A stroll by the shore . . .

By the shores of the Digha beach on the stone pavements as I sit and stare into the sinking sun, the melody of the gushing waves beating the shores in the backdrop of an unusual but peaceful silence fill my heart with contentment for apparently no reason. I feel unusually happy. Good, because I haven’t felt this way in a long while, exuberance starts to fill me out of nowhere. However, unusual, because I simply do not know why I feel so.

My mind starts to dive into an overdrive trying to find an explanation for the genesis of my mind’s apparent pleasurable state of affairs.  Questions, questions are the key to unravel things that you seek answers to. I had known this since sometime now as I had a habit of trying to find answers to things. I start to ask myself then; questions that I think may offer me my answers. I began with ‘When’; when was the last time I felt like this, happy and content without a reason?  I do not know this, simply because I haven’t felt this way in a long while since childhood probably.

Ok, I’ll move on to ‘Why’ I thought; why was I feeling so? Well, if I had an answer to this I would have probably found a way to be perpetually happy. Why me? Anybody who could know how he or she could be happy would be the most content people in the world. For all we know there maybe people who know this and are leading a content life.

I ponder further and trying to get the best out of me I start walking, dragging my feet in the cooling sands. As walked, I started to wonder what people said about happiness. Started to think when people generally fell happy. This one question, thankfully, I could come up with some answers unlike the ‘When’ and ‘Why’ of before. People generally feel happy when they meet someone the first answer that came to my mind as I had just met my girl a week back and the memory was the first to strike me. They also feel happy when they get something probably a gift, an appreciation, salary or bony may be. They also are happy when they accomplish something significant.

So far so good, so how often then people feel happy? Well, going by the above we don’t feel happy for a long duration as material things they are the common reasons for our happiness the sources for which have but a finite time of existence. You meet someone, how long do you feel happy? Till the company remains, or more practically till such time that the company of that person does not grow old on you. Either the company itself or the memory of the momentary meeting fades away and it is no longer strong enough to stimulate you anymore. Much the same way, when you get something, say a gift, your happiness is bound to a finite time duration after which you get accustomed to it and in a way the worthiness of the thing fades away. I thought, that would mean people are at the mercy of a set time limit during which they could feel happy much like a wave, feelings rising up only to settle down again. Their cup in essence could never be filled.

Just then, something pricked my leg and broke my thoughts. A small thorn had made its way into my feet. I removed it and threw it away and saw around that during my thoughts, the sun had already set. I had already passed an hour lost in thoughts. In that one hour, I was privy to the happenings of my surroundings. I was not blindfolded but yet was cut off from the world. I had not closed my ears, still the sound of the gushing waves the ones I described as a melody didn’t register in me. I could not relish the soothing sun peacefully making its way for the night to set in. I didn’t see the children play their pranks on each other by the shore nor could see the people taking joy rides on horses and camels a little distance away. I felt sad as I no longer found the sound of the waves soothing nor the cool winds comforting me. I realized that it is nothing but our brains that keep us from enjoying the little things that are in plenty in life. The brain makes us take these things for granted, just like how an hour back I took the awesome feeling for granted and started to ponder over stuff that didn’t matter rather than enjoying that moment. I, in a sense, became accustomed to my ‘pleasurable state of affairs’.

I life, much the same way we fail to realize that it is the small things that matter to us and should not be taken for granted. The sooner we realize this, the better for us. The key to being happy is to control our brain and try not to decode life too much. The most important thing is the moment that we live in. to make it count to not take it for granted, to not become accustomed to it. When all these small moments add up we will see that we are no longer bound by the finite limits of time and we need to look no further to be happy. Stop finding reasons for happiness because what you do, what you have each moment is the key to be happy then and every moment you have something and you do something don’t you?