Opinion 25 January 2021 issue .
Keys to Happy life
Writer:-Ijlana Nazir
ijlananazir@gmail.com
“The Days that makes us happy makes wise”
When I first read the lines by England’s poet laureate, it startled me. What did John Masefield mean? Without thinking about it much I always assumed that the opposite was true. But his sober assurance was arresting. I could not forget it. Finally, I seemed to grasp his meaning and realized that here was a profound observation. The wisdom that happiness makes possible lies in clear perception, not fogged by anxiety nor dimmed by despair and boredom, and without the blind spots caused by fear. Active happiness not mere satisfaction or contentment often comes suddenly, like an April shower or the unfolding of a bud. Then you discover what kind of wisdom has accompanied it. The grass is greener, birds’ songs are sweeter. The shortcomings of your friends are more understandable and more forgivable. Happiness is like a pair of eyeglasses correcting your spiritual vision.
Nor are the insights of happiness limited to what is near around you. Unhappy, with your thoughts turned in upon your emotions woes; your vision is cut short as though by a wall. Happiness the wall crumbles. The long vista is there for seeing. The ground at your feet the worlds about you-people, thoughts, emotions, pressures are now fitted into the larger scène. Everything assumes a fairer proportion. And here is the beginning of wisdom. From the early stages of life a person experiences a lot of things , gains a lot of knowledge about every aspect of life especially life itself. Life is never easy, it many times teaches us a lesson at that point where a prominent teacher or where family, friends, relatives these words seems muffled in the fog of golden age of trying to achieve all, Upbringing from the days where we start to observe world I use to listen from my elders we learn when we fail(“girnay k baad insaan sambalta hai”) the words were dancing in room of mind how can it be possible but later on I get to know the wisdom behind these experiences. After every short comings and emotional fights within one’s mind ,changes in hormones and the change in moods as well , happiness, sorrow, regret, these are the days of early formation of our way of accepting life and the world around, these are the times when an eye connects to its cognitive nerve and starts to observe the battling views. Millions of people fritter away their lives by a thousand details of which nine hundred get them no-where certainly not towards happiness. And so do their parents. They live life fast, but neither hard nor deep. They live too fast because they don’t know where they simplify their lives because they had never simplified their thinking. These millions have never stopped long enough to calculate what an aim worth having is. They really don’t know what they want, or where they have to reach, the only goal of there is to reach to the lively luxuries which fades soon before the dream of being esteem fades away. Henry Thoreau, a great natural philosopher, had his own solution to the problem, and anyone can apply his theory in his/her general principle. We live in the midst of details that keep us running around in a circle and never getting anywhere but tired, or that bring on nervous breakdowns and coronary thrombosis. The answers no to talk to the woods, but to find out what we really want to do and then cut out the details that fritter away what is most valuable in life. Live deep instead of fast. I think this is what Thoreau mean. He who had set his course in the direction which his own intuition and logical intelligence led him to believe was the right one, and with dogged courage he keeps on going. The words of people are not especially comforting ones but these are days when the world is less in the need of supine comfort than gallantry and faith in an inner integrity. During times of distress, doubts and weariness, people may well be inspired by the- words of the great navigator, “This day we sailed on” (Christopher Columbus).One of the most appalling comments on our present way of the life is that half of our hospital beds are occupied by the patients with nervous and mental troubles. And a principal cause is that too many people allow themselves to collapse under the crushing burdens of accumulated yesterdays and fearful tomorrows.
Here is the problem: you and I are standing in this split second at the meeting place of two eternities-the vast past that has endured forever and the future that is plunging on to the last syllable of recorded time. We can’t possibly live in the either of those eternities, but we often try to do so; and in the process, we wreck both our bodies and our minds. The answer is to live for today in that way which makes you happy to prepare for tomorrow. Of course, it may be that part of today’s work calls for reviewing the past or planning for tomorrow. But there is no excuse for doing so with regret or panic. Instead we should get the facts and push on from there. Today is the only time we can possibly live. Let’s not turn it into a physical and mental hell by aimless worry about the future. Let’s also stop fretting over the blunders we made yesterday.
Remember how a walking trip always seems shorter if we concentrate, not on the total distance to our destination, but just the distance to our next milepost. In the same way, we should concentrate on living within today. Then better tomorrow will inevitably follow. Faith in oneself is important part of all others faiths. The lack of it can paralyze a life. Of course it is natural to have nervous moments. Everyone who has spoken in public is acquainted with the panic that seizes one just before the occasion. There is always the fear that lines will be forgotten, that something will go wrong, and yet the play goes on, usually without a hitch. The same preliminary lack of confidence attends every accomplishment known to man the launching of a military campaign, the composition of poem, the salesman’s first trip, the bride’s first cookery. But if we all succumbed to such misgiving nothing would ever be done. Self- doubt is caused by the fact that every human activity involves some other person whose praise or blame seems unduly important. We set goal of perfection before ourselves and groaningly conclude that it cannot be achieved. But perfectionism is the dangerous state of mind in an imperfect world. The best way is to forget doubt and set about the task in hand. While the battle is being fought or the cake is baking in the oven, leave the outcome to the future where it belongs. If you are doing your best, you will not have time to worry about failure. Live for today with happiness and satisfaction, leaving apart the burdens of tomorrow, prepare for a failure before every new day and start with good confidence and a hand full of smile, because THE DAYS THAT MAKES US HAPPY MAKES US WISE.
“Don’t be pushed around by the fears in your mind,
Be led by the dreams in your heart.
More smiling, less worrying.
More compassion, less judgments.
More blessed less stressed.
More love, less hate.”
(Roy T.Bennett)