In lighter vein.. Sheikh Chilli, my mentor for the day

Sheikh Chilli alias Sheikh Chehali, is a popular folk character, some say a Sufi saint, in Northern India who is mostly known for his daydreaming where he would build castles in the air.A story about him goes somewhat like this: Sheikh Chilli was going to town with a milk pot on his head to sell milk there. On the way, he started daydreaming about some of his ambitious projects that he would undertake with the money he would get by selling milk over the time. He would happily imagine that in a year's time he would save enough money to have a house of his own. Then he would marry and have children. The children would grow up and play with him. Some would play even with his beard.
When that happens he would turn his neck backwards to extricate his beard from the hands of his naughty children.Thus happily involved in his daydreaming, Sheikh Chilli would actually turn his neck backwards. The milk pot on his head would fall down and the milk would be spilled around crashing his dreams of prosperity.But repeated failure of dream projects didn't deter him from dreaming of another projects. It kept him happy forever in his dreams. 
Moral of the Sheikh Chilli story is that happiness is merely a state of the mind. We can choose to be happy by thinking of things that make us happy. We should try to think of happy ideas whenever we may feel depressed due to some untoward situation.
My friend master Zile Singh says that he effectively uses Sheikh Chilli's method to beat out his blues from a situation.The method that he learnt from a Principal of his school says that whenever in depression, one should imagine that one has got a lottery of one crore rupees. Then one should work on the plans to spend this money. Take your time to work out the details. One may even change the blueprints as many times as one wishes to make it something after one's dreams of happy life. The longer you take, the better it is. 
The hypothetical incident was very amusing  for senior citizens of Agarsen Colony Hisar who gather daily in the neighbourhood park. They sit under a canopy and call themselves as the Chhatri Group. They  even offered their equally funny suggestions to  make it a joyous session with juicy dreams.They laughed out their meeting with the stories of Sheikh Chilli and those of master Zile Singh, who is also president of the Chhatri Group.
The stories amused me so much that back in my home, I too started daydreaming of my own happy projects.Well, a lottery of one crore rupees wouldn't get much these days to make me happy. You can't buy even a good house.So let there be a hundred crore rupee lottery.  But even this amount wouldn't buy me a farm house that I dream of in the NCR  where an acre of land in Gurugram sells for 20 to 50 crore of rupees depending on its location. 
So let me  think of something else to beat my depression.Why  a farm house in the NCR only?  Get away from there into remote Haryana or Rajasthan where one can purchase a village with that amount. No, no, I wouldn't purchase an entire village. That would render all my brothers, relatives and friends homeless and landless.It is an Arjuna moment for me. I wouldn't listen even to Lord Krishna on that. The idea is just not acceptable.
Ok. What is the alternative? It requires a lot more of daydreaming.Dreaming and dreaming till the children don't pluck your beard and spoil your dreams? Oh here is the dream of dreams. The in-thing among the billionaires of the world. An out of world idea. And what an idea!I shall be going on a space journey in a rocket. It costs about two crores of rupees. I can take along 50 members of my Whatsapp groups. Hurry up for early booking with Richard Brenson's Virgin Galactic. Hurry up before some naughty children pluck your beard to spoil the things.But there is a slight problem here. Those who enjoy their farting, are not eligible for space tourism. Why? Ask Google. It is a really serious issue.
Thank you Sheikh Chilli,  my mentor for the day.Ha ha ha. 

(Writer freelance journalist based at Hisar in Haryana)