Adding up to Happiness Article
Adding up to Happiness Article
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BY Fredelle Maynard
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R E A DER’S DIGE ST
O
ver lunch recently, an with additions, subtractions, multi-
old friend and I talked plications and divisions. Chances are
about life. She admitted these steps will work for you, too.
that she’d been lonely Add to your life by trying some-
since her husband died. thing new. Remember the first-day-
“Yet I can’t complain,” she said. “I had of-school challenge? That annual
a good marriage. The kids are on their shake-up obliged you to mix, reach
own. My job isn’t exactly thrilling, but out, discover. Last winter, I decided
it’s secure, and I retire in 15 years. So to take a plumbing course. Like most
what else is there?” What else indeed! girls of my generation, I had been
A woman of 50 – able, experienced, at- programmed to be hopeless with
tractive – assuming, in effect, that her tools, but very soon I found I was in-
life is over. I’ve seen this often, and in trigued by vises and wrenches and
much younger people – the resigned the fact that I could use them.
conviction that change is impossible. W hen I consider which of my
What many of us fail to realise is that friends seem happiest, most alive,
it’s possible at any age to improve the I observe they’re the ones who are
quality of our life. constantly expanding their skills,
But we have to initiate the process interests and knowledge. Ronnie
ourselves. By taking a new job or mov- had never grown so much as a cac-
ing to a new locale, we can propel our- tus when she was asked to tend a
selves, forcibly and excitingly, into the neighbour’s prized pink African vio-
stream of life. It’s like pruning an over- let. One day she found a leaf that had
grown tree: the result is new growth broken off and stuck it in water. Now
and more fruit. A widow I know sold she has a unique collection.
her house and bought a van so she
could travel the country showing her A DD TO YOUR LIFE by turning
silverwork at craft fairs. She has made limitations into opportunities. If your
friends wherever she goes and looks life has a built-in constraint, struggle
ten years younger. “There’s so much against it, or use it to your advantage.
I haven’t seen yet,” she said. “It’s not When an industrial accident con-
too late.” fined Martin to a wheelchair, he
It’s almost never too late to do, was over whelmed by the feeling
on some scale, what you’ve always of uselessness. One day I asked if
wanted to do. The key is to move I could give his telephone number
forward, to make changes. The path to my daughter’s teacher, in case
many of my acquaintances have taken there should be an emergency when
to greater happiness may be thought I couldn’t be reached. Soon he was
of as a kind of creative arithmetic, performing a similar service for other
working mothers. Word got around, and lifestyles are unlike mine. For ex-
and now he runs an answering ser- ample, because I cultivate friendships
p vice. The money he earns helps pay with the children of friends, I have
for extras his pension wouldn’t cover. been introduced to music, poetry and
“Above all,” he says, “I’m doing some- ideas I otherwise would never have
thing, and touching other people’s understood.
lives.” A woman I know ‘adopts’ grandpar-
ents. Usually she finds them through
SUBTRACT FROM volunteer work, but
YOUR LIFE posses- sometimes she makes
sions that are a bur- a direct approach. “I
den, activities that met Harry in the su-
you no longer enjoy. permarket,” she told
When I was growing me. “He seemed to
up, I admired my have trouble reading
mother’s wedding prices, so I offered
china, which stood in to help. I ended up
a cupboard and was driving him home;
brought out only for he asked me in for
dusting. “Someday tea and now we reg-
this will be yours,” ularly shop together.
mother said. Dur- TURN My children love
ing my young mar- Harry’s stories. Harry
ried years, when I
LIMITATIONS thinks we do a lot for
longed to entertain INTO him, but he gives our
with style, that fine OPPORTUNITIES family something
china remained in priceless, a sense of
her cabinet. When the past.”
it all came to me last year, I realised
that at this stage of my life I don’t want MULTIPLY YOUR CONNECTIONS
possessions requiring special care. So with the life around you. “My wife
I passed the china on to my daugh- was the social one,” Philip told me.
ter. She’s delighted; I’m relieved of “After she died, I was terribly lonely.
a chore. Then it occurred to me that I met
lots of people every day. I just hadn’t
MULTIPLY YOUR POINTS of con- been seeing them.”
tact with other people. My life has He struck up a conversation about
been enhanced since I began trying fly tying with the hardware store
to know people whose assumptions manager and discovered a shared
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R E A DER’S DIGE ST
contemplating the whole discourag- together and covering one wall with
ing picture, she isolated priorities. baskets, the impact was stunning.
Convinced that her best hope lay in In human relationships, where it
completing her education, she listed matters most, intensification of ef-
things to be done, one at a time. “Sell fort may produce important gains –
car for money to tide us over. Find out as it did for my friend Paul. He lives
about educational loans. Reapply to far from his mother’s nursing home.
university. Find apartment in safer Though he regularly sent long, newsy
neighbourhood. Find good daycare letters, his mother was always queru-
centre. Write to Mum and Dad. Get lous when he telephoned.
in touch with creditors and arrange to “I was beginning to wonder if I had
pay when I can.” By the time she con- a son,” was her usual greeting. Paul
tacted her parents, who’d cut off com- would protest he’d just written; she
munication when she married, Jenny would insist she’d had no word for
couldn’t help but impress them with weeks. So he gave up the letters, con-
her resourcefulness. cluding that his mother’s concentra-
tion on the letters wasn’t the same as
RAISE YOUR EFFORT LEVEL to his own. Now he sends a daily greet-
the nth degree. I used to wonder why ing, very short. Sometimes it’s just a
TV advertisers repeat the same com- postcard, a snapshot, a note saying,
mercial so often. But of course repe- “Thinking of you.” He never misses a
tition – intensification – has a special day – and the change in his mother’s
force. The principle of raising to the attitude has been remarkable.
nth degree works in all areas of life.
Take home decorating. For years I’ve HAPPINESS IS ALWAYS an indi-
collected wicker furniture. Scattered vidual matter, and so is the path to
through the house, it added up to happiness.
very little. Yet when I gathered every The most important thing, if you’re
bit in one room, placing the furniture not satisfied now, is to act.
Walking Companion
Not feeling ready to have another dog of her own, a Perth woman
enquired on a social media community page if anyone in her area
had a dog that needed walking. Next thing she knew she was
inundated with offers. She chose dachshund Louis, who she now
walks four times a week. “It’s a win-win situation because he gets a
walk... and I’ve got company on my daily walks.” abc.net.au
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