There are two men who are both very sick in the same ward. One man is only allowed to sit for an hour each afternoon to drain the water that has accumulated in his lungs, and has the only window in the ward next to his bed, while the other man has to lie in a hospital bed for long periods of time.
They always talked a lot, about their wives and families, about work, about their time in the military, about where they had been on vacation. Every afternoon, when the man by the window had a chance to sit, he spent a lot of time recounting to his roommate what it looked like out the window. The other man is enlivened by this hour, and his little world is enlarged and enlivened by the colorful life outside the window.
Outside the window there is a park and a lovely lake where children boat across the lake, ducks and swans play, and young couples walk arm-in-arm among the colorful flowers. Huge trees made the view even more beautiful, and from a distance you could see the city reflected in the blue sky. While the man by the window narrates the view with great attention, the man on the other side of the room closes his eyes and imagines the beauty of the scene.
One warm afternoon, the man by the window was narrating the passing parade, and although the other man could not hear the band, he could still feel it with his heart, feel the vocabulary of the words used in the description given by the man by the window.
Unexpectedly, a bad thought surfaced in his mind: ‘Why is that man the only one who can experience these delightful things? Why can’t I see this? It’s not fair.’
At first he would have found it shameful to think such thoughts, days passed and he wanted to see more, his envy grew to anger and soon to his soul. He began to brood and noticed that he himself could no longer sleep, the idea and only idea that he should have a window controlled him.
One night he was lying and staring at the ceiling. The man next door started coughing up his staff, he couldn’t breathe because the water was pooling in his lungs, and he just watched in the darkness as the struggling man fumbled for the distress bell. He listens to the commotion next door and doesn’t move himself, nor does he ring his own distress bell to get a nurse. After five minutes, the coughing staff and wheezing stopped, and only the sound of a man’s breathing could be heard, leaving only a dead silence.
The next morning, the nurse brings water to scrub them. When she realizes the man by the window is dead, she is saddened and looks for someone else to take him out. Seeming like a good opportunity, he asks the nurse if he can move to the window, and the nurse gladly switches his seat over, leaving him alone after making sure he’s okay.
Slowly, painfully, he leaned on one side of his elbow to prop himself up, trying to get a glimpse of the world outside. He was so full of joy to see a world of his own that he forced himself to slowly turn and look out the window and see that there was only one wall! He asked the nurse what compelled his dead roommate to recount all the beautiful things outside the window. The nurse said that the man was blind and couldn’t see anything, even a wall, she said: he probably wanted to encourage you!
You can translate this story into whatever you want, but stick to your moral conscience: a very good happiness is to make other people happy, regardless of our own condition. Sharing misery is half the misery, but sharing happiness is double the happiness. If you want to feel rich, count all the things you have that money can’t buy, or reflect on the things you have experienced and taken for granted. Too often we fail to see the meaning and significance of something.