The Art of living!

This weekend, I’ve read an article about the Art of Living! It all started with the heading: ‘The Art of Living is best copied from family and friends’. Huh? So according to this, there seems to be no need for all those self-help/Art of Living books and the Dr. Phil’s of the world.

The article states that life itself is life threatening. ‘A plant can fall from a balcony; a passer-by can have a screw loose and can turn violent or you get an illness that you didn’t invite. All these diverse dangers can really mess up the image of a long and happy life. How will you know if you can still eat that yoghurt that’s two days past the sell-by-date or how dangerous a trip to the tropics will be? Choices, choices, choises! Living is all about making choices and if you make the wrong choice too often, you won’t get old.'

But help is close at hand (according to the article). 'Just look around you. Of course it is fantastic that you can get advice from a supernanny on television, read all about ways to improve your sexlife in a glossy magazine, but you can learn just as much from your family, relatives, friends and acquaintances. When you see a hard working career junkie regretting that he never spent time with his kids, maybe you can think of a way to have the best of both worlds. If a friend lives in a trailer because his businessplan did not work out the way it should have, you learn that you have to come up with a better plan and make the necessary preparations. Just look around you, see all the pitfalls others have to deal with and learn. The Art of Living can be copied!’

I think the article is partly right. You can learn a lot from the people around you. But do people really tell all about their smashed hopes and dreams, failures and problems or do they just paint you a pretty picture? I think it’s often the latter. So I think I will do both (the best of both worlds) keep an eye on my surroundings and keep on reading about the Art of Living every now and then. Isn’t life all about learning too?