"San ka Humuhugot ng Saya?": A Review

Jenette shares a laugh with Rose Ann during the event 

“A writer, I think, is someone who pays attention to the world."       ~ Susan Sontag

My friend Jenette Vizcocho of Murphy Report came to our event, "San ka Humuhugot ng Saya?" as a guest but she ends up translating the 1 hour talk in Filipino to Rose Ann and later writing about her beautiful experience.

I asked her if I can share her thoughts in this blog and like the angel that she is, she said yes. 

Here's what Jenette has to say about the event.     

I joined a talk on Happiness and where we find it at Brahma Kumaris because I was curious about my notion of happiness and if my practice/daily life is leading to a sustainable form of it. The speaker, BK Gopi Patel, came highly recommended by @smilea who heard her speak in London, and so to have her come here and explain happiness seemed like lucky happenstance.

BK Gopi said that we usually identify our happiness with momentary pleasure: food, material wealth, even people. The problem that cases us to over-anything (eat, spend, form unhealthy attachments) is that pleasure is fleeting. If we make an external thing or person our happiness, we will always be let down. Not to say things and people cannot make us happy, but if we hand the responsibility of our happiness over to others, we never find ways to feel happy with or by ourselves.

So how do we attain happiness? She suggests learning to recognize our thoughts especially the negative, downward spiral, self-sabotaging ones, and learn to dispute them as fears and false truths. She suggests sharing the best of ourselves with others not for their approval or for an expected reaction, but because we are inherently giving. She suggests learning to see the good/joy in everyday life, even in the ordinary days, especially on the bad days.

It's funny because I went there for myself but ended up translating the whole talk to Filipino for Rose Ann, a girl I previously met, who is sick and has to endure daily painful treatments, who thinks going to BK is a grand adventure, who spoke of how when she went to a party, she chose a Batman figure for her nephew instead of the bracelet she really liked because she knew it would make him happy, who sang out loud to Katy Perry during an intermission. It reminds me I am in a very good place in my life, and that one of my happiness comes from sharing my time with her.

It is customary after the talk to receive sweets or toli, so that all our thoughts and words are sweet even after we leave the center. BK Gopi handed me this card and when you look her in the eyes, you see that in her life of simplicity and practicality, is a life of happiness.

P.S. BK Gopi Patel still has one last talk in Manila on August 24, 6:30pm before she flies for London. I hope you get to listen to her.  

invite by Brahma Kumaris Makati