when we start to appreciate the smaller perks of life, the blessings become so much more vibrant than it seemed earlier.
It was just like any other day. I slept till the afternoon since it was raining and I basically had nothing good to do for the whole day. Then I finally got up, had my breakfast and went out around the evening to meet a couple of friends. We hung out, went out for a bike ride to touch the damp weather in some speed, had some very unhygienic and unhealthy food like the absolute chads(!) we are, and so on. By the end of our hangout, it was almost midnight. It was still mildly raining so I wanted to walk back home. But a friend insisted us to take a rickshaw instead as he already had cold issues. So we took a rickshaw, and on our way back I was basically lecturing him about why walking would've been the better option, among other things. The rickshaw dropped him at his home first since it arrived before mine as we were on our way back. After dropping him off, on the way back to my house, me and the rickshaw puller fella didn’t get a chance to talk as it was starting to rain again and we were in somewhat of a hurry.
After we reached my place, as I stepped down from the rickshaw, this guy randomly said, "ভাই, আপনার কন্ঠটা অনেক সুন্দর।" which roughly translates to "bro, you have a nice voice."
I thought I didn’t hear him properly so I asked "bro did you say something?"
And he very casually replied, "I said you have a nice voice bro."
I started laughing (in a happy manner ofc 😛) at this point and politely said "Thank you brother", and added a salam as he took off and I entered my home.
Even at this point I didn’t realise how beautifully this one complement would affect me, but as I got in, got freshened up and sat on my bed, I realized that the one liner complement from this complete stranger, who I might not even meet ever again, made my day much better than it would've been if this incident, which would arguably be insignificant to most people, didn’t take place. And trust me, I couldn’t wash the smile off of my face for hours. To this day, if I remember this incident, a smile automatically appears on my face.
The whole interaction was so genuine, he was so genuine, so purehearted, he didn’t need to splurge out some sophisticated narration to complement a random stranger. He just said what he wanted to, right on my face, without any hesitation, without expecting anything in return. I don't really know if my voice is actually any good, or if I'm over-reading the whole exchange, but even now, it feels precious to me.
The world is so full of negative people, we are surrounded with so much negativity and not-so-positive judgements, that its quite easy to get upset and lose the hopes needed to keep ourselves steady. It becomes very easy to give up as the negativity piles up and it becomes too much to take. But when I, personally, start to lose the grip with all these happening; these kinds of incidents, these small gestures of positivity and appreciation makes me take a closer look at my life and I realise, over and over again, that even if there's a hundred negative people surrounding me with their self-ignited negativity, the energy of one positive person’s existence in my life, their touch, their smile, even if its just for a few moments; it still matters much more than all of their negativity combined.
As we start focusing on the positivity we're presented with, the negatives in life begin to get so vague and weak that they cannot touch our soul anymore.
So, even though I don’t know the guy who dropped me off on his rickshaw that day, I'm very thankful to him, for giving me another thin layer of positivity to wrap my soul with, protecting it from the raw negativity I have to deal with in the everyday life.