Gratitude for the Simple Pleasures

What are the simple things in life that I am most grateful for? Many indeed. But let's start with the first one.

1. Waking up

I've said it before, sleeping is not much different from dying. We die every night to be reborn again the next day. There's no guarantee that you will wake up. You simply surrender to sleepiness when you put your head on the pillow. When you wake up, you have some vague awareness that you were dreaming and you remember going to bed the night before. But all these considerations only happen after you wake up.  If you did not wake up, none of that would have mattered. Your dream life is akin to life after death. Perhaps life in heaven is just like that and those who end up in hell are just living a perpetual nightmare.

To sleep is to practice dying--surrendering everything you've got, not knowing if you will ever regain it. When you wake up, it is another opportunity to make things better. You are given a second chance every morning. Yesterday is your past life--the momentum of its activities which you still carry. To wake up in the morning every day with the full realization that it is a new beginning, is the very gift of life itself.   

2. Reading and Writing

I write here because I consider writing a miraculous act of expression. Reading and writing are two sides of the coin. When you read, you are listening to someone else's thoughts and ideas. Very naturally you would also want to express your own thoughts. So you write. Writing crystalizes ideas and sets them into motion. The hidden value of your thoughts become clear when expressed, their weaknesses exposed when put to written form on a blank page. It is a stage for thoughts to sell their own worth.

I am the old-fashioned type who still reads the hardcopy newspaper every morning. Breakfast with the morning papers is one of the greatest joys of life. One to be cherished with gratitude.  In an era of audiobooks and podcasts, I shall also include listening as an alternate form of 'reading'. Reading reprograms the mind.  AI technology takes its inspiration from the neuron structure of the human brain. Every sentence read and comprehended creates a new wiring.  Every insight gained creates a dopamine hit in the brain. We feel rewarded and satiated.  It is a pleasure I consciously lap up every time I read. The pleasure one gets from reading far exceeds that of eating or drinking. I can never understand why people complain about the price of books when what they spend so much more on food. The pleasure of the written word is undoubted one of the greatest joys of living.

3. Walking

Being able to walk is a great blessing that we should never take for granted.  For those of us lucky enough to have fully functional limbs, walking is such an effortlessly beautiful act. It just propels you forward in space. Walk slowly and steadily, absorbing the scene that passes through your vision; watch people and their idiosyncrasies; savour the different smells and aroma from the street; feel the sensations on the soles of your feet as you gently lift and land them. Walking is sampling life in all its myriad richness.  Every walk we take should be an action of meditation--a reaffirmation of life itself. 

I try to walk whenever I could. I sometimes park slightly further away from my meeting place so that I can get a chance to walk and approach the location gently, giving me an opportunity to organize my thoughts. Walking is a way to work out thoughts--it is thinking in motion and an immeasurable source of pleasure in itself.

4. Sitting

To sit at a sidewalk cafe, sipping a cup of coffee, reading or watching people passing by--isn't that one of the great simple pleasures of life? When this simple act of repose is combined with the activity of reading and writing, it is a state of blissful existence, one which I try to indulge myself in every time I get the chance. 

When I'm in a foreign city, simply walking its streets and sitting at a restaurant or cafe is my preferred way of enjoying the place. You get to learn a lot about the people and the place from this simple act. Too many tourists rush through cities from one sight to another, without actually slowing down to absorb its real atmosphere. When you sit, you sense everything that's happening around you. You are part of the place, at least for that brief space of time. To sit is to pause and to acknowledge the richness of the moment.

Having the privilege to perform these four acts of simple pleasures already make my life meaningful. And of course, there are others: good food, wine, conversation with friends, helping someone in need, exercising, playing games and doing creative work. All these are part of the joy of living. But these four four, if performed with gratitude, are the very essence of living itself.