Search and you will find life so wonderful.

One day I met a retired teacher at a bank. We sat down to talk about days gone past. They were happy memories.

Then this retired teacher bemoaned the present retirement time; how slow time crawled by. He watched television in the morning, then read the newspapers from front to back, top to bottom before returning to his television again. Time was too long. He just did not know how to fill it.

I asked him about his hobbies. Well, now is the best time to continue with his hobbies, with the things he was interested in but could not find the time to indulge in them previously. I told him about my fish, my edible leaves and plants, my tortoises, my birds, my reading, my qi kung, my meditation, yoga and my daily trek up a hill. Those are the things I love to do. In fact, there are still a few interests which I still could not find time for.

It looked like he had no such interests. What a poor fellow he was!

Then I told him he could do volunteer work. There are so many Non-Government Organisations which need our help. Be a volunteer and discover the pleasure of being able to assist others. And such work does not cost you a cent. There is Tzu Chi and other organisations known world-wide. There are old folks' homes and orphanages. I told him about The Art of Living which is sending its trained teachers to schools to help teachers and students overcome tension, to prisons to help prisoners realise and be aware of their mistakes, to love themselves as well as others, to find the divine spirit in themselves. I told him about the charity work done by The Art of Living. And to know more about this organisation, I directed him to http://www.artofliving.org for further information.

He was not interested. I finally discovered that he was still thinking of material gains; he was thinking of money. He could not imagine himself doing work for the benefit of others.

If his pension was a small miserable sum which could not be sufficient to support him through his days, then he was right to think of work and more money. However, I am talking about a guy whose pension was more than most people's salary. See? He was so well-do-to, yet he was so bored with life because he was stingy with his time. And time became a burden, each day bringing more boredom.

Finally, I asked him whether he had ever heard of the saying: GIVE IN ORDER THAT YOU MAY RECEIVE. I told him of the happiness I got from helping and doing such volunteer work, the type of happiness which money can never buy.

I could do nothing else but hope that he could find the right path to the same joy and happiness I derived from my type of work. His path might be different but if he could achieve it, that is all anyone can wish for.

Life is what we make of it. Just do it and everything will be fine.