Rika: Only good things have been happening, and that kind of scares me.
Satoko: What an indulgent worry! […] Worrying about being too happy is just as wasteful as missing out on a good sale at the supermarket!
Rika: You’re right, it is a waste.
Satoko: Perhaps you just haven’t realized the true nature of happiness, Rika.
Rika: Huh?
Satoko: Painful moments, no matter how small, stay in our hearts forever. But tiny moments of happiness are quickly forgotten. Forget them, and you forget how truly blessed you are, and you instead yearn for a happiness far greater than you can bear. I cannot think of a more unfortunate turn of events.
Happiness is hiding. In every breath we take, there’s a glint of happiness we’ve ceased to notice. The silent smile about being here, living, experiencing emotions and the colours of life has left us early on. Hunting for pain, searching for bad news, failures and issues we are, having lost the once playful cheer of childhood’s innate wisdom.
How can we return to this lost state? Who can heal the soul which has digested the poison we call the knowledge of adulthood? Can we shut out these voices which announce the news all around us, the voices we’ve learned to believe in and long for?
Silence is hard to get back. Meditation, isolation, decoupling the self from the racing world is not easily done. We must strive to step back from time to time, and observe from a distance. Step back from the daily activities, the stream of events, contacts with others, and ourselves.
Happiness is enjoyed best with others. But we can’t enjoy it, can’t store it, can’t remember it, if we don’t know how to watch from a distance.
Temporary, light happiness is easy to achieve. But only with true depth it is remembered — we must embrace it, accept it, know and realize we experience blissfulness. Only then, happiness is more than a fleeting emotion. Solely then, it is true to the bone and becomes a part of us.
Close your eyes. Shut out the noise, the stream of daily tasks, the idle chatter of mailboxes, media and the voices in your brain enumerating the list of duties. Breathe. Experience the silence.
Think. What is it that made this day special to you? Who was with you? Which experiences did you make? A united decison, a ray of sunlight in the morning, a chirping bird, a silently tumbling whirl of snowflakes. There is so much. Laughing together, enjoying a wonderful landscape, a calm night, a warm bed, a good meal.
All these elements are usually ignored, taken for granted, erased from the equation of life, while a single headline in the news may burn itself into our minds so much more easily. Take back control, adjust your focus. Achieve true happiness by refocusing the blurred image society has imprinted into your brain, burned into your soul.
Turn off the autofocus which has been broken by the lifestyle we are forced to enjoy, and refocus manually to gain back the innate wisdom of children.