Life is short, time is fast, no replay, no rewind, so enjoy every moment as it comes. How often we listen to such statement by many people around us. “A Good Life is a collection of Happy Moments” — Denis Waitly
This quote by Denis Waitly inspires to many, but I believe without sad moments in life you wouldn’t know what the happy moments are.
College days, with so many responsibilities, work load, and an incredibly hard time struggling to cope up with stress, life wasn’t so great for me. The more I thought about things the worse I felt. One night I went for a walk. I remember this night walk in particular because it reshaped my thoughts, views towards life.
While passing by I saw an old man who opened up the sewer cap and went inside. I couldn’t believe what had just happened! I sat there on the bench the whole night. Early morning the man came out of the sewer, waved to someone inside and closed the cap. I was too curious to know what all was going on so I went there and opened the cap. What I saw there was something that nobody would even imagine. I saw an old lady lying on a small bed. I had to talk to her and know their story.
I came to know that their children have thrown them out of their house and they were homeless. This couple decided to live in such a place where only 2 of them were. It took them a month to clean that 3ft sewer, which was smaller than our bathrooms. With a small bulb, a single bed and some clothes kept under the bed and a stove to cook food. Every morning the man goes out to beg, returns home at night with a small amount of penny which was nothing according to us but enough according to them.
When I came back home, I sat down and realized that the couple even after facing tough time at such an old age were satisfied and were living happily. That moment changed my life forever. It changed my mindset towards life. The place where we feel gross even when we just have to cross it was their home. Both of them were each other’s world and enjoyed everything that life gave them.
This moment shifted my negative thinking to extremely positive one. I had a much different filter on my views towards life. These aren’t small things. These are major life changes. All things made possible by one moment, one shift in thinking. Most of our lives are spent doing unconscious, autonomous behaviors. In fact, about 40% of our daily activities are habitual. Without realizing, we criticize, we think negatively, we complain, we tend to see the bad in situations rather than the good.
This sort of thinking doesn’t change immediately. You can, however, change a little at a time. Start right now by taking a minute or two to create your own mental list of all the good things in your life. Your mindset will start to shift, and you’ll become more mindful.
