I was going through the self help section at a book store recently. It had books on everything right from talking to strangers, feeling confident, making friends, and more than a dozen titles on being happy. Here’s my two cents on being happy.

Firstly, do we need a book to know how to be happy? Happiness is a feeling which comes from within. It cannot come by reading books. No one else in the world knows us better than ourselves. Only ‘We’ know what makes us the happiest. For some it is the latest gadget while for some it’s the best jewelry. Some people even get happy when they get the food they like while some others find happiness in success. Some of us get a thrill out of creative effort while some of us find happiness in our family or friends. It’s totally up to us to realize what makes us happy. Some people can earn Rs10 a day and sleep happily while others earning 10,000 a day might not be happy. It’s just our state of mind.

One thing common among all the people on earth is Pursuit of happiness. Someone rightly said “What we want from life is continuous and genuine happiness”. We all have only one motto in life – to be HAPPY. Some want to be successful to be happy, some want to be rich to be happy while some want to be famous to be happy.

Since childhood, we have known happiness as a conditional feeling. For example, as a kid, if you got a new toy you were happy. Slowly it graduated to good marks, good job, good pay, nice family….. We learnt to get happy on conditions. If I buy a new car I will be happy. If I can buy a new house I will be happy. Most of the times we relate happiness with things that have not happened.

We human beings have this common habit of forgetting the joys and remembering the bad times. We never ever think of being happy with what we have. I don’t say that we should not pursue success, money, fame or love. I just want us to remember the reason why we want success, money, fame or love. We always see happiness as something that will happen tomorrow. We forget to experience it today. The desperation, need or anxiety to achieve the means of happiness does not let us find happiness around us. There is no secret for happiness which we do not know or which a book can tell us. Everything is within us. We should learn to look inward for happiness. Care for people around you, try to make someone happy, and try to enjoy the life you have. Be grateful for what ever you have and you will be happy. Don’t relate happiness with future. It is in your present.

If you are already happy, your attitude towards your goals changes. You are more confident in your approach. Be happy that you have friends and family to share your sorrows. Be happy that you have not been struck by a calamity or tragedy. Be happy that you have a good home to live in and good food to eat.

Let us start being happy with ourselves first and other things will come on their own. Happiness does not need any investment. It just needs a mindset that we are happy. Being satisfied and happy gives you the feeling of joy and bliss which I guess is the ultimate aim of our every action. Let us not forget to be happy in this pursuit of happiness.

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It was a bright sunny afternoon and I was just about getting onto an important business phone call when the the rhythmic drumbeat started. It was sharp, intense and with increasing tempo. A minute later, disturbed and annoyed, I peeped out of my window. Initially it was a sense of anger and rage, upset that my planned and peaceful environment had changed.

Enraged that an otherwise relatively silent afternoon in this quiet locality was suddenly cacophonous. Minutes later, I quietly fastened the window panes and proceeded to take the call in relative silence. All through there was something about the scene that kept me upset.

The din was from a 2 member roadside circus team. The acrobat was a girl of about eight or less. Perhaps from a gypsy family, she was riding a bicycle rim on a makeshift tightrope suspended at least three times her height. She had but a long stick to balance herself and carried three pots on her head that did nothing more than complicate the scenario. Safety was non existent beyond her confidence. Her act no less than a stunt from any blockbuster.

There were just 2 active spectators and perhaps a few passive ones like me who didn’t do more than peep from within their comfort zones. A passerby threw in a coin onto a small red cloth below that was otherwise empty. Needless to say the amount of money collected throughout the act would not suffice a meal for the girl. Yet the performance lasted for a full 20 minutes. As the drumbeat became louder and faster, the complexity of her acts reflected the tempo of the tense act and I watched her defy the rules of balance and gravity.

At a time she should have been enjoying her childhood, she was doing daredevilry to support her family. Desperately keeping alive a dying art. Surviving through a culture handed down her generations. Given a choice, I am sure there are a dozen different things she would want to do.

For me, this was just another moment when I thought I could use a few minutes and contribute a few coins… Devoid of feelings, I admit that I did neither. I managed to cover it up, convinced that I had time for more important things.

Fortunately, I did click the snap with the hope that I would someday be able to spend at least a few minutes on it… Perhaps the next time around I will take a minute to walk down and add in a coin. Till then, I hope the art lives. And so does the girl.

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