Smiling Buds

By Acharya Sudarshan

Laughter is a natural quality of man. Except man no other creature does laugh. God has especially gifted this quality to man exclusively. God has bestowed the humans with the art of laughter so that we can forget our woes. Only the one who is surrounded with various desires becomes unhappy. That’s why, God has dictated that you perform your duties, don’t desire anything. You can only appear in the examination. But the result is not in your hand. Still, if there are agonies, anxieties, wounds in your heart, then learn to laugh. Even witnessing sorrows also you can laugh. That which has to occur, the same shall occur anyways, and the same is but happening only. Don’t make yourself a culprit for no reason. ‘If one moment of smile can make your photograph beautiful, then what about when you smile always to make your life charming and beautiful?’ So come. Let’s take resolve from now itself that we shall always keep smiling, laughing, humming. You will see that miraculous changes would start occurring in your life and negative energy will get destroyed automatically; and by turning into a complete optimist you can relish the joy of life.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Diamond Books
• Release date: Dec 7, 2021
• ISBN: 9788128822759

Book preview

Learn to Laugh for Long Life

If you can, then live life smiling.

The seas of woes that come across,

Drink them up thinking it a drink.

Really in this world no other living being laughs except human beings. Laughter is the quality only with the man. God has blessed man with this quality as man is a creature with discretion. He keeps on fighting infinite problems constantly. Sometimes he gets happiness and sometimes suffering. When he gets happiness then becomes elated, but when he faces sorrows then breaks down badly. That’s why, Sri Krishna has asserted in the Gita that only that person is happy in this world, who stands beyond happiness and sorrow. Due to his egotism, carnality and endless desires, man keeps hankering all the time and he becomes unable to be satisfied, and then starts feeling sad. The only reason for unhappiness is to expect. As much as you would expect from someone, so much disappointment shall you get. Several times, even the profoundly wise person also starts getting immense unhappiness. Because nothing is happening in this world in his accordance. He worries as to why the world doesn’t go his way, why all the people of the world don’t act according to him and so on. And the same very thought is the reason for his unhappiness. It’s said:

The wise becomes ignorant, the conscious becomes unconscious

When the mine- thine is dissolved, then one enters Godliness.

God has bestowed the humans with the art of laughter so that we can forget our woes. Only the one who is surrounded with various desires becomes unhappy. That’s why, God has dictated that you perform your duties, don’t desire anything. You can only appear in the examination. But the result is not in your hand. Still, if there are agonies, anxieties, wounds in your heart, then learn to laugh. Even witnessing sorrows also you can laugh. But whatever is happening is not because of you, don’t blame yourself or anyone else for this. The storm comes, your house falls down, then you say that I had built a fragile house, that’s why it fell down. But in reality, the storm didn’t have any idea as to where lies your home. But it did its own job, just like that whatever is happening within this Nature, is Nature’s wish. Don’t make yourself a culprit for no reason. That which has to occur, the same shall occur anyways, and the same is but happening only.

Jaake matibhram hoi khagesa, so kah pachchhim ugahi Dinesa.

(One who become delirious, says the Sun rises in the west.)

When man would be living in such circumstances, getting bogged down under the mounting of hope, expectations and desires, then to become unhappy is but natural. Man is unhappy because he has had nurtured many hopes in his life. Lord Krishna has laid in the Gita: If you are unhappy then by seeking blessings from God free yourself of all sufferings. As the happy only gets the blessings of God.

Jagat Guru Shankaracharya has said: only the joyous can get to see The Supreme. A joyous person never becomes the victim of negative energy. That’s why Sri Krishna says that one who is happy, his intellect remains standstill always.

I have experienced in my life that in the struggle of life only those can stand undaunted who are happy and cheerful. As one who is happy, woes can never enter inside him. Garbage gets collected there only, where it is meant to be dumped. If there is a neat and clean atmosphere inside ourselves, then how can debris get collected there? You must have noticed that one who keeps negative thinking, his entire life gets filled up with negativities, and those who are optimistic, they have faith in God and the one who keeps faith in God never becomes unhappy. Unhappy are those who don’t have faith in God. I have realised in my life that if one decides very morning that he shall remain cheerful all time that day, he will never get angry nor become morose. Then on certain grounds he becomes happy. Because unhappy are those who are sitting ready to become such. Many people but keep waiting days and nights, wait keeping sleepless for nights together that when shall sufferings approach them. Such persons only get unhappiness.

