KidSpirit

Every Day a Happy Day

HappinessGlobal Beat

Believe it or not, I can’t wait to get to my school every single weekday of the year (sometimes even holidays)! Presenting to you, my dear friends, The Riverside School in Ahmedabad, India. Let me share with you the happiness recipes that are created, cooked, and experienced here on a daily basis.

My school is the kind of place that helps me focus and give my best efforts to all that I do. It’s like my own personal space to just be myself. It’s a place that encourages me to be free and develop my all-around personality. Here, I’m not compelled to have a singular focus on getting good marks; instead, I am encouraged to focus on building my character and exploring my responsibilities and opportunities as a citizen.

There’s a pattern that emerges, whenever we’re happy — it’s usually when we do good. When we do good, we feel good, and in turn do well in things like academics. My math, science and English scores on the Asset exam were a pleasant surprise for my parents.

My school supports me and enables me and my peers to do good by guiding us on a path where we work towards a goal for the world and give more back to the community than we get. We believe that every day is an opportunity to practice relevance, relationship, and rigor and to build content — knowledge and academics — as well as character, which makes us global citizens.

This good can be done anywhere. We have been taught from a young age to help and serve without any expectations. But we know that whatever good goes around comes back around.

In every session we attend, and with each morsel we eat, we express our gratitude for the privileges we have. It’s important to realize that we’re not entitled to them, and every moment in our life is a chance to earn those privileges. And we can earn them just by smiling at someone — it very often makes that person’s day!

The fact that there are people out there who are deprived of their bare necessities — child laborers, terminally ill or disabled children, grandmas and grandpas at old age homes — has started to disappoint me, but we have initiatives at school which help us to contribute and spread happiness among them on a regular basis. Every single time I’m not happy, I remind myself of all the privileges I’m granted every day, and I’m sure to get back on track, with my chin up.

Every person I make happy makes me much happier — it’s a chain of happiness that exists all the time. I’m sure it’s contagious! My school, my teachers, and I believe that every child deserves to develop the spirit of “I can!”

Look within. Happiness is not out there; it’s in you.

Samarth Jajoo is a seventh grader from Ahmedabad, India. He’s a programming enthusiast and solving problems is his best source of entertainment. When not coding, you’ll probably find him in school playing table tennis, or writing about something that triggers his imagination.

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