On happiness again.

I would say that happiness comes in different shapes and sizes. In fact, I must say that happiness is a lot like a Christmas morning where kids rip their present wrappers apart to uncover the object in the box to be exactly what they want. Truth be told, happiness can also be said to be the undemanding joy of parents watching their kids flutter with delight as their kids unwrap their presents.

I, however, am not a parent so I’ll stick to opening presents!

In fact, I wouldn’t say that happiness deriving from material possessions are from school of thoughts which are superficial, one-dimensional and stereotypical. I feel that as long as we do not go to overboard with our materialistic thread and refrain from allowing material possessions to become obsessions, we should be doing fine. Setting a boundary between one’s ability and keeping our virtues in mind with a good sense of rationality will definitely allow us to hang on to our sanity.

Nevertheless, if we pay more attention to the little things in life, we would find [still finding another word to replace material ownership] to be unnecessary. Again, I must say that I can’t be any happier with my MacBook (YES! I JUST GOT MY HANDS ON ONE!) but what would a notebook mean without family or friends? What would a cold (except when it’s running) machine mean without knowledge and integrity?

I think that one of the true meanings of happiness would be contentment and satisfaction. Last Wednesday’s basketball training would be the perfect example. Since it was raining, the girls and I were training indoor, which of course meant pure physical training. We were doing the horse stance (I think) to strengthen our hamstrings (I think). So we were split into 3 groups, the last group (half) standing would obviously be the best.

There were no trophies, medals or certificates waiting for us. In reality, it was just some training that didn’t really matter. No one was going to get angry at us for not doing it, no one’s going to nag at us for being bad at it and no one was going to be disappointed with us if we didn’t turn out to be the best.

Even though it was true that no one was going to be disappointed at us, but I kept pushing my teammates to remain (half) standing. I pushed them through every second, minute to minute. I don’t actually know why I did it but I did. Obviously, we turned out to be the last ones (half) standing, with a record of 15 minutes. Mind you, we did a few sets. 15 minutes was our longest. We started with 3.5 minutes, then 5.5 and finally a tremendous leap to 15 minutes. I remembered the times where 1 minute already took half our lives away.

Well, as an outsider, some would say that my teammates and I just wasted our time and strength. Some would even say that we just put ourselves through hell for no reason.

I simply beg to differ.

That simple episode has given me a visualisation of what I am and a precognition on life that is seen to be fuelled by determination, my drive to strive in life for the many years to come.

And with that, I walked away a happy person that day.