yeah !!! Life is not complicated ..we make it complicated by lots of never ending expectations...from everyone and everything...We just need to love ourselves and our dear ones...follow what our mind says..JUST DO WHAT IS RIGHT...Peace and..happineess will will flow into your life..effortlessly...

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  3. Great article. Very relevant in the current world. I wish people realise this soon.

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  4. Happyness is inversely proportional to expectation. One who realises this will always be happy.

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  5. This is so true in the current context. It is amazingly well written and ended superbly with the Chinese proverb! Bravo.. keep it up

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  6. Happiness is our intrinsic nature. Keeping it within us, we go after the world and its objects for happiness. No doubt we get happiness in them, but it is our own happiness reflected there. The dog gets happy sucking the bone. The bone scrathes its tongue and blood oozes out. The dog thinks its from the bone. It does not know it is its own blood, that trickles out from the tongue, hurting itself in the process. Likewise we humans too go after the world.

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