Happiness in Bali. During my travel I met a lot of people. Some of them I want to forget that I even met and others I will remember for the rest of my life. Puspa and her husband Tut are people whom I will never forget. I met them on the road, trying to hitch the ride. You can find details about this story here . I had a chance to know them better since I was invited to live in their house on Bali for almost a month! That time was incredible, it taught me a lot about myself, about people and general values in life. Puspa taught me meditation, and I helped her blogging. I would like to introduce you to Puspa.
How does your daily routine look like?
Every day, I wake up in the morning and start my day with 10-15 minutes meditation. It’s a very important part of my daily routine because it makes me feel good and also gives a positive energy for a whole day. Before my work, I prepare breakfast and food for lunch. In my religion, after cooking, I have to make an offering of new food, we call it „Banet Saipan", as a gesture of being thankful to God and the universe that we can cook and enjoy that food.
happiness in Bali
Before going to sleep, I also meditate to release stress and bad memories that had happened on that day. Whether you realize it or not, actually we pass many bad memories every day. Meditation is also a part of praying.
What do you do for life?
As you know, I am a hotelier. I work in a five star hotel in Bali. But sometimes I also work as an event organizer or wedding planner with other company (freelancer). If I still have time and I’m not busy with organizing Balinese ceremonies, I also sell hand-painted t-shirts with Balinese art picture.
Do you earn enough money to live the way you would like to?
Why I do so many things and, even as a wife, I am also busy at home? Because I like being busy, time is going fast. But, honestly, for marriage life... my salary is not enough for our life, my salary and my husband's is enough to pay credit to build a house, to buy food, or to spend for our social life (for example: to visit family or friends, to have a ceremony, in case of sickness), for religious life...as you see, we have plenty of ceremonies for which extra money is needed as well. But surely we love to do that.
In Bali, on the small Island there are 3 main religions: Hinduism, Islam and Christianity. In Poland we have one main religion and from time to time we have a problem to understand each other and accept different opinions. I think we have a problem with tolerance. I know that even in your neighborhood there are Muslims who live here...
How do you feel with it? Do you feel safe and comfortable?
Actually we have five religions in Indonesia - Hinduism, Islam, Buddhism, Christianity (protestant and catholic), but I have never felt uncomfortable because of it. We are used to our differences and we live in peace. We respect each other and stay friendly. There is no reason to feel unsafe because of differences between us. For example, in Bali most of people are Hindu but I don’t think that other religions feel to be a minority here.
One of my favorite quotes is “If you worry - pray, if you pray - don’t worry”. It describes how much the Christians should believe that God give us anything we need. I try to follow it.
Do you have general rules/quotes, which show you direction in life?
I don't follow any special quotes but I really believe in karma. Our religion teaches us that if you do well, you will attract good things, and if you do or think bad you will also attract bad things. Have you ever heard about law of attraction? Law of attraction means that whether we realize it or not, we are responsible for bringing both positive and negative influences into our lives. A key part of the Law of attraction is to understand that where you place your focus, it can have an intense impact on what happens to you. For example, if you spend your days focusing on regrets about the past or fears of the future, you’ll likely see more negativity appearing, but if you look for the silver lining in every experience, you’ll soon start to see positivity surrounding you every day.
I have a lot of experiences where karma really works in my life.
Some time ago I was in a hurry to go to work but on the road, in hot weather, I met my friend’s mother-in-law going home, which was still far away, I felt ashamed and so I dropped her to her house. When I was on my way back to work I saw that a few minutes ago there had been a truck accident and many cars and motorbikes were hit by the truck. How lucky I am! - I thought to myself.If I had ignored my friend’s mother-in-law walking in hot weather, maybe I would have been there at that time and would have had an accident.
I also believe that if you have a problem… every problem will pass and come to an end. No matter what, how huge it will be or how complicate… you will pass it. It will be either a happy ending or not. But you can always learn from it.
Why did you decide to help me and my friend on the road and drive us to our destination? To invite a stranger to your house and let her stay for almost one month! Is it because of karma?
Yeah karma may not be working suddenly on that day but, for sure, I believe someday the universe will pay off that day. Someday, somebody will also help us when we need it, I’m sure of it.
And one more reason is, I helped you because I’m pregnant. Me and my husband try to do good things as much as we can. We believe and hope that the good things will come back to our baby in the future. Simple thing is... even when you are in a bad situation, you can still do good things to others. It makes me feel happy.
Why did we invite you to stay? To be honest, we have a new house. Only two of us. Sometimes it is boring so we thought... why not invite you to stay? :) other ways, we have a new friend... :)
Don't you feel worried to invite a stranger to your house?
We weren’t worry or afraid, we were in our hometown with God beside us ;)
My journey teaches me that there is no straightforward relationship between wealth and happiness (money doesn’t give happiness). A lot of my friends work so hard for material success, as a main road to happiness. The media and government encourage us to believe that we need to keep earning and spend to boost economic growth. What do you think about it?
Happiness for me is when I have valuable people around me, especially my parents and my husband. Sometimes money can give us happiness but more than, we need love and time. If we have a lot of money but we don't have love and time for ourselves, family or friends, it will mean nothing.
If you had a chance to make one of your dreams come true. What it would be?
My dream is to be a housewife with good finances, to make money but at the same time to have more time for my family and for social life. I really want to work smart... not work hard like now.... ;)
And what about blog?
Yeah...you are right....I really want to write a blog to tell everybody about my culture, my experiences. I meet a lot of people from all around the world (as a hotelier I met many people from many countries with different character).
I wish you all of that and I’m still willing to help you! Thank you!
Who would like to read Puspa’s blog? :)
> More about incredible people from Bali you can read in my book. Here you can find more.<<
12 thoughts on “happiness in Bali, Happiness according to the Balinese”
Great interview! I wish to visit Bali next year!! Looking forward to reading Puspa’s blog :-)))
Thx Alex! Bali is really amazing! You should go there for sure! 🙂 I can’t wait to read Puspa’s blog as well 😉
Great interview! I wish to visit Bali next year!! Looking forward to reading Puspa’s blog :-)))
Thx Alex! Bali is really amazing! You should go there for sure! 🙂 I can’t wait to read Puspa’s blog as well 😉
Bali has its advantages and disadvantages. Being under the care of Balinese you probably do not you experienced this. The biggest drawback of this place are crooks. Tourists must be careful at every step.
I agree with you. This is happening everywhere, not only Bali island. Always when we visit touristic places we should be careful.
But I never met them so much. Almost daily they were trying to trick me. This happened for example in front of the temple of Besakih, near the waterfall Sekumpul, with money exchange, while driving Uber.
ok, I understand. It’s a pity that you experienced this on Bali ;/
Bali has its advantages and disadvantages. Being under the care of Balinese you probably do not you experienced this. The biggest drawback of this place are crooks. Tourists must be careful at every step.
I agree with you. This is happening everywhere, not only Bali island. Always when we visit touristic places we should be careful.
But I never met them so much. Almost daily they were trying to trick me. This happened for example in front of the temple of Besakih, near the waterfall Sekumpul, with money exchange, while driving Uber.
ok, I understand. It’s a pity that you experienced this on Bali ;/