(Before You Read This: I filtered out few parts of my previous article Sigada Aakashakke Kai Chaachi and added few things, it's almost same except few parts, it may give slightly different feels or not, I don't know since I'm not a reader, hope I have cleared it up for you, and now please, read on)
The other day I asked a question on my WhatsApp status, "Are you happy?". An hour later, it had 48 views, but nobody responded. I was disappointed and thought to delete it, but couldn't do it. I thought to myself, "I don't know, if they're happy or not, they're are certainly busy". I slept off and I woke at 2AM to drink water, turned on net and went to kitchen and while coming back, my phone is ringing with back to back notifications. One of my friend replied with "Not sure, probably yes". I forgot the question I asked few hours ago and replied with question mark emoji and he said that it was his answer to my question, "Are you happy?". It was a simple yes or no question, I was prepared for a yes answer and a no answer. I wasn't prepared for a 'in between' answer. It opened up a chain reaction of thoughts that sparked both of us with self awareness and burden of philosophy, like that Danny Boyle movie, 127 hours, figuratively stuck 'Between A Rock and A Hard Place'.
It took me back few days down the memory lane. A kannada movie named Koti released few months ago starring Daali Dhananjaya. The movie is basically about a lower class guy, who tries to attain a happy and comfortable life for him and his family. That's all I know about that movie. If you are retired from watching movie at theatre like me, or watch one or other movie like one in Sankranti and other in Deepavali, you too probably wouldn't know much about this movie either as It didn't had any big promotion events or such. I was randomly watching YouTube and it had a video of an interviewer asking, what would you do if you get One crore now? At this day and time, It's almost impossible to make a feature length movie under one crore. Movie making has become the costliest business industry in our country. You win big or lose big and straight one way ticket to C/o footpath. Of course there are multiple movies that made more than ₹1,000 Crores this year. That proves one thing, India is not a poor country and you ca definitely make a ₹1,000/- crore movie with proper attempt. But the number of people that disappeared trying to do so is Error 404: Data not found. Coming back to that YouTube interview, few said, they would buy car, start own business, buy an home and settle all the loans etc. As per one of the reports from Deccan Herald newspaper, India's top 1% of rich population holds, 40% of country's wealth. It means if India is a classroom with ₹100 rupees, 99 students has ₹60 altogether. That's not even ₹1/per student and it's definitely concerning. Earning one crore in a lifetime is a dream milestone achievement for many of us, correction , all of us. Considering the inflation and all, imagine an average household income of a middle class family is nearly ₹30,000/- for a family of 3 people. Hypothetically speaking, let's say, a family of three, where both husband and wife are earning, and they earn together ₹30,000/- pm and assuming they have saved each rupee assuming they don't need food, shelter and other basic needs, they would almost need to work for 28 years. Hypothetically speaking, let's say I have One Crore with me now. Even if I have that, I am already poor than several million people in my country. But I'm richer than crores of people in the same country. So, should I be happy about the fact that I have One Crore, or should I be sad that even if I have One Crore, I will just be rich for the majority of the country but a poor fellow when compared to Richie Rich type of people. It's a glass half full, half empty approach. I also thought what would I do, If I had One Crore with me right now. I had various plans to spend or save or invest my hypothetical One Crore. There are many things I thought I would do If I accidentally had One Crore. I stopped for a while and thought about something other than this. Wait, before I had this hypothetical One Crore, Was I happy? Or the arrival of this hypothetical One Crore made me happy? I think I was happy and after attaining the hypothetical One Crore I would be happier. Let's say, I will have One Crore for one year and it's not spent till another 365 days. So, for rest of the year, would that One Crore stop me from being sad for any reason? Because, technically, I was happy before the money, I was happier after the money, the happiness is increased, and over a period of time, If I still have that money and be sad, what's the point of having it? Technically I am richer than yesterday me, but I'm poorer than tomorrow me, which brought me back to my friends answer to my question "Are you happy?" He said, "Not sure, probably yes" and his answer started to make sense to me.
The index of happiness is always moving and nothing gives us happiness anymore. We can be happy for some time, but the happiness wouldn't last long. Because, you know what makes human happy? Nothing, nothing makes us happy. Of course, money may solve many of the problems, but it wouldn't solve all of the problems. Poor people have sad moments, rich people also have sad moments in their life. The only difference is one cry sleeping in footpath and one in their multi bedroom villa. So, even if we are happy now, we always will crave more.
Some say, when you're happy, you enjoy the song, but when you're sad, you understand the lyrics. Going back to the question, "Are you happy?" Both me and friend are definitely more rich than few people in our society, Ignore society, we are atleast some percent rich than what we were few years ago, considering inflation too. We are earning more, spending more, heck we are also saving more, but why did it stopped us from saying yes when me and friend when we asked each other the same question, "Are you happy?" Because, even if we are higher and closer to sky than we were yesterday, the sky is and will always be more far and will remain unreachable, and it always feels we are stuck between a rock and a hard place. We can never ever be satisfied with what we have today, the sky is always expanding and the wealth is never enough. I kept thinking about that line often and now and made me think, why we bother reaching the sky when we never will be able to reach it, Instead let's just be happy that we are still touch with the ground, standing on earth, smelling the roses and such. But never give up on yesterday's dreams to achieve it tomorrow. It's okay to try to reach the sky and fail, but it's never okay to not try. I asked my friend for advice on upcoming promotion exam, he only said one thing, "Move On, Grow On, Don't get stuck on the same page of that book, Read On further." And somehow it made sense to me and hopefully to you too. Have a Happy Today, Happier Tomorrow.
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