Painting Happiness

It’s amazing how small things can help us realize great lessons. Lessons that can sometimes turn your day around! 🙂 Read on, and you will understand what I’m talking about.

Well, yesterday morning, I met up with Saba. We spent almost over 5 hours or so at her place. All we did was talk, eat and watch TV for a (very very) short while. Anyway, it did a hell lot of good to me! I felt so much better, just being with her. I admit there were times when I kinda fell back into my distracted, moody phase but never for long. We spoke about a lot of random stuff – movies, songs, friends, her life, my stuff, Osama bin Laden (yeah,  you read it right!), so on. 😀 Just wish I could have stayed longer. But she had work and we had no other option. I was in a perceptibly good mood once I got back home.

When Ann came back from school, she showed me a painting she had done. She

From the Windows Of Jupiter – Gerardo Gomez (click to know more)

isn’t really into painting, doesn’t do it so well or anything but likes to dabble at everything. And, so, she tries to paint out her thoughts in her own weird ways. Only she can make sense of her paintings. I love trying to interpret her paintings with crazy thoughts. [Note: The painting on the right looked like a really happy one probably because of the vibrant colours, which is why I chose it.]

Anyway, this particular painting had a yellow dome-like structure in the middle with some black lines outlining it. Thanks to her help, I understood that it was supposed to be a gate. Underneath the gate, there were thick streaks of yellow, blue and black (horizontally). Ok, like all of you, I was clueless when she showed it to me. And I asked her what it means (she loves explaining her paintings!).

Firstly, it depicts a kind of fantasy world. According to her, the layers/streaks of colours show the different layers separating the ‘world’ from the ‘gate to happiness’. Black stands for sadness & negative emotions while blue is a more positive layer and yellow, of course, denotes happiness. I LOVED the whole idea (I always love her ideas, they are so novel and different).

But, when I looked closely at the painting, I noticed another possible interpretation. It could have been a painting of how our mind is… The layers represent different emotions, starting from the depressive, negative thoughts (black), the slightly positive ones (blue) and then the happy ones (yellow)…finally leading to the gate of happiness, which lies deep within all of our minds. Only when we navigate through these different, deep layers and go deep into our minds will we find happiness. Happiness is found within, after all.

This is what I meant by the very first sentence…how small things can teach us great lessons. How the seemingly silly painting by my little sister could make me see something so profound and immense! I know I’m sad, and now, I’m trying to overcome it…by going deeper into myself…because that’s the only way out. 🙂 I already knew it, but I guess I had to be reminded. I won’t find joy (that lasts) anywhere else, for it lies within.

So, what’s the one great lesson that you have learnt from a quite small/trivial incident? 

 

This is another picture Ann drew. I LOVE it. Maybe because it’s from a different angle and perspective. 🙂