Fake Actions, but Real Emotions!
I was invited to join a tea-party.
Hand-painted cups, the best quality tea, full cream milk and sugar cubes. The location was beautiful, a sit out on a terrace with an overcast sky and a gentle breeze blowing. The host was my niece, all of 5 years. And i was her guest of honour!
[Pic: Own picture — The hand-painted tea-cups at the party!]
Here was a tea party with a difference though. You had to earn your cup of tea! I was given a blue paint can, a brush and was set on task to colour the blue cup. My niece finished the Red one in the meanwhile. After the blue cup it was my turn to paint the flowers on the yellow cup (‘the flowers make the cup more beautiful and the tea more refreshing’ — was the narrative!)
Ok, there was no Milk, Tea or Sugar. Just the Teacups. And that was all that was needed to have the tea party.
My niece set about serving the invisible tea, the phantom crackers and the missing muffins. While i was wondering how to go about with my play acting, i could hear my niece sipping softly on her tea. The expression on her face was heavenly. Even the best of tea from the most classiest of tea houses couldn’t have brought that forth in real life! While drinking, she was explaining about how her dad brought this tea from one of his trips. From a place where there are amazing tea plantations with women plucking only the choicest of top leaves for the customer’s delight.
An amazing amalgamation of fact and fiction, but yes, it made the ‘tea’ more tasty!
The love with which the ‘tea’ was served was real
The pleasure that was derived from drinking this ‘tea’ was real
The story-telling and chit-chat that made the tea party better were real
So what if there was no tea or milk to begin with, the experience of having had a fun tea-party was real!
Isn’t that what really matters?
I couldn’t help relating the tea party to life.
Many a time, we have almost everything that we have asked for. Yes, sometimes we do not get what we wanted, but even that seems to have reasons that are revealed down the line. But how often do we become comfortable with what we have rather than fretting about what is missing? I am sure this has happened with you — i have desired things very strongly, and i finally attained them, i seemed to have lost all charm for the object, and just moved onto the next. The regret and the uneasiness that i felt when i did not have something seemed to be so real. It was real enough to drive me nuts, make me uneasy, make me doubt myself and get into a state where i really had to get it or i would be terribly disappointed.
But it turns out that neither the feeling of disappointment is real nor the feeling of elation is.
Kids have this amazing power of make-believe. They make the most out of every situation. We were kids once and had the superpower as well. Where did we lose it?
Everything, then truly, is only a creation of the mind. Everything we think and feel are based on our perceptions, the mental picture that is painted on the canvas of our life using our life’s experiences as the shapes and our emotions as the colours.
Beyond our mind — there is nothing!
Life is actually beautiful. Count your blessings. Beyond the limiting perceptions are the things that truly count.
What a little girl and her teacups taught me about perceptions