It was 9:00AM but it felt more like 9:00PM. I ran the short distance from my hotel in Princeton, New Jersey to the parking lot dragging my suitcase behind me. It was raining so hard that by the time I got to the car, it looked like I had just jumped out of a swimming pool. Starting the engine, I left the parking lot behind me and headed towards Newark airport. The heavy showers limited the visibility to just a few feet ahead, making driving a tiresome task. As I crawled along in traffic I noticed how some of the other drivers were dealing with the situation. Looking around, I saw only gloomy faces. Nobody was smiling on this dark, cold and rainy morning.

The airport was not any better. Everyone was less polite than usual. All of the airport staff from security to immigration had woken up earlier to the same gloominess. I took a look at the flights board and was relieved to see that there were no delays. However, the sour face of the flight attendant at the gate entrance left no doubt that passengers were not being welcomed on board that day and that even the crew was anxious to cancel the flight. 

As I settled onto the plane, I noticed as the last passengers were getting ready for departure and tightening their seat belts, that their facial expressions were grim—as if they expected this flight to be their last. The mood inside the airplane was an exact reflection of the gloomy weather outside.

Fifteen minutes later the Boeing 777 tilted its head toward the clouds and made a wide turn north, heading toward London. Climbing through the dark, the plane hit some thick clouds that made for a rather bumpy, unpleasant flight. The bumps that morning could have made even the strongest air passenger feel sick.

Twenty minutes after takeoff, something magical happened. The plane broke through the clouds into a crystal clear blue sky and the sun hit our eyes abruptly and unexpectedly. I looked at the view with astonishment. The grey clouds below looked strangely pretty in the strong sunlight.

However, the most amazing change that day occurred inside of the aircraft. The entire atmosphere began to change. The crew was smiling gracefully and chatting with passengers as they began serving breakfast. The passengers’ faces suddenly brightened. People’s attitudes began to change as well. They began to make pleasant conversations with one another, engaging each other in small talk. Everyone’s spirits seem to have been magically lifted. The funny thing was that nothing had really changed. The weather was the same. It was still miserably cold and rainy in New Jersey. Only one thing had changed and that was…our point of view.

There is a great lesson to be learned from this situation.

In the gloomy, dark days of our life, when nothing seems to work out and the whole world seems to be against us, we need to take off and soar high above the clouds to find out that the sun is still there. Changing our point of view takes only a few seconds of halting our thoughts, igniting our imagination and flying high above the dark clouds that clutter our lives.

In doing so, we discover that the sun is still shining above the clouds even on the most gloomy of days. We will understand that the clouds that fog our life hide the happiness we could have enjoyed if we were only able to see it. We will realize that changing our perspective toward life also changes the reality of our life. We can still be happy during the unpleasant events that life brings from time to time; we just have to train ourselves to remember that the sun still shines above us—even if we can’t see it right this moment.

Happiness shines through all of the time. We have to activate our mind to change our point of view in order to soar high above the clouds. This will allow us to eliminate the dark influence of the clouds so that we can enjoy enduring happiness. The next time your life and your day feel gloomy, think about flying high above the clouds and discovering that sunshine and happiness are still there and always will be.