A Great Life

What is a ‘Great Life’.  Before we know or think about what a great life is, we should know more about life itself.  Since childhood, I used to get questions about life – what is life, why are we born, where from this world around us came, the trees, the animals, people around us, the water, sky, the Sun, the Moon, the Stars, and the Planets, the seasons, and the numerous things that we happen to see around us everyday. Till date, I could not get a satisfactory answer to all these questions.

As we grow up, we go to school and study and learn few things about life and the world around us.  The normal school education does not deal about these things too much.  Later we come to know that there is something called religion, philosophy, science, and so many other things which throw some light and try to explain these aspects of life, but nothing appears satisfactory.

If you refer to religion, there is not one religion in this world.  There are many religions and each one has its own explanation about life according to their own religion. It differs from what some other religion has to say, right from what or who is ‘God’, to things like how this life came into being and how we all came into existence.  This creates more confusion rather than answer questions. During childhood, everyone thinks that there is only one God, but as you grow up, you realize that it is not correct and that there are so many different Gods like people and that different people worship different Gods.

When you go to school and start learning, you get a perspective of life when you start to learn science.  Science as a subject offers different knowledge about the world and nature around us.  This is in stark contrast to what our religion says.  Then on, the confusion begins about life.

For me, it is very difficult to understand and come to a conclusion about how life came into existence, the way it is, and the way we see and experience.  Whatever the reality is, it is far more important for people to figure out that as human beings, we have one life and we need to make the most of it.  For that, we need to figure out what is a ‘Great Life’ is all about, and how to make our life ‘Great’.

As such, there is no one definition of a ‘Great Life’ as different people have different perspective of life.  For some, it may be enjoying life by doing things they life, for some it may be traveling, sports, music, business, enjoying with the people of their choice, and so on.  Whatever we do, we must realize that a healthy body and mind have a big role in making our lives ‘Great’.  If we have a healthy body, we can have a healthy mind. We cannot have a great life without one of the two. To have a healthy body and mind is not completely in our hands.  It is by birth that we get both.  So our life is greatly dependent on our birth.  If we are born healthy, there are great chances that we will live a great life.  There are so many people who are abled differently by birth. Some are blind, some are mentally retarded, and so on.  So, all those who are born healthy are very lucky and stand more chances of having a great life.

Let us see what few great people said about ‘Great Life’.

“The purpose of our lives is to be happy.” — Dalai Lama

“Health is the greatest gift, contentment the greatest wealth, faithfulness the best relationship.” — Buddha

“The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why.” – Mark Twain

“Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.” —Mahatma Gandhi

“Life is a dream for the wise, a game for the fool, a comedy for the rich, a tragedy for the poor.” – Sholom Aleichem

“The secret of happiness, you see is not found in seeking more, but in developing the capacity to enjoy less.”-Socrates

“You’re only human. You live once and life is wonderful, so eat the damned red velvet cupcake.” – Emma Stone

But the irony is that only being born healthy does not make our life great.  There are so many ingredients that go into making our lives great. Again, this may vary from person to person as the definition of a great life may vary.  I would describe what according to me is a ‘Great Life’, although, as I mentioned in the beginning, it is not known to me why we are born.  Many people say that every life has a purpose.  May be, it is true or may be not, but what I observed that many lives end without they having done anything, which makes us feel that their life was meaningless and without purpose.  One thing is clear that you have to live because you got life, you are born, whether you understand life or not, whether you are educated or not, whether you are rich or not, intelligent or not, rich or poor, smart or not, whether you understand life or not.

The most important ingredient of a ‘Great Life’ according to me is being able to do whatever we want to do.  If you like to play football, and you end up playing tennis, then your life would not be great for you.  If you wanted to be an engineer, and you end up teaching subjects in schools or colleges, then you would not love your life and your life may not be great.  You wanted to be a musician, and you become a cook, then your life would be like hell even though you would have everything to eat around you all the time.

Let us imagine now that you are born healthy and you got to do what you like to do in life. The next big thing that would make our life great after being able to get to do what you wanted to do in life is money.

During childhood, we have no knowledge about money, buying, selling, earning, and things like that.  All we know that we get what we want when we ask, or everything around us is free and belongs to us.  Only when you grow up, you begin to realize that nothing is free.  Everything around us comes with a price and you have to buy.  If you have no money, you get nothing.  This underlines the importance of money and without money, you cannot have a great life.  Although money is not everything and does not guarantee a great life, at least it is a quintessential thing.

If you got a healthy body and money in life, the next thing is what you would do with it.  What you do will decide what your life is going to be like.

There are great people who have experienced life and many of them have shared their wisdom about life.  Some say that we have rebirth, that is, we are born again and again.  Our body is different than our soul, and at death our body dies, but our soul does not.  The soul has no death.  It has to be only liberated.  If your soul is not liberated, you are reborn and the cycle of life and death shall continue for you till your soul is liberated.  Based on this theory, it is evident that you are going to do what you are destined to, but you will have no inkling of what your destiny is.  You will keep doing what your mind says, what you like, and what you don’t.  This way life goes on and on.

There are others who do not believe the theory of rebirth.  For them, life is just one and you have to do what you want only in this life, as long as you are alive. There are also people who do not believe ‘Destiny’.  According to them, you make your destiny by deciding what you want to do.

Whatever it is, be it destiny or what you want to do, you have to live your life.  You may choose things to do what you like, but you may end up being able to do it successfully or you may not.  Whether you are successful or not, nothing is going to stop your life.  You have to live until your last breath, and you don’t know which is your last.  So just keep doing what you like until your last breath, and you will for sure enjoy your life and that is what possibly would be a ‘Great Life’.