She Is Going To Skin Me

So, a ‘good’ friend of mine classifies herself a Certified Loner. I’m not even sure I should call her a good friend, owing to the fact that I last saw her ten....yes ten years ago, but I’d rather call her that. She has done nothing not to deserve it-it’s not like she has pulled a gun on me or worse made off with my muffin. But being a loner gets me thinking rather worryingly whether she is happy. But again what is happinesas any way? I’ve got no real answer but just what I think happiness should be all about.

It’s not about job success or raising perfect kids or a great marriage. It’s about how you live each moment. My neighbour Pamela, a young mother struggling to pay her bills and raises a child on a receptionist's salary, woke up one morning in a state of near despair. She and her husband had split up-again-and she was dead broke. The sky was overcast. Figuring things looked so bad she got out the vacuum and was dispiritedly working her way back and forth across the living room rug when she looked up. There right beside her with his toy vacuum, was her 18 month old son. He beamed at her, and Pamela realized that despite everything, in that moment she was perfectly content. At least that’s what she told me.

Most of us are like her. We conclude that if we aren’t happy all the time, then we aren’t happy. Yet its ludicrous to expect to be happy 24 hours a day. Happiness as I’ve come to see comes in bits and pieces, and what we must learn to do is savour the small events in our lives-like the baby working a vacuum across the room. Oddly it may come your way in the form of a bird several meters airborne, relieving itself on your precious top!

I understand Buddhists call this approach living mindfully or living with mindful awareness. I kind of agree, but there is no chance that I’m about to change my affiliation. Others describe it as living in the present, or growing where you’re planted. Whatever the phrase, the concept is the same: Its when you are consciously and completely experiencing where you are, what you are doing and how you are feeling. It’s when you aren’t thinking about anything but the experience you’re having.

At such moments, when the present is so full of richness and wonder that nothing else matters, when you are feeling connected to nature and to other people, you are happy. If there is one secret to happiness it is paying attention to these moments and creating opportunities for more of them in your life. I don’t even know if I’m even making any sense but I guess I’m happy! Is she?