Saturday, February 15, 2014

On Past and Present Happiness

Last Friday, while we're having one of our random pig-outs after work, my training mates and I touched on the topic happiness. The main question that night over french fries and affogatos was: "Are you happy where you are right now?"

It's a simple question in the context that it can be answered with a yes or a no. But beneath it lies more complicated and mind-boggling questions most people can't readily answer, myself included. The three of us answered variations of "maybe", "somehow" and "I don't know." It concluded with wishing that may we know what we're looking for to make us say that we're happy, no ifs and buts and just let time run its course.

Today, as I was reading a few pages of Gretchen Rubin's The Happiness Project,  I am presented with this: 
"What did you like to do when you were a child? What you enjoyed as a ten-year-old is probably something you'd enjoy now."
Tracing back to my ten-year-old self. All I remember was that I liked playing a lot like most kids. I usually play teacher-teacheran, complete with kiddie blackboard and colored chalks; my cousins being the students and I, the teacher. Now, I am a language teacher. So it got me thinking- is this what really makes me happy? Will I grow old doing this? Will it give me life satisfaction? I think it's for me to know and find out. Or maybe I'll never find out. But same old, I'll live my life the best way I know how.