On Santosha and the Good Life

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I grew up in the India of the 1990s, when life was simple and contentment wasn’t something you had to search for. It was built into our days.

Our house was small, our possessions few, but our lives felt full in a way that’s hard to explain today.

Summers meant playing cricket in dusty bylanes, not exotic vacations. Afternoons were spent lying under a slow ceiling fan (which often didn’t run due to regular power cuts), listening to old songs or reading the same comic books over and over again.

A bottle of Gold Spot or a softy ice cream was a luxury, and the Sunday evening movie on Doordarshan was an event the entire family gathered around for.

Looking back now, I realise we didn’t have much. Yet, strangely, we didn’t feel like we were missing anything.

Somewhere along the way, however, that feeling faded. We grew up, the country changed, markets opened up, and along with new possibilities came new desires…and new restlessness. The idea of “enough” got pushed further and further away.

It wasn’t anyone’s fault. When you grow up with limited options, it’s natural to want more when you finally can. But somewhere, we forgot that the simple joy of contentment doesn’t automatically grow with our bank accounts.

There’s a word in our old Indian wisdom for this. It’s santosha, which means contentment.

In Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras, santosha is listed as one of the five niyamas (personal observances) essential for a meaningful, good life:

सन्तोषातनुत्तमःसुखलाभः॥ Yoga Sutra 2.42

Translation: From contentment (Santosha), the highest happiness is attained.

Now, some people may misunderstand, but santosha doesn’t mean resignation. It’s not about giving up, settling, or stopping your efforts to improve your life. It’s something far more subtle and powerful, and is actually the ability to recognise what is already enough, even as you continue to grow.

But I’ll be honest. Today, when someone talks about santosha, it’s easy to roll your eyes. Contentment sounds like something privileged people talk about after they’ve achieved enough to afford it. And I agree. Telling someone who is struggling to pay school fees or keep the kitchen running to “just be content” can feel insensitive, even cruel. It can sound like the kind of spiritual advice you give from an air-conditioned room.

Yet, if I look back at my own childhood, I remember that most people around us then — teachers, small shopkeepers, factory workers, even my own parents — didn’t have much, but they carried a kind of peace. They worked hard, they had their struggles, but they weren’t running a race inside their heads all the time.

Life was not easy, but it wasn’t empty either. There was as much joy in a cup of tea as in a festival celebrated together. Most of us didn’t use the word santosha, but we lived it without realising.

It’s important to note here that the real meaning of santosha is not about stopping your progress. It’s about not letting the absence of something become the absence of everything. You can still strive, still want to improve your circumstances, but you don’t have to postpone your peace until every box is ticked. Because the truth no one tells you is that those boxes never end. The mind has a habit of moving the goalpost every time you get close. What felt like “enough” five years ago will not feel enough today.

Anyway, I was reminded of this idea of santosha recently when I visited my childhood home. The house is old now, the paint peeling, the lanes narrower than I remembered. But the neem and mango trees are still there. And the neighbour’s music player (earlier, it was a radio) still plays old Lata Mangeshkar songs every evening.

As I stood there, I felt something I hadn’t felt in a long time. It was the lightness of having nothing to prove, nowhere to get, and nothing more to accumulate.

That feeling is santosha.

Anyways, before I end, here’s a small task for you: Tonight, before you sleep, pause for a moment and ask yourself — If nothing in my life changes tomorrow, what do I already have today that is simply enough? It could be your child’s smile, a roof over your head, a home-cooked meal, or just the fact that you made it through the day.

That’s the silent art of santosha, which I think may be the most underrated secret to a good life.

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That’s all from me for today.

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