There is no sure-shot way to live life. There is no one particular rule that applies to everyone. No two people will live the same kind of life, but they will face similar problems and predicaments. And they will, in all likelihood, react similarly, too.
In this YoursWisely video, Dr Janki Santoke, a Vendanta teacher and author, shares a very important life lesson — of finding happiness and keeping it. She tells the story of a rich man who always wondered why he is agitated, unhappy and stressed all the time, despite having all the riches. One day, when a sage visited, he asked him the same question. The sage then asked for 99 exact mohars (gold coins). Confused, the rich man did as told. Together, they went to a poor couple’s hut and surreptitiously threw the bag of coins through their window. The next morning, while the couple was astounded to see the bag, they were confused as to why there were only 99 gold coins inside it, and not 100. They decided to starve themselves every alternate day, so as to collect enough money to make it exactly 100. Their simple life suddenly became a life of deprivation, agitation and stress. Seeing this, the sage told the rich man that no matter how much we have, we fall into the snares of 99.
“This kind of lifestyle, where we are always craving for something more, is bound to create agitation, is bound to create stress… What we need to learn is the capacity to aspire with contentment. Why can I not be happy with what I have and still strive for more? It is not the aspiration that’s a problem. The problem is our lack of contentment with what is there. And if we do not learn to be content with what we have today, we will not be content with what we get in the future,” Santoke says.