After a full day of helping out at Applejack’s farm, Essentia placed on her pendant again to conceal the tattoos on her body and the dye on her wings. She wiped the sweat from her face with a rag, and she grinned to herself as she rested against a harvested apple tree.
Damn, that was some good hard work, she thought to herself.
Seeing that it was well in the afternoon, she decided to leave the farm and head for the town square to see what other things she could eat that were not apple-related. The priestess grinned to herself as she passed all the country folk in Ponyville, trotting cordially toward no place in particular.
This is just like in that one Spanish town where everypony knows everypony.
Essentia stopped in front of a colorfully painted shop, and she read the sign carefully to herself: “Sugar Cube Corner”. One could only guess what sort of food such an establishment would sell to the general public. She giggled at the prospect of treats and decided to canter right along inside.
Upon touching a hoof to the door, Pinkie immediately shoved Essentia back outside and shut the door behind them. “Nyyyyope! No peaking!”
“Wh-…but I’m hungry!” complained the priestess.
“Nope! You don’t get to go inside! Not until it’s ready.”
“Until what’s ready, darling?”
“It’s a surprise!”
Of course it’s a surprise…
The pink mare scooted Essentia along and started bouncing, and the priestess presumed she wanted to be followed. The pegasus sighed in defeat and trotted alongside Pinkie, although she soon had a radiant smile with the pink mare’s overwhelming positive vibrations. She could not help but love that sensation of interaction with the witch-like pony.
“So, whatcha do to have fun?” asked Pinkie jubilantly.
“Well, let’s see…I like to read comic books, I like to meditate, play my sitar…”
The pink pony gasped loudly and abruptly stopped to hold Essentia’s face before exclaiming, “You mean you don’t do anything fun?!”
“Hey! I think reading is plenty fun,” Essentia said with a bit of pout in her voice.
“But you don’t do anything silly?”
“I mean, sometimes on occasion, I suppose…”
“But you need to have more fun!” She booped Essentia’s nose and let her go before bouncing in circles around the priestess. “Oh, I know! We can go out and do silly things together, like pull pranks or put on funny masks or throw pies at each other or tell funny stories!”
Essentia smiled at her enthusiasm. Pinkie Pie had an aura of happiness that she seemed to spread to everypony she encountered, and the priestess was grateful to be friends with somepony like that. However, the spiritual pony felt this was a good opportunity to teach Pinkie something.
“Do you always act silly to lighten your mood?” she inquired with curiosity.
“All the time!” Pinkie grinned.
“Have you ever tried acting calm?”
“What?! Are you nuts?”
“You can say I’m criminally insane; that much remains true to some level.”
“What do you mean, ‘Have you ever tried acting calm?’ Acting silly is the best way to have fun!”
“Ah, but I know a method that would work even when having fun doesn’t, darling. This, is of course, not to assume that having fun has ever failed…has it?”
Pinkie remembered back to her moment of insanity after nopony would come to Gummy’s after-birthday-party, and she also recalled that, no matter how silly or active she wanted to be, partying in and of itself didn’t make her feel happy. She realized just then that Essentia might be imparting wisdom onto her, and Pinkie stopped bouncing just then to smile.
“I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to try.”
“It never does.”
The two of them congregated in the middle of Ponyville Park, and Essentia sat Pinkie down to begin her lesson.
“One thing that you learn very early on in priesthood is reciting mantras.”
“Oh, I know mantras!”
“You do?”
“Yeah! It’s stuff like, ‘Never give up,’ and, ‘An apple a day keeps the doctor away,’ right?”
Essentia giggled at that. “Well…somewhat. A mantra is a sentence or paragraph that you repeat over and over to yourself to achieve some sort of feeling. It’s actually quite easy; anypony of any age can do it.”
“So, I can just say anything?”
“The idea is that you put your heart and your energy behind what you say. There are both positive mantras and negative mantras, so what you say can you pull you up or bring you down, depending on what you wish to accomplish.”
“So if I just repeat the word ‘sugar’ over and over again, it’ll work?!”
“Not necessarily, darling. Here, trying using this mantra: ‘I am happy within myself, without myself, and all in between.’”
“Ooooh, like a tongue-twister?”
“Just take your time with it, darling. Close your eyes and relax. Say the words deliberately, and mean what you say.”
Pinkie nodded and followed Essentia’s instructions, albeit with a wide smile on her face. Every time she repeated the phrase, she became more and more tranquil. The grin never left her expression, but she could start to feel an inner joy that was not normally present when in previous states of relaxation. She found herself speaking quieter and quieter, albeit comfortably so as she felt warm on the inside.
Wow, this…actually feels really nice.
After about 15 minutes of reciting the mantra, Pinkie Pie opened her eyes and nuzzled Essentia platonically and slowly.
“That was amazing~!”
“Yep! One of the best ways to get your spirits up.”
The two of them stood up, and Essentia cocked her head to one side.
“So, what was it you were preparing in your store, darling?”
“OH!! THE PARTY!!”
Pinkie Pie immediately started galloping forward, pushing Essentia’s backside and forcing her forward as she ran. The priestess got the hint after about two seconds of her hooves sliding on the ground, and she started galloping with the earth pony. There was a grin on Essentia’s face that never left, and she knew she was in good company with her new friends.