The Simplest Pleasures!

Over this weekend - which by the way was so very hectic, I found out something. About me, about that little something we all ignore...

The Yoga classes that take up half of each of my Saturday and Sunday, a dance performance, the cooking, doing things with my daughter not add my own studies to finish up, usually leave me pretty exhausted every single weekend - I still do it for a lot of reasons :-)

This weekend was about the same, but there was a difference which has left me smiling!

Let me start with introducing you to this girl in my yoga class, who is usually the last one in the row, rarely speaks up, no questions to ask and usually the non-existent student. I happened to get a spot next to her yesterday, and we partner to do some 'Asanas' during the practice sessions.

I was struggling with a particular 'Asana' that gets your body twisted at all the joints in the body and to top it all in a standing posture :-) I was pretty excited and at the same time was making a lot of hoopla about how I couldn't get it etc. etc. Then this girl, who happened to be my partner said she would help me. At the end of two minutes she gently yet so firmly guided me with ease to the final posture of the 'Asana'.

I was impressed! The last person I thought who could be so firm, so sure of herself and yet so un-assuming....it set me thinking. People who play low usually have a lot to deliver too...and pack it with a punch! This was new awareness...

Later during the afternoon today, I had a dance performance at my little one's dance school. I was in-charge of all the tickets - selling, money, will-calls and also letting people into the show. So I sat at the entrance at around 3:00 PM in the afternoon along with a girl who was helping me.

This girl I shared the table with is a mom of one girl in middle school and a set of twins (a boy and a girl). As we sat there, she kept generally chatting up and said "You look so pretty - with the beautiful dress and everything" I said so why didn't you dress up? She simply said "I don't have any".

Very simply said but with a smile. I was suddenly embarrassed! As I talked with her, I realized how simply she lived her life. Not because she couldn't afford certain things, but because she didn't need them! She is the kind of person who camped in the woods every year with her kids for a whole week to enjoy nature, had given up her job to stay with her children though qualified, did small things to make her children happy.

People around us were swarming, busy running with the little ones dressed in the dance costumes. I sat there amidst them a part of the scene but not really a part. It was a strange I'm there and not there kind of a feeling....

And this afternoon, the breeze, the moment had made me so happy!

With this also came the thought - why am I like this? Why do such small things give me such pleasure? Isn't it fashionable and smarter to be more complicated? I don't know - but maybe this is the real me...or maybe not. Who knows.

I thought to myself that we have so much noise within us that we don't have the bandwidth to notice all these wonderful people around us - be aware of these little details..

It's funny - sitting there in the warm, cloudy afternoon with the slight cool air blowing the curls on my face, I realized something! I found something that was so very critical!

The truth that the greatest treasures are hidden in the simplest pleasures!

Holding your child, a glass of cool water, soothing music, a call, a smile, a gesture, a picture, a thought, a simple sentence you tell people who care for you - you miss them, you love them, whatever small something maybe is all that it takes to change lives - forever! That of yours and of the people around you...

So, indulge in those small little pleasures - be aware - they are yours to enjoy!