It is simple yet powerful, which is why I love it. It made me think about what happiness means for different people. One of the things which I always am fascinated about is how us humans, no matter how different we are in terms of the country we come from, religion, age etc all react more or less the same way when we are truly happy.
I remember the ending of the movie called "Love, Actually" (yes I actually saw that movie :P) where they have shown the arrival gate of an airport (presumably Heathrow) and it is funny as well as fascinating to see people who are so different to each other react the same way to see their loved ones arrive. It is a moment of sheer joy - smiles, hugs, tears of joy etc.....that moment is a true reflection of how similar we all are.
All of us cherish the same things - being with loved ones, having good times with friends, living a peaceful life etc. Even people who are murderers do have a part of them leading them towards happiness.
I know I'm dabbing into politics again - but this reminds me of the video of Osama bin Laden in his son's wedding video where you see him all smiling and happy to see his son getting married. I also remember a picture taken of Saddam Hussein with his entire family and see him all happy and smiling. I point out these two recent figures because they have been portrayed to be or are responsible for murdering thousands of people. Even then one can see that these guys are at their happiest when around their loved ones.
Returning to the movie I mentioned earlier i.e. "Into the Wild", the guy really wanted to live by himself in the wilderness of Alaska without anyone for hundreds of kilometres. Even though he loved the experience, in the end when he was close to his death he realised the fact that being with his loved ones was the one time he felt true happiness. He then wrote the quote I noted earlier and passed away.
All of us want to be happy, fine there are different things that make different people happy and people have even killed in the pursuit of happiness. But I truly believe that all of us are trying to get to the same thing in different ways.
We are too busy these days to think about these things, but we should all cherish the times with our loved ones.... I know I do!
