Yesterday was a good day.
With open skies, a cool breeze on my face, amidst a garden full of lush green trees, surrounded by my closest family, exchanging old stories and laughing, I could feel calmness sweeping over me like a warm, cosy blanket.
Living in a bustling city in an apartment, we don't get much of our share of nature these days. So, when my in-laws came into town for a visit, we decided to spend a couple of days in a nearby farmhouse for some quiet time.
We spent the last two days cradled in the senses of nature, plucked fresh vegetables from the farm, watched one of the most picturesque sunsets of our lives, and had fun.
But, what I felt on the last night, as I sat on the front porch of the farmhouse, enjoying the company of my family in the calm and cosiness of a farm tucked far away from the noise of the city, was what the Dutch refer to as gezellig.
There's no literal translation for this word in English; it's more of a feeling than a definition, but if I put it in words, it would be cosy togetherness.
You might have experienced this feeling before.
You're out on a date with another lovely person you can connect with emotionally, and the whole world and its troubles seem to have melted away. It's just you and that special person, having a lovely time in warm, comfortable surroundings, feeling like there's no place else you'd rather be. Gezellig.
These tiny moments not only make us feel alive and satisfy our human instincts of social bonding but also help us cope with the constant demands of our modern life.
In this hyper-connected era, we're more connected than ever yet distant from our closest tribe. We connect with thousands of people worldwide with the tap of a button, but it's probably been weeks or even months since we had a hearty conversation with our friends and family.
Making time and the likelihood of gezellig moments can bring us back from being a dull, overworked machine to simply being a human.
But what makes a moment gezellig?
Try blending good people with a warm, welcoming atmosphere and doing something enjoyable together.
I've had many strokes of gezellig moments before, one being when I spent a warm evening at my home with my wife and some friends, sitting on a couch hugging a plushy pillow, catching up on everything that happened since we last got together.
Time flew, and I was the least concerned about anything else apart from being fully immersed in the moment and having a good time with my people.
You have to experience the feeling yourself to understand what this emotion really means.
So, call some of your friends with a game night this weekend or spend a lovely evening with your partner at home cooking or watching a movie, cosied up.
It's one of the most powerful feelings of togetherness that you can have in this modern and disconnected world.
Add some gezellig to your life.
