The simple pleasures of life

Life can be measured by emotions and their intensity. From another perspective, life can be measured be the significance and diversity of events occurring to one's life. Technically, these two points of view have a casual relationship, but with a closer look, viewing life from the events one go through speaks volume of how we pursue happiness and meanings in life.

One's nature and upbringing can have profound impact on what they seek for in life: some value diversity - having as many opportunities as possible to experience as many things as possible, while some value stability - having the opportunity to settle down and keep circling around a cadence of familiarity.

We each have a different way to benchmark success and how significant an event is to our life. But the thing we might all have in common is the instinctive pursuit to achieve several, or at least one, significant milestones. As another common cliche goes, sometimes we are too busy chasing grander things that we neglect the simple happiness of life. Another popular saying is to live like today is the last day in your life.

I understand the goodwill from the sayings, but concurrently, life would be much more different if we know we have only 1 day to live compared to 10 or 50 years ahead. The element of long-term planning is always a commendable factor influencing how individuals make decisions. Let's take the simple example of spending time with our family. With the whirlwind of work and socialization, family time may not be the top priority - one might see their parents at meals or even through a 10-minute daily calls. If there's only one day left to live, the simple pleasure of having family time would turn into the blatantly obvious number-one priority.

Regardless, I'd like to think of simple pleasures as casually taking a step back and celebrating not only small wins but also random things we consider fortunate to be able to accomplish within a day. Because looking at life as a long-term journey means having to plan resources carefully at any point in time. My simple pleasures? Waking up in time, getting myself ready to go out, enjoying the hustle of life, seeing a lovely cat at a cafe, having a good dinner, or calling my mom to share what's happened in our day.

To me, simple pleasures are not to be prioritized; they are to be appreciated at any moment possible in our day. So just keep moving on with a long-term goal in mind, but don't forget to spend some time in your day slowing down to know life's worth living thanks to its simple pleasures.