Tuesday, April 27, 2010

The Simple Pleasures


Recently I've taken to, well, just loving the simple pleasures of life. Each day lately I seem to notice little details that I usually don't, noting how simple they are in their beauty. It's so easy to become lost in the hectic haze of modern society that I think we sometimes lose sight of what can be profoundly beautiful about the simplicity of life. I sit here now, profoundly relieved, having just finished a research paper for psychology. I think with all the hustle and bustle of finals and the drive to be social, I haven't taken time to sit back and observe what is truly obvious: that life itself is absolutely gorgeous, a sort of dynamic piece of art which never ceases to fascinate. I've really been itching to get a blog post up because I'm sick of writing for a grade, so I think now I'm just going to release, a pouring out of my soul if you will, of what my soul has touched, felt, and perceived, of that which has permanently imprinted itself upon my being.

The simple pleasures:

  • Watching my friend write on a banana and laugh about it
  • The physics of a door swinging back and forth in Main Building, my dormitory
  • Jumping in order to touch really high things, like branches
  • Listening to Sigur Ros in this very moment (god their Icelandic is stunning)
  • The fact that I'm alive (you might say well duh! but I'm talking about being alive, anyone who has experienced being alive, fully conscious of their own being and the being of everyone and everything around them, knows what I'm talking about)
  • Having a profound experience at an amazing musical performance (my body extending into a tree and filling the room, fyi)
  • Seeing my friends smile
  • Hearing the voices of my parents
  • Saying a prayer
  • Talking to friends far, far away
  • Vassar College and all its amazing people
  • Being praised for hard work
  • Chewing gum that tastes like yummy berries
  • Making a summer reading list, and just the thought of reading for pleasure
  • Realizing how much I have grown as a person
  • Being asked to sing "Singing in the Rain" by three random girls in the middle of the day
  • Seeing a family happy together
  • Making the day of a child just by giving them a paper airplane
  • When animals seem to smile
  • Acoustic music to calm the senses
  • Letting go of nagging stresses and worries which don't even matter
  • Just being alive (not alive, but alive now)
  • God
  • Letting all your muscles completely relax so that you get that tingly feeling in your body

What has made you happy lately? How about right now, in this very moment? Think about it...

Because I'm lovin' the simple pleasures.

Friday, April 9, 2010

The World's Greatest Sport


"In our country, true teams rarely exist . . . social barriers and personal ambitions have reduced athletes to dissolute cliques or individuals thrown together for mutual profit . . . Yet these rugby players. with their muddied, cracked bodies, are struggling to hold onto a sense of humanity that we in America have lost and are unlikely to regain. The game may only be to move a ball forward on a dirt field, but the task can be accomplished with an unshackled joy and its memories will be a permanent delight. The women and men who play on that rugby field are more alive than too many of us will ever be. The foolish emptiness we think we perceive in their existence is only our own."
-Victor Cahn