How would unhappiness know where do you live, in which neighbourhood? You only invite it searching for it. That is why, first cleanse your inner conscious. If joy is filled up inside you, then how would sorrows enter it? It’s said that unhappiness approaches you, only when you beckon it.

The Benefits of Laughter

If you ask me the truth, then laughter is a psychological process. To remain healthy it’s extremely essential to laugh. You shall notice that the person who laughs, sings, smiles, his face keeps glowing. His personality keeps remaining attractive. People love him. His toe to head stays flooded with positive energy. He lives for long, remains healthy. Where is the leisure to fall ill for such people? Those who have the leisure to fall ill, only they become sick. That is why a person who laughs, stays healthy and lives long.

I recall, Shakespeare has composed a play: ‘Julius Caesar’. In this play he appointed one of his loyal persons as minister, whose name was cashius. After a few days, cashius started remaining depressed and keeping away from Julius Caesar. Seeing this Caesar said: A person who remains gloomy, keeps sitting in isolation, in whose mind every moment there is some activity going on, one who would never laugh, wouldn’t sing, then on certain terms can such a person prove to be very dangerous.

Laughter is a psychological process, as by laughing the blood circulation becomes faster in the body, breathing becomes faster and every vein and sinew of the body becomes active. The most important thing is that by laughing the digestive process becomes faster. Constipation never occurs in the stomach, the lungs remain clean. Because while laughing much stress falls upon the rectum. Owing to which all the constriction of the abdomen are released. If due to any reason there is any depletion in marrow and flesh in the body, then as soon as one laughs the blood circulation gets accelerated. Oxygen enters every cell of the body, following which man starts feeling well from inside. Lord Buddha has laid the necessity of laughter to remain healthy. According to him laughter is of six types: Sita, Hamsita, Vihamsita, Upahamsita, Apahamsita, Atihamsita. Lord Buddha who himself used to stay in serious posture, he even has said that with laughter the vital forces are enhanced. Laughter is beneficial for health. That’s why, it’s said that in the morning time try to live one hour for your own self. If every day, a person sitting secluded, laughs, sings songs, remains cheerful, then he can certainly remain joyful for the rest twenty three hours. Because there are so many sorrows in the world that keep getting wounded by their pain every moment-sometimes you get blows from your relatives, sometimes you get hurt by your own children, while at other times you get wounds from the outsiders.

I kept wandering through branches, and find woes in every leaf,

Kabeera in this world, nowhere did find happiness.

But a person who learns to get happiness, learns to have faith in the Almighty, sorrows never come to him. One person was grinding wheat grains in a home mill. On seeing the person pouring wheat grains near the pivot in the middle of the grinder and flour pouring out from everywhere around it, Kabirdasji had uttered:

Watching the running mill, Kabeera fell into tears,

Nobody remained intact, falling in between two roofs.

Kabirdasji said that the wheat that come in between the two roofs of the mill, gets crushed badly and become flour.

Hearing this Kabir’s son Kamal said:

Watching the running mill, laughed Kamaal of laughter,

Who goes into the shelter If the pivot, escapes totally intact.

Kamaal said: One on whom the grace of the Supreme Lord remains, one who stays near the Lord, never falls in any peril. Only those who keep out of the pivotal pin do get crushed. The wheat staying near the pivot gets saved. That’s why one should always keep happy one’s psyche and always should keep laughing, grinning. It’s said:

If you can, then sing songs of life,

Humming sing lullabies to your own self.

How so many nests might be there of anguish,

Behold oneself for one moment, smile.

In reality, a person who laughs and smiles never becomes morose. Psychology also admits that today only that person lives long, who keeps happy all the time, but a gloomy person keeps destroying his vitality on his own. Man remains alive because of his life force only. When he laughs then the vital force increases and when he remains sulky, then life force is destroyed.

Various kinds of circumstances keep emerging in our lives. All those circumstances have to be observed, understood. That’s why whatever circumstances arrive in life, arrive like bubbles of water, and then leave. But to be wounded and fall by them is not right. That’s why be optimistic every moment and never ever get disappointed.

Someone has said:

Don’t hurl pebbles into the water, as someone else drinks it,

If life has to be lived then live laughing, as someone lives looking at you.

