How to... beg a senior colleague to get a real espresso machine in your office
How to... understand love without analysing it
How to... keep your bed on body temperature when you have to go to the loo at night
How to... change yourself the way you want it in the pursuit of Happiness. Bingo !
How to change yourself the way you want it in the pursuit of Happiness.
Good question. Let's have a closer look at it, shall we?
Happiness.
To me, it was once absolute, when I was a child. When me buddies and I built camps in the bushes and stormed, dressed as crusaders, the walls of Ierusalem/my mothers' terrace. When my dad told me stories about the Romans and their massacre of the Belgae and his awesome adventures in Hong Kong as a cook. When I got a Lego-TGV from Saint Nicolas. When my uncle took me on his shoulders for a long walk in the fields and I lost my bonnet and I didn't notice and we had to go back for a search.
Once my dad told me he found out when he had been truly happy: when his dad took him by the hand for a walk, to watch television with his grandparents, under a starry, starry night. My old man is right, I think. About Happiness.
As a child, I never realised the intensity of the true feeling of happiness on these particular moments. It was so real and tactile. I'm sure if I had known the value of it, I'd have taken it and put it in a can, together with the snails I captured in the Provence, as a lifesaver.
Now, as I am growing older and still not quite used to the repeating 'doing stupid thing-falling really hard on my dumb face-trying to get up' scenario, Happiness only comes as a delicate flavour in the simmering borscht life is. Something very volatile, like you've been waiting to spot that rare animal in thick woods for hours, and at the end of the day, you're not quite sure if you saw it in a glimpse or not. So I've redefined Happiness for myself, only to make it less uncompromising and rare. A coward, no, me?
Happiness. The smell of lavender fields stretching to the horizon, the intense colours of a Tuscan landscape after a storm, the itching sand between your wriggling toes on a crowded beach in Nieuwpoort, the air full of icecream, sunprotectors and salt.
Why do all these memories make me cry, and smile?
Changing yourself.
It's not like invading yourself with new ideas, forcing yourself to rupture with the past and creating out of the blue a brand new and better ME, the way you want it. It doesn't work that way, I think. It makes you feel disorientated, en plus, it's quite a blow to your self-esteem. Picture Iraq.
A more durable way to improve yourself is to focus on the little stingy parts of your personality first, avoiding to put too much stress on the basics, it seems to me. Little by little, working on the parts that are all inconsistent or inconsequent. And maybe the big chunks of one's character may evolve positively with it too.
In my case, the ToDo's have been the same for years:
Pay attention to your language: ban swearing and blurry phrasal constructions to avoid misunderstanding.
Try to be empathic: even the simplest 'How are you' followed by one minute of attentive listening (all to often, the second part is gravely neglected) is not evident, as my life is de facto the most interesting life one man has ever had.
Curb laziness and its triggers: self-pityness, defaitisme, lack of sleep or too much partying, loss of focus on greater goals in life, an empty agenda.
Avoid lying, by 1) telling the naked truth or, more realistic, 2) keeping my big mouth shut.
Not easy, but it helps, step by step. I hope.
How to change yourself the way you want it in the pursuit of Happiness?
djr
To my cousin, once more in a country far, far away.
