Count Your Blessings Today. You Don’t Know What Tomorrow Hides

Vedant is around forty years old. He is married, has two children, and lives in his own house in an upscale locality of Bengaluru, India. But Vedant is not a happy man.

Till about seven years ago, Vedant had a well-paying job and an upwardly mobile career in a multinational company. Then one day, the market changed, things spiraled downward, and eventually Vedant lost his job. He tried to get another job, but jobs matching his skills and qualifications started to vanish, and however much he tried, he could not get another job. He attended many interviews, only to be told that he was overqualified, that his skills had become obsolete, and that younger candidates were being preferred.

Days became months and months became years. Vedant had planned his finances well and made some investments that were enough to afford a decent lifestyle despite being jobless. The standard of living changed only slightly, nothing worth worrying about.

However, Vedant was very depressed and thought everything was lost and that he was deadwood now. Nothing excited him anymore, and he grew bitter by the day. For the first time in his adult life, nobody needed him professionally. The phone no longer rang with work-related calls, and slowly he began to feel irrelevant. Because unemployment is rarely about money alone. It is often about identity.

Days went by and then one day, everything in front of him became blurred. He felt very unwell and had to be shifted to a hospital. No one was worried about the hospital expenses, as Vedant had been particular about keeping his health insurance policy active. The doctors stabilized him, and he stayed in the hospital for a few days before coming home. However, he was not the same anymore. He had suffered a paralytic attack, and his left side had become partially paralyzed, enough to impact his mobility and quality of life.

With limited mobility and declining health, Vedant became even more depressed. He wished his health could return to its earlier state. He was now completely consumed by his suffering and often cursed his bad luck.

Time passed and life settled into a new routine. Vedant was now slowly coming to terms with his health condition.

However, he slowly started realizing that his friends had drifted away from him. Nothing obvious, but they came to see him less often, called him less often, and often missed his calls. He began to feel isolated and neglected. He figured out that the majority of his social contacts existed for many reasons. His job, his availability for fun trips and social gatherings, and his social status had attracted a lot of friends. But with those gone, the gang of friends started thinning.

Life went on. Vedant figured out newer ways to keep himself busy, including developing a new hobby of singing and nurturing a hope of building a new identity as a singer. His singing initially got some traction, and Vedant received appreciation and even some money from his singing ventures.

Over a period of time, people got bored of his songs and poems, and even the online traction for his work faded away, leaving Vedant absolutely furious this time. He cursed his luck and questioned God as to why he had to endure so much misfortune.

Vedant was hopeless and completely shattered. Day and night, he burned in the fire of despair. He became bitter, and his family bore the brunt of it.

Then, one night, he dreamt that his family was leaving him because they could no longer endure his outbursts and constant negativity. He woke up sweating and breathing heavily, but as he regained his senses, he saw his wife sleeping peacefully beside him, and the children were also there in their room.

He got out of bed and went to the balcony to get some fresh air. As he sat down in the recliner, he started thinking.

When I lost my job, I had everything else intact: my health, my friends, my admirers, and my family. But at that time, none of these mattered, and I was fretting about losing my job.

When I lost my health, I still had friends, admirers, and family, but these did not count then. All I was concerned about was losing my health.

When I lost friends and admirers, I became bitter and never realized that my family was still beside me, giving me love and care.

Today, when I dreamt of losing them, I realized how important they are and what would happen if I were to lose them too.

It was an eye-opener for Vedant, and he sat thinking. What I lost was merely a fraction of what I still have. I realize the value of every blessing in my life only when I lose it.

From that moment onwards, he started counting all the aspects of life which, if lost, would make him even more miserable, but which he fortunately still had. He may not have thought of the word “fortunately” for many years, but when he did, he realized how lucky he was to be where he was today.

You never know what you might lose tomorrow, but if you value what you have today, you will realize how blessed you already are. You have food on your dining table, you have your limbs, you have your eyesight, you have loving people around you, and the list goes on. But imagine having to lose any one of them tomorrow.

So count your blessings today, be grateful, and revel in the bounty of life, for you don’t know what tomorrow holds.