Types of Laughter

Generally there are five types of laughter: it means that the action of laughter is but one only, but the manners of laughter are different. Fundamentally the meaning of laughter is to express happiness. When there is happiness inside then coming out of the waves of that happiness is only laughter. A weeping person never laughs as he has sorrow inside. A sad person but cries only. When there is happiness inside, then laughter comes outside anyways, giggles erupt spontaneously. To laugh with efforts is unnatural, there is no essence in that laughter. Like if you come across any person while walking down the street, by spreading his lips he might as much try to convince that he is happy, but this is not laughter. In trains, flights, large corporate houses, such types of laughter is embraced. In reality laughter is that only, which has the nectar of bliss.

You must have noticed that when man laughs, then a chemical transformation starts occurring inside him. There starts a biological change in his body. The entire body starts tickling. Like when waves arise from the sea then jumping inside of the sea, one can reach up to the shores. That scene is very enchanting. Just like that when laughter comes out of inside then the face becomes very attractive. The beauty of the face is enhanced. The same face of our which earlier was pale, turns red with flush. This only is called Lavanya. Lavanya means saline— salty. The face becomes saline— salty, spiced up. Man becomes more elegant. That’s why on our culture laughter has been divided into various classes:

Faint smile

Smile

Laughing

Heehaw

To laugh sprawling and rolling or to scream

Laughter might well have many divisions, but the action of laughing is the same. Some people have very attractive simile. Their faces look charming. Kalidas has written in his Abhigyan Shakuntalam that when Dushyatnt saw Shakuntala, she was smiling faintly. This faint smile enhances the beauty of humans even more. The third class of laughter is to laugh clearly. In this the teeth show up on outside. Our face becomes flushed out with joy and a person starts looking beautiful. As seeing a laughing person you can’t make out if he is angry. There is one more type of laughter. Chortle or shriek. In yoga method we people administer to raise both the hands upwards and scream loudly. By this, the blood circulation is enhanced in your entire body. The pulse starts working faster. The toxins in the body parts ooze out and then body starts feeling lighter. Laughing this way, the body becomes healthier and a person’s life span starts increasing. Another laughter is to laugh aloud rolling and sprawling. In this laughter all the body parts are brought into exercise. This laughter brings amazing benefits to the body.

You must have seen the image of Lord Buddha. The laughter contained in it doesn’t show up outside. But laughter can be sensed in it. It feels as if light is about to erupt out of the face anytime. As the redness of the Sun is when about to emerge. Similarly you must have seen the painting of Monalisa. Very few people can smile that way.

In reality laughter is a natural quality of man. Except man no other creature does laugh. God has especially gifted this quality to man exclusively. No animal of the world laughs. But several times man makes his face sullen. From which it’s comprehended that is a gloomy soul. These days to look sullen, broody, considering oneself destitute and inferior has become a fashion. To gather others’ sympathies people want to look sad. This way man’s lifespan is decreased. Negative energy starts rising in his body day by day. Man generates energy by himself. Like when water remains in the river then it’s clean and pure. But when it is blocked in banks then becomes muddled, the same ways if positive thoughts are flowing in a person’s mind then he keeps laughing and smiling. If he is enmeshed in evil things, netted inside dirty thinking, then negative energy starts building up in his body and his entire life becomes negative. To protect from this negative energy only, the procedure of laughing is prescribed in our yoga scriptures. That’s why it said: Good results are generated at the end of the day only if good thoughts are generated at the beginning of the day.

If in the morning itself good thoughts start coming in the mind then we keep laughing and playing, smiling throughout the day. Really if there are positive things, good thoughts in the mind then one keeps smiling always. It’s said that there is a lot of difference between remembering and being remembered. We remember those who are our own and are remembered by those who consider us as their own.

It’s said that when a person meets someone then immediately getting in touch brings ribs of tickling in the mind, and a laughter erupts out in the mind.

It’s said:

This is true that these eyes have longed for you tremendously.

And true is this also that you have made these eyes cry immensely.

Because laughing and parting from one another are events of the inside. From outside only hands can be shaken, it can’t be love. These days by shaking hands people but of course enact love, but can’t love in reality. It’s said:

In one moment the distance of centuries is parted

O the one to shake hands! Why hide the heart?

In reality we love those only meeting whom we get happiness. Happiness doesn’t come to the mind from fake encounters. It’s said that if a person sees someone and if the personality of the same is attractive, alluring, loving then spontaneously it some out of the mouth.

Since when have seen you, wishes are soaring

Your image has begun to inhabiting these eyes.

That’s why I keep saying to my friends time and again that God can’t be seen everywhere. That’s why he appears on the face in the form of smile. By which it can be proven that God the blissful, is dwelling inside man. His rays sometimes show up outside, that only- is laughter.

The person who laughs doesn’t get angry

These days often this questions is raised across T.V channels as to why people are becoming so angry? Its reason is that harmony, compassion, love and such feeling have faded away from people’s hearts. So much so people have dumped loving themselves even. Nobody is loving anybody anymore these days. Love has got destroyed between the husband and the wife, between the father and the son, between brothers. When man loves his own self then harmony emerges in his life. Attraction comes in his life. But when he abandons loving his own self, then his life becomes a burden.

You observe that the things that are pleasant to you, you keep them with care; but the things you hate, you would throw them out somewhere. Today that we are perplexed of our lives, have started hating life, then it is natural that a person who doesn’t have love for his own life, how would such a one love others? When harmony, love, charm gets destroyed from life then the individual becomes a desert and in the desert only heat is created, thorny bushes and shrubs take birth. Rose doesn’t bloom. Every person today has turned into barren. It has a single reason that the Stream of nectar should otherwise flow in every person has never ever flown itself. Even the stream of mother’s nurturing has also dried up. How many fortunate humans are there today, who have listened to the lullabies under the mother’s affection? Now neither the mother has spare time nor the kiths and kin who would nurture the child in the shadow of motherly affection. The result is, today children are in upbringing without any motherly affection, today for them neither does anyone carry any love nor any affection.

Psychology says that the person who doesn’t get love becomes aggressive. He gets angry too much. Because the person who is immersed in love, how would the same become angry? One who is immersed in the nectar of love, how can one get angry? As long as the mouth of the honey bee is filled up with honey, it can’t sting anyone; and if there is no nectar in its mouth then it starts spilling venom. Hence first thing is that if the family atmosphere is loving, blissful then children shall be filled with love. Experts in deep psychology say even this that if the mother is in anger or sick or under any type of stress while conceiving then the child becomes likewise for the entire life. That’s why it’s said that during conception parents should be replete with joy and happiness. If the child is rewarded in a blissful atmosphere after birth, then it shall never turn mentally challenged ever.

In man’s life there are different stages of sorrow and bliss. When man is unhappy then he gets constricted, becomes shrinked. But when the same becomes happy then he becomes expanded. This is only called excess of joy. When man gets to enter complete bliss, total happiness, like when the river becomes filled up with water, then it’s waves hurl water over beyond its banks. But when the river is unfilled, then no wave arises from it. Waves arise in filled up rivers. The duration of childhood is the time of happiness only. During this time life remains full and total. At that time there is neither any hope nor any wishing, only bliss remains there. Hence giggles keep coming out. I have composed a poem- Who has stolen our childhood. Two stanzas of it are:

By making wise wiped out ignorance

By teaching to read forgotten humanity

Robbed off childhood, made helpless

Who has stolen our childhood?

Hence it’s essential that first we try to fill happiness inside ourselves. When bliss gets filled up inside then start spilling over outside, the same spillover is called laughter. You must have seen an empty pitcher, tapping it much sound comes out from it, but when the pitcher gets filled up then sound stops coming from inside it.

Why does man become unhappy? How did he forget to smile? You ask anybody as to when did he have his previous laugh, then he would say that he wouldn’t remember. What happened to him? The only reason is that he has made so many wishes in his life, has started yearning for so many things that when his desires aren’t satiated then he becomes belligerent. Such people can’t ever laugh in their lives.

Another important thing is that a person, who is humorous, can’t slit anyone’s throat. He can’t commit atrocities or perversion. Because he is in love with his life. Such people but don’t even like plucking flowers. He knows that whose head is to be thrashed, whom to be angry upon, everything but belongs to that Supreme Father God Almighty. A person who keeps faith in God neither gets angry nor commits violence. As for violence anger is necessary and anger comes only when there is scarcity, panic and hollowness inside. Man, to fill up the same hollowness becomes aggressive; and this hollowness gets filed up with love and compassion.

In what words should I propitiate, all words are but yours,

The body, the mind, vitality in the vitals are of you.

This moon, sun, creatures, tripartite time, the colossal universe,

The beginning and end of this live creation, jot to jot is your dwelling place.

It means that when man is filled up with happiness then his intellect gets stabilised in every direction. Sri Krishna’s saying is that when happiness, peace and bliss gets