here are some people like Lou Costello who come into this world to spread happiness. He was a great comedian. His son had died just as he was to perform his show. The phone was ringing calling him to come home as his son had drowned in the swimming pool. He was informed that the baby boy had crawled over to the edge of the pool when he tumbled over and died. Lou Costello was in deep shock.

Costello thought that he was already ruined. There was nothing left for him. Why then should he make others laugh? He was about to go out to inform the neighbors about the tragedy. Two children from the neighborhood saw him and came rushing towards him. They caught hold a corner of his coat and started pulling him towards them.

He noticed that the two children were of the same age as of his son, of the same physique, wearing clothes just like his son. Looking at them he started weeping. Tears rolled down from his eyes. His son had also played like them, laughed like them but now he could not see him. His lips trembled and his face fell with pain and sorrow. He wept bitterly. One of the two children said: ‘Uncle, make us laugh. You make every body laugh. The other said that uncle was crying to make us laugh. He is making faces to make us laugh.’

That man, the great actor of his times, felt as if his own son had woken up and was telling him to make him laugh just as he used to make other people laugh. After that incident, Costello said to himself that he felt that God had given him the power to make others laugh. ‘Though my bad luck had not given me the happiness but I have, at least, one thing within me, the treasure of happiness, with which I can make other people laugh and fill them with happiness and pleasure.’

Then it is stated in his autobiography, Costello, leaving his dead child, went back to his studio where he was to perform, of course, with a heavy heart. He made people laugh and feel happy while hiding his grief. He delivered a stellar performance thinking that he could at least give happiness to this world.

He felt that all the children of this world were his own children. All the children of the world have the face of his own son. He felt ‘I was distributing happiness to the world’. In him the treasure of happiness was flowing. He was distributing it. He said: ‘I felt that acting as a comedian was not a mere performance. It became my devotion; it became my prayer and I was taking pleasure in that’.

Take pleasure in you. Bring satisfaction in you. You will find that the moments of pain that are before you would not remain for long.