Happiness Comes from Small Things

By Madan Arora Ph.D.

This book offers a few simple ideas to be always happy. Does happiness require wealth, material objects-big houses, expensive and fancy cars, expensive diamonds and jewelry-big bank balance, awards and recognitions, and a large, highly recognized social circle of friends and acquaintances? No, the author believes. Quite to the contrary, happiness-in fact, lasting happiness-comes from simple things of life: a good family life, leisurely time spent with family and friends, having time to smell the roses and watch the sunset, doing everyday chores with full interest and dedication, and just by simple everyday living. While big, materialistic objects are transient, simple things are always there, waiting for us to be seen, touched, and enjoyed.

This book is timely as we seem to be complicating our lives and, by doing so, feeling stressed and unhappy by wishing more and more than what we really need.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Aug 31, 2015
• ISBN: 9781503594432

Madan Arora Ph.D.

Madan Arora, PhD, comes from a humble background. He was born in Pakistan—which was part of India at the time of his birth, in a small town of about ten thousand—to a relatively uneducated but very loving family consisting of a grandfather, parents, and four brothers, one of whom was married. To escape religious persecution (half the population of the town was butchered by religious fanatics a week earlier), Madan’s family of nine fled to a small town in what now is present-day India. Before settling down in this town, his family spent about two years leading, more or less, a nomadic life in three village-size towns, living in one- or two-room mud houses, with no indoor plumbing and sanitation facilities at each of these places. He got his education up to a BS in civil engineering from Punjab University in India and decided to migrate to the United States in 1966 to pursue higher education in environmental engineering. But this is not the background that inspired Dr. Arora to write this book. It is the loving family he comes from, great teachers in schools and colleges he attended in India and the US and their dedication to work, and the values his family and parents taught him by example—hard work, honest living, and love—that prompted him to undertake this effort.

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Copyright © 2015 by Madan Arora, Ph.D.

Library of Congress Control Number: 2015913088

ISBN:   Hardcover        978-1-5035-9444-9

              Softcover         978-1-5035-9510-1

              eBook              978-1-5035-9443-2

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

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Rev. date: 10/06/2015

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CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

PREFACE

CALMNESS

CLEANLINESS

CONTENTMENT

DIVERSITY

FOOD

FORGIVENESS

GRATITUDE

HEALTH

HONESTY

HUMILITY

INNER VOICE

KINDNESS

LEISURE

LISTEN

ROLE-MODELING

SELF ASSESSMENT

SHARING

SIMPLE LIVING

SPIRITUALITY

FAMILY & NEIGHBORHOOD

O God! Fulfill my needs-not wants

– so that I am humble and wise.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Thanks to

- My wife Madhur who encouraged and inspired me to write this book believing that I have the right life experiences to undertake this effort. She often made suggestions which were immensely helpful in improving and enhancing the message of this book.

- My late wife Asha who shared her life with me for almost 30 years and left for her heavenly abode in 1992 after a long bout with cancer.

- Leonor DeGuchy who, in spite of her busy schedule, assisted in typing, retyping and formatting the manuscript patiently.

- Vamsi Seeta for cleaning up the manuscript and seeing it through the tedium of the publication process.

Madan Arora

PREFACE

L ife can be as complicated as we want to make it. This book is not about making life complicated and stressful but simple and happy.

Happiness does not necessarily come from acquiring too many things. Quite to the contrary, it often comes from a simple living, having only what we need, being grateful and contented in what we have, and by not cluttering our lives.

Is this goal far-fetched? This book describes a few ways in which this can be achieved. All it requires is a different mind-set and recognition of what really is important in life. Are materialistic possessions, accolades, awards-which in most cases are transient and temporary- or simple every day things like friends, leisure, moments spent with your children and family at meal times and talking about mundane matters more rewarding and pleasure giving?

The readers may ask me Are you always happy? Are you always content with what you have? Have these thoughts helped you in achieving lasting happiness that you have written about in this book? The answer is No to all these questions. But these ideas and thoughts are like an oar which constantly helps me in steering my ship of life towards the shore happiness and quietitude whenever I am overwhelmed by the stresses and strains of life.

Some sections in the book are very brief, more so than others. The message contained in these brief sections is as important and hopefully as inspiring as contained in other sections. They are brief because I felt that saying more would simply dilute the message instead of enhancing it.

I hope the readers will find the thoughts written in the book