Unhappy Me

I sat at my desk sipping my lemon tea and battling my confusions over my desire to write and to be read. That was when my colleagues came to my desk. My immediate reaction was to minimize the word doc I was writing. All I wished was to be read and here when I had an opportunity to be read, I chose to shy away.

Why? For fear they would ridicule me? For fear their reaction would discourage me? For fear I might not hear what I really wish to hear? For fear that somebody would tell that the writing was too mediocre.

How can what they say influence me to give up doing what I like the most? I always told myself that I do what I like and not what people around me or conventions demand. I do not care what others say or think has always been my punch line. But today I feel I have been cheating myself. When hypocrisy is what I hate the most, I have always been the biggest hypocrite. People and conventions have always affected me. They have always influenced my thoughts and action. I do what people want me to do and end up being dissatisfied and whine about it for the rest of my life. Instead of doing so why dint I ever listen to my heart and do what I liked? In this way I could have been happy inside. I tried to keep the people around me happy without being happy myself. I failed to understand that

• ·         You cannot keep everyone happy
• ·         Keeping others happy need not always keep you happy
• ·         Only if you are happy can you keep others happy

People tipped me to put on a happy face even if I was not really happy. How, neither they could answer nor I could contrive. Life is pursuit of happiness. Though it may sound clichéd, I cannot describe it in any better way. And this happiness has to come from within. It is easily said than done, coz I have found it extremely hard even to feign a happy face.

Why should I put on a happy face for those who feign